English Defined

The world's best dictionary of the

English language past and present.
Telephone :
ILS
0207782 5000 Fax: 02077824966 letters @ the-tls.co.uk

Editor Pe ter Stothard (editor @the-tl s.co .uk)

Assistant to the Editor Maureen Alien (editor@the-tls.co.uk) 020 7782 4962
Deputy Editor Alan Jenkins (deputy@the-tls.co.uk)

Mary Beard Classics, Ancient History (mbI27@hermes.cam.ac.uk)

Mic hael Caines Biblio graph y, Film , Theatre, Reference (theatre@the-tls.co.uk)
J ames Ca m phe ll American Literature, Scotland (scotus@the-tls.co.uk)
Lucy Dall as. Web site, In Brief (TLS_Internet_Editor@newsint.co.uk)
Lindsay Duguid Fiction. Engli sh Literature (fiction@the-tls.co.uk)
W ill Eaves Mu sic . Architecture, Art History (arts@the-tls.co.uk)
Da vid Ho rspool Histor y. Sou th Asia . Sport (history@the-tls.co.uk)
Mick Iml ah Poetry, Archaeolo gy, Ireland , English Liter ature (mick.imlah@the-tls.co.uk)
Roh er t I r win Midd le East, Islam (alhambra2@gmail.com)
Ala n J en kin s Co mmentary, Engli sh Literature (deputy@the-tls.co.uk)
Tohy Li cht ig Web site, East Asia, Engli sh Liter ature (TLS_Internet_Editor@newsint.co.uk)
David McKitterick Bibliography (dmckitterick@gmail.com)
Maren Mei nhardt Science, Psychology, Medicine (maren.meinhardt@ the- tls.co. uk)
Red m ond O 'Hanlon Natural History (science@the-tls.co.uk)
R ob er t Potts Production, Au stralasia (australasia@the-tls.co.uk)
J ohn Ryle. Africa , Anthropolog y (tls@ryle.net)
Rup ert Shortt Religion. Latin America, Spain (rupert.shortt@the-tls.co.uk)
Martin Sm ith Picture s (images@the-tls.co.uk)
A major new edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary- Pet er Sto thard Politic s, Classics (editor@the-tls.co.uk)
contains more than a third of the entries found in the Ga len Strawson Philo soph y (tlsphilosophy@mac.com)
Adrian Tahourdin France, Italy, Letter s to the Editor (adrian.tahourdin@the-tls.co.uk)
Oxford English Dictionary in just one tenth of the size.
An na Vaux. Biograph y, Social Studie s, Learned Journ als, Travel (anna.vaux@the-tls.co.uk)
From the language of Milton and Shakespeare to the latest E liza het h Winter Germ any, Russia, Je wish Studie s (elizabeth.winter@the-tls.co.uk)

words of today, this new edition is a literary landmark. Ma nagl ng Di r ect or J ames Muclvlan us (caroline.johnston@newsinLco.uk)
Display Advertising Linsey Ke nhard (Iinsey.kenhard@newsint.co.uk) 020 7782 4974
Available as a standard hardback edition (£95 ) and a Class ified Advertis ing Lucy Smart (Iucy.smart@newsint.co.uk) 020 7782 4975
Head of Marketing Jo Cogan (jo.coganO the-tls.co.uk]
deluxe edition which includes the dictionary on CD-ROM (£125).
For more information visit www.askoxford.com Correspondence an d d eliver ies Time s House, I Pennin gton Street , London E98 IBS
S ubscriptions tls@sub scription .co.uk 0 1858 438781; US/Canada custsvc_timesupl@fulcoinc.co m
1-800 3709040 Su hscriher arch ive webmaster@the-t1s.co. uk
Reference at your fingertips Ba ck issues 020 7740 0217 tls@ocsmedia.net

Encyclopaedia Britannica,
the subject of some of the
NEW EDITION
mo st ext ended revi ew s in the
Oxford Dictionary of Modern Quotations
early yea rs of the TLS. Lik e
Edited by ELIZABETH KNOWLES

'Ga th er s the brightest and wittiest thoughts of the zoth T his is what we might call
an " interactive" wee k at
the TLS - a nd not ju st
and arst centuries . .. there's good fun to be found here.'
beca use the reaction of le tter
TheTimes
wr iter s to Richard Dawkins
978-0-19-920895-1 I £1 8·99 on Chri stopher Hitchens in
the last issue has been so
angry and inte nse, almost
NEW EDITION
reaching that of our revi ew
Concise Oxford Companion to English Literature of Dawkins' s own book by
MARGARET DRABBLE . JENNY STRINGER, the Nobel Laureate, St even
and DANIEL HAHN Weinberg in Ja nu ary.
Perhaps similar le vels of
A portable edition of the classic Companion to English
re sponse were reach ed in
Literature :-\ book one turns to with constant pleasure.'
great TLS rows of the pa st.
Times LiterarySupplement We do not ha ve the records
978-0-19-921492-1 I £II ·99 to tell us. But thanks to the
infinite capacity of websites
we can certainl y now publish
OXFORD far more of this "interactiv-
ity" th an we ever cou ld
UNIVERSITY PRESS
before. Religious arg ume nt,
!'lTlI{.lSHER & DlsTRlllUTOR OF THF. YEAR.zOf)J, 2006, @d 2007 it see ms, attracts comment
A"''U'lied: 'hJehe .Au.demic.J ~ecWur• • Ni F'romW1a1l1 C:r.oulJ of the ll"K: Ba ~ le! ~ ,A..u;~xiuio.ll
like nothing else bar the sub-
j ect of the Web itself.
Tel:0153674'7'7 I Emall: bookorders uk@oup com
Not everyone is happy
Availablefram all good bookshops . or frorn oupdirect
www.oup.comjukjt ls for speclaloffers, sample chapters . and news
Ri cha r d Dawkin s (2006)
about th is exp los ion of talk.
This week our regu lar writer
on new techno logi e s, Paul
Duguid, examines a claim
that far from extending inter-
national debate on big issues
the impact of "shrill opin-
ion s" and " superfici al obs er -
vatio ns" on the internet is
" killing our cult ure" . Th e
au thor of the book und er
review , however, is him self
" no t free from these failin gs".
Richard Dav enport-Hin es
look s back to the glorious
pre -Web day s of the 19 10-1 I
many of us he find s this ed i-
tion still invaluab le, not
because it is up to dat e or
ea sy to navigate, but bec au se
" its content is so clea r-h eaded
and di scriminating" - books
" writte n by an elite" with
" elite va lues on every pag e".
An especially skilled Victo-
rian expe rt on managing
"conflict among her corre-
sponde nts" wa s, we learn, the
be st- se lling writer, fem ini st,
sociologist and ant i-slav ery
campaigner, Harrier Mar-
tin eau . As Maria Fraw ley
not es, th is formidab le contro-
ver sialist had a part icular dis-
like of that leading attractor
of le tters, The Times, a " rot-
ten old oracle" as she term ed
it; sadly, she d ied too ea rly to
be able to take a view of th e -
even then , highly int erac tive
- Times Litera ry Suppl ement .
PS

TL S SEPT EMBER 14 2007


Memos on Melville and Mao, reminders of Montaigne: a literary
and political j ourney with Clive James
n 1576, having soug ht refuge from
I public life and taken up residence in
the library of his family estate near
Bordeaux, M ichel de Mo ntaigne gave
instructions for an engraved meda l to be
placed on a wall above his writing desk: Que
sais-je'l Th is admo nishmen t to be scep tical in
the face of rece ived knowledge was to be
Montaigne's motto dur ing the composition of
the Essais, the great record of his mind over
the last two decades of his life. "A insi, lecteur,
je suis moi-meme la matiere de mon livre",
cau tions Montaigne; "ce n' es t pas raison que
tu emp loyes ton loisir en un subjec t si frivo le
et si vain." A finer exa mple of what the
rhetoricia ns ca ll praeteritio co uld hardly be
fo und, as Mont aigne ' s winking warni ng
invites the rea der to accompany him on a
kind of holid ay jo urney as he embarks on the
thrill ing endeavour of ske tching the intellec-
tual terrain of Renaissance hu mani sm.
Four and a quarter cen turies later, Cultura l
Amnesia: Notes in the margin of my
time arrives as the record of a prope rly
Mon taignea n projec t - the adve ntures of
Cl ive James 's agile mind as it con fro nts the
cu lture and history of the century jus t ende d .
The mind, as Mon taigne and James know
well, co ntains multitudes; indeed , it is "the
one co llec tivity that the free individu al can
thri ve in" . If nothin g else, James reve ls in the
work ings of his mind, as must any wri ter
worth his salt, and because he has chosen to
engage with so many compelling inter-
locut ors, the volume is always stimulating.
Begun as anno ta tio ns in the m argi ns of the
books James has devo ured over the pas t
half- century, the 106 essays co llec ted here
add ress a stagge ring variety of topics witho ut
settling on a sing le overarching theme or
claim. " Far from a single arg ume nt, there
wou ld be scores of arg umen ts . about philo-
sophy, histor y, politics, and the arts all at
once, and abo ut what had happened to those
things durin g the co urse of the multiple
catastrophes into whose second princ ipal
outburs t" James was born in 1939.
Whi le James professes to resist the siren
song of ideology, which petrifi es by way of
a "premature synt hes is", Cultura l Am nesia
espouses a humanist ethic, which provi des
the banner und er which his one -ma n army
rid e s. Fo r Jarn e s, hum ani sm sta nds in o ppos i-
tion to totalitarianism; in its fealty to the
irreducible particularities of the indi vidual,
hum anism is the very ideolo gy of enlight-
ened democracy - "a par ticularized but un-
con fined co ncern with all the high-qu ality
produ cts of the creat ive impul se, which co uld
be distingui shed from the des truc tive one by
its pro pensi ty to increase the variety of the
crea ted wor ld rather than red uce it" . Whereas
the tot alitarian "insists that, apart from a
few hand- picked satraps, there will be no
individuals except himse lf', the humanist
acce pts and enco urages indi vidu alit y and
LIT ERARY CRITICISM
U nforgetting
A DA M BR E S NI CK
C live Ja mes
CU LTURAL AMNES IA
No tes in the margi n of my tim e
896pp. Picador. £25 .
978033048 1748
variety, and see ks to expa nd the purv iew of
human sensibility.
Variety is the name of the game here, as
James expatiates alphabetica lly on figures
as diverse as Louis Armstrong, Robert
Brasillach , Dick Cave tt, Wit old Go mbrow -
icz, John Kea ts, Georg Christoph Licht en-
berg, Mao Zedong, Alfred Po lgar, Sophie
Sc holl, Eve lyn Waugh and Stefa n Zweig.
James tucks into this feast with rema rkab le
gusto; his appe tite fo r culture is lusty and his
tastes are admirably catholic. At times the
reader is hard-pressed to keep up with him.
TL S SEPTE MBER 14 2 0 0 7
James is well aware that such an endeavour is
threatened by a kind of cen trifuga l disso lu-
tion, as the book throws out names and
addresses in di zzyin g fashion. At first glance
it is hard to know for whom this boo k was
written, as scholars will most like ly find its
courses too brief and too allusive, while lay-
men may well experience a certa in bewilder-
ment in the face of so much information.
Given the torrent of arg umen ts and the
ca tarac t of topics und er cons ideration, James
relies on sty le to prov ide the glue for his
proje ct, professing his "faith that the unity
wo uld come fro m the style". Now style, as
Roland Barth es once arg ued, amounts to the
di still ation of the writer's body, the scripted
trace of his likes and dislikes as they move
fro m impress ion to express ion. Style is the
very index of the writer's se nsibility in the
old sense of the term. James is indeed a wo n-
derful sty list, and Cultura l Am nesia is filled
with ma rvello us turns of phrase, many of
15.9.07: Kew
This view of th e Orangery at Kew
Gardens in South-west London is on e
of which th e sculptor Henry Moore
would certainl y hav e a ppro ved. Th e
glasshouse by Sir WilIiam Chambers
(nev er in fact used to grow an y kind of
citrus fruit) is seen through th e fir st of
a pair of ma ssive bronze ellipses that
make up "Double Oval" (1966), one of
twent y-eight works by Moore on dis-
play in the pa rk from September 15
until March 20 next yea r .
A TL S re view in May commented on
the post-war democratic motiv es for
exhibiting works of modernist sculp-
ture in public parks - r ather th an per-
manentl y siting th em in th e landscap es
of th eir owner s. Early projects aft er
the end of the Second World War wer e
"loaded with optimism" about the edu-
cation of public taste. Moore, who died
in 1986, felt th at land scap e was an apt
setting for his bronzes, and for th eir
symp athetic r evisioning of natural
form s, an artistic process that matched
th e hop es for social and politi cal r econ-
struction of the country.
"Sc ulpture is an art of th e open air",
he once said ; and ju st as his works
merg e th e figurativ e and the ab stract -
the ovals, here, feel both ero tic and
monument al - so the "open air" that
hous es th em carries a double me aning.
For Moore's sculptures, which can be
found in shopping centres throughout
th e land , are urban as well as "natu-
ral", and at Kew their doubleness is
exhibited to full advantage.
3
which parry force fully with those James
dee ms antago nists of the hum anist enterprise.
On Jean-P aul Sar tre, the book ' s intellectu al
bete noire : " In Sar tre's style of arg umen t,
Ge rman metaphys ics me t French sophistry in
a kind of Euro pea n Coa l and Steel Com mu-
nity produ cing nothing but rhetorical gas".
On Wa Iter Benjamin's cryp to-messianism :
"Whenever Benjam in transcends his sense of
the releva nt detail, one 's ow n sense of the
relevant detail tends to punch holes in his
abstrac tions". Aga inst the pe rsisten t cult of
Leon Tro tsky : " [he] lived on for decades as
the unassailable hero of aes thetica lly mind ed
progressives who wished to persuade them-
selves that there could be a vege tarian ver-
sion of comm unism". To Jose Saramago,
who defend ed his adherence to the Co mmu-
nist Par ty in spite of all, by cla iming, " I am a
Eurosce ptic who learne d his scep ticism fro m
a professor called Europe " , James aci dly
reto rts that such a pose is one "about whic h
we are entitled to be sce ptical, having learned
our scep ticism from a professo r ca lled
history" .
For James, style makes the man, but too
much style threatens to unmake him, for
when the writer attends too close ly to his ow n
sentences, he tends to turn away from the
horizon of real eve nts, and it is on this hori-
zon that James believes the wa ry writer must
unstinti ngly train his eye . Ed mund Burke , he
rema rks, "was not ju st a stylist. But then
aga in, nob ody with a considera ble sty le is" .
Whi le Burke wro te admirably sinuous, mus-
cu lar pr ose, he never inve st ed it w ith mo re
ene rgy than the ideas whose veh icle it was to
be. The writer who too lovingly ca resses his
own phrases risks falling into the trap of
narcissism, a kind of affec tive dis orde r of
the text that inevitably saps the prose of its
vigo ur. Thus the decli ne of Gore Vidal, once
a paragon of style for James, now sadly fallen
into decadence. For James, it is the Viennese
writer Alfr ed Polgar, little known in the
English-spea king wor ld, but greatly es teemed
in the Germanophone one, who is the model
sty list, as Polgar manages to attend to his ow n
text and the rea lity it would represe nt with
equal acuity. James cites a few marvellous
aphor isms that ma ke one wish Po lgar 's works
we re readily avai lable to the English reader:
"The striki ng apho ris m require s a stricken
aphor ist"; " It is the des tiny of the em igrant
that the foreign land does not become his
homeland: his homel and becomes foreign" .
Indeed, throughout Cultural Amnesia, the
polyg lot James mourns the vanis hed culture
of Vien na, which he takes to be the very
heart and soul of pre-war Euro pe, and it is the
Viennese cafe ph ilosopher Egon Friede ll,
author of the obscure Kulturgeschichte der
Ncuzei t (1927- 32), who is one of the true
heroes of James ' s book.
Jarnes' s allergy to wr iting that he believes
Cont inued on page 4
4

Continued f rom page 3

LIT ERARY CRIT ICISM 3 Adam Bresnick Clive James Cultural Amn esia take s itself too much as an objec t of psychic
Jon Barnes Diana Pavlac Gly er The Company They Keep inv estm ent lead s him to offer some question-
able aes thetic judgem ent s. Of Moby-Di ck ,
LETT ERS TO TH E ED ITOR 6 ' God Is Not Great ' , Ayn Rand, John Buchans losses, etc James writes : " It' s not so much that I find
[Mel vill e ' s] langu age contortedly and even
LETT ERS 7 Maria Frawley Deborah Anna Logan, editor The Collected Lett ers of wilfully archa ic: more than that I find it
Harriet M artine au make s a meal of itself, as if foretelling a
mod ern critical age in which it is fated mor e
SOCIAL ST UDI ES 8 Paul Duguid Andrew Keen The C ult of the Am ateur - Ho w tod ay' s intern et is
to be tau ght than enj oye d" . De gustibus non
killin g our culture
est disputandum notwithstanding, it mu st be
said that James is dead wro ng in his blanket
REFERENCE BOOKS 9 Richard Davenport-Hines Justin Wintle, editor New Makers of Mod ern C ulture
condemnation of Mel ville, ju st as he is wro ng
Nicholas Jardine Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, editors Th e Cambridge Histo ry
about Na bokov : "There will always be equi-
of Sci enc e
vocal admirer s who think the beauty of what
PO EMS 10 Michael Foley Piano Lesson s [Nabokov] could achieve with Eng lis h was
15 Carrie Etter A Birthmother' s Catechism the real reason he could never tear him self
20 Michael Mott Another Arro w away from the mirr or". It is curious that one
24 Andrew Johnston Hyperm ark et as attuned to the possibilities of expr essive
langu age as Jam es should so thoroughl y mi ss
HIS TORY & ART HISTORY 12 Elizabeth Edwards Harold J . Cook Matters of Exchange - Comme rce, medi cin e the wicked humour and patho s, not to men-
and science in the Dutch Gold en Age tion the shee r invention, that inform Moby-
Anne Goldgar Tulipmani a Dick and Lolita. Ind eed , give n his unflagging
Peter Mandler Rosemary Hill God's Architect - Pugin and the building of rom anti c interest in the politics of pro se , Jam es wo uld
Brit ain do well to reread Benit o Cere no, Mel ville ' s
profound literary meditation on the probl em
COMMENTAR Y 14 Anthony Alofsin The problem with MoMA - Jetti sonin g the canon of what counts as of race .
Modern Art is easy: revising it is rife with peril It is hard, too, to take James seriously
Michael Greenberg Freela nce when he claims of Paradi se Lost that "there
Then and Now TLS October 19, 1990 - Canadian short stor ies has never been any likin g for the poem ' s
story, bec ause there isn't one. It' sju st an out-
ARTS 17 Judith Flanders Masqu erade - Th e art of James Ensor (L ady Lever Art Gallery, line". Ho w remarkable that he should byp ass
Port Sunlight) not ju st the poem' s epi c tale of rebellion and
Paula Marantz Cohen Two Days in Pari s (Vari ou s cin em as) damn ation , but also the characterization of
Laurie Maguire Shakespeare Twelfth Night (Co urty ard Th eatre, Stratford upon Avon) Satan, one ofthe two mo st penetrating presen-
tation s of the man of Nietz schean ressen ti-
FICTION 19 Stephen Henighan Michael Ondaatje Di visadero men t in the English canon (Shakespe are's
Rozalind Dineen Ann Patchett Run lago is the oth er), the very type of the terror-
J. J . Purdon William Gibson Spo ok Country
ist who se onl y solace, futil e though it mu st
Katharine Hihbert Roddy Doyle The Deportees and Oth er Stori es be, is Schadenfreude. Satan is the ava tar par
Jonathan Keates Alan Bennett Th e Unco mmon Read er
exce llence of the festering Bin Laden s of the
Alex Clark Emma Tennant Co nfess ions of a Sugar Mummy wor ld; it is odd that Jam es sho uld ignore thi s,
in a volume so centrally conc ern ed with the
BIBLIOGRAPHY 22 David Finkelstein Patricia Lockhart Fleming, Gilles Gallichan and Yvan Lamonde,
stakes and legacy of the politics of terror.
et ai, editors Hi stor y of the Book in Ca nada
l ames' s comment s about satire are simi-
John L. Flood Stephan Fiissel, editor Gut enb erg Jahrbuch 2007
larl y probl ematic . In a fascin ating essay on
TRAVEL 24 Barnaby Rogerson Rohert Twigger Lost Oa sis the character and legacy of Karl Kraus,
lame s w rites ,
RELI GIO N 25 Emmanuel Sivan Michael Bonner Jihad in Islamic Hi stor y his supreme mastery of verbal satire pro ved
Adnan A. Musallam From Secul ari sm to Jih ad that satire is not a view of life. It can be a use-
Peter Marshall Edward Norman Th e Rom an Catholic C hurch - An illu strated ful and eve n necessary by-product of one, but
history it can have no independent existence, because
the satirist hasn't either. Any writer who finds
PHILOSOPHY 27 Peter Hylton Marie McGinn Elucidatin g the "Tractatus" the height of human absurdity outside himself
Elisaheth Schellekens John Hyman The Obj ecti ve Eye must find the well-spring of human dignity
inside, and so lose the world.
IN BRIEF 28 Nicholas Guyatt Have a Nice Doomsda y Here Jam es gives in to the allure of phrase
David Pratt Th e Political Thou ght of King Alfred the Gre at making and get s carri ed away with him self:
Ingrid D. Rowland Fro m Heaven to Arc adi a put some pressur e on the planks of his aph o-
David Kempe Ann a Eliza Bray risms and they break into splinters. Whil e the
Forrest Reid Th e Gard en God critique may we ll hold true for Krauss bit-
Inigo Garcia Ureta Escrito en Blanc o terl y barb ed version of satire, it ignores the
Rory Spowers A Year in Green Tea and Tuk-Tuks more dialectically cunning Horati an variant
Barbara Hulanicki From A to Biba of satire, in which the writer mocks him self
as he mocks other s. In tim es of soci al cr is is ,
31 This week' s contributors, Crossword
such mocker y certainly do es present a world-
view, and oft en a tonic one at that.
NB 32 D. H. Man Booker sho rtlist, Writ ers who kill , Aud en undi scovered , etc
Or mayb e thi s is ju st a winking provoca-
tion , designed to exe rcise the read er and to
draw him into dialo gu e. Inde ed , Cultural
Amn esia invit es preci sely this kind of engage-
ment on the part of the read er , and thi s is one
of the volume 's signal virtues . Jam ess liter-
ary and mu sical sensibility may be problemat-
icall y con ser vati ve , but it mu st be said that he
is never dull in his cond emn ation of the
Cove r picture: Harrier Martine au by Richard Eva ns, 1834 © Na tional Portrait Gallery; p2 © Eddie Gallag her/S unday Times; p3© Getty Images Europe; thing s he dislik es. Tho ugh I do not asse nt to
p14 © Richard Pare, 2007; pl7 © DACS; p21 © l/P/Photocall Ireland/Eamonn Furre ll; p24 © Associated British/The Kobal Collection his claim that in the tenor sa xophone ex plora-

TLS SE PTE M BER 14 20 07

 LITERARY CRITICISM 5

tion s of John Co ltrane "there is not a ph rase
that as ks to be rememb ered exce pt as a lesion
to the inner ea r", I ca nnot but enj oy the inven-
tion Jam es brings to the dismi ssal. He is right
when he claim s that Duk e Elling ton's sho rt
pieces of the early 1940 s are in eve ry way
superior to the often pond erou s suites of the
later part of his ca reer: " It was all too ev i-
dent " , he writes , "that three minutes on shel-
lac had been his ideal form from the start: he
was a sonnetee r, no t an epic poet".
Wh en James turn s his atte ntion to pol itics,
the result s are bracin g. Cultura l Amn esia is
invalu able in its unfl agging defence of hum an-
ism, and its argument that Sov iet co mmunism
and Naz i fascism are obverse sides of the
same murd erou s coin. Against the gauc histe
line of Sartre and his epigo nes , James defe nds
the hum ane liberalism of Raymond Aron and
his intellectu al progeny, Jean- Fran cois Revel
and Franco is Fure t. He cites Aro n fro m The
Opium of the Intellectuals at the start of his
ow n book: "The liberal believes in the perm a-
nence of hu manit y' s imper fec tion; he resign s
himself to a regim e in which the go od will be
the result of numb erless actions, and never
the result of con sciou s choice" . If we are
conde mned to wa nde r an imp erfect world,
James sugges ts we have the power to impro ve
our exi le increment ally.
In a lapidary aphor ism from the essay on
Fure t, James put s his finger on why Left intel-
lectu als in France we re so loath to abando n
their adherence to the Communist Par ty in
spite of the Stalinist pur ges and horrors:
"Their re luctance to accept that so much
suffering co uld be was ted" . Th ro ugho ut
Cultural Am nesia James is painfully attu ned
to the tragic waste of life brou ght on by
"La Louviere , Belgium" (1979); from Earth lings by Richard KaIvar
(192pp. FIammarion. £30. 9782080300096)
Co mm unism and Fasc ism in the middl e of
the twenti eth century, and he is espec ially
go od at dissecting the bizarre way in which
mon strou s apo log ists on the Right and Left
ju stifi ed the excesses of the Sta linist and
Naz i regim es by invoki ng de risory notion s of
pro gress. In an essay o n the aw ful career and
legacy of Grigory Ord zhonokidzhe, James
shows how thi s Stalinist henchm an claimed it
was the cadres liquidatin g the kulaks who
ex per ienced hardship s grea ter than the farm-
ers who peri shed. Heinri ch Him mler, officer-
in-ch arge of the Naz i death camps who
faint ed dead away at the sight of real blood ,
spoke of the "har d task" of liquidatin g Euro-
pean Jewry and empathize d with the SS offic-
ers charge d with gass ing and incineratin g the
innoc ent 6 milli on . "The hard deci sion had to
be taken", wro te Hi mmler, "to have thi s
peopl e disappear from the face of the earth. "
If nothin g else, Cultura l Amn esia offe rs
lesson s in sce ptic ism abo ut such uto pian
politi cal lan gu age, which James shows to be
the scree n for any numb er of brut al regi mes.
He endorses the notion that it was the English
literary and cultural traditi on above all that
pro vided a safeg uard aga inst the totalizin g
dream s that turn ed European history into a
nightmare for mu ch of the twenti eth century .
"The grea t playw rights infu sed o ur langu age
with a perm anent awa re ness of the differen ce
between desiccated eloq uence and the
vo ice of ex perience. This was how Eng lish-
speaking nation s, above all others, were
arme d in adva nce aga inst the rollin g barr age
of ideolo gical sop histry in the twenti eth ce n-
tur y." On thi s acco un t, it was Eng lis h emp iri-
cism that provided the philosophi cal bul wark
aga inst Co mm unis m and Fascis m .
In goo d Kantian form , James writes, " It
has alw ays been part of the definition of
hu mani sm that true learnin g has no end in
view exce pt its ow n furth erance". Jamess
vo lume is an exe rcise in what the psyc ho -
analys ts ca ll "anam nes ia", or unforgett ing,
his attempt to present and preserve what he
has found mo st vita l in the culture and history
that he and the rest of us have, to a grea ter or
lesser ex te nt, lived throu gh over the past
decades. That Cli ve James rem ember s it all
so we ll and res cues so much that has ofte n
been forgott en is a testament to what an exce l-
lent , passionate reader he contin ues to be.

-----------------------~,-----------------------
here is magic in the last line of The

T
Lord of the Rings. To rec ap : the
stolidly co urageous Sam Ga mgee,
havin g wa tched his best friend, Fro do
Baggin s, sa il towards the Grey Havens and
into a kin d of dea th, is left to wa lk back to the
Shire where he find s his wife and ch ildren
wa iting with the pro mise of a qui et life far
fro m the slaug hter of the War of
the Rin g. J. R. R. To lkien fini shes with the
sentence : "' Well, I' m back,' he sa id" . It is a
tou chin gly und erstated co ncl usion which
returns the prose to the hom ely simplicity of
the inaugur al chapters after the archaic epic
mo de of The Return of the King.
However , as Diana Pa vlac G lye r tell s us
in her scho larly and percepti ve study The
Compa ny They Keep, thi s is not how To lkie n
origina lly intend ed to fini sh his trilogy. He
had in mind a furth er ep ilog ue, set sixtee n
years after the eve nts of the rest of the book ,
which wou ld have provi ded another, superflu -
ous glimpse into Ga mgees dom esticit y. In
thi s ultimatel y excise d ve rs io n, a grey -ha ired
Sam reads stor ies of his adve ntures to hi s
children , spinning them tales of wiza rds and
ores and wa lking trees. There is eve n the
faint sugges tion that Sa m has been narratin g
the story of The Lord of the Rings itself,
before, at last, we depart the Shire for goo d,
leaving Sam and Rose in a state of connubial
bliss, tale-tellin g by the fireside.
Wh at stop ped To lkien from publis hing thi s
ending was his membership of the Inklin gs -
that renowned circle of Oxford writers and
academics who met for seve ntee n yea rs from
1932 and which cou nted C. S. Lewis, Charles
No more Elves
JO N B AR N ES
D ian a P a vl a c Gl y er
THE C O MPANY THEY KEE P
C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Ta lkien as writers
in community
293pp. Kent State UniversityPress. $45; distributed
in the UK by Eurospan. £29.95.
9780 87338890 0
Williams and E. R. Ediso n, the author of The
Worm Ouroboros, amo ng thei r numb er. It
was they who po inted out the glutinous
se ntime nta lity of the scene, marshallin g
their forces to argue that it added no thing of
substance to a narra tive which had already
swo llen far beyond the "second Hobbit"
requ ested hy his publi shers. Glye r sugges ts
that thi s incident typifi es the way in which
the Inklings affec ted o ne another's wor k,
despit e the fact that in later ye ars its members
we re frequ entl y to insist that their meeti ngs
acted more as a social cl ub than a writers'
circle, bru shin g asi de any sugges tio n of real
influ ence .
Tolki en and Lewis form ed the spine of the
Inklin gs, reg ularly co nve ning to rea d and dis-
cuss one another's wo rk in Lewis' s rooms at
Mag dalen Co llege . Th ere we re nin eteen
memb ers in all, and Glye r excels at depicting
their wor ld, wi th its pett y rivalri es, j oshing
.. .. Tolkienjumping up and down, declaiming
in Anglo-Saxon.
Endea ringly eccentric though this might
sound, the group have been acc used of cliqu ey
pro vincialism , of bein g hennetically sealed in
hon esty (" he is ugly as a ch impanzee", wro te their nook at "The Bird and Baby" from those
Lewis of fell ow Inklin g Charles Willi ams), cvo lutio ns w hich we re occu rrin g in the wide r
its wit and learning and championshi p of world of literatur e. John Wain, a form er pupil
scho larsh ip for its own sake . The Inkli ngs of Lewis' s and an occas ional Inklin g him self,
we re often supportive and sympa thetic ("the wro te a hostile acco unt of the gro up in 1962,
inexh austibl e fertilit y of the man' s imagin a- stating that they were "politically co nserva -
tion amazes me" , wro te Lewis in 194 9 on tive, not to say reactionary; in religio n .. . in
receipt of another instalm ent of The Lord of art, frankl y ho stile to any manifestation of the
the Rings), but were capable of ferociou s criti- ' modern ' spirit". Th e survivi ng Inklin gs were
cism if it was felt that a me mber had don e outrage d, but some of Wa in's criticisms seem
anything less than his best ("You ca n do diffic ult to repudiate. Here, for exa mple, is
bett er than that. Bette r To lkien, please !" ). Lewis lamp ooni ng T. S. Eliot:
Temp er s mu st sure ly have becom e frayed at For twenty years I' ve stare d my level best
tim es - as Tolki en became unyieldin gly criti- To see if evening - any evening - wo uld
ca l of Lewiss Chro nicles of Na rnia ("a bout suggest
as bad as can be") or as the Eng lish don Hugo A patient etherised upon a table;
Dyson met the latest bull etin from Middl e In vain. I simply wasn't able.
Earth by (ac cording to Tolkien ' s son Christo- Yet thi s mistrus t of mod ernit y was part of
pher) " lying on the co uch, and lollin g and the gro up's esse ntial spirit. Most of the
sho uting and say ing, 'Oh Go d, no mor e Inklin gs were vetera ns of the Trenches and
Elves"'. had littl e ca use to app laud a wo rld descend-
Not that all of them were eve r present at ing once aga in into co nflict. The image
the M agdalen reading meetin gs: often no that Glyers ex pert acco unt will sometimes
more than six or seve n wo uld turn up, while co nj ure up, of age ing scho lars swa pping tales
the rest preferr ed to save them selves for the with a pint of ale in hand , seems tellin gly
more raucou s soc ial ga ther ings in the Oxford famil iar - rem inisce nt of a co nvocation of
pub The Eag le and Child. Inklin g Jam es hobbits back from the war and livin g out their
Dun das-G rant recall s a typic al scene : days in co mfort in the Shire. Small wonde r
we sat in a small back room with a fine coa l that To lkien, who declared himself to be "a
fire in winter ... . back and for th the co nversa- Hobbit in all but size" , was so attached to that
tion wou ld flow. Latin tags flyin g aro und. sentime ntal ending , with its cosy dom esticity
Homer qu oted in the or igi na l to make a point and its bedt ime stories by the fir e.

TLS SEPTEMBER 14 20 0 7
6
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
six feet of Fre nch or Flemish soil,
Lover's Complaint 'God Is Not Great' you will come to think of those
Sir, - You print another dismissive year s as a consecrated stage in the
letter from an Ox bridge aca de mic procession of time.
defendi ng their perso nal investm ent Sir, - Distinguished authors who cates the matt er, since the "black-
in the "authentic Shakes pea re" have co mp lained in these co lum ns guar ds" literalized Hit chens' s as- l AY R. DEUTSCH
stakes . Katherin e Du ncan-J on es about their publications being sub- sault on reli gion, brin gin g death Leica Gallery, 670 Broadway # 500,
needs to have people believe that jected to rev iew by their lifelong and miser y to hundred s of thou- New York 10012.
"A Lover' s Co mp laint" is gen uine, acad emic op po nen ts must look with sands of Mu slim s and others,
----~,---
otherw ise the stra nge theory she has some envy on the specta cle of thou gh lau nched by a ma n who
been professin g since 1983, that Christophe r Hitchens' s God Is Not takes his "marching orde rs directly
fro m Go d". Gi ven that Daw kins
Ayn Rand
Sh akespeare so ld the Sonnets to Grea t co ming under the sympa-
Th omas Th orpe in a legitim ate tran s- thetic gaze of hi s avowed co nfede r- cann ot tell the diffe rence between Sir, - Mark Crees rightly sco rns
action, wo uld co llapse. Jo hn Kerri- ate in the war aga inst religion , Go d and uni corn s, it is ju st as we ll - Ayn Rand' s personality cult, but
ga n (Letters, Septem ber 7) mu st Richard Dawkin s (Se pte mber 7). as he tell s us - that he reviewed ignores her brilliance as a story-
rely on Thorpes attribution to sup - Th e reviewer's ina bility to take Hitchens ' s book rath er than his poli- teller (July 27). It is no small feat to
port hi s equally stra nge theory account of any of the defects of Ietters @the-t1s.co .uk tics, since it wo uld never do to con- spin a 750-page blood- and-thu nder
(ex pressed in hi s 1986 edi tion of his ally 's work sugges ts that thi s fu se the latter with the pol emics of tale out of a fussy architect's search
the Sonnets and his 1991 an tho logy , decision may have been un wise. These are only two in a catalogue the for mer. for the perfect co mmission. With-
Motives of Woe: Shakespea re and Prof essor Dawki ns co mpoun ds of howlers that mar God Is Not out that feat, The Fountainhead
"f emale comp laint ") ide ntifying the the imp atient re ligious illit eracy of Great as ass ured ly as they co mpro- GERARD LOUGHLlN could not have succeeded as artistic
fem ale speaker of thi s poem and Hitchen s' s pyro tec hnic prose with mi se the po lemics of its reviewer. In Department of Theology and Reli- propaganda. No other wor k in any
the male sed uce r whose fault s she his ow n trad emark strateg y of the area of religion, it appears that gion, University of Durham, Abbey medium did more to establish the
anato mizes so ruthl essly with tho se delegitim ation : phil osophi cal and the subtle mastery of a discipline House, Palace Green, Durham. popular myth of heroic moderni sm.
famili ar old pha ntoms , the " Dark theol ogical qu estions that have exe r- that these two think er s wo uld else - For better or worse , it is a central
Lady" and the "Young Man" of cised some of the grea tes t mind s in where ch ampi on as the precondition Sir , - In hi s review of Christop her docu ment of mid-t wenti eth-c entur y
the Sonne ts (har dly a creditable asso - Western thou ght (believer, ag nos tic of enlightene d debate is uniqu ely to Hit chen s' s God Is Not Great , thinking about art: reason enough
ciation for the latter). Thi s strange and atheist alike) are dismi ssed by a be sco rne d . Sho uld either be inter- Richard Dawkin s ass ures us that for its reissue as a Modem Class ic .
identification has two fatal conse- peremptory wave of the unqu alifi ed es ted in a list of potenti al aca de mic Hit chen s "is certainly not a bigot".
qu en ces fo r Kerrigan ' s theor y. He is hand as se lf-ev iden tly invalid, to be interlocutors quit e unf azed by Havin g read Hit chens' s narro w, l AMES TRILLING
forced to overvalue thi s turgid and for ever silenced by the du al threat their style of assa ult on reli giou s ten-page dismi ssal of Buddhism, 39 President Avenue, Providence,
repetiti ve poem as "a sophistica ted of Dawkin s empiric ism and Hitch- belief (itse lf as old as Hum e), I which appea rs to be based largely Rhode Island 02906 .
reworking of complaint conven- ens sarcas m . Come ahead, as we am co nfide nt there are friend s on a sing le boo k (Brian Victori a ' s
----~.----
tion s" , and he keep s susp iciously say in Glasg ow . and coll eagues only too happ y to Zen at Wa r), I am not so sure . But
qui et abo ut that trul y grea t reshap- Perh aps it is this vain ove rcon fi- ass ist. Dawkins himself comes perilou sly 'One of us'
ing of the com plaint tradition, dence that produces the frustratin g close to bigotr y when he contrasts
Shakespeare' s The Rape ofLucrece. levels of shee r ignor ance of reli- ROBERT A. DAVIS the "reptilian brain of southern and Sir, - In his perc epti ve co mme nt
As I have show n, John Davies of gious scholarship in the wor k of Department of Religiou s Education , middl e Am eric a" with "the co un- on Joseph Co nrad's Lo rd Jim
Hereford borrowed from Lucrece, both writers. Does Dawkin s seri- Univer sity of Glasgow , St Andrew ' s try' s cereb ral cor tex to the north (Co mmen tary, Septem ber 7), Brian
and purposefully aligne d his heart- ous ly believe that it is news to tell Building, Eldon Stree t, Glasgow . and down the coa sts". However Tho mpso n quotes Marlo w ' s cru-
less sed uce r wi th Ta rq uin. TLS reade rs that the word "virgin" is ingeniou s, Dawkin s' s metaph or cial phrase about Jim - he's "one of
It is symptoma tic that both a mistranslation of the Sep tuag int Sir, - It is a relief to be told by betr ays an impli cit endo rse me nt of us" - four times, and concludes:
upholders of the status q uo co nte nt Greek of Isaiah (typically, eve n Richard Dawkin s that athe ism does region al prejudice and dem ogr aphi c "Even after 300 pages or more, we
themselves with skirmishes aro und on thi s min or issue, the matter is not lead to mass murd er, for other- stereo types . As a nati ve of the Mid- cannot say for sure wha t the phrase
the fringes of my arg umen t. Ne ither infinit ely more complex than thi s)? wise one might be misled by the wes t who has lived for four decades means" . In fact, the phrase comes
con fro nts its heart , the 150 pages of Similarly, when Christopher Hitch- metaphors he emp loys to desc ribe in New York State, I ca n ass ure from Genesis 3:22, in which Go d
detailed analys is doc umen ting the ens wa nts to poi nt- sco re o n th e th e argumen ta tive force of Prof essor Dawkins that cerebra l and says to the ange ls afte r Adam has
many ways in which this poem dif- supposedly self-fulfilling nature of Christopher Hitchen s' s "broadside" reptili an mentaliti es may be foun d eaten the forbidden fruit: "Behold,
fers from Sha kespeare's attitudes the New Tes ta men t use of prophecy , aga inst religion. Hitchens likes to in both regions of the co untry, as the man is becom e as one of us, to
and stylis tic preferenc es, but co in- he is reminiscent of the talented "spray" his enem ies with "A K47 can a broad spectru m of sec ular and know good and ev il".
cides with those of that prolific and undergradu ate to whom one might arnrno", thou gh not in a " scatter- reli giou s attitudes and beliefs.
unori ginal versi fier from Hereford . reco mmend a bit of ex tra readi ng in sho t" way , but with "deadly acc u- JEFFREY MEYERS
For critics clin gin g to Th orp es attri- the libr ary in orde r to ga in a margin- racy". Buddhists ge t "both barrel s". BEN HOWARD 84 Stratford Road, Kensington,
buti on , to co nsi der any oth er author ally more sophisticated apprec iation Of co urse , Hit chen s' s "mysterio us Division of English, Alfred California 94707 .
wo uld be to thin k the unthi nk able. of how the Gospel texts engage with flirt ation [sic] with the neoc on University, I Saxon Drive,
blackgu ards of Washin gton" com pli- ----~,----
For those readers willing to co n- the Hebr ew Scr iptures . Alfred, New York 14802.
side r a new attributio n with an open
--------~,---------
Linguists
mind , compelling ev idence ex ists to
justify transferri ng thi s poe m to the Saxon word for glide, and refers to 191 7, in the same battle in which Sir, - In my review of Davi d
can on where it belon gs. "Saris quod the red kite, a bird of prey . In fact, Buchan's loss Buchan' s brot her Ala stair had also Crys tal's How Language Works
sufficit". both parts of the name G leadth orpe Sir, - Kate Macdon ald ' s ex treme ly perished . In the preface to the book , (July 20), the word "linguist" was
stro ngly sugges t Viking ances try. A tho rou gh comment ar y (August 10) dedicated to his children, John replaced by "linguistician" through-
BRIAN VICKERS Scandin avian origin is indicated by on the value of John Buchan ' s volu- Bucha n wrote : out, without my permi ssion . "Lin-
7 Abbot ' s Place , London NW6. hoth "glead" (Danish "red glente", min ou s lit erar y , j ournali stic a nd The me n who were at school and col- guistician" is a term which I wo uld
Swed ish "rod glada" , red kite) and prop agandi stic output du ring the lege j ust before me, my ow n conte m- never use myse lf. People who do
----~,--- linguistic s are known as linguists.
"<thorpe' ' (Danish "to rp", farm or vil- First Worl d War period to the pora ries, and my jun iors by as much
In the review I used the phra se
Name of the kite lage). The Old English wor d for kite co ntinued success of the publi sher
is "cyta", so that Kiteton wo uld be Tho mas Ne lson & So ns, of which
as twenty year s - upon them came
the ends of the earth. They propped "linguistic researchers" in the first
Sir, - Mark Cocker , cited by Joh n the equivalent Anglo-S axon name, he had been a director since 190 3, up the falling heavens and saved the sentence to make clear what sort
Fanshawe (in his rev iew of Silent but Goog le sugges ts that Kiteton sur- pro mpt s thou ght s of Buchan' s pri- world for you. But most of them of linguist I was referrin g to (since
Fields by Roger Lo vegrove, Augu st vives tod ay only as the name of a vately published volume These for died for it .. . . So I want you to cher- "linguist" can also mea n someo ne
24 & 3 1), appea rs to have his doubl e-glazing business based in Rememb rance (1919). It is a heart- ish the me mory of the war because skilled in foreign languages).
Saxo ns and his Dan es confused. Chelten ham. breaki ng me moir of six of his clo se of the price that was paid for victory
Acco rding to Fanshawe , Coc ker friends kill ed in the war, including - victory for yo u. When yo u rea lize JENNIFER COATES
sugge sts that Glead thorpe in North- TlM BAYLlSS-SMITH Ca ptain Thomas Arthur Ne lso n, a what riches of heart and mind, what Department of English Language &
amptonshire (it is actually in Notting- Vnstra Torggatan 3, Jokkmokk, scion of the publishing firm , who abounding zest for life, what faithful- Linguistics, Roehampton
hamshir e) was named after the 96213 Sweden. was kill ed in acti on at Arras in ness and courage, were bartered for University, London SW I5.

TLS SEPT E MB ER 14 20 0 7
 LETT ERS 7

orning broke on Decem ber 21, her ma ny abiding friend ship s and strong

M 1852 - the shor test day of the year

- to find the jo urna list and social
reforme r Harri et Ma rtinea u charac teristica lly
Unburnt offerings wor king relation ship s, for ged ove r years of
shared wor k on pressing social probl em s,
and surviving the inevit able strains . The
preoccupied with concerns both person al Unitarian mini ster Willia m Fox, Editor of
and publi c. Writing "in haste" to her friend MARIA F RA WL E Y Review, but one senses in much of the the Monthly Repository, served as a crucial
Fra nces Ogden, she covers plans for her corres pondence a careful and sustained men tor to Harriet Martin eau in her earliest
annua l Christmas kitchen party, conveys dis- D eb or ah A n na Lo g an , e di t or counterattack, an entirely under standable stages of authors hip; she ma de no bones
may about the likely eruption of war in the desire to better those who questioned , of her disapp roval when Fox abandone d his
Cr imea, and expresses anxiety about whether THE C O L L ECTED LETTE RS O F criticized, or mali gned. She chose the wife to live with his wa rd, Eliza Flowe r, yet
Prin ce Albert is up to the task of bein g HARR IET MAR TIN EAU Athenaeum as the outlet for Letters on their friend ship continued . Whil e in Ame rica
Prin ce Co nsor t. No ne of these matters could Five volumes, 2, 036p p. Pickerin g and Chatto. Mesmerism because it had previously in the late 1830s for an extended tour,
long occ upy her , tho ugh , as she con fesses £450 the set (US $750) . ridicul ed the practice; to Edward Bul wer Martineau es tablished relationship s with
978 I 85 196804 6
herself to be "busy with an odd correspond- Lytton she exp lains, " I refused all paper s fellow supporters of the Aboliti on Movement
ence today, - about who is to have my ea rs that we re on our side already, & preferred that became the basis for so me of her mos t
after death" . As M artin eau put s it, "An bequeathed her bod y to posterity was not di sarmin g an enemy ". enduring friend shi ps. She referred to the
eminent surgeo n begs for them; & the matched by an equal avidity to have her Harriet Martin eau was not nearly as ca n- Unitarian preacher Charles Fo llen as "the
question is whether his having them is letter s preserved. Indeed , one of the domi- tankerou s as that might imply, however, and greatest man I eve r knew", and enjoyed
compatible with my legacy of my skull & nant them es to surface in these five volumes give n how many co ntrove rsial topics she decades of sustained corr espond ence with
brain to ano ther" . is her intense belief in indi vidu al freedom wro te about - Amer ican slavery , taxation , his wife, Eliza; she ca lled the Revd William
One cannot help but wonder how Fra nces and the right to privacy whic h ma nifes ts British India , among man y others - it is Furness and his wife her "American broth er
Og den - no matter how conditioned she was itself in directives to her correspondents to remarkabl e how skilled she was at managing and sister" . Another Unitarian abolitio nist
by her years of intimate cor res ponde nce to destroy her letters. As she stresses in one writ- conflict amo ng her cor res ponden ts. To be who becam e close to Martin eau was Maria
expec t such ecce ntricities from her friend - ten in 1843 to Henr y Cra bb Robin son, "I sure , she was inclin ed to make critica l asides Weston Chap man, the woma n she chose to
digested this latest morsel of news from The choose that my letters sha ll not be print ed. I here and there. The publisher John Murray III supervise publ ication of her autobiography
Knoll , the home in Ambleside that Mart ineau know und er what feelin gs, & with what is cond emn ed as a "censor of the press", after her death. Willi am Lloyd Garri son ,
had built and where she had lived since intent I write letters, & I will let no one judge the American newspaper Editor Horace Lydia Child, Lucretia Mott and Ralph Wald o
1845. The reputation that she established in for me what their destination is to be" , the Gree ley's "manners are detestable" , the Revd Emerso n we re among the many prominent
the 1830s, first as author of the series Illustra- emphasis makin g clear her determin ation to Sydn ey Sm ith is " such a Mammon priest" , A mericans that Martin eau counted as her
tions of Political Economy and later of a have the last word. Ne arly two decades later, the Am erican statesman, and one-time friends. At hom e, too, her many professional
numb er of books based on her travels to Ame r- her passion on the sub ject unabat ed, she President of Harvard University, Edward relations hips evo lved into friendship s; the
ica, had, by the middle of the century, become wro te to another corr espond ent , Edwar d Eve rett is "a wrigg ling worm as I always seem ingly endless letter s to publi sher s and
altogether more complic ated, thanks in part to Walford, " I am burning your note; & you knew him to be" . Nor was she immun e to pro- editors such as Mo xon , Charles Kni ght
the sensation cre ated in 1845 by her Letters on will burn this" . Deborah Ann a Logan , who fessional rivalry; she showe d little patience and Henr y Reeve often mo ve far from the
Mesmerism, which docum ented her rapid has edited The Collected Letters of Harriet with Carlyles "bellowing", depl ored George business at hand .
return to health through "animal magnetism", Martineau , pays tribut e to the obvious edito- Eliot's "bad art" and was ready to take Martineau ' s relation ship s were sustained
after nearly six years of sickroo m sequestra- rial dilemm a with prefator y "apologies to the Dick ens to task both for his represent ation of in sickness and in health , although the sca le
tion. Yet more scandalous was the book she author for going aga inst her wishes" , but the A merica n people and for his treatm ent of undoubtedly tips towards the form er. The
co-authored in 185 1 with the phrenolo gist and arg ues conv incingly (though without iron y) his wife . If Mar tinea u had an enemy, it was letter s are a veritable Merck Manu al of
philoso pher Henry Atkinson, Letters on the that " no text from her pen spea ks with greater not an indi vid ual but an institution. The nineteenth- century ailme nts and affl ictions,
Laws of Man 's Nature and Development; she eloquence, in her favour and on her behalf, "wonderfully ignor ant" Times newspaper in all their imprecise glory . Alth ough biog-
described it to the publisher, Edw ard Moxon, than the wor ds that were most assuredly comes under steady , sustained fire through- rapher s tell us that a prol apsed uteru s and
as "daring to the last degree" (he declined it), never written for publ ication" . Martin eau out her corres pondence for "wickedly raising ova rian cyst were the main causes of
and on publication it was immediately clearly relished the power of letter s to con vey false alarms" and generally "villainous Martineau ' s chronic invalidi sm, her autobio-
denounced "atheist" (she preferred the term and invite confidences . "Entre nou s" was a condu ct". It is, in her summation, a "rotten graphy docum ent s a far more diffu se "world
"secularist" ). Mart ineau' s contempora ries favourit e and oft-i nvok ed phra se, one that old oracle" . (Mar tineau 's allegiance was to of suffering" , com me ncing in childhoo d. Ref-
were familiar with her beliefs about phrenol- we nt hand in hand , somewhat paradox ica lly, the Daily News , the paper that treated her as a erences in her corr espondence to any tangibl e
ogy, me smerism and me taphysics, to say with her frequ ent appea ls for ope n, frank "ge ntlem an o f the pre ss" du ring her fou rtee n di sease , di sorder, o r sympto m are rare .
nothin g of her sense of her own stature, and co mmunication, for "no con cealments". yea rs of wr iting for it.) Instead, she writes almos t incessantl y of
this familiarity may have helped the remark Yet the stridency of Martin eau' s instruct- Whil e a few rel ationship s fell by the way - "internal co mplaint", "s inkings" , "fainting
about her legacy of ears and head go dow n ions to friends, famil y and colleag ues to side und er the pressure of confli cting op in- tendency" , " neuralgic attacks" , "spring fail-
rather more easily for Frances Ogden than for destro y her letters - her willingness to give ion , none was more affec ting to Martin eau ure of strength" , a "pulse sca rce ly perc epti-
today' s readers, predisposed as we are to dis- up a corres pondence rather than compromise than that with her broth er James, describ ed ble, and always inter mittin g". "An enlarged
miss phrenolo gy as ju st one more example of - bespeaks not ju st a stubborn disposition , in early idoli zing days as "g lorious" and as heart" is frequentl y to blame for her prostra-
early Victoria n pseud oscience and to regard as or what W. R. Greg ca lled, in his me morial "that wo nderful per sonage, the Reverend tion. She is " in no severe pain , but abundant
dubi ous, at best, M artineau' s estimate of her essay on Mart ineau publ ished in The Nine- Jarnes". Relati vely few letters survive, but malaise" ; she has "a case of organic disease,
ow n worth. teenth Century in 1877, a "too imp eriou s and they docum ent a steady eros ion of feelin g, not admitting of esse ntial amendmen t"; she is
If the scientific community had, in the end, impetu ous conscience", but also a long- intense pride in him giving way to more "in her usual state - very suffering and very
to do without the benefit of Ma rtinea u's ears sta nding strugg le to exert control over her moderate respect, tru st evaporating as feel- uncert ain" . Tod ay, when op tions for eve ry-
and skull, she did leave - albe it so mew hat ima ge and public reputation, despit e many ings of bet rayal come to do minate. No single day pain relief seem limit ed to ace ta mi-
unwi ttingly - a substa ntial legacy in her vast claims to the contrary . After "giving notic e" ca lam itous disag ree men t was to blame; noph en or ibuprofen, Victori an method s
corr espondence. Her letters co mplement a to the phrenologist George Combe of her instead, differences over Ma rtinea u's restric- come across as de lightfully varied. "The
formid able array of books and ess ays, and do injunction aga inst any prese rvation of her tion on the use of her letters (lames des troye d cold revives me as a dram does a drunkard",
what letters do best: they convey the inner letter s, she writes in 1843, " Suffice it now them but sec retly took notes in shorthand), Martin eau tell s one corr espond ent. Oth ers
life of the autho r, as she manage s the routine s that it arises from no ca re in regard to my o ver the qu estion s de are st to Martineau ' s she thank s for se nding re stor ati ve s such as
of day -to-day living and confront s the occa - ow n reput ation , - wh[ich ] I never tried to heart , espec ially abolition, and ove r Jarnes' s cha mpagne, oys ters and turtl e soup her way.
sional moment ous even t. O ne glea ns as much gain or to keep, & shall not begin to troubl e ponderous dispo sition and his scornful "I live by wine, laudanum, and ether , which
about the woma n from a co mmen t, made myself about now". But troubl e herself she response to her ow n rising fame took their keep the heart going, and in some sort of
after reporti ng the death of one of her farm did , most fam ously by preparin g her ow n toll. Jamess sca thing review of Letters on order ", she tell s Eliza Flower in 1856 .
anim als - 'T here is no small attac hme nt to a obituary in 1855 (it was n' t publi shed until Mesmerism (titled "Mesmeric Atheism" and It would, however, be ju st as much a
goo d cow ; & we are all, - serva nts and all - after she died, in 1876 ). One ca nnot bl ame publi shed in the Prospective Review in 1851 ) mistake to view Mart ineau ' s chro nic ill
rather grave on the occasion " - as one does Martin eau for seek ing con tro l of her image, was the fin al straw. "He has traduc ed & health as backdrop to her authorial ca reer
fro m her co mment ary on important occas ions given the malicious reacti on her writings insult ed M r Atkin son", Martin eau wrote to as it would be to conclude that illn ess was
like the access ion of Victoria to the throne: inspir ed in tho se unable to accep t the fact of a Fra nces Ogden. "Above all, he has forfeited some thing she had to overc ome in order to
"We are all somew hat romantic about our wo ma n dari ng to write on subjec ts deemed my estee m irreconcilabl y; & the only hon esty write . Her letters ma ke it clear that her
young Queen , poor thin g! What chance has off-limits . She laugh s off Jo hn Wilson and decenc y are in silence." constituti onal "need for utterance" (the
she of grow ing up simple & goo d?" Croker's characteriza tion of her as " False, One neverth eless comes aw ay fro m the phrase she invoked in her 1855 obitu ary,
The eagerness with which M artin eau fo ul, and unfemi nine" in the Quarter ly collec ted corr espo ndence impressed with and one with parti cul ar meanin g for a

TLS SEPTEMBER 14 200 7

8 SOCIAL STUDIES
woma n who was incr easin g y deaf from
adolesce nce on wards) was part integral to her
sense of her self as suffering . If pressur es to
produce result ed in over work and Martin eau
found herself "sick and ill - half dead with
wr iting too much", she often embraced
her wor k as that which kept her alive. " I
sha ll die as soo n as I have to give up writing",
she told Sa muel Lu cas, the Editor of Once
a Week, in 1862 . At tim es, she described
her self as "scarcely able to sta nd, and
q uite unabl e to co nve rse for any length
of time" , but still able to write - thank s in
part to the ministrations and sec reta rial
suppo rt prov ided by her belo ved niece
Maria M artin eau, who m Debor ah Logan
describ es as Martineau' s "Woman Frid ay".
In fact , through out her seve nty-fo ur years
of life, M artin eau often believed herself to be
dyin g, an impression corroborated by the
medi cal men who atten ded her throu gh the
yea rs. Rath er than qu ench her activist
impulses, the noti on that her life was "so very
precariou s" fuelled her passion for wor k, for
writing. In a lett er to the publisher George
Smith in 1859, she summar ized her plans
to coll abo rat e with Flor ence Nightinga le
on Eng land and Her So ldiers, a book usin g
the exper ience of the Sc utari Hospit al durin g
the Crimea n War to plead for better sta nda rds
of milit ary hygiene: "We two dying wo men
are resol ved to save the Briti sh Army .. . . if
we live a few mon ths, we have the stro nges t
ex pectation of doin g it" . M artin eau lived for
another seve ntee n years, Nightinga le another
fift y. Martin eau ' s early sense that she wo uld
be " laid on the sofa for life" makes her
periods of go od health all the more striking,
her descripti on s pro vidin g evi de nce of a
robust per son alit y: "I ride like a Bord erer, -
walk like a pedl ar - cli mb like a Mountain-
ee r" , she wro te to Emerso n in 1845, shortly
after deci ding that Ambl eside wo uld becom e
her hom e.
If Harri et Ma rtinea u lacked anything, it
was the gift of pro phecy . In 1837 , she saw
"little chance" that Queen Vict ori a could
" turn out m uc h" . She predict s a wa ning int er-
es t in Te nnyso n, but aug urs that the poetr y
of her friend Richard Monckt on Milnes will
achieve "deep and lastin g goo d" . In 1843 ,
she lam ent s "poor declining B oz" ; a few
yea rs later, she not es that "the public are
tired of fiction " . Happil y, her failin gs as a
proph et seem mo st to concern her self, at least
so far as her frequ ent predi ction s of immin ent
death were co ncerne d. As Greg wro te in his
memori al essay on Harriet Martin eau "her
fault s, which were neith er few nor small,
were readil y for given her, for she loved much
and labour ed hard for the happiness of
oth ers" . An apt appraisa l of a wo man who
beli eved herse lf so lon g to suffer from "an
enlarge d heart" .
• FOUR COURTS PRESS
Manx kingship in its Irish Sea setting ,
II8 7-1229: King Ragnvald and the
Crovan Dynasty
R. AN D R EW Mc D ONALD
Ragnvald Godredsson of Man was a fearsome power to be
reckon ed wi th in th e Irish Sea basin around 1200.
ISBX978-1 -8 4682-°47 - 2 264 pa ges ills £45
Published: I Sentember
7 Malpas Street, Dublin 8, Ireland
Tel. (Dublin ) 453 4668 www.fourcourtspren.ie
Departure points
oftware publi shers like to indicate major
S rev isions to their products with a who le
numb er (" Windows 3.0"), keepin g deci-
mal fraction s ("W indows 3.1") to mark
merely incremental changes . Tim O 'Reill y,
publisher of book s on the internet, thu s co ined
(and sw iftly trademarked ) the term "Web 2.0"
in 2004 to sugges t that the World Wide Web
was undergoing a thorou gh tran sform ation .
He illustrated the difference between the old
Web and the new by co ntras ting Britanni ca
online, the digital manifestation of the Encyclo -
paedia Brita nnica , with Wikip edia, the online
encyclopedia assem bled by vo lunteers. In his
book The Wealth of Ne tworks (2006), Yochai
Ben kler, Professor of Law at Yale Univers ity,
also po ints to Wikip edia and similar project s
as transform ational, arguing that the individu-
ally vo lunteered rather than institutio nally
controlled co ntent of Web 2.0 reflects not
merely technological, but also cultura l chan ge.
Andrew Keen, too, in his new book , The
Cult ofthe Amateur, summons Wikip edia. But
where Benkl er, like O'Reilly, argues in its
defence, Keen rises for the prosecution , declar-
ing that such manifestations of the new
Web defer abje ctly to amateurism, and as
such represe nt an assa ult on "our economy,
our culture, and our values" .
Som e con cept of culture, then, sta nds at
the centre of these opp osin g acco unts of the
intern et , but what con cept isn't com pletely
clear. Benkl er ' s catho lic view might defe nd
Raym ond Willi ams' s dem ocrati c notion
that "culture is ordin ary" . Keen certainl y
wo uldn' t. In his eyes, it is the "collective cry
for a dem ocratized medi a" that threatens "the
very futur e of our cultural instituti on s" and is
con sequ ently something from which we need
to be defend ed.
Perhaps only an ex patriate Englis hman, as
Keen is, co uld laun ch so unapol ogetic an
att ack o n "de m ocratization" in A meri ca,
where ma ny acce pt that if dem ocracy is
goo d, then more democracy is bett er. Yet
Am eri can history is not , as some popul ar
accounts wo uld have it, an unstopp able
march from despoti sm to dem ocracy. It has
also invol ved strugg les to restrain dem o-
cracy 's mor e ex tre me enthusias ts. Wh en
A nthony Trollope tra vell ed in the North
durin g the Civil War, he was surprised to
hear of Union Army unit s where deci sion-
making was coll ective. He was less surpr ised
to hear that they had been disbanded und er
press ure of war. Despit e such setbacks , a
naive , if fragile, faith in popular demo cracy
endures amo ng techn ologic al utopi ans, many
of who m see digital technol ogy as the means
toward s a mor e perfect polit y (thou gh recent
setbac ks in elec tronic voting have cause d
some to recon sider). In 1990 , computer pro-
gram mers at a Xerox research ce ntre devel-
oped an online "world" , where anyone co uld
crea te charac ters and through them live out
fant asy lives. (It was a forerunn er of virtual
wo rlds such as Web 2.0' s Seco nd Life .)
Wh en so me fantasies proved incompatibl e
with oth ers, the pro grammer s ass umed that
plebi scites would settle the disput es. They
found instead that the disputes onl y esca-
lated . As a result , the programmers we re
for ced to transform them selves fro m beni gn
TLS SEPTE MBER 14 20 0 7
PA UL D UG UID
And r e w K e en
TH E CULT O F T HE AMAT EUR
How today' s intern et is killing our culture
240pp. Nicholas Brealey. Paperback, £ 12.99.
978 185788 393 0
US: Doubleday. $22.95.
97803855 20805
"Bibliotheque" (1926---7)from Making It
New: The art and sty le ofSara and Gerald
Murphy; edited by Deborah Rothschild
(238pp. University of California Press.
Paperback, $34.95; distributed in the UK
by Wil ey. £19.95. 978 0 520 25240 0)
returning office rs rea ding off the ayes and
the nays into littl e dictators issuin g electro nic
ASBO s and ex pulsion orders.
The Cult of the Amateur sugges ts that Keen
may have go ne throu gh a similar tran sfor ma-
tion . Formerly the head of an internet music
start-up, he seems to have discovered that
there are porno graph y and pira cy at loose on
the Web, while vulgar amateur s, with no
regard for authority or expertise, are undermin-
ing respected institut ion s such as the Encyclo -
paedia Britannica or the New York Times.
Keen is clearly outraged, and his boo k yea rns
for the programm ers' power to stamp it all out.
Failing that, his last chapter proposes a range
of gove rnme nt intervent ion s, few of which are
new and fewer likely to be effec tive . Effec tive
or not, ex perience tells us that, without careful
ove rsight, government intervention on the net
tend s to serve the interests of those who lobb y
Congress. The Recording Industry Asso-
ciation, which Keen champions, has done very
we ll in this way ; co nsume rs less so . So before
summo ning the Feds, we might notice first
that Keen' s bill of complaint is not particularly
coherent. For exam ple, while there certainly is
pornograph y on the Web and some of it is very
disturbin g, it is generally the product of profes-
sionals of one sort or another, rathe r than a cult
of amateurs . Moroever, internet-b ased porno-
graphy, like seve ral of the issues Keen com-
plains of, was there long before Web 2.0. By
his ow n datin g, Britann ica stumbled around
1990- 91 , which eve n antedates Web l.0.
Furthermore, while Keen depl ores the cult
of the amateur for its "superficial ob serva-
tion s" , see n as repl acin g "deep analysis" with
"shrill opinions" , he himself is not free from
these failin gs. As he ackn ow ledges in his con-
cl usion to The Cult of the Amateur, he too is
an amateur, and by the time we get to this con-
cession , we do not feel either that his arg u-
ment is profound, or that his tone is ca lm. His
sources are prim aril y clippings ava ilable
from online newspaper sites . As bloggers
ge nera lly draw on much the sa me stock
and use it in mu ch the sa me way, Keen' s
approac h works more to vindicate than to
damn them . His image of the press as a
"noble instituti on " , staffed by "qualified
report ers" and " seasoned ed itors", whose
stories, "fact-checked, ed ited, pro ofr ead and
... back ed by a tru sted news or gani zati on",
advance "the integrity of our polit ical dis-
course" (Kee n may have been o ut of England
for some tim e), is und er min ed by the rather
mawki sh cl ippings he chooses. No r are
blogs, as he wo uld have us beli eve, merely
parasit es on the mainstream press . The blo g
talkin gpoint smem o.com, for exa mple, has
played an imp ortant role in breakin g the story
which, arg uably, led to the res ignation of the
US Att orn ey General. And , contrary to
Keen ' s asse rtions abo ut their freed om from
conseq uences , American bloggers have faced
prison for defendin g their so urces. Finally,
eve n if we accept that not all blogs acknow l-
edge their debt s, it should be noted that the
idea that We b 2.0 suffers from the cult of the
amateur was put for ward by the we ll-know n
blogger Nic ho las Car r (http://ro ughtype .
corn) a coupl e of yea rs ago.
If deb ates about the intern et are turning to
examinations of o ur culture, this is to be we l-
comed. The turn may refl ect an exaspera tion
with the way eco no mic con cept s have co me
to domin ate such discussion s. Even the New
Yorker, the stately hom e of cultural deb ate in
America, now feel s oblige d to pro vid e roo m
for a "financial" page . Changes that fall
under the headi ng Web 2.0 do have cultu ral
impli cation s. For example, co llec tive ly pro-
d uced and dyn amic ally chang ing pages, like
those of Wikipedi a, unsettl e implicit notion s
abo ut what a page is and how it might be
und erstood , notion s that ex tend back at least
to the rise of print culture, if not to the appear-
ance of the codex . The end of the page as we
knew it will be unsettling not onl y for biblio-
phil es, but eve n for such Web 2.0 businesses
as Go og le, whose empire depend s o n its
ability to rank pages, and the inherent assump-
tion that with these there is so mething rela-
tively co nstant and co here nt to rank.
A de bate pitting Will iam sites such as
Benkl er, who are in support of ex panding
popular culture, aga inst Arn oldi ans such as
Keen , who write in defenc e of a circum-
sc rihe d " H igh C ulture", wo uld not he ne w,
but, in the cont ext of the intern et , it might
non etheless be wor th havin g. Unfortunately,
Keen, who see ms happy on the plains, lament-
ing the loss of NBC pro gramming, is less
likely to thri ve on the higher altitudes he has
chose n. Wh en he approa ches the foothill s, he
is unsur e: High Fide lity for exa mple, was not
writte n by Horn sby. As he cli mb s, he stum -
bles more: The Declin e and Fall was not
writte n by G ibbo ns ; nor did Dicken s go on a
readin g tour of Am eri ca in 1842. For the
mom ent , it may be better to lea ve the deb ate
to the eco no mists.

n or abo ut October 1910 , something
I changed for encyclopedists . A for midab le
co llection of scho lars, statesmen and
cognoscenti put togeth er the twent y- nine
vo lumes of the eleve nth edition of the
Encyclopaedia Britann ica - issued in the nine
mo nths to Jun e 1911 and sold und er the aegis
of The Times. Nothing publi shed since in
book form has exceeded its all-encompassing
reac h, boldn ess, insight and authority . Nea rly
a century after its publica tion it is still wo rth
con sultin g; and the acco mplishment of the
men, and occas ionally women, who comp iled
its entries deser ves reverent gra titude . Sir
Cl ifford Allbutt, Geo rge Elio t's model for Dr
Lydgate in Mid dlemarch , wrote on modern
pro gress in medi cine, Bert rand Russe ll on
geo metry, Fridj of Nansen on Gree nland
and refu gees, John Morley on Burke and
Danto n, James Bryce on Ju stini an and on the
United States Co nstitution, while Algernon
Swinburne' s subje cts inclu ded Marlowe,
Mary, Qu een of Sco ts and Vict or Hugo.
Nor was there de teriora tion in the qu alit y
of the work afte r the Encyclopaedia Britan-
nica interests were bought in 1920 by, so me-
what improbabl y, the Sears, Roe buck depart-
ment store in Chicago. Th e supp lementary
volumes issued duri ng the 1920 s included
contributions by Marie Curie on radium,
A lbert Einste in on Space- Tim e, A lexa nder
Fleming on antise ptics, Juli an Hu xley on
evo lution, Marech al Foch on mor ale in war,
Thomas M asaryk on Czechos lov akia, Eduard
Benes on the Littl e Entente, Gustav Strese -
ma nn on the Locarn o Pact, Henri Pirenne on
Be lgian history, the ow ner of the News of the
World on cen sor ship , and the biolog ist Ray-
mo nd Pearl on "Death, Why and Wherefore " .
Thou gh the factu al co ntent of these entries
gra dually came to seem dated , their
inspirin g, ex ca thedra clarit y has never
been surpasse d.
Work star ted on the e leve nth edition of the
Ency clopaedia Britan nica in 190 3, and abo ut
a ce ntury later ca me another Co pern ica n revo -
lution in dicti onari es of ideas. In the 1990 s,
Ti m Bern ers-Lee devised the World Wid e
Web - there is a rou singly eva nge lica l sum-
ma ry of his wor k in the book under review -
and by 2003 sea rch eng ines were prov iding
instant aneou s access to basic inform ation .
Som e of the online data is inaccurate, eve n
wilfully inaccur ate, and careful researchers
see k corr oborati ve ev ide nce to confirm the
initi al informati on , but the Web is now the
encyclo pedia of first resort. For print ed
texts to compete with the intern et, they mu st
dem on strate an un assail able super ior ity .
O ne returns aga in and aga in to the 1910 -11
Encyclopaedia Britannica not beca use it is
up to date , or because it is qui ck to nav iga te,
but because its conten t is so clear-h eaded and
di scrimin atin g. It was writte n by an elite,
and elite values shine on eve ry page. Though
book ency clo ped ias ca nnot co mp ete with
the intern et in term s of accessibility , they ca n
re main paramount by asse rting - if publi sh-
ers and compilers will let them - elite va lues
in cont ent and product ion.
Ho w serious sho uld be the purp oses of
an encyclo pedia of ideas? In the twent ieth
century they were , at their best, a showcase
of new approac hes to the writing of history
and biogr aph y, of the impl ication s of recent
scie ntific discovery, of ad vances in theology,
psyc ho logy and aes thetics . The ir purpo se
was to instru ct and edify , but also recrea-
R E F ER ENC E BOOKS
More Muslims
RI CH ARD DAV E NPORT-HI N ES
Ju stin Win tl e , e d it or
NEW MA K ERS OF M O DERN
CU LTU RE
Two volumes, 1,856pp. Routledge. £225 the set
(US $395).
978 0 4 153383 18
tion a!' Ear lier, in the nineteenth century, ency -
clopedi as of ideas we re a go dse nd for aut o-
did act s striving to lift them selves from
ignor ance and po verty, and there are few
activ ities more worthw hile than that. But
these co mp ilatio ns onc e had an even graver
purpose : the redem pti on of souls. As the
edi tors of a twenti eth- century edition of
Pierr e Bayles Dictionnai re histor ique et
crit ique (1697 ) wro te, "The relig ious wa rs
we re over, but mo st people we re still con-
cern ed with the all-im port ant qu estion:
' What mu st I do to be save d?' ''.
Bayle aban doned his orig inal intenti on of
including definiti on s of obj ects and ideas as
we ll as person s, and all his glor iously pun-
ge nt entries describ ed indi vidu als, tho ugh he
scru tinized their beli efs, and analyse d their
actions arising fro m those beliefs, with a scep-
tical iron y that often failed to hid e disg ust.
Per son al en tries are the medium chosen by
Ju sti n Wintl e as the editor of three successive
Routl ed ge dicti on aries of ideas, Makers of
Modern Culture (198 1), Makers of Nine -
teent h Centu ry Culture (19 82) and now to
superse de them, New Makers ofModern Cul-
ture. In the qu arter-century that has elapsed
since publ ication of the earlier volumes, the
wor ld has enj oye d the de mise of Ma rxism-
Lenini sm as a potent ideology outside China,
the rise of the intern et as a primar y means of
communication , the di screditin g of Fre udian-
is m as a reli abl e g uide to hu man c hoices, a nd
the slow de tumes ce nce of postm oderni sm. It
has also ex perienced , wi th less enjoy me nt,
the resur gence of politi cal Islam.
Th ere are 957 entries in Wintl e.'s two
thick, sturdily bound volumes. His starting
point is 1850 , so as to include Darwin and
Marx, which means that Kierk egaard is
ex cluded becau se he did no signific ant work
after that date but Berlio z sq ueezes in
because his greates t work, Les Troyens, was
co mpleted in 1858. Wintl e has co mmis-
sioned pieces on creative artists in all ge nres,
including architec ture and cinema (both of
which have a high sta nda rd of coverage),
psycholog ists, soci olog ists, scientists, tech-
nologists, and a few politici ans who soug ht to
recon stru ct soc iety (Hitler and Ho Chi Minh ,
for ex ample) . Entreprene urs who have had an
impact on wo rld culture are included - tho se,
for exa mp le, who have co mmodified news,
intelli genc e and raw da ta, such as Baron de
Reut er, the pion eer of the telegraphic news
agency, and Bill Gat es. Som e inclu sion s
see m hard to ju stif y: Yoko Ono, "the mo st
ce lebrated Japanese wo man of her era" , who
has turn ed "her app arent isolati on into an
ambiguo us art obj ect in itself' , wi ll doubtl ess
reck on her inclu sion alongs ide Newman,
Niebuhr, Nietzsche, O' Neill , Ort ega y Gasse t
an d Or well to be onl y j ustice don e. But that
TLS SEPTEMBER 14 200 7
9
Islam , "who viewe d the povert y and degrad a-
tion of the black masses as the res ult of
persecuti on by the white devil " but insisted
that they co uld save them sel ves by rules of
life that combin ed ortho dox Islam with the
most wry ly se lf-de precating memoir writer, values of white middl e-cl ass Am erica -
Mi cha el Holro yd, will hoot at so me of the "cleanliness, mod esty, fidelit y, thrift and
large claim s made for him, as also at the refer- self-de nial" . Th e cumulative imp act of these
ence to the "ra mpant hom osexu ality" of one accounts of Mu slim makers of modern
of his bio gr aphi cal subje cts, that incorri gibl e culture is decid edl y di smaying. By co ntras t,
old skirt-chase r Au gu stu s John. Th eod or Herzl and Chaim Weizm ann are the
Wintl e is a man of bra ve and conscientious only repr esent ati ves of Z ion ism in over 1,500
purpose . He recogni zes that at a time when pages of doubl e co lumns, and thou gh one ca n
many top polic y-m akers in Washin gton , DC hardl y ex pec t Wintl e to reargu e and settle the
don 't know the differenc e bet ween a Shi 'ite rights of everything that has happ ened in the
and a Sunni, it is imp ort ant to res cue Mu slim Middle Eas t since the Balfour Declaration of
thou ght fro m the oubli ette into which West- 191 7, a cas ua l dipper in New Makers may
erne rs have cast it. And so there are entries take away some imb alanc ed co ncl usions.
on O sam a bin Laden , lead er of al-Qae da, Diction aries should be more than ju st
Yasser Ar afat , the for mer Palestini an leader, comp endiums of knowledge: they mu st
Co lonel Mua mma r Ga ddafi, leader of the correct errors, refut e false argum ent s, dis-
Lib yan rev olution, Mull ah Muh amm ad credit co nven tional pieties. Oth er wise their
Omar, the Talib an leader in Afgh ani stan, and compil ers becom e slaves to pious fraud s,
Ayman Zawahiri, pro moter of jihad against not ju st the religiou s fraud s de rided by Bayle,
infid el states to es tablish a wor ldw ide Islam but the secularized pieties of pas t and prese nt
hegemon y. Th ere are no less valuable entries tim es. By thi s crit erion , the New Makers
on Jamal Uddee n al-Afghani, the nineteenth- entry on Fouca ult, though a miracul ou s
ce ntury scho lar , ora tor and politi cal jo urna l- compression of his sub-N ietzschea n ideology,
ist, who aro use d anti-imperialist feelin g is not sce ptica l enough. It reco gni zes that his
aga inst Europea n inter venti on in Egy pt, Per- intellectual career was a " self-centred qu est" ,
sia and T urkey; Muh amm ad Iqbal , the poet notes that he was far from a libertari an,
whose leadership of the Mu slim Lea gue stresses "his nihilistic fascinati on for
result ed in the creation of the state of Paki- the collapse of Iran" and "his unflinching
stan; and Elija h Muh am mad , the Am erican support for the fund ament alist Islami c revo lu-
black nation alist prophet of the Na tion of tion" in that country (although not the cru el
The Europa International Foundation Directory 2007
Now in its sixteenth edition, th e Europa Int ernation al Foundation Directory 2007
providesanun-paralleledgUide to the foundations. trusts. charit able and
grant-making NGOs, and oth er similar not -for-prof it organizations of th e world. It
prov ides a comp rehensive pictu re of t hird sector activity on a global scale. Present ing
names and contact details for over 2, 550 instit ut ions w or ld-w ide, thi s new edit ion
has been revised and expanded t o include th e most comprehensive and up-to -dat e
inf ormation on this grow ing sector.
June 2007: 279x211mm; 700pp
Hb: 978- 1-85743-4 30-9
The Europa Directory of International Organizations 2007
An exte nsive and unequalled one-volume guide covering over 1,700 internat ional
and regional organizat ions, thi s titl e provides detailed and accurate inform at ion on
a wi de spect rum of internat ional orga nizat ions from t he UN to th e Internat ional
Council f or Science.
July 2007 : 279x211mm: 750p p
Hb: 978-1-85743- 425-5
Also available online: www.worldoflearning.com
Tile Europa Worla of Learning 2008
Now in its fifty -eighth edition, The Europa World of Learning has become estab lished
as one of the w orl d's leading reference w ork s. M eticulou sly updated to th e highest
edito rial sta ndards, ent ries are sourced from th e organizatio ns themselves t o ensure
accurate and reliable inform ati on. Profilin g some 30,000 academic instituti ons and over
200,000 staff and off icials, t his highly esteemed w ork covers th e w hole of th e higher
educat ion and learnin g spect rum. Available in bot h print and online edit ions, th ere is
no ot her source that provides such comprehensive, int ernation al coverage.
Septe mbe r 2007; 279x211mm; 3000pp
l-lb: 978-1-85743-436- 1
European Union Encyclopedia and Directory 2008
The eight h editio n of th is w ell-inf o rmed and comprehensive Encyclopedia and Directory
charts th e European Union' s develop ment. Tho roug hly updated, thi s exte nsive
reference source provides in-depth info rmation on all matt ers relating to th e Europea n
Union: th e expansion of th e EU under th e Nice Treaty is covered, and th e future of the
union is addressed. A glossary of key t erms, a statistical survey and a directo ry section
provide a uniqu e guide t o th e w orkin gs of t he EU as w ell as up-t a-date contact deta ils
of M EPs and ot her EU off icials.
Novem ber 2007; 279x21 1 mm; 756pp
Hb: 978- 1-85743-426-2
For more information, ind uding pricing or to order your f ree Routledge Reference
catalogue please contact: Clare Meth ven
+44(0)20701 76169 reference@routledge.co.uk www.routledge.com/reference
an Informa bu siness R~~o~;~;n~~~up
10
nihilism of his respon se to the AIDS pan-
demi c), but gives no hint of his inex cusa ble
legerdem ain with historical evi de nce . Th e
entry on Ma rx - follo win g, in one of Wintl e' s
amusi ng chanc e ju xtaposition s, a piece on
Bob Ma rley (" he ' d dodged the bull ets but still
his fate was to die yo ung") - is we ll
exec uted, but has the disheartenin g, antiquar-
ian air of gravestone transcripti on s by the
Reve rend Doctor Dryasdu st. Todd Dufresnes
assess me nt of Freud is irrepro achable.
Some of the best entries are those which
make high claims for their subje ct, and thu s
encourage revisitin g of their subjec ts' wor k.
Boyd To nkin's piece on Martin A mis has the
form al sonority of a No bel Laur eat e citation,
and is non e the worse for that. John Ca rroll's
masterl y sum mary of the ideas of Philip Rie ff
- "arg uably the mo st important social theo-
rist since the discipline' s founding fathers,
Du rkh ei m and Weber" - is another case in
point. Car roll's precis of the bur den of The
Triumph of the Therapeutic (19 65), and of
Rieff' s aphor istic polemic o n the "alternative
culture" of the 1960 s, Fellow Teachers
(1972), is amo ng the most arres ting passages
in New Makers. "Culture is interdi cts - a cen -
tral bod y of com manding ' Thou shalt not s' " ,
Carroll sum marizes .
They are co ntravene d at the individ ual's peril.
Eve ry society depe nds on orders o f authority -
from parents to teachers, priests to rulers -
whose fundamental responsibility is to main-
tain the interdicts, and by means o f g uilt-induc-
ing repressions .... Cultures go into decl ine
when the interdicts are not defended by the
elites, and the remiss io ns take over. This is the
co ndition of the modern West, where it is
increasingly forbidden to forbid, and the trend
is towar ds everything being permitted . In place
of the traditional response to feeling bad: "Pull
yourse lf together!" which ass umes that individ-
ual character is respons ible for its own malaise ,
the modern reflex is remissive. The therapist
replaces the priest as society's centra l authority
figure.
This passage reverb erates as one reads oth er
assessme nts of late tw enti eth-centu ry c ultural
lead ers, espe cially those whose sho ddy
aes thetic is based on nove lty for its own
sake : the pecuni ary-dri ven Shock and Awe
doctrine of Dami en Hir st, for exa mple.
Wintl e has co mmissioned seve ra l gro up
entries, including pieces on the English archi-
tectu ral group Arch igr am ; a suitably face-
tiou s piece on the com edi ans Monty Pyth on ;
Dun can Fa llowe ll on the Beatles - writte n
with panache, and closing with a pro voc ative
plu g for the Ger man pop gro up Can; and John
Porter's splendidly hect ic acco unt of the Roll-
ing Stones , which praises their lyric s ex press -
ing "ferocious resentm ent [located] firml y
within ex perience of dru gs and capitalist
media neuro sis" , but complains that "in the
1970 s their politics of delinquency hecame
increa singly dominated by ca mp theatricalit y
and intern ational dru g-culture chic".
Lazy rev iewers who cav il at pro ofr eading
lapses in lon g book s will appreciate New
Makers. Th e description - only a few lines
apa rt - of John Fow les's last novel as
A Maggot and The Maggot will be o ne of
the many mistakes mentioned by them . The
credibility of mod ern publisher s sta nds and
fall s by how mu ch they are willing to spe nd
on a goo d ind ex. It is indispen sabl e for refer-
ence sources in book form to be equipped
with ind exes com piled with hum an intelli-
REFERENCE BOOKS
ge nce and discrimination rath er than chea p- read er; and a print er ' s grem lin has made
skate, automated affairs. A print ed ind ex
needs to be mor e nu anc ed and appraising
than the instant word-spo tting of Search and
chaos of the typo gr aph y.
Odd est of all is Janet Mont efiore ' s readin g
list for Auden . Her ess ay, it mu st be said, is
World
Find ava ilable in online research. But New an efficient summary of co mplex literar y
Makers' s ind ex has some errors and many
vaga ries . Its entry on the hu man immunodefi-
ciency virus correctly refers to page 550 (the
ideas, thou gh it has a secular bias and skims
ove r Au dens Christia n poetr y, which is arg u-
ably his mo st powe rful. Rather , it is her bibli-
before
jo int entry on Robert Ga llo and Luc Mont a-
gnier, the Am eric an and Frenc h discoverers
of the virus , which gen tly de mo nstrates the
ruthl ess cha uvinism of US reaction s to supe r-
ogra phy that see ms so obje ctiona ble. I mu st
decl are a person al interest - that of outraged
amou r propre - for my 1995 biograph y of the
poet is omitted while Char les O sborn es pla y-
word
ior French sc ience) and incorr ectl y to pages ful , skimpy, nam e-dro ppi ng bell etri st mem-
99 0-92 (w hich covers the sepa rate entries of oir of 1980 is recomm end ed as a biograph y. N IC H O LA S JARDI N E
Th om as Mann and Karl Mannh eim ). The Mont efiore ca tegorizes Thekla Clark's Wys-
index of New Makers is satisfactory so far as tan and Ches ter as a biogr aphi cal study,
peopl e ' s names go, but feebl e on ca tegories thou gh it is a per son al mem oir of Auden ' s K athar in e P a rk a n d
and concept s - a vulnera ble point in a dicti on- post-war summer holid ays. It is a plea sant lit- L orr ain e D a st on , e d i to rs
ary of ideas - and fail s to identify similar con- tle book, but in a minor key TH E CAMBR IDG E H I ST ORY OF
cept s or activ ities when they are not men- co mpa red with other wor ks in the sa me SC IENC E
tion ed in the text by the same keyword s. Th e ge nre : Dorothy Farna n's Auden in Love Volum e Three: Early Modern Scie nce
three index references to hom osexuality take pre-emine ntly, but also Charles Miller' s 894pp. Cambridge University Press. £90 (US $ 160).
reader s to Aud en , Fo uca ult and Hockney; but charm ing Auden: An American fr iendship . 978052 I 572446
with no hint of the en tries on Hou sm an, Whit- For no ev ide nt reason only one of the critica l
man, Wild e et hoc omne genus. Indeed , sev - volumes edited by Nicho las Jenkins and
era l of the entries have a "Don' t Ask, Don 't Katherin e Buckn ell is cited; Lucy Me- istories of the sc iences have been
Tell " approach to their subjects : A lan Turing
"died of poisonin g, possibl y acc ide ntal" , we
are told, but it seems ignobl e to avoid men-
Diarmid ' s surname is miss pelt, the title give n
for her mon ograph is incorrect , and (int erest-
ing thou gh it is) see ms oddl y spec ialist for its
H compose d since antiq uity; but as
an acade mic di sciplin e, histor y of
scie nce is a recent form ation , largely a pro-
tionin g the medical and legal persecuti on that listing. So, too, does the Bloomfi eld- duct of curricular reforms of the 1950 s and
led to hi s suicide . Mend el son bibliogr aph y of Auden ' s writ- 60s . In tho se days it was a lively field with
Eac h of the entries comes with a supple- ings: exce lle nt in its day, but now ack now l- sharp, oft en politi cally moti vated division s
ment ary paragr aph headed "Further readin g" , edge d as o ut of date by its surv iving editor. over the natur e and cau ses of scientific
which acts as a brief bibliogr aph y of its sub- Predictabl y, the worst critica l study of adva nce . Had it been a continu ou s or a discon-
ject. Wintle makes no clear statement of the Aud en ' s po etr y, Ant hon y Hecht ' s narcissis- tinuous pro gress? Had the stimuli to cha nge
principles on which these bookli sts were com - tic, unnecessaril y mys tifyi ng and shamefully been intern al or ex terna l? If the form er , we re
piled , and they are incon sistent , eve n er ratic self-pro mo ting The Hidden Law, is listed , the prim ary agen ts the grea t theoreti cians,
in their conten t. To take con secutive entries while more mod est, intelli gent studies are often envisaged as solitary ge niuses; or were
fro m "A", Charles Greg ory - who also con- ignored . Montefiore ' s list is one of the longer they rather the artisa ns and ex perime nters? If
tribut es pieces on Phin eas Barnum , Bu ster ones in the book , but it omit s Alan An sen' s the latter , were the ex terna l factors to be
Keaton , Don DeLillo and Th eod ore Dreiser - edition of Aud en ' s tabl e talk , Arthur Kirsch ' s sought in the realm of ideas or, rather, as
concludes his lucid acco unt of lsaac As i- edition of Aud en' s Lectures on Shakespeare those on the Left claim ed , in the do main s of
rnov 's sc ie ntific writings w ith reference s to and Sta n Sm ith's Cambridge Companion to techn olo gy, indu stry and co mme rce? In one
two autobiog raphica l vo lumes : a sensible Auden - esse ntial read ing for anyo ne wishing notable respect , however , the vario us fac-
decision as Asimo v wro te tens of millions of to und erstand the poet' s mi nd. tion s were at one - all we re committed to
wo rds in his lifeti me. Jo an Bird , who is Aud en , as Mo ntefiore see ms chary of conveyi ng to their pred omin antly scientific
anoth er of Wintl e' s versa tile contributors admitting, was a man of faith ; so, too, are readership a coh erent account of past
(Bob Ma rley as we ll as Charles de Ga ulle) , Mullah Om ar and Aym an Zawa hiri. "Faith", prog ress in the c onte nts of the sc iences . Co n-
app end s to her acco unt of At atiirk a list of Rieff wrote, " is bett er than knowledge if it sider, for ex ample, The Beginning ofModern
two biogr aphi es and one ge nera l book on works; but knowled ge is better if faith be Science fro m 1450-1 800 (1964), the prede-
his legacy for mo dern Tur key. A lexandra only an escape from knowled ge." The grea t cessor of the vo lume und er review. The re we
Free ma n's account of David Atte nboroug h subsuming ten sion s that see m to und erli e find a range of approaches. Some of the
lists fourteen book s based on hi s television New Makers are between faith , intellect and contributors ruthl essly moderni zed in the
pro gramm es about the world's plant s and (often commercializ ed ) sens ation; and the interests of did acti c clarit y, but others, mo st
anim als. The criteria for se lection see m arbi- dicti on ary ' s emerge nt long-t erm story is of not abl y Al exandre Koyre, carefull y con-
trary, with seve ral book s unexp ectedl y omit- Western loss of faith - fir st in reli giou s trasted the pas t conc ept s and notation s with
ted; the title of Zoo Ques t in Paraguay see ms beli ef , and then in the pri vileged status of our ow n. In deali ng with the key question
to have been incorrectl y altered by a pro of- the intell ect and elite aes thetics. of the causes of the Scientific Revolution (a
notion whose currency we owe to Koyre),
some look ed to shifts in metaph ysical wor ld
pictures, to huma nism, to the Refor mation ,
Piano Lessons where others atte nded to rather mor e mun-
da ne matte rs: techn ological innovation s, the
And when her bitt er screec hing filled the hou se, as it frequ entl y did , di scover y of the New World, and the found a-
the bo y went to the front roo m, always di m, the blinds down to protect tion of new i nstitutio ns. Rut the wo rk was
carpet, curta ins and suite, and on the plum velvet ar mchair he 'd sit, held togeth er by a concern to convey as fully
by the mantelpiece brass clock that never wor ked, the lacqu ered scree n as possibl e the past cont ent s of the full ran ge
hidin g an em pty grate and next to his feet , the companion set - poker of disciplines ances tral to our sc ience (let us
that never pok ed , slee k bru sh that never bru shed . . . and wo uld that ca ll them "p roto-sc iences") ,
burni shed shove l eve r deign to lift dirt ? But in any case the fire Sin ce then, the history of sc ience has gone
was never lit, the roo m rarely visited . .. thou gh occasionally a rumble throu gh a series of transform ation s, bein g
o n the distant stree t drew from the glass crys ta l locked in the cabinet sociolog ized in the late 1960 s and 70s , anthro-
a brief keenin g note . Back aga in to the upright piano his eyes . pol ogized, materi alized and ge nde red in the
Su ch sonatas of silence on hidd en keys! Duet s eve n . . . light 1980s, and in the 1990 s swa mped with cul-
forever stea ling in to play along the heavy lid in knowin g gleams. ture. Unde rlying these lurch es in fad and fash-
ion we can de tec t a fu ndament al cha nge in
MI CHA EL FOL EY focu s and sty le of interpretatio n. Th e history
of science has been "decentred ". In Koyres
TLS SEPTE MBER 14 200 7

era , it wa s securely centred on these proto-
science s, on great scientific disco verers and
their canonical work s. Nowadays, how ever ,
histori ans of science are at pain s to do ju stice
to the full range of past disciplines , theori es
and practices, not ju st to those that prefigure
our own. Att empts are mad e to reconstruct
the activities not only of figures traditi on ally
regarded as exemplary, but of all tho se who
participated , dir ectl y or indirectly. Thi s
decentred approach is conc erned, above all,
with respect for "actors' cat egories" , the
term s in which past agent s envi saged and
interpreted their own activities and worlds.
For the focus is no longer on significance for
us, but on the significance s that deeds, text s
and ima ges had for their authors and for
their audi ences.
The Cambridge History of Science, Vol-
ume Three: Early Mod em Science nicely
illu strates the strengths of this new historiog-
raphy. Th e pieces by Anthony Grafton, Paula
Findlen and Klau s Vogel expertl y relat e the
practices of the arts and sciences to their
educational, social and political circum-
stances and role s. Ste ven Harri s has fascinat-
ing thing s to say about the mo st basic precon-
ditions of inquiry - namel y, patronage and
communication; and the contributions of
Richard Serj eant son and Ann Blair stand out
for their skill in doing ju stic e to the contexts
and settings as well as to the subs tance of
past di sciplines. Mo st of the authors strive to
avoid anachronism , a tough task given that ,
as explained in the exce llent introduction by
Kath arin e Park and Lorraine Da ston , in thi s
period the disciplines ance stral to our science
did not form anything even approximating an
institutional or conceptual natural kind , so
that the very title Early Mod em Scienc e is
seriously anachro nistic . Man y succeed on
this score , but others pay onl y lip service,
avoiding "science" only by employ ing "natu-
ral knowledge", " study of natur e", etc, to do
the sa me job. As for scope , the volume is
impressive in its decentring. All kind s of sites
of teaching, inquiry and conversation are
de alt with - not ju st uni ver siti e s and acade-
mie s, but also court s, libraries, mu seum s, cab-
inet s, botanical gard en s, arsenal s, work shops
and print shops, not to mention piazzas and
coffee hou ses. Th ere is co verage ofthe whole
rang e of math ematical, natural philosophical
and practical disciplines, as well as alch em y,
astrology , magic and other activities who se
plac e in the ances try of our science has often
been played down or contested ; and valiant
attempts are made throu gh out to do ju stic e to
the contributions of all sorts and condition s
of men and wom en.
Microhi storie s and case studies are the
genr es most characteri stic of the new decen-
tred cultural history of science , for the sheer
multiplicity of past sites, deeds, work s, partic-
ipants and perceptions to he considered
rend er s larger-scal e surv eys and synthes es
impracticable. A s for the "big issue" of
the older historiography of earl y mod ern
science , that of the nature and causes of the
Scientific Re volution, it appears, at fir st
glance, to have vanished from the pre sent
volume. Indeed , the Sci entific Re volution
figur es ex plicitly onl y three tim es in the 839
pag es, on each occa sion onl y to be summar-
ily dismi ssed as a historiographicall y dubi ou s
categ ory. Yet it haunts the text. Thu s Peter
Dear write s of the "upgrading of arti sanal
knowl edg e" and the emergence of "experi-
REFERENCE BOOKS
"Genesis Project" (1999) by Eduardo Kac; from Echo Objects: The cognitive work ofimages by Barbara Maria Stafford (2S1pp.
University of Chicago Press. $45; distributed in the UK by WHey. £27. 97S 0 226 770512)
ment al reports as the foundation of a new
natural philosoph y" ; Pam ela Smith tell s of
" new imp etu s from excha nge between schol-
ars and prac titioners" leading to a more direct
engagem ent with nature ; and in a splendid
piece Jim Bennett tell s of the con sequ enc es
of a new engagement by natur al philosophers
with the mechanical arts of instrument-
making. Here, as in man y oth er instance s, we
have echoes of the famou s theses of Edgar
Zil sel, Paolo Rossi and others of the Left, con-
cerning the genesis of the Scientific Revolu-
tion through the union of scholarly kno w-
ledge with artisanal ex pertise . But echoes are
not e xp la na tions , a nd thi s c om pe nd io us work
is mark ed by an unwillingness to indul ge in
explicit expl anati on . Such reluctance is, I sus-
pect , larg ely moti vated by the fea r of commit-
ting the crime of anachroni sm in invoking
explanator y cat egories not available in the
period. If so, anachrophobia has a lot to
answer for. For any historiography that
neglects to spell out the cont ent s of the proto-
sciences and explain the ways in which the y
have changed would see m to hav e thro wn out
the bab y with the bathwater.
Describing the activities of oth ers in term s
not available to them is not in itself a mistak e
- otherwise we could not even apply eco-
nomic theor y to the activities of businessmen
ignorant of that theory. As is well expl ained
in Peter Winch's class ic The Idea of a Social
Science ( 1958), the vicious ca ses of anachro-
nism are tho se in which our descriptions
carr y pre supposition s about instituti on s and
form s of life that are fals e of tho se to whom
we apply them. Thu s, Copernicus and Kepl er
cannot properly be describ ed as scientists,
not simply because their society reco gnized
no such cate gor y, but because it lacked man y
of the institutions and activities con stituti ve
of science as we practi se and henc e under-
stand it. But there are plent y of innocuou s
cases. It is, for exa mple, harml ess to call
the early mod ern di sciplines anc estral to
TLS SE PT EM B ER 14 200 7
our science "proto-sciences"; ind eed , such
ex plicit anachroni sm is far preferable to the
fudging of the issue with such term s as "natu-
ral knowledg e". A good interpreter will use
modern terminology and notation sparingly,
and will con sci entiou sly alert the read er to
di screpancies bet ween the past concept s and
our own best approximations to them - Ale x-
andre Koyre was in thi s respect an exemplar y
explicator of proto-scientific text s. But no
matt er how historically sensitive the inter-
pret er , anachroni sms will have to be
employed in the interests of comprehen sibil-
ity. A total ban on anachronism would fru s-
trate the whole task of explaining past tran s-
form ation s of the proto-scienc es; for how
could such expl anation s possibl y get off the
ground if allow ed to appeal only to notions
that the pa st agent s them sel ves would hav e
recognized ?
In sum, with its decentring, the history of
science has forg ed valuable link s with main-
strea m social and cultural histor y; but at the
same tim e it has lost much of the fascin ation
that it once had for scientists, science polic y-
makers and philo soph ers of science . To re-
engage with these audi enc es, it is sure ly legiti-
mate to spell out the chan ges in agend as and
contents that the proto- scientific disciplines
have undergone en rout e to our science , and
to seek explanations for them. For the early
modern period, thi s is hy no mean s to advo-
cat e a return to the traditional theme of the
Scientific Re volution and its cause s: reco gni-
tion of the diversity of the proto-scienc es in
the earl y mod ern period precludes that. But
middl e-siz ed pictures of shifts in the prac-
tices, agendas and theori es of the proto-
sciences are sure ly in ord er. In fact , though
the present volume ventures little in the
way of ex plicit expl anation of disciplinary
changes, it does contain a numb er of promi s-
ing point ers. Som e of the se are sugges tive of
ways in which old er grand theses about the
origin s of the Sci entific Revolution might be
11
revi ved in suitably scaled-dow n and qu alified
form s. Such are the sugges tions menti oned
abov e about the tran sformations of the
practices of natural philosoph y throu gh
the interaction of scholars and arti san s.
Others break new ground: the contributions
of Serj eant son , Adrian John s, Grafton ,
Harri s, Findl en and Vogel pro vide fascinat-
ing reflections on the ways in which new
form s of inquiry were open ed up through the
es tablishment of new type s of publication,
new networks of communication, new way s
of assayin g and compiling te stimonies, and
new sites for civil con ver sation. It is no
accident that hi storian s are becoming se ns i-
tive to these factors, given the ways in which
our own form s of publication , auth entication
and con versation are being tran sformed by
the electro nic revolution. Here, I think , we
hav e the germ s of a new histori ography
of the sciences: one that can combine some
of the strengths of the fashionable decentred
historiography - notabl y its concern to do
ju stic e to the full rang e of participants in
pa st disciplines - with a re-engagement with
the central task of explaining the tran sforma-
tion s in the practices, agendas and theories of
the pro to-sciences. Thu s we can hop e to
reco ver the proto-scientific bab y, so cru elly
eje cted by so many of the social and cultural
historians of the sciences .
Dr K Moti Gokulsing (University of East London)
The New Shape of University Education in England:
Interdisciplinary Essa ys
292pp £69.95 Hardcover
978-0-7734-5268-8 Jul y 2007
"...This volum e will prove of enormous value to anyone
interested in how British higher education is organized today,
how it got there, and in likely future trends and battle-
grounds ..." Profess or Alison Wolf, Kings College London
The Edwin Mellen Press Ltd
Telephone 01570 423356
Bmail: cs@melle n.demon .co.ukwww.mellenpress.com
12
Flowers for power
H
arold J. Cook' s study of medicine
and natural history , the "big science"
of the Early Modern period, is a chal-
lenging and comprehen sive examination of
the tran sition of natur al history into modern
science . But it is much more besides. In
sixtee nth-century Europe, chan ging phil-
osophi es and technologie s provided opportu-
nities for new methods of observing and
measurin g, and the grow ing potenti al of the
univer sitie s and the printing press made it
easier to tran smit knowledge and ideas.
Resourc es from newly di sco vered territories
were exploited by trad ers and merch ant s, by
those with an interest in medicine and natural
hi story, as well as by tho se more conc erned
with the collection of curio sities - all of
who m form ed an extensive but clo sel y con-
nect ed wealthy elite. Th e focu s of much of
their activity in the sixtee nth century was
Ant werp and the southern Netherla nds, but as
the political and religiou s uphe avals of the
Dutch Revolt again st Spain found grea ter
success in the north , in the seventee nth cen-
tur y there was a shift to the new Republic
centred around Am sterd am . Here the urban
infra structure, with a rulin g merch ant elite
and a flouri shin g commerici al empire giving
access to many of the newly discovered land s
and their naturalia and exo tica, pro vided the
ideal marketpl ace fo r the exchange of com-
modities and idea s. Integral to Coo k's thesis
are net work s and an ex change "informatio n"
ec onomy , the develop ment of which is exa m-
ined in the very wides t sense throu gh an
explora tion of the ideolo gical, phil osophical
and comm erci al values that both gave rise to
them and develop ed from them . He sees the
excha nge economy as the offspring of new
approaches to kno wledge in the sixtee nth and
seventee nth centu ry, with a concentration on
the disco very of new facts. Thu s a period of
transiti on fro m the medi eval to the mod ern
respond ed to a grow th in exchange between
people at all levels.
The most fruitful outcomes of these inter-
action s took place where the bond s of
exchange were weaker , that is where peopl e
were operating, either physicall y or virtually,
beyond the confin es of their own , famili ar,
cultural environment. Nowh ere was this more
success ful than in the acti vities of the Dutch
Eas t India Co mpany, which domin ated trade
in the early seve ntee nth centur y. Jacobu s
Bontiu s, working as physician, apoth ecary
and oversee r of surgeons for the Com pany in
Java, during its most aggressive phase, con-
duct ed detailed research on the diseases, natu-
ral resourc es and medicin es of the Indies.
Althou gh his written works we re limited hy
his Europe an prejudic es and focu s on empiri-
cism , which led to the omi ssion of much local
kno wledge , nevertheless they were an impor-
tant part of the ever-widening range of know-
ledge dissemin ated within Cook's exchange
economy. Back hom e in seventeenth-century
Am sterdam, old and new practic es and kno w-
ledge also combin ed in a "medical market-
place". Quack and alchemist, together with
apoth ecar y, physician and surgeon in sear ch
of "exact clinic al and anatomical descrip-
tion " , all exchanged their know ledge and
skills in the same environ ment , neatly illus-
HISTORY & ART HISTORY
ELIZABETH EDW ARDS
Harold J . Cook
MATT ERS OF E XCH A NGE
Commerce, medicine and science in the Dutch
Golden Age
576p p. Yale University Press. £25 (US $35).
978 0 300 11796 7
Anne Gold g a r
TU LI PMAN I A
Money, honor and knowledge in the Dutch
golden age
446pp. Universityof Chicago Press. $30; distributed
in the UK by Wiley. £ 17.
978 0 226 30 125 9
trated by the clo se ju xtaposition of Rem-
brandr ' s paint ing "The Anatom y Lesson of Dr
Nico laes Tulp" with "The Quack Doctor" by
W. French after Gerard Dou .
At eve ry stage in Matters of Exchange:
Commerce, medicine and science in the
Dutch Golden Age, Cook look s beyond the
fact s from which his thesis started, to the
moral philo soph y, culture and religiou s
chan ges and tension s which influenced the
impact of the new approach. In the late
sixteenth century, Carolus Clusius, director
of the Leiden hortus botanicus, throu gh
travel and wide networkin g, brou ght together
his inqu iry into "hidden mys teries" with his
ow n materi al observations, tempered still by
echoes of a quasi-medi eval, but "undoctri -
naire" devotion. A hundred yea rs later, one of
Clu siuss successors at Leiden , Hermann
Boerhaave, distancin g him self from his own
religiou s belief, had develop ed a Cartesian
approach to the study of medical materialism,
despite official disapprov al of Cartesianism
and Spin ozism. If there is a weakn ess in
Cook's arg ume nt it is in a tend enc y to sim-
plify the influen ce of the changing political
frame work in the Dutch Republic . By the
later seventeenth ce ntury, stadholder-King
William Ill' s control of the scientific and
philo sophical dynamic , which had taken off in
an apparently more favourab le political envi-
ronment, w as as con strained as w as his power
to contro l the Am sterdam regent s, and subje ct
to the same polic y of pragmatic compromise.
Academic s, among them Cas parus
Barla eu s, develop ed a mor al code which
saw virtue in a close relati onship betw een
"wisdom and commerce" and "material
progress" , resultin g in what Co ok describ es
as "an extraordinary flouri shing of arts and
sciences" . Thi s new moralit y may have been
a self-ju stific ation for the role of the ruling
merch ant elite, but its emergence from the
uphea val of Renai ssance hum ani sm and the
Reform ation was cruc ial to the intell ectu al
debates and advances in medicine and natur al
history. So , for example, man y of the coll ec -
tor s involved in the tu lipom ania of the 1630s
were Menn onite s, who were prepared to com -
promi se their strict religiou s cod e by invest-
ing in armed ships. And Adri aan Pauw, a
Calvini st regent in a merc ant ile, politic al and
academic net work , becam e the investor in a
count ry estate and the ow ner of the onl y
kno wn twelve bu lbs of the Semp er Au gustu s
TLS SEP T EM BE R 14 200 7
tul ip. As a histori an of science, Harold Cook
is ove rtly cynic al about reaction s to art in
nature; tho se who saw this mo st valuable of
tulips had to be taught to look on it and experi-
ence, or ju st pretend to experience, pleasure.
In direct contrast, Ann e Go ldgar' s study is
that of a cultural histori an whose ma in thesis,
that the commodification of the tul ip did not
undermine appreciatio n of its "pure value". is
explored throu gh a fascinating investigation
of the socia l and cultural networks operating
in the north ern Netherla nds . Thi s is a direct
challen ge to the more con ventional interpr eta-
tion of the tulip as ju st another commodity to
be exploited for profit, by trad ers with no
appr eciation of its intrin sic value. Goldgar
takes famili ar them es and applies them to the
very specific ca se of the collection and trad e
in tulip bulb s in the ea rly seventee nth-
century Dut ch Republic, cu lminating in the
cra sh of 1637. She cites a "policy" of wonder
in the formation of coll ections of exotics,
rath er than the search for an encyclopedic
kno wledg e. Thi s is refl ected in her own ,
so metimes engag ingly naive, wond er at the
coll ections she is investigating . She very
effectively illustrates this wond er with appo s-
ite exa mples, such as Abraham Cas teleyn' s
"twin intere sts" in collecting tu lips and
ex otic shells, link ed to the many still-life
paint ings incorporating both . The transienc e
and unpr edictabl e natur e of tulip s se parated
them from man y other collectibles and mad e
them strong cand idates for still lifes and for
individual tulip portrait s, which, like the
portraits of memb ers of different social and
cultural networks, fixed in "time and space
something that was ephemeral and change-
able " . In Tulipmani a: Mon ey, honor and
know ledge in the Dutch golden age , Goldgar
reminds us of what is implic it throu ghout
Cook's study, that despit e the common
assumpti on that c o nno isseurship was good
and comm erc e was bad , many of the sa me
peop le were involved in both . When a single
tulip bulb cou ld sell for up to 1,000 florin s,
the equivalent of three years ' wages for a
ma ster carp ent er , es tablished merchant fami-
lies such as the Barth olotti and Coy mans,
we re engag ed in transaction s with one of the
leadin g bloemis ten, Reymont de Smith,
involving sums rising to more than 10,000
florin s, far out stripping the deals of the lower
trad esm en cau ght up in the opportunity to
invest sma ll surplus sums.
The se studies demon strate two very differ-
ent approaches to histor y. In Tulip mania,
Ann e Go ldga r has taken a relati vely sm all,
current ly popular, topic with a short time
frame , and suhjected it to a thorou gh rein ve s-
tigation and reinterpretat ion in order to chal-
lenge an accepted " myth" of histor y: that the
"true cognoscenti kept out of the tulip trad e
which was left to the unthinking pub lic" .
Harold Cook's Matters of Exchange is far
more broad-ran ging , equally thorough, and
with the und erpinning intent of extending our
und erstandin g of how we got to where we are
today within the cont ext of the histor y of
science . Both book s are the result of long
love affairs with their subjects, and are
ev idence of impecc ab le and enthu siastic
re search .
Pirate
•
In
port
P ETER MANDL ER
Ros emar y Hil l
GOD 'S AR CHITE CT
Pugin and the building of romantic Britain
624pp. Alien Lane. £30.
9780 7139 9499 5
ne of the heart -warming things about
O the Victor ian s is how generou s they
were in their choi ce of heroe s. The
same bourgeois phili stine cou ld find himself
one week worshipping an exotic Orienta l
dand y such as Benjamin Disraeli , and the
next a man ly Christian gentl eman such as
David Living ston e. In many ways , Augu stu s
Welb y Northmore Pugin united both mode ls
in one brief life - thou gh this promi scuit y of
charact er may have limit ed rather than
extend ed his heroi c potenti al.
Lik e Disraeli , Pugin imagined for him self
a rom antic foreign hi story: a long line of roy-
alist Comt es de Pugin , a nobl e father exiled
by the French Revolution, a fami ly cres t and
signet ring ostentatiously sported in evi-
dence. In fact , his father Au guste came from
a long line of Pari sian art isan s in the luxur y
trad es, self-ex iled prob ably in sea rch of bet -
tertradin g conditions. Augu ste' s bump y Eng-
lish car eer as an architectura l draught sman at
best permitted on ly a shabby-ge nteel life-
style, but the raffi sh world of late-Georgian
Bloom sbury in which he work ed allowed
him suffic ie nt artistic lice nse to sustain an air
of myste ry, and his marr iage into very minor
Lincoln shire gentry added furth er resourc es,
not least a fierc ely intelligent and ambitious
wife, Catherine Welby, without too much
respectability. In this decid ed ly louch e envi-
ronment Au gustu s grew up qu ick ly. In his
fath er ' s workshop he learned to dra w. Hang-
ing around back stag e at the theatre , he
learned about sets, and actre sses, and sex . It
is possibl e his first child was conc eiv ed in a
tumb le with a danc er in a darken ed theatre
box, after the last show . When they marri ed,
as was not uncomm on at the time, the bride
was heav ily pregnant. By Nove mber 1829 ,
aged seventee n, he had opened his own
carpentr y-and -join ery wor kshop in Hart
Str eet, literally at the Co vent Gard en stage
door. By the age of twent y-one , he had lost
both parents and his first wife , but gain ed a
second, possibl y another danc er. For a time
they lived at Ram sgat e, inauguratin g Pugin' s
long associ ation with that seas ide town ; he
took up sailing, and all his life was said to
dress like a sailor, almost piratical.
So far, so swashbuckling. But already the
Christian ge ntleman had begun to emerge.
Part of Pugin' s attracti on to the sailor 's life
came from his restless search for the true
simplicity that might lie beneath the shams of
mod ern co smopolitani sm . While knock ing

up all sorts of Go thic nonsen se for ho mes and
theatres, caterin g to the fashion of the day, he
began to take the medi eval form s and formu-
laries deathl y serious ly in a way that was not
com mo n in Bloom sbury or Cove nt Ga rden,
nor in respectable Ra msgate. With furiou s
energy he drew up " Ideal Schem es" of richl y
imagined high-m edi eval ense mbles, hum an,
social, decorative and architectural. Gra du-
ally he ca me to inh abit an " Ideal Schem e"
him self, building for his yo ung famil y the
first of his trail-blazing ope n-plan villas,
outside Sa lisbury and, spiritually, j oining the
Rom an Ca tho lic Churc h there . Fortunately
for Pugin , the Eng lish Ca tho lic Church of the
1830 s was clo ser to his " Ideal Sche me" of
manl y simplicity, spiritual unworldlin ess and
ega litarian community than any Ca tholic
Church in Euro pe . The Sa lisbury co mmunity,
as describ ed by Rosemary Hill in God 's
Arc hitect, sounds mor e like a band of John
Buny an ' s No nco nfor mist Pilgrims than the
lim p- wri sted , incen se-drenched Romani sts
that haunt ed the Victori ans' nightm ares. In
the same way , the ideal Ca tho lic community
that Pugin illu strated in his most famous
wor k, Contrasts, published at thi s tim e
(1836), "passionate and plain" , bore very
littl e resemblance to the histori cal Ca tholic
wo rld of the previou s 300 years . As Hill
nicely point s out, Pugin at thi s time hardl y
see med awa re of the ex istence of the Renai s-
sance . And, aga in, he owe d to his Prot estant
hom el and an alm ost complete absenc e of
Baroqu e and Rococo architec ture to unsettl e
his medieva l dream of Ca tho lic ism.
But then, Prot estants were to prove ju st as
eage r as Ca tho lics to embrace Pugin' s dream,
at least as it was playe d out in iro nwork and
glass, wood and stone, beam an d pill ar. Th e
ge nera lized piety and go od so lid construc tion
of the Gothic had ge neral app eal ; it felt more
nation al and eve n more dem ocratic than the
effete classical alterna tives. It was a Liberal
An glican Parliament , not a neo-feud al Catho-
lic prin ce, that specified its new palace should
be co nstruc ted in a Go thic or Eliza bethan
sty le, prov iding Pugin with his grea test caree r
oppor tunity. It helped that the official winner
of the comp etiti on was the respectable High
Society architect Charles Barr y. Pugin' s role
was dipl om atically played down at the time .
O n the whole, Hill clears Barr y of any mean-
spiritedness in this respect - he often tried to
protect Pugin from him self - but he did
ex ploit the younger man' s astonishing produ c-
tivity as a designer, sq ueez ing eve ry last qu at-
refoil he co uld out of him until practically his
dying breath, and at sho ckingly chea p rates .
Eve n when (as happ ened often) Pugin
insisted on adve rtising his outrageous Ca tho-
lic fantasies in the newspapers an d in polemi-
cal pamphlets, most Protestants see med
happ y to accept his hon est Go thic adorn ment
for th eir national pala ce , and to we lco me hi s
ideal s of con stru cti on and decora tion into
their ow n hom es. In the celebr ated network of
craftsmen to whom Pugin supplied design s,
there we re, equally, Ca tho lics like the iron-
work ing Hardmans and the builder Ge orge
Myers, and Protes tants like the cerami cist
Minton and the decorator Crace .
Like any go od jobbing artisa n, Pug in took
his com mi ssion s where he could find them ;
in any case, he was such a dri ven man,
whe ther by ange ls or demons, that he could
hardl y eve r say no. Neve rtheless, at the
height of his pro fess ional producti vity, in the
ART HISTORY 13
dencies of the new con vert s from Anglican-
ism - which Pugin felt we re ruining his lovely
old Eng lish Catholic Church - and by the
increasingly shrill anti-Catho lic reactions
from within English Protestant ism that were
peaki ng at the end of his life. He began to see
that some of his truest disciples were Angli-
cans; indee d, many were liberals. Nor should
we blame him if, nearin g the age of forty, he
was keen to taste some of the fruit s of celeb-
rity. In any case, he wor ked surpr isingly hap-
pily with the design reform ers Henry Co le and
Richard Redgr ave on the Grea t Exhibition ,
and was delight ed to join the sma ll committee
charged with purchasing item s from the Exhi-
bition for the nation al collecti on s. One-third
of the monies spent for this purp ose on "buy-
ing Briti sh" went on Pugin' s ow n produ cts,
thu s ensuring him at lea st one lasting mem o-
rial at the heart of the Establishme nt.
God knows, he needed that mem ori al. He
was not to survive to lead the "developmental"
Go ths as he had do ne the antiquarian ones.
Hill spec ulates that his loose youth caught up
with him; syphilis seems a likely diagno sis of
the miserable symp toms that dogged his final
yea rs, put him in Bethl em not long after his
Wallpaper by Pugin for Captain Washington Hibbert; from th e book under review fortieth birthd ay, and fini shed him off a few
month s later, leaving a third wife and more
early I 840s, he wished passion ately to be era tion of Gothi c architects - the likes of small children. In his ow n lifetim e, he had got
onl y a Ca tholic architec t. One might say that George Gilbert Sco tt, G. E . Stree t, Willi am preciou s little recog nition. Hill illustrates
at thi s point his Disraeli an side resurfaced . Butte rfie ld - we re imp rovising their ow n ver- amply why this was , due not only to his cuss-
The times were propiti ou s. A se nse of social sions of the Goth ic. Ant iqu arian faithfulness edly idiosync ratic Catholicism, his temp estu-
di sorder amo ng the masses (trigge red by was giving way to interp ret ation. Pugi n ous personality, his nearly illiterate polemi cs,
Chartism inter alia), but also of fresh light s respond ed in kind . As ea rly as 1841 - 2, in a but also to the very oscillations between the
and new energy amo ng the elites, galvanized new edition of Contrasts, in his seco nd most poles of his compl ex aesthetic which wro ng-
all sor ts of dr eam y proj ect s. Disraeli showed celebrated stateme nt, The True Principles of footed eve n his best friend s. How puzzled
his own Disraeli an side to best advan tage at Pointed or Christian A rchitecture (1841 ), George Gilbert Sco tt mu st have been whe n
this junctu re, sloga neer ing ex travagantly on and in other writing, he had begun to shift proudl y bu ilding an Anglican church in
beh alf of his " Yo ung England" coterie for a his vocabulary aw ay fro m straightforward Ramsgate in pure Pugin style, authentically
newly chi valri c, newly nation ali st Tory ism. medieval ism toward s something more medieval, only to find that the Ca tho lic church
One of that coterie, Lord John M ann ers, was dir ectl y applica ble to the challenges of the Pugin was buildin g, a stone's throw away,
sa id at the tim e to be rather a "P ug inite", present , sympa thizing with the younge r ge n- was in the new Pugin style, muscular and
Puginit es were certa inly multiplying. As era tion's appetite for "plainness, simplicity, asy mmetr ica l, not medi eval at all. For a wide r
Trac tarians trickl ed over to the Rom an side seve rity" in a mod ern idiom. "The adjec tive publi c, it must have been eve n more confu s-
and the Churc h of Eng land see med to be ' natural', rather than 'Catholic ' or 'C hrist- ing. Whi ch was the true Pugin - the Ca tho lic
los ing its nerve, there was a little wave of ian ', applied to Go thic arc hitecture" , Hill or the Purit an? - eithe r wo uld do , but a puritan
Ca tholic triumphali sm in which Pugin says of P ug in ' s w riting in 184 2 , " w as ne w Ca tho lic, leaning now thi s way , now that, was
allowed himself to luxuriate. He had fo und and significa nt". Clea rly not yet full y present too hard to fathom .
his ow n Ca tholic princ e, the Earl of Shrews- in The True Principles of Pointed or Fatho ming Pugin is ju st what Rosem ary
bur y, for who m he design ed cathedrals and Chris tian A rchitecture, the new voca bulary Hill has done. She writes passion ately about
mo nasteries and worke d endless ly on another stresse d materi als, their "intrinsic qu aliti es" , a passion ate man, sympathetica lly about an
pa lace, Alt on Towe rs. Having moved to Ram - the ways in wh ich design co uld show them often unsympathetic one, always with fair-
sga te, Pugin built for him self anoth er " Ideal off or bring them out, and, by 1845, the ways ness as we ll as engageme nt. Her treatm ent of
Sche me" in wh ich his ow n villa stood at the in wh ich new building form s and new materi- the Pugin -Barr y relation ship , a min efi eld of
ce ntre of a medieval co mp lex of church and als could be brou ght together into "natural" prejudice and parti sanship , is exe mplary . Her
cloi ster. However , when he was in ramp ant crea tions that were also trul y mod ern . The architec tura l criticism see ms, to a 0 00-
moo d, he co uld make it diffi cult for others to rail way statio ns he enco untere d on a Co nti- spec ialist rea der, techni call y shar p, but mo st
be Puginites. He chose thi s mo ment to cham- nent al tour in that summer were , he wro te to imp ort antl y to that reader it co nsistently
pion the one arc hitectural detail that mo st Barr y, "beautiful - all con structive princi- co mes alive . To be sure, she gives the influ-
Prot estant s assoc iated with the wors t of ple" . " It was no w" , Hill concludes, "that he ence and the legac y shor t shrift, and some of
Ca tholicism - the rood scree n - that highl y began to be - in some res pec ts - what Pevs- Pugin ' s less admira ble associates may ge t
sym bo lic barri er between the priest in his ner might have called a prot ofun ction ali st" , mor e credit than they are due ; "benign" is
sanctuary and the co ngrega tion in the bod y of though he left littl e trace of thi s fin al ph ase the softening adjec tive that she applies
the chu rch . Th e Tractarian con verts were hor- and Pevsner based his judgement s on work quite fr equentl y to so me of the looni er neo-
rifi ed ; thi s was not the modern Ca tho lic and writing to which they we re less clearly feud alists of the day. But God's Arc hitect is,
Churc h which they thou ght they had joi ned. applicable. triumphantl y, a biography, not a "life and
But Pugi n was no mod ern Ca tho lic . To some extent, this last, exc iting shift in tim es" nor an architec tura l histor y (a nd yet
And yet, towards the end of his life, he Pugin ' s leanin gs was triggered by his sensitiv- eve n Hill ' s arc hitectura l hi story gives a fair
began to lean aga in in the other direction , ity to the new leadership needed by the estimate of Pevsner, ano ther notoriou s
back towards an alm ost purita nica l sim plic- yo unge r ge nera tion; he was also chafing (to min efield ). Fo r once , a lon g biogr aph y of a
ity. As Hill argues, the yo ung Pugin had put it mildl y) at his continuing subordination short life seems not a page too lon g - if any-
never reall y been the bald func tion ali st - the to Barr y on the Hou ses of Parliament project , thin g, too shor t, such are the plea sur es of life
precur sor of mod erni sm - that later mod ern- and at Barry ' s increasingly unreal use of his with her Pug in. It is almos t cert ainl y vas tly
ists so metimes imagin ed ; his loyalti es were Go thic ornament slapped onto a j arrin gly mor e pleas ura ble to live with Pugin throu gh
to the Middl e Ages, only incident all y func- unsymp athetic struc ture . But it is not fancifu l Rosemary Hill' s lucid and moving pro se than
tion ali st. In the late I 840 s, thou gh , she allows to co nnec t his shift with wider doubt s about to have had to live wi th the sem i-de range d
that his thin kin g had mo ved o n. A rising ge n- Rom anism , triggered by the ultram ont ane ten- sa ilor in real life.
TLS SEPTE MBER 14 20 0 7
14
The problem with MoMA
he Mu seum of Mod ern Art in New
T York once introduced thou sand s of
visitors from around the world to
the canon of Mod erni sm in the
visua l arts . Its door s on 53rd Stree t led to ga l-
leries filled with grea t works. In its tight ,
cro wded , gray spaces lay the fractur ed form s
of Pica sso' s " Still Life with Liqu eur Bottle"
and Braqu es "Still Life with Fan" . "The
Sleepin g Gypsy" by Henri Rou sseau pin-
ioned visitors as if they were lookin g at the
physical embodiment of a dream . The soft
watches of Salvador Dali' s "Persistence of
Mem ory" (currently at the Tat e Mod ern )
dripp ed and mes merized. The objec ts in
Mati sses "Red Studio" floated in a red sea ,
and Pica sso' s " Les Dem oiselles d' Avig non"
marked a point of breatht akin g sty listic syn-
thesis. Unknow n masterwork s also emerged,
such as Pavel Tchelitchew 's " Hide-and-
Seek " , in w hose tran slu cent childre n on e
could make out the traceries of vein and
muscle. Medardo Ro ssoss wax-covered plas-
ter faces lay in a case, and in the sculpture
garde n might be found "The River" by
Aristide Maillot and Rodin ' s Rosso -
influ enced "B alzac" .
Visitor s we re encountering the can on of
Modern Art. The paintings and sculptures
belonged to movem ent s that interacted with
each other : from Cubism, Fauvism and Sur-
rea lism , to Ab stract Express ionism. In 1929,
Alfred H. Barr , Jr, the founding Dir ector of
MoM A, had "c rea ted" this ca non and docu-
ment ed it in a famou s diagram which showed
the conn ections bet ween styles and move-
ment s. MoMA also defin ed the canon that
co ns tituted M od ern Architecture w ith it s fi rst
archit ectural show "Modern Architecture :
Intern ational Exhibition", in 1932.
The arrangeme nt of the ca non was clear
and powerful ; its works influ enced viewe rs,
arti sts, curators , critic s and patron s. But
influ ence is no simp le flow of ideas back
and forth . As Harold Bloom arg ued in The
Anxiety ofInfl uence (1973), it is a psychologi-
ca lly compl ex phenomenon . For poets to be
strong they must confront their predecessors'
works and only throu gh a crea tive misread-
ing of those wor ks ca n they find their own
voices. The job falls to the ephebe, the Ath e-
nian term for the "young citizen of poetr y" ,
who deals with influ enc e within a recogniza-
ble ca non. The degree to which artists ca n
find a so lutio n to thi s an xi et y det er min e s if
they will be strong or wea k poets.
Bloom' s canon in which influ enc e oper-
ated had star ted di sintegratin g by the time his
book appeared. Promot ers of what Bloom
called Ga llic-Germa nic theory, ideologues
for gender studies, and multi culturi sts had
not only Balk ani zed literary studies, but they
resent ed all hierarchi es of aes thetic value,
denied literary lineages, and reject ed sta nd-
ards of qu alit y. As the study of dead white
men had ove rdetermined race, class and
gender in the suppress ion of the exploited
masses, the new literary criti cs would discu ss
Jetti soning the canon of what counts as Modern Art is easy :
revising it is rife with peril
A NTHONY ALO FSI N
qualit y, if menti oned at all, as only relati ve:
hip-hop and a Shakes pea rean sonnet had
equal value, and all cultures played on a level
field . As in literatur e, so in the visual arts: out
with sty les, ism s, ord er and the value systems
that supported them . Bloom respond ed by
writing a howlin g defence of the grea t works
of literatur e, in The Western Canon (1993).
MoMA respond ed with doubt and confu sion .
Postmod ern critics had declared that Modern-
ism was a historical phenomenon with a
beginnin g and an end, which meant that
MoMA had to figur e out what it was and
what its futu re would be. Would it henceforth
enshrine a histor y of Moderni sm, or wo uld it
bec ome a gallery for contemporary art? In
Gosprom Building, Kharkov, Ukraine, 1929
ord er to decid e, MoMA would have to assess
the nature and con sequ ences of its own histor-
ical influenc e. Bloo m had warne d, "The anxi-
ety of influ enc e crippl es wea ker talent s but
stim ula tes canonical ge nius" . Ar ound the
yea r 2000, as it contemplated in a series of
experimental exhibitions how to occupy a
vas t, planned expa nsion of its site, MoMA
opted to have it both ways : to be at once
Mo dern and cont empor ary.
By Nove mber 2004 , MoMA had a big
place to work out the differences between
Mod ern and contemporary art. Nearly dou-
bled in size to 630,000 square feet, the new
building had swa llowed the old galleries , and
the only fam iliar referenc e point was the
sculpture court. Where there had been a single
entrance on 53rd Street, there were now two
TLS S E PT EMB E R 14 20 0 7
entrances , one still on 53rd, next to a large
book- and- gift shop, and the other throu gh the
block on 54th Street. No fanf are greets the vis-
itor look ing for the great paintin gs and sculp-
ture of Mod erni sm, but a floor plan indicates
that they are located in the perm anent collec-
tions on the fifth and fourth levels. The rest of
the buildin g consists of two basement s with
theatres; the lobb y for ticketin g and cro wd
control; the seco nd floor , which hou ses con-
temporary art, print s, illustrated book s and a
"media gallery", and has perm anentl y in its
vas t open, cubi c space Barn ett New man's
"Broken Obelisk" ; the third floor , which
hold s the architecture and design galleries,
photograph y, and special exhibitions; and the
sixth floor , with wide and tall spaces reserved
for more specia l exhibitions.
On the fifth floor , the visitor in search of
modern masterwork s enters a suite of galler-
ies, each identifi ed on ly by a sma ll numb er.
The sequence begin s with the paintin gs of
Ce za nnc and Pic asso and continues w ith art-
ists including Klimt , Matisse, de Chirico,
Malevich and Duch amp . Eve ntua lly the
visitor find s M on et ' s famous water lilies
("Refl ection s of Clouds on the Water-Lil y
Pond ") hun g on the long side of a rectangle;
and though the curat ors reinstalled them after
an outcry about the initial hang, their arrange-
ment still doesn't give the visitor enough
room to take in their panor ami c scope. After
passin g through a gallery of Surr ealist paint-
ings from the I 920 s, the sequence jumps
back in time to conclude with M atisses
"Dance (I )" (1909) in a stairwe ll. Mati sses
vibrant blu e, green and flesh-pink paintin g
was originall y intend ed to hang in a stairwell,
but takin g the stairs do wn to the fourth level
to continue the tour of modern masterpi eces
turn s out to be a mistake. Instead of findin g
any continuation from above, the visitor
land s in front of Richard Diebenkorn ' s paint-
ings from the 1960 s. Perhap s the di slocation
in time is delib erate, but it is better to exit
Level Five and take the escalator to Four,
where the chronologic al sequence more or
less recomm ences with Arshile Gork y' s paint-
ing and works from the I 940s. The follo win g
room s contain paintin gs by artists such as
Pollock, Rothk o, Stella, Rausche nberg and
Judd . The sequence concludes in Gallery 25
with some examples of Op art from the 1970s.
Mo st of the great paintings of the canon of
Modern Art are still there somew here, but
makin g sense of them and of their relation-
ship to each other would challe nge most visi-
tors. Some critic s argue that today ' s curator s,
operatin g in an age of cultural relativism,
have the right - eve n the obligation - to pro-
pose new, multipl e ways of lookin g at the
history of art. In this sce nario, a random
wa nder throu gh the ga lleries allows visitors
to con struct a do-it- your self version of the
history of Mod ern Art. This is plur alism at
large; take any path you wa nt and invent
meanings as you please. The experience
cou ld be liberating, but in the curr ent installa-
tion many may find onl y incoh erenc e. Any
sense of the coeval and con secuti ve nature of
artistic movement s has disappeared . The cur-
rent installation defamili ariz es the paintin gs
and gives the impr ession that arti sts did not
compete with each oth er , copy. tr an sform and
refut e; that influenc e and its burd en s never
existed . Understanding these great paintin gs
as represe nting the histor y of Mod ern Art is
now dependent on an a priori familiarity with
that histor y, which few people possess, or on
a particularly inform ati ve acoustiguide .
Alth ough MoMA wa nts to have it both
ways - retainin g the Modern and champion-
ing the new - the Mod erni sts are , in fact,
winning the day as can been see n in the
recent retro spect ive , "Richard Serra , Scu lp-
ture: Forty Years" (rev iewe d in the TLS, Ju ly
6). Describing the maker of the se vast cur v-
ing arcs of rust-coloured steel, Mich ae l
Kimmel man , chief art critic of the New York
Times, called Serra "one of the last great Mod-
ernists in an age of minor talents, mad money
and so much mea ningless art" . Serra 's awe-
inspirin g abstract work is perfectly at home
on the big second and sixth floor s, and in
the mu seum ' s sculpture gar den. Walkin g
through and around these objects makes the
bod y feel heavy, and alters one ' s physical per-
cepti ons of sound and space. Serr a' s works
induc e a sombre, medit ati ve state regardl ess
of the cro wd s surrounding them . Taken as a
whole, their present ation should accomplish
what onl y a museum ca n do and onl y at its
best: the brin ging togeth er of di sparat e works
into a tran scend ent whole. But the curator s

presen t the long trajectory of Serra's work as
disconnected from the Mod ernist con text of
abstrac tion whence it sprang, with no refer-
ences to who or what influenced him. Visi-
tors with good memories will spot the connec-
tion s betw een Joseph Beuyss layers of felt ,
on the fourth floor , and Serr a' s layers of lead
on the sixth. The less retentive will not.
After disassemb ling the old canon of
mod ern painting and sculpture , MoMA
recent ly attempted to revise the can on of
Mod ern Architecture formu lated in its 1932
International Style exhibition. Th e original
organizers, Barr, Henr y-Ru ssell Hitchcock ,
Ph ilip John son and Lewis Mumford, had
featured a striking set of images of flat-
roofed , planar buildings, as we ll as mod els,
that see med to parallel deve lopments in
Mod ern Art . A catalogu e, Mod ern A rchi-
tects, docum ented the exhibition, and a book,
The International Style since 1922, foll owed
shortly thereaft er. The exhibition was
definitive; its dri ving forc e, Philip John son ,
became from that point on the high priest of
archit ecture at MoMA .
MoMA' s canon of Modern Archit ecture
had an immediate appe al. Its images were
abstract, they were new in a new museum , and
in the middl e of the Depression in Am erica
they offered some hope of a break with a past
that had resulted in materi al and spiritual
despair. But the canon as an embodiment of
actual modern architectural practic e was prob-
lematic . The style con stituted as fresh and
alive for Am erican s was already moribund in
Europe and the subject of revision by its major
propon ents, particularl y Le Corbusier; the
curators jettisoned the politic al agend a of the
Modern Mo vement in Europe and presented
its bui ldings as form al object s - only Mum-
ford' s section on housing hinted at a social pro-
gramm e; and the monochrome arrangement of
works, often without indicati ons of real sites,
reduc ed buildings to graphics that floated free
of colour, texture, detail and cont ext.
MoMA ' s recent exhibition, 75 Years of
Architectural Collecting (which clo sed on
Jun e 18), claim ed not on ly to identify and to
celebr ate changin g patterns of coll ecting, but
to correct omi ssion s institut ed by the 1932
International Styl e show . Th e curator of such
an eve nt had , of necessity, to con sider the
Miltonian influence of Philip John son , who
died in 2005 at the age of ninety-eight. And
the man allotted that task was Barry
Bergdoll, who se profession al title is Philip
John son Chief Curator of Architecture and
Design and whose exhibitions spaces are
called coll ecti vely the Phi lip John son Archi-
tecture and Design Galleries. Bergdoll, a
specialist in nineteenth-century French and
German architec ture, eo-organiz ed a Mies
van der Roh e retrospecti ve at MoMA and is a
professor of art histor y at Columbia Univer-
sity. He maintain s that the International Style
canon made sever al spec ific omissions, and
to redr ess them he organized his show , with
the extensive participation of his students, in
four sections: the art of dra win g, which occu-
pied almost half the gallery; visionary archi-
tecture, which con sisted of unbuilt project s;
urbani sm ; and "other mod erni sm s" which
included express ionism and organic styles .
Th e objects on di splay we re mostly graphic
works from architects such as Mies van der
Roh e, Le Corbusier, Marcel Breuer and a
sma ttering of livin g ce lebriti es, along with
eight models and one illu strated book.
COMMENTARY 15
Bergdoll' s exhibition succeeded in explain- national Style had sanctioned functionalism . corr ectn ess. Aesthetic deli ght is a good thin g,
ing its dra win gs and mod els. It pro vided For a brief mom ent , architecture moved but it has limits, particul arly where archit ec-
informative narrati ve text labels. The draw- ahea d of other field s in the articul ation of ture is conc erned . The emph asis on the art of
ings them selves were hand some and in good postmoderni sm. dra wing in the anni ver sary exhibition
taste. And the show also inad vertentl y empha- The anniversary archit ectural exhibition smacked of a conn oisseur ship quit e distant
sized the important cur atori al role played by cont ained so me new materi al - little-kn own from contemp orary archit ectural issues with
Arthur Drexler, a form er Director of the drawin gs and projects by Marcel Breuer and their focu s on the physical and material acts
Departm ent of Architecture and Design, who Buckminster Fuller , for exa mple - but the of building. (The subje ct was architecture , so
in the 1960s had begun to expa nd the ortho- fund am ental corr ections to the canon that the why not emphasize the art of constructi on?)
dox John sonian canon. Working in the show present ed as fresh and innov ative were Self-congratu lator y when it should have been
penumbra of John son , Drexler (1925 - 87) , a neith er: the y had been made long ago. probin g, the show glo ssed over the very
dr y, thoughtful and unglamo rou s man, ini- Drexler began the revi sion in the 1960 s by categori es it proffered for revision . Bergdoll
tially toed the offici al line: his sma ll exhibi- including visionary and organic archit ectu re, con sidered ex pressionism and organici sm in
tion , Build ings f or Business and Governmen t and durin g the past thirt y yea rs historians and superficial aes thetic term s, whereas the griev-
(1957 ), not onl y confirmed the glass-bo x sky- scholars have made exten sive emendations ous fault of the International Style approach
scraper as the ultimate Moderni st icon , but and additions. The histor y of Mod ern Arch i- was preci sel y its obsess ion with visual style
made the buildings exhibited therein the mod- tecture now reach es far beyond expression- to the exclu sion of the social and political
els for hundred s, if not thou sand s, of sky- ism, organicism and urbani sm to include age nda of its functionali st archit ecture. Man y
scra per design s that follo wed. Omitted from developments of man y Mod erni sm s, region- critics have long regretted the omi ssion of
the anniversary exhibiti on, this little displ ay ally and globa lly, from Central Europe, the political and soc ial base of Mod erni sm
was, as Drexler indic ated in an unpublished Afric a, Asia, South Am erica and the entire at MoMA in ge neral: refin ed aesthetics tend s
interview in the late 1970s, his most impor- third world . In the second edition of the Inter- to obliterate such cont ent. Too messy, too
tant show . Am ong the other exhibitions he national Style book (1966), Hitchcock had uncomfortable.
produced wer e Visionary A rchitecture ( 1960) already conc eded the style's reductive One might say that the ephebes of MoMA
and The New City: A rchitectural design and approach. John son eve n sought to rev ise the have dealt with the anxiety of influ enc e
urban renewa l (1967). Drexler also curated revision s: as postmodern architecture lost its either by regressing into the past to avoid the
the A rchitecture of the Ecole des Beaux Art s glamour by tricklin g do wn into the hand s of futur e, or by ignorin g the present in an act of
(1975) . The anniversa ry exhib ition prai sed mund ane practitioners, he attempted to self-repress ion. In either condition, the bene-
the latter for refocu sing archit ecture on draw- defin e a new avant-garde , in 1988, with fits of creati ve misint erpr etation and cath ar-
ing, but failed to estimate its more important Deconstructivist A rchitecture. The effort to sis are absent. Its curators do not emerge as
impa ct on theor y and practic e. For at a stroke make a new movem ent fiz zled, so John son strong poet s. In addition, MoMA ' s predica-
the Beaux Art s exhibition repudiated the turn ed to amplifying the star sys tem that was ment highli ght s the broad er issue s of what it
anti-hi storic al approach and voided the tran sforming architects into celebri ties. means to have a canon , to revise one, or to
abstraction MoMA had prop agated for forty Despit e the spin in New York about the move on . Co nviction turn s out to be the key
yea rs; sudde nly architecture could have his- freshness of Bergdoll' s 75 Years of A rchitec- fact or. Harold Bloom oo zes con victi on eve n
toric al referenc e, colour, symbolism and nar- tural Collecting and its "resonant" installa- when he kno ws he is fighting a losing battl e,
rati ve. MoMA , with the ironic blessing of tion , the critic al apparatus at work was or when the battle is lost. A canon cannot be
John son (Drexler ' s gray emin enc e, after all), largely a fram e for a show of pretty imag es sustained without belief , and the effort to
sanctioned postmodernism ju st as Inter- that con stitut ed their own bod y of politi cal retain one without con viction leads to di sas-
ter. For Bloom it is esse ntial: "Without the
Canon, we cease to think ".
Jetti sonin g a canon is easy, but revising
A Birthmother's Catechism one is perilous. The situation is not hop eless:
indi viduals and institutions have choic es. We
(September 11. 1986) can muddl e along, repressing the anxiety of
influ enc e, ignoring issues of identit y and
comp etin g with all the other cu ltural institu-
What is the annive rsa ry of los s ? tion s as purveyor s, and buyers, o f such com -
moditie s as qualify for status in the market-
A national da y of mourning
plac e. Thi s comp etition will get incre asin gly
Really no w. what is the anniversa ry of loss ? ex pensive as museum s vie for the same
She outstretched her arms as though she might float do wn to her works from the same maker s. We can recla im
death like a feath er the Mod ern canon , pre serve it and present it
as a counterforce to cultural relati vism . (This
What is the anniversary of loss ?
is the Bloomian ideal.) Or we can accept con-
My moth er and I watch TV well past her usual bedt ime temporary contradictions and create a new
What is the annive rsary of loss ? critical model that scrutinizes cultural relati v-
ism itself, posing the very questions it as ked
Where the swa ns nest had been, wide ly scattered branches and
of Mod erni sm, but this time put more deepl y,
some crumpled beer cans more sce ptically : why indeed do books and
What is the anniversary of loss ? art have value, at what costs are they made
Sometimes the melancholy arr ives befor e the rem emb erin g and con sum ed , and who benefit s from them ,
not ju st as individuals or institutions but in
What is the anniversary of loss ?
society as a wh ole?
Som e believe it is impo ssib le to spend too much on the memorial
What is the anniversary of loss ? A Comprehensive Georgian-English Dictionary
When I say sometimes the melanchol y com es first, I kno w the bod y editedby a tearnheadedby DonaldRayfield
has its own memory 2 vols, xl + 1727 pp., 140,000 entries - every
What is the anniversary of loss ? word in the Georgian language, ancient, modem,
literary, colloquial or dialectal. Essential for
The wishbo ne snapped, and I clun g to the sma ller piece work in Georgia, in Byzantine or Soviet studies.
What is the annive rsary of loss ?
£75.00 (plus p&p): Garnet! Press, Dpt of Rus-
A catechi sm that stops and starts but never ends sian, SML, Queen Mary University of London,
MileEndRd, London El 4NS.
CARRI E E T T E R Orders and queries: d.rayfield@qmuLac.uk
TLS SEP TE M BER 14 200 7
16
t a dinner recently I was sitt ing next
A to a French woman named Solange
who had ju st moved to New York .
She wan ted to know if I was familiar with
"the ea rly twentieth- century Am er ican novel-
ist Levenson", She co uldn' t remember the
writer 's first name nor how to spe ll his last
name, nor the title of the nove l tha t in every
othe r resp ec t "has staye d in my head for
years" . I wondered if she was thinking of
Abra ham Cahan's novel The Rise of David
Levinsky (19 17) - abo ut a self-made garme nt
industry tycoon - and had confused the name
in the title with that of the author. "No, no" ,
said Solange in her heavily accent ed Eng lish.
"This is the story of a miserable marriage.
I' ve been ask ing American s abo ut Leven son
since I arrived here, but no one I talk to has
any idea who he is." She infor med me that in
Fra nce the novel was known as a cr itique of
A merican moral hypocrisy. "Antonin Arta ud
admired it. So did G ide . It' s still in print. I
wish I co uld tell you more."
The following morning I did a Web search,
and only one rem otely viable ca ndidate
turn ed up: Sam Levenson, the stand-up come -
dian and writer who lived dow n the street
fro m me in Rockaway when I was a boy. He
was our neighb ourh ood celebrity, with his
ow n radio show on CBS . Am ong Leven son' s
books in my famil y library we re Anything
But Mone y, Sex and the Single Child and You
Don 't Have To Be in Who's Who To Know
What 's What . He had grow n up in an Eas t
Harlem tenem ent, and the basis of his
co medy routine was the anx iety that acco mpa-
nied his ge nera tion 's swift rise from poverty
to the mid dle class. Accordin g to Leven son ,
Freud and the new " Kindergarc hy" in which
children we re the trib al rulers had destroyed
IN NEXT WEEK'S
Niall Ferguson
What Hitler
decided
James M. Murphy
Tenet' s tales from
the CIA
Alex de Waal
Why the poor stay
poor
John Rogister
A French extremist
COMMENTARY
FREELANCE
MI CH A EL GR E E NB ERG
the natura l order. His lost mythic hero was
"Mama" who could "thread a needle in the
dar k with one hand, tie a knot with her teeth,
and chop mea t with her free hand". Ma ma
hated dirt and tore throu gh her chi ldren 's
scalps "with a horse bru sh soaked in naphtha
soap"; to kill lice she added kerosene. I
fondly rem emb er his story about the time he
brou ght a narcissus bulb home from schoo l
as a boy. "A n uncl e gra ted it and ate it with
sardines ." Co uld this man have written the
desperate novel about marr iage that Solange
descr ibed?
When I was eigh t or nine, I broke Leven-
son' s parlour window while playing stoop
ball. He rushed out of the house, a round-
faced man wea ring a bow tie and thick wire-
rimm ed glasses, followed by his rotund wife
whom I had often heard him describe as " my
childhoo d sweetheart" . I could sense that he
felt obligated to give me a lecture that I
wo uldn' t forget, and at the sa me time I could
make out his rising am use me nt. After show-
ing me the damage I had caused, he held up
my ball , led me into the kitchen and chopped
it in half with a cleaver.
The next step in my investigation was to
go to Es ther Schor , a professor of English at
Prin ceton, and she guesse d straight away that
the writer was Ludwig Lewisohn. "Spoken
with a French acce nt the name could eas ily
sound like Leven son ", she explained. Schor
hadn 't read him and couldn' t thin k of anyone
she knew who had. "All I can tell you is that
TLS October 19 1990
Canadian Short Stories
Michael Ondaatje's most recent novel, about the tragedy of the Air India bomb.
Divisadero , is reviewed on page 19. We look
back to Chris tine Bold 's review of The Faber antho logy with an age nda. Its them atic
Boo k of Co nte mporary Canadian Shor t shape is sugges ted by the two stories that
Storie s, edited by Ondaatje, from the TLS of bracket the vol ume , both by the Nova Sco -
Octob er 19, 1990. To read this in f ull, go to tian wri ter Alistair MacL eod. They reach
www.t he -tls.co.uk
n the curren t politi cal cl imate - with
I Cana da rive n by ancient antago nism s ney to the treacherou s territor y of memory
bet ween English and Fre nch, wh ite and
nati ve, " mainstream" and " m arginal" -
Michael Ondaatjes anthology carr ies the
welco me message that ethnic di versity
eq ua ls cultural richn ess. His hu ge collec tion in Anne Heb ert ' x ev oca tive retelling of th e
of forty-nin e pieces incorporates voices
from the Mar itime s to Va ncouve r Island
and up to the Arc tic: Cana dian voices
accented by nati ve, black , French, Carib-
bean, Indi an, Japanese and Ang lo-Saxon
origins . .. . For the intern ational audi ence
there will be new names: along side the
famili ar Margaret Atwood, Mord ec ai Rich-
ler, Margaret Laurence, Mavis Ga llan t and
Alice Munro appea r Dionn e Bra nd, Sandra
Birdse ll, David Adams Richard s and Jack
Hodgins, who are widely adm ired in Can -
ada but less readily recog nized overseas.
TL S SEPTEMBER 14 20 0 7
he publ ished fo rty books , most of them
bet ween the First and Sec ond World Wa rs,
and that he had a homo sexual affair with
Geor ge Viereck, who spent four years in a
federal priso n for co nsp iring with the Naz is.
Princeto n ow ns their love letters."
Lew isohn' s affair with Viereck took place
while they we re both students at Co lumbia,
arou nd 1904 . Vierec k was the one to break it
off, at exactly the mome nt when Lewisohn ' s
graduate thesis was rejec ted and two of his
professors warned him that no A merican
university would hire a Jew to teach English.
Shortly thereafter, Lewisohn married a woman
twenty years older than he was and already a
grandmother. He wrote of the marriage in The
Case of Mr Crump, the novel, I was able to
asce rtain with a phone call to Solange, that she
had spoken to me about at dinner.
I track ed dow n a copy of the nove l, which
arrive d in the mail with a blurb on the cover
from Sigmund Fre ud - "an incomp arable
masterpiece" - and a preface , written in
1931, by Thomas Mann. Manu ' s cry ptic
praise for the boo k only serve d to sharpen my
expectations. "It is more and less than a
novel" , M ann w rites : " it is co ncre te and
und reamed realit y and its artistic silence
see ms .. . like a cry."
The book ' s obsc urity in the US see med to
be mainly the fault of its unusual publi shin g
histor y. In 1926, Edward T itus, an Amer ica n
patron of ava nt-ga rde literatur e, brou ght out
an English ed ition of The Case of Mr Crump
in Paris. The threat of a libel suit from
Lewi sohn' s estranged wife, however, pre-
Even for the home audience, Ond aatje has
un co ver ed gems in unlikel y p laces, from
Glenn Go ulds "comic deconstru cti on " of
Petula Clark to Bharati Mukherj ee' s fiction
For all the comp lex variety, this is an
back poetically to the Gae lic mythology
which echoe s through the frac tured lives of
modern Cana dians. Many of the stories jour-
and histor y, see king the key which knit s
together or at least explains the present cir-
cumsta nces of a famil y, a co mmunity or a
nation. A potent image of the pas t appea rs
peopling of Quebec, as she focuses on one
of the marr iagea ble girls sent ove r from
Fra nce who failed to survive her first winter
in the New World; and a similar dedi cat ion
to makin g the past spea k, however unpalata-
bly, mot ivates Leon Rookes poor white pro-
tagonist on her painfull y comic quest for
her backwood s dadd y and Keath Frasers
dy ing Ca nadian journalist in her retracing
of the romantic upbrin ging which led her to
the stinking tortur e chambers of Cambodia.
In Ondaatjes words, "The pas t is still, for
us, a place that is not yet safely settled." A
vented the book from bein g so ld in the US
until 1947. When it did appea r in Ame rica,
reviews were respectful , and the novel
slipped into oblivio n, exce pt for an abrid ged
mass paperback version, retitl ed The Tyrann y
of Sex , which sold more than a milli on
copies, but did nothing to help the novel' s
litera ry reput ation.
Reading it, I rea lized at once that it was
Lewisohn' s swo llen late Victorian style that
had doomed the novel' s prospects in Am er-
ica. "Their feebl e bumptiousness only
revea led more gro tesquely their inner supine-
ness" , goes a typical sentence . Several refer-
ences are made to the protago nist's "heavenly
intoxicatin g ichor". When Lewisohn breaks
free of this tone, a jarring rea lism takes over ,
driven by Cr ump 's infern ally detailed hatred
of his wife. I und erstood what had lingered in
Solanges head - the kind of to-th e-death
animu s you find in Strindberg. "Did he have to
sit still and let the mud of her seep and splash
and ooze and poiso n and chok e all things
decent and kindl y and not ignobl e and of goo d
report?" Lewisohn' s bad luck was to be born
fifteen year s before the Lost Generation,
whose writers would make his prose instantly
obso lete. It must read better in French.
I felt disappoi nted, and oddl y sad for the
fort y books Lewisohn had publ ished : fifteen
works of fiction, and several volumes of auto-
biograph y and criticism, as well as ess ays
again st the stra nglehold of the Anglo-Saxo n
intellectu al aristocracy, as Lewisohn saw it,
and the sex ual repression of purita nism - a
consciousness that pa instakingly record ed
itself , and then disappeared .
A co uple of days later, one of Sam
Le ven son' s books arrived in the ma il. In One
Era Out the Other , it' s ca lled .
numb er of these works are not, techni call y,
short stor ies : there are exce rpts from well-
know n novels, autobiographica l essays,
even a speec h by a native Gra nd Ch ief to
the Royal Co mmissi on on the Northern
Env iro nmen t. But " story" is at th e heart of
all these writings , with character s recur-
ren tly reconstru ctin g the narrati ves cru cial
to their per sonal and communal identit y.
Joy Kogawa ' s Nise i narrator, already
impressed by her inescapable heritage when
she is interned du ring the Seco nd Wor ld
War, begins to gras p the still darker
co mplex ities of her ma ke-up when she
rea ds a letter describing the slow , ago nizing
death of her mother at Nagasaki. The voice
in Alice French's memo ir of Inuit girlhood
chants:
Listen, listen my children, And I'll tell you a
story of where I was born and where I grew up.
About your ancestors and the land we lived on.
About the animals and the birds. So you can see.
With thi s e m phas is, the vo lume int er ven es in
a debate raging in the Canadia n arti stic com -
munity: the right of peopl es - visible minor-
ities - to tell their ow n stories, rather than
see them appro priated by writers belon gin g
to the domin ant culture .
Ondaatjes selection takes that danger
seriously: many of these writers dram atize
the ways in which colonization of one race,
class or gender by another erases a peopl e ' s
language, names and me mor ies . .. . But
the volume also sugge sts that the conflict
is not as simple as the debate at times
implies . .. .

Exquisite turbulence
JU D IT H FL AN DE RS
MAS QUERA DE
The art of l ames Ensor
Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight,
untilSeptember 22
he artist sta nds in typical nine-
T teenth-century three-qu arter burger-
lich pose, dapper down to the hank y
in his breast pocket, jutting elbow,
ches t puffed out. The style of the etching is
precise, careful - one would say lifelik e,
exce pt that dea th-like is nearer the mark, as
the carefully cult ivated , slightly-too-Iong
hair that indic ates the artist surrounds a face
that has been flayed , the flesh remo ved to
expose the skull beneath the skin. The natty
suit is now a grotesq ue joke, all that' s left
whe n death passe s over.
James Ensor is an oddity, not full y belong-
ing to any schoo l, foll owin g no one and
having no foll ower s. Born in Ostend in 1860,
in the newly crea ted Belgiu m, to an English
father and Belgian moth er, Ensor was the
insid er-outsider par exce llence . He rarely left
Belgiu m, and hardl y eve r ventured out of
Ostend . His moth er came from a famil y of
sma ll merchant s, makin g a living selling sou-
venirs to seas ide visitors ; his English father,
who he claim ed spoke several languages and
had studied medi cin e in Heid elberg, was an
out-of-work engineer, an alcoholic who in
1887 was found dead in a door way.
Death was no stranger to Enso r. In his dry-
point of 1888, "My Dead Father" , Ensor Sr is
co nventiona lly depi cted, calm and peaceful
on the deathbed he did not actually have.
Eve n befor e that, Ensor knew Ostend as a
place much possessed by death; in the seve n-
teenth century, the town speople endured a
formid able siege : more than 150,000 peopl e
died, and their skeletal rem ains continu ed to
be found we ll into the twenti eth ce ntury . In
the 1890s, a series of comic photograph s
shows Ensor and his friend Ernes t Rou sseau
Jr posin g with bones on the beach : arm bones
clut ch at living flesh or substitute for swords
in mock duels on the same sands where
ear lier battles had been fought in realit y.
Thi s whimsica lity , these acts of crea tion
throu gh elements of destru ction, are charac -
teri stic of Ensor. There is a fine line between
playfuln ess and malice, and then bet ween
ma lice and vitriol. Enso r con stantl y blurr ed
that line, as he blurr ed the line separating real
from imaginary, public from private, reli-
gious from politic al. Thi s shifting bet ween
the real world and fanta sy is how he created
his art of the domestic macabre, a kind of
ghos tly Gemiitlichkeit .
Ensors con ventional art trainin g was mini-
mal. After two yea rs at the Academi c Royal e
des Beaux-Art s in Bru ssels, he return ed to
Ostend and his mother ' s shop, setting up a
studio in the attic, and more or less never left
home aga in. Despit e this appea rance of
James Ensor' s cheerful torments
"Old Lady with Masks" (1888)
retr eat, the late 1870s her alded the fir st flow- adopting etching as a means of express ion" .
ering of his originality. By 1883 his palette Not onl y death in pictures, but the death of
had lightened under the influ enc e of Impr es- pictures was a constant preoccup ation .
sionism, and then light ened furth er , tow ard s The fir st etching, "The Cathedral" (1886 ),
the bright, flat Flemish col our s of Fauvism. is alrea dy co mplete with leitmotifs, parti cu-
That same yea r he join ed nineteen other larly the massed cro wd s, here plac ed in criss-
ava nt-ga rde Bel gians to create Les XX; their cro ssing composition al lines that butt up
exhibitions includ ed works by Gauguin , aga inst the pictori al surface, while the cathe-
Ceza nne, Seurat, Va n Gogh and Toul ouse- dra l itself, ostensibly made of less epheme ral
Lautr ec . To the end of the century Ensor stone, see ms to dissol ve in a Remb randtian
pour ed out wor k that enca psulated many of light. A second of Enso r's preoccupation s
the movement s of the avan t-ga rde, and yet he appeared in another print that sa me yea r:
rem ained isolated . "Ecce Homo" (ca lled at the Lady Lever
It may be this lack of belon ging that has "Christ Mocked" ). Christ here is naked , as he
ensured Ensor has had relatively few exhibi- was traditi onally paint ed in Netherla ndish art
tions; Masquerade: The art ofl ames Ensor at of the seve ntee nth ce ntury, and so me of the
the Lady Lever Art Gallery, organized in onlookers have mask-like, Brueghelish faces.
conjunction with the Mu seum of Fine Arts in Mask s we re fashionable in fin- de-siecle art,
Ghent, is therefor e especially welcome. On but Ensor took the fashion and used it for
display is a single paintin g, three drawin gs deepl y person al ends : "With my pur suer s
and thirt y engrav ings , nearly a quart er of all clo se upon my heels I happil y incarc erated
the engravings Ensor produc ed . While Ensor myself in a solitary land of bant erin g mirth in
worked for more than seve n decad es, his great which the mask , wholly made up of violence,
work dat es roughl y fro m 1877 to 1899, and he light and brilli ance, hold s sway . The mask
made no engravi ngs after 1904 . He exhibited mean s to me: freshness of tone ... exquisite
with Les XX between 1884 and 1893, with turbul enc e" . Th is series of see ming contradic-
each exhibition seeing a furth er declin e in his tion s in fact produces a startling coh erenc e in
reput ation, until his annus horribilis of 1888, the work itself , per mittin g Ensor , the good
when all his submissions were reject ed . Long bour geoi s, to express hi s hostilit y - personal,
befor e, in 1866, Ensor wrote, "Ideas of politi cal and cultural.
surviva l haunt me. Perishable pictori al And there was no lack of hostilit y to
material upsets me; I dread the fragilit y of express . "Le Pisseur" (18 87) is ba sed on a
paintin g. I want to survive, and I think of solid seve ntee nth-ce ntury drawin g by Jacqu es
copp er plates, or unalterabl e inks, of easy Ca llot and also, it is imp ossib le to doubt,
reprodu ctions, of faithful printin g, and I am Bru ssels' s famou s Manneken Pis. A man
TLS S EPT EMB E R 14 20 0 7
17
pisses against a wall , which carries a scribble
of a man wa lking a dog and the graffito
inscripti on: "Ensor est un fou" . It was a child-
ish respon se to his critic s. Less simple was
his dra win g of the yea r befor e, "Calvary", in
which the cross bears a label namin g the sacri-
ficed son of God as "ENSOR" him self , whil e
the lanc e of the so ldier piercing his side car-
ries a bann er inscrib ed "Fe tis" , the nam e of
his most virulent critic . In 1898, Ensor
return ed to the subjec t, with " Demons Perse-
cutin g Me" , a co lour ed etching of the artist
surro unded by spirits, supposedly malevo-
lent , but actua lly rather swee tly comic .
The savagery is ever-prese nt, an almos t
palp abl e swe ll of rage against his criti cs, his
famil y, the masses, the right- win g gove rn-
ment. "Doctrinal Nourishme nt, Bel gium in
1889" shows King Leop old 11, a bishop , a
so ldier, a jud ge and a nun sitting with their
hack s to the masses, hare-arsed as they shit
on the popul ace belo w, who eagerly turn up
their faces, mout hs open . His feelin gs about
women we re similarly visceral:
Sexe trornpeu r, sans foi ni loi . / gouffre
d'h ypocrisie / . . . bouclier de malice / . . . bete
gr iffue a suco irs, aux canines carnass ieres / .
girouette grincant a tous les vents mau vais / . ..
masque co nstant et sourire sans fin. (Dece itful
sex, without fait h or morals, a pit of malice, a
beast with claws and suckers, with flesh-eating
fangs, a weather-c oc k crea king at every ill
wind, a constant mask and endless smile.)
In the single can vas on displa y, "Old Lady
with Masks" (1888 ), a haggard , jo wly
woman is surrounded by grotesques. The cap-
tion at the Lady Lever says that this was a por-
trait commission fr om the " pro letaria n"
writer Neel Doff, but that when she rejected
it, Ensor disfigur ed the ori ginall y attra ctive
likeness and added the masked figu res. (A
hand-out next to the disp lay gives a more
nuanc ed readin g, and sugges ts that this is
probably an apocrypha l tale.) Whatever the
case, and whoev er the origin al, the paintin g
was clearly not sym pathetica lly conc eived .
In the bal anc e are a number of pr ints that
put a different face to Ensor's misanthropy.
In "Death Pursu ing the Hum an Herd" ( 1896),
the crowd pour s do wn a street while Death ,
with a scythe, flies overhead . Each per son is
out to save onl y him- or her self , except for
one solitary figur e, prominentl y at the front ,
a woman who strugg les to save her baby.
De ath is the sa me figure as in medi e val
Dance of Death engrav ings, but with the addi-
tion of an almos t charming grin on hi s face;
he is terrorizing the cro wd s, not the viewe r.
Ensor's me me nto mor i ar e , in fa ct , almos t
always cheery. In "The Haunt ed Wardrobe"
(18 88), a skeleton peers out from the side of a
wardrobe, gesturing towards a man in the cor-
ner. It may be that Ensor intended a Rom an-
tic ges ture, Death reminding the living, " You
will follo w me" ; what he ended up with, how-
ever , was a skeleton giving a chipp er wave to
a sma ll ectoplasmic appurte nance that sits on
the man' s shoulder. Onl y the lizard at the
18
foo t of the wardrobe is a rem inder of Last
Things, harking back to Bosc h's " Seven
Dead ly Sins", where Pride lurks behind a
wardrobe, its demo n's tail the giveaway.
"Skeletons Trying To War m Themselves "
(1898; cap tioned by the Lady Lever as
"Warmth-seeking Skelet ons", which makes
them sound like missiles) is another depi c-
tion of chirpy reven ant s: a gro up of skeletons
gather aro und an unlit stove, while a lamp
that has burnt out reinforces the traditional
sym bolism of truth extinguished . But they
are on ly play-act ing: the skeleto n at the foot
of the stove is a paint-rag and a pa lette,
barely a bod y at all; items of cl oth ing co me
from the music hall: the huge hat on the tiny
head, the big boots with the upturn ed toes.
Their pos tures add to the air of pleasant
co mpan ionship: one skeleton pop s his head
aro und the door as if to ask his co mpan ions if
they wou ld like some tea.
Likew ise , in "The Bath s at Ostend"
(1889), jollity and repu gnance see m to be in
equal measure the emo tions of the artist, but
with its bright co lours and rather Donald
M cGill-like figures, the print's jollit y wins
out for the viewe r. The com pariso n with
M cGill is not as far-fetched as it might
appea r: "naughty" seas ide postca rds also
ex isted in Belgium at this time, somet imes
c ontaining co ded message s or numerical innu-
en do ("69"). In Enso r's etching, a figur e
wa tches the bath ers throu gh a telescope fro m
a vantage point on the roof of bathin g-
mac hine number 68, and nex t to him are two
machines pushed togeth er - nos 6 and 9.
McGill, in the more decorous Edwa rdian
pe riod, wo uld not have had a woman sailing
a toy boat by fartin g into its sails.
Not all of Ensors vulgar ity is so straight-
for ward: in "Christ Tor me nted by Demons"
(1895), an angel ove rhead plays his trum pet
to Christ cru cifi ed, but a devil sitting on the
crossbar blasts back on a bigger instrum ent ,
while a seco nd dem on farts a fanf are.
A demon defecat es on to Christ's out-
stretche d hand, while his bod y is em braced
by a skeleton. At the foot of the cross an old
woma n bends ove r a crib , while grinding a
baby und erfoot in a creepy reve rse nati vity.
Certa inly nothin g here ca n be describ ed as
chee rful. As with the 1898 etching of "The
Entry of Christ into Bru ssels" (the 1889 paint-
ing is in the Ge tty) , Ensor sees the world as
an endless carn ival of ev il, led by igno rance,
follo wed by stupidity, ma lice and greed.
Christ was a recurren t figur e in the Ensor
psyc hodra ma , ordinarily representing not reli-
gio us but sec ular persecuti on, as personifi ed
by Ensor himself. Yet that, too , was do uble-
edged . In "The Vengea nce of Hop-Frog "
(1898), an evocation of an Edg ar AlIan Poe
story, in whic h the king ' s dwarf revenges
himself on his persecutors by setting fire to
them at a mas querade, o nc o f the mo st prom i-
nent figur es among the hapless part ygoers is
a man in a feathered hat and band eau prom i-
nentl y mar ked "Ensor" , Poe saw the figur e
of the torm ented artist in the persona of the
dwarf ; in Ensor's version the aliena ted
artist is merely a bystander. And that may be
one reason why Ensor is so diffic ult to pin
do wn. In his wor ld we are all both persecutor
and persecut ed. We are not only the hun gry
crowds, eage r to lick the ruli ng class' s
behinds, we are also the rulin g cl ass, smea r-
ing eve ryo ne with our corruption. A nd that is
not a com for table thou ght.
ARTS
Pretty funny girl
Ulie Delpy is best known for her delicate
J perform ances in Richard Linkl ater ' s
bookend film s Bef ore Sunr ise and Bef ore
Sunset . Two Days in Paris shares the sa me
voca bulary as these film s: it is a movie about
relation ships, set in a beautiful cit y. But
while Sunrise and Sunset we re lyrical
romances, this is an anti-ro mance, and almos t
entirely the handi work of Delpy. No t only
does she star in it, she writes , direc ts and
edits it; casts her parent s, her cat, and her ex -
boyfriend in principal roles; and co mposes
and perform s the music. If this aggressive
auteurs hip has been rid icul ed in so me
quarters, that may be because people can't
believe that a pre tty young woma n could
have so much talent and exe rt so much con-
trol. The fact is, she ca n. And she has a tough,
acer bic sense of hum our as well. Two Days in
Paris is an impressive first effort at film-
makin g and a first-r ate contemp orary screw -
ball com edy.
The movie tells the story of Fre nchwo man
Marion (Delpy) and her Ame rica n boyfriend
Jack (Ada m Goldb erg) who stop in Paris on
their way home to Am erica after a holid ay in
Venic e. Durin g their short stay, Jack must con-
tend with Ma rion ' s leering, bohemi an-artist
father (Albert Delpy), her ex-hippie mother
(Mar ie Pillet), and her cynical, do-gooder sis-
ter (Aleksia Landea u). He is also introdu ced to
a slew of Marion ' s ex-love rs, unsavoury types
with whom she still see ms comp elled to flirt.
Superfi ciall y, the film bears some compari-
son to ea rly Wood y Alien . Delp y ' s Marion
has a bit of Diane Keatons dith erin g neurotic
--------------------~.--------------------
Quiz show
eil Bartletts producti on of Twelfth
N
Night explores theatri cal perform-
ance, value, authenticity, disgui se,
gender, identit y, and (ho mo)sex ua l awa ken-
ing. There ' s a lot go ing on here - perh aps too
much for one production to deal with. Bartlett
gives us an Oscar Wil de wor ld of soc ial
posing and concea ling. Kandis Coo k's cheval
mirrors illu strate the charac ters ' concern with
image as they talk to, gaze at, kiss, or avo id
their reflecti ons. At key moment s, glow ing
lightbulbs round the stage and backdrop turn
the entire playing area into a dressing-ro om
mirror : this is life as theatri cal di sguise rather
than theatr e as mirror he ld up to natur e.
When Mal voli os madhouse sce ne takes
place in the wardro be depart ment , we under-
stand that costume is a form of imprisonm ent.
The late Victorian setting provides vis ible
class distincti ons: Malvolio (John Lithgow) as
a ramrod-postured butler in white gloves has
never seemed so egreg ious in aspiring to be
Co unt Malvolio. And give n the rigid conven-
tions of this world, sexuality requires self-pro-
tecti ve disguise or denial. Antonio is an Orsino
lookalike (the two actors are brothers: Simon
and Jason Merrells), and Orsino' s public hostil-
ity to Antonio seems more Freudian suppres-
sion of his sexual other self than politic al
pun ishment of an enemy . Orsinos chaste peck
on the cheek of the pageboy Cesa rio (played
by a man, Chris New) in Act Five becomes a
TLS SEPTE M BER 14 200 7
P A ULA M AR A NT Z C O HEN
TWO D A YS I N P A RI S
Vario us c inemas
manner and funk y sty le, and Go ldberg's Jack
recall s the hypochondri acal Alie n of Ann ie
Hall and Manhattan while lookin g uncannil y
like the Ali en surrogate, To ny Robert s. But
the sim ilarities end there. Alien' s characters
ex ist in the urb an pastora l of New York City,
which never com es in for criticism - why
would anyo ne wa nt to live anyw here else?
Delp y, by contras t, makes Pari s co mplicit in
her charac ters' neuro sis. Her Pari s is hardl y
innocent - and her critique is direct ed as
much at Frenc h culture as it is at personal
idiosy ncracy . In this sense , Two Days in
Paris is more in the spirit of Henr y James
than Woody Alien.
The central conceit of the fil m is of the
American abro ad, skewe red for his lack of
language and savoir fa ire, but maint aining
dignit y and freshn ess in the face of hi s more
knowin g Europea n counterparts. Go ldberg
ex udes a surly charm in this role, wa ndering
about with wonder and incomprehension
amo ng Mariorr' s snee ring friend s and need-
ling, sex -obsessed parent s. Though Jack
perfor ms one act of meanness at the begin-
ning of the film (his subse quen t trials ca n be
read as puni shm ent for it), he is overall a gen-
tler per son than those around him, a qualit y
that see ms so mehow linked to his Am eri can
innocence.
LA UR IE M AG UIR E
S hakes peare
TW E L FTH N IG HT
Co urtyard Thea tre, Stratford upon Avon
strong clinch, as he seizes his last opportunity
before she dons her maiden weeds. Orsino' s
attraction to the boy in Viola is paralleled by
Olivia's joyous claimin g of the female in Cesa -
rio: Justine Mitchell excla ims "a sister !" in a
tone that sugges ts more than sororial delight.
With the cas ting of women as Sir To by, Sir
Andrew and Fabian (Marjo rie Yates, A nnabel
Levent on and Joanne Howarth respectively),
the subplot trium virate - or triummulierate -
are literall y viragos. Fabian often see ms the
od d o ne out in the letter sce ne, but here a natu-
ral trio is created by gender, and they have a
different kind of theatrical upper hand: Malvo-
lio is outnumbered by sex , and Feste (lames
Clyde) becom es the outsider among the con-
spirators as a male actor rather than perip a-
tetic Foo l. Throughout, he observes the actio n
and is brought into it against his will (as when
Sir Andrew' s "Here co mes the fool" claims
him during his tipto ed attem pt at ex it).
Feste's main relationship is with the audi-
ence , crooning into the microphone at his
gran d piano and conductin g the interro gation
of Ma lvolio as a television host: "What is the
Delp y' s gift as a film-m aker is for cultur-
ally revealin g set pieces: one, of the opening
of Ma rion's father ' s photog raphy exhibition,
is a terrific pastiche of pretentious drivel.
A nother, of Mari on exploding in fur y at an
ex-boyfriend in a cafe, manages to be both
grea t slapstick and astute cultura l co mme n-
tary. And a third , of her father engag ing in an
act of self-righteo us vandalism, makes one
wince at its crude malice. A running motif
invol ve s a se ries of raci st Parisian cab drivers
who dri ve Marion and Jack to and fro across
the city. In these scenes and others, Delp y is
adept at show ing French sophistication dis-
solve into puerile acting out.
The weakest aspec t of the movie is its lack
of poli sh. The beginnin g, where Marion
spea ks in voice -ove r and illustrates her point s
with simplistic illustr ations, see ms amateur-
ish; the end, when she tries to sum thin gs up
with a tidy, upb eat co ncl usion, seems forced .
Delpys pith y dialogue is remark able -
perh aps becau se English is her seco nd
langua ge, she has a heightened awareness of
the rhythm s and cadences of the langua ge -
but sometimes the verba l riff s jar with
the charac ters spea king them. In the en d, Two
Days in Paris works because Delp y brings
to it such hum ou r and intelli gence. As
Marion, she has a mor al ce ntre that e leva tes
her above her sma ll-minded, self-involved
count rym en. A nd as fil m-m aker, she infu ses
the produ ction with creative zest. (Rumour
has it that backers wanted some thing more in
the etherea l style of the Linkl ater film s, but
Delp y battled for her ow n vision.) Go ldberg
may pla y the role of the innocent abroad in
this movie, but Delp y, her natio nality not-
withstan ding, is its heroine: Henr y Jarness
A merica n gir l.
op inion of Pythagoras concernin g wild
fowl?" could be a qui z show question.
The relation between ontological authentic-
ity and an individual' s public perform ance
of self is see n in the production ' s handlin g of
paym ent. C ha rac ters refu se paym ent for truth ,
accept it for perform ance. The most interest-
ing mo ment is when Feste sings "Come away,
death" . He shuns both shee t music and pay-
ment, sing ing for "pleasure" and, for the only
time in the play , unaccomp anied. Shed ding
perform ance mode, he sings from the heart.
Only when payment is forced on him by
Ors ino does he revert to comi c moc kery .
As this example shows, the productio n has
a line-b y-lin e intellige nce and clarit y. None-
theless, its intellectu al strengths pro ve its
theatric al weak ness; in presenting life as a
spec ies of perform ance, it co nsis tently dis-
tances us. The mirror s may und erline theme
but they impede pace and inh ibit co mic
energy . The subplot charac ters' rapport with
the audi en ce is no t sus tained. Eac h has on c
moment of met atheatric al interaction , as
when Fabian sizes up the Co urtyar d Theatre
for its bear-baiting potenti al, but they never
have us eating out of their hands. And , oddly,
the unions and reuni on of the last sce ne fail to
move. Oli via and Se bas tian (la in McK ee) are
toffs, as superficial as those in any co medy of
manners. And whereas Pro pe ller's recent all-
male Twelfth Night ove rrode our conscious-
ness of the actors ' gender, here our constant
awareness that Viola is a male actor makes
the reunion with Sebas tian feel like A
Comedy of Errors manqu e.

STE P HEN H E NI GH A N
Mi ch a el O ndaat je
D IVISA DER O
288p p. Bloomsbury. £ 17.99 .
9780747589240
n a pivotal ea rly scene of Michae l
I O ndaa tje 's new novel , Divisadero, a
Ca lifornia far mer in the 1980s surpr ises
Coo p, the farmh and he has raised from an
o rpha ned child, making love to his sixtee n-
year-old da ug hter. The farmer hurl s Coop
throu gh a glass wa ll, beats him with a stoo l
and leaves him for dead. The dau ght er, Ann a,
runs away; her adop ted sister, Claire, resc ues
Coop and cares for his wo unds . Ea rly in
Coop's reco ver y, the reader is told , "When
he woke he realized he had been asleep at the
tahl e". Mor e than 200 pages later, in the
novel' s fin al sequence , Lucien Seg ura, a
fiction al early twenti eth-century Frenc h
writer , hobbl es back to his co untry hou se
fro m the First Wo rld War to spe nd a night
imaginin g that he is car ing for the woman
who is both his inform al ado pted sister and
occasional lover. " He woke in the mornin g,
his head on the kitchen table" , Ond aatj e
writes . The repetiti on of the image of a
battered man as leep at a table stresses the
often tenu ou s them atic con tinuities in thi s
diffuse wor k, which insists on the sibling-like
kinshi p bred by pro ximit y eve n as it flin gs its
ch aracter s into or bits so separate that Divisa-
dero rea ds less like a novel than a series of
di scr ete narr at ion s.
Th e guiding intelli gence is Anna, who
revea ls herself as the narrator in the open ing
sen tence and returns to close the book in its
fin al paragraph s. After running away from
hom e, An na changes her name and becom es
a literar y scholar. Her preoc cup ation wi th
Fre nch literature is reflect ed in recu rrin g allu-
sions to the works of Stendhal, Balzac and
Flaubert. A panoptic intelli genc e, Ann a re-
creates the fates of her self, Coop and Claire,
who sca tter and lose touch wi th each other
after her father di sco vers her with Co op . She
is the divisadero of the title ; thi s Spanish
wor d, which is also the name of a stree t in
San Fra ncisco, means a look- out point which
offers access to a broad view . Less acc u-
rate ly, Ond aatje also teases out of the wor d
th e co n no ta tio n of division, a refer en ce bo th
to the day that the non-t raditi on al famil y on
the Ca lifo rnia farm fall s apar t, and to Ann a ' s
ow n life, divid ed between a ru ral childhood
and an aca de mic adulthood, and fin ally
between the roles of scho larly researcher and
of ar tist.
Th e symbo l which towers ove r the novel' s
fin al sec tion is also a di visadero. Thi s sec tion
moves fro m an acco unt of Ann a' s affa ir,
while do ing research on Lu cien Seg ura in the
south of France, with Rafae l, a man of Gy psy
back grou nd who had met the age ing Seg ura
as a boy, to the len gth y biograph y of Seg ura
Ranging with Michael Ondaatje' s lonely romantics
Divided we fall
\ A nil is a for ensic scientist who spec ializes in
"Route 66, Ludlow, California, 2004", from JeffB rouws'sApproachillg Nowhere
(160pp. Norton. 978 0 393 06274 8)
wi th which the novel clo ses. A mino r
chara cter in thi s section works on the renova-
tion of a fift y-m etre-hi gh churc h tower of a
peculi ar twisted form "created or iginally by a
sudde n and per verse wind or by the madn ess
of a roofe r in love" . Th e churc h tower loom s
ove r the final hu nd red pages, much as the
descripti on s of the viaduct built across a
To ro nto ravin e by immi gr ant workers
loo med over Ondaatjes earlier novel, III the
Skill of a Lion (1987). The church tower' s
power to unify Divisadero, however , is
dimi nished by co mpar ison with the role of
the governing symbo l of the earl ier novel.
Ondaatj es ro ma nticism and res idual mod-
ernism co -ex ist with an ever stronge r pos t-
mod ern ethos of fra gm entati on , ev ide nt in the
cumbersom ely self-co nsc ious di scontinuities
of the latter half of his previou s no vel , Anil 's
Ghost (2000) . Divisadero' s struc ture is
centrifuga l, as the lives of Ann a, Claire and
Coop are pro pelled farth er and farth er apa rt;
yet ves tigial mod erni st devices, such as the
re pe titio n of th e im age of a m an as lee p at a
table and the sym bol of the churc h tower, fret
aga inst thi s drift toward s sha pe less ness , reas-
serting the author ity of the artist to order the
narr ati ve wor ld. Th e res ult is a novel which
titill ates the reader with the pro mise of a
co herence wh ich it is struc tura lly incapable
of deli verin g.
Ondaatje hedges his bets aga inst fragmenta-
tion by allow ing the lives of Coo p and Claire
to cross briefl y in adulthood. Co op becom es
a professional pok er player in the resort town
of Lak e Tah oe. The pared-d own passages
describing his relati on s with other ga mblers,
TLS SE PTEMBER 14 200 7
and his bold ness in making off wi th a large
sum of mon ey in violation of the ga mblers'
code, are amon g the mo st narrati ve-d riven
pa ges Ondaatj e has writte n. The Ca lifornia
and Nevada settings of most of the first two-
thirds of the novel, Coo p's immersion in a
wo rld of ma le c amarad eri e and C la ire ' s
ob session with ridin g horses ove r da ngero us
mountain ter rain, lend these sec tio ns a cu ri-
ou s similarity of ton e to the novel s of Cor mac
M cCart hy. Men, in Co op 's universe, re late to
women or other men throu gh almos t arbitrary
act s of violence . Th e beatin g Co op suffers at
the hands of his adop tive fath er, for whic h
the novel provid es no psych ologic al prepara -
tion , for eshad ows his later ord eals. Th e
gamblers he has betrayed lure him back to
Lake Ta hoe by placin g a beautiful, self-
destru cti ve yo ung wo man in his path . After
suffe ring terrible tortu res, which ca use him to
lose his memory, Coop is rescued by C laire,
who m he meets by chance afte r years of
sepa ration. Lik e the father in the openin g
sec tion, and like Coop him self, Claire is a
charac ter whose moti vati on s rem ain invisi-
ble; she becomes an investigator for a public
defend er in San Franc isco , has no perceptible
emo tional life and devot es her weekends to
horses and her adoptive fath er.
The conc eption of charac ter, in Divisadero
as in Ondaatjes earlier novels, is the mo st
probl emati c aspec t of his fiction . His
novels may even owe part of their popul arit y
to his very cont emp or ary definition of hu man
bein gs as the mee ting poi nt of stro ng visual
ide ntities and spec ialized information.
O ndaa tje's characters perform acro batics,
19
com mittin g bur glaries naked like Ca rav agg io
in The English Patient (1992), or sw imm ing
at great speed like Anil in Alii! 's Ghos t. Th ey
master obsc ure trades. Kip, in The English
Patient, is an ex pert at dism antlin g bomb s,
skeletal rem ains. In Divisadero, Coop's car d-
playin g strategies are desc ribed with similar
atte ntion to detail. O ndaa tje revel s in the ga m-
bler s' langua ge: "The plan is for him at some
point to doubl e-duk e . .. . He will place this
riffl e-stacked slug of cards beneath a crimp,
abo ut where the man on his right usually cuts
the cards". A poet befor e he turn ed to fiction ,
Ond aatje ran sack s his research for fresh
words. Yet the three cen tral charac ters, Ann a,
Coo p and Cla ire, all ema nate the sa me lack of
a persuasive emo tiona l or psychological life,
the same pass ivity and absence of self-
awa re ness . O nd aatj es romanti cism requi res
hi s cha ra cte rs to tak e lo ver s, hut at bottom
they are solitary bein gs. Citing Fried rich
Nietzsc he and French literatur e, and brandi sh-
ing their spec ialized talent s as they suffer in
isolati on , they feel like the crea tions of a
much yo unge r writer. Luci en Seg ura, whose
work A nna is resear chin g, is the only signifi-
cant charac ter in O nda atje ' s last three novels
with an active marriage . But Seg ura 's wife is
never named ; the only ex plicit references to
his famil y life appea r in acco unts of his daugh-
ter' s ex tra marita l affair with a young poet.
Ann a, as much of a cipher as the others, is
plagued by incon sisten cies. Twice she is
show n con ver sing in "her mo ther's Spa nish",
eve n thou gh her Mexican-American mo ther
died the wee k she was born and she grew up
in an Eng lish-speaking hou sehold. Wh en
Ann a travel s to Fra nce , it is not with the fasci-
nated yet diffident postur e of the American in
that country that descend s fro m Henr y Jam es
and Edith Wh arton , but wi th a stunned co lo-
nial reverenc e for the ach ieve me nts of Euro -
pean high culture more reflecti ve of
Ondaatjes ow n ex perience as a Sri Lank an
sent to be ed ucated in Brit ain an d Canada.
Two-thirds of the way into the novel ,
Ondaatje abru ptly aba ndo ns An na, Co op and
Claire, leavin g man y narrati ve threads unre-
solved, to co ncentrate on what rea lly interests
him : the life of an artist. The len gth y digr es-
sion about Segu ra with which the no vel co n-
clud es gives the book an unsatisfyin gly un-
balanced fo rm, but it also co ntributes the few
m oments of hon e st em otio n . A wo ma n w hom
Segur a meets in a rail way ca r evo lves into a
character who takes ove r his crea tive life. At
hom e "he alrea dy missed her .... He began
to invent the da ys and nights of thi s woma n
without havin g taken a single step into her
life. For mor e than a yea r he wrote of Claud-
ile and her belli gerent com pani on . . .''. Whil e
the no vel ' s three central charact ers rem ain
opaque, Seg ura 's acts of creation radi ate
vitality. If the passion Ond aatj e feel s for the
creato r ex tended to his ow n creation s, Divisa-
dero's glistening surfaces might be amplified
by emo tional depth .
20
un begin s and end s with a statue of
R the Virgin Mar y; stolen, generations
ago, from a church, by a drunken Irish
boy bec ause it so rem arkably resembled the
Irish girl he pined for, with her dark blue
stare and red hair. It resembl ed her both in
beauty and piety: its beauty melted her
ch astity, and she bec ame his. Sinc e then ,
the statue has been passed do wn the famil y
to the dau ghter who most resembl es it, and
so it comes to live on Bern adette ' s shelf, in
Boston , given to her on the day she marri es
Doyle. Bern adette and Doyle hav e one red-
headed son, Sulli van , and then adopt : first,
a boy called Te ddy who is black and swee t.
Later, Teddy's mother offers up his older
broth er , Tip, who is black and smart. And
then Bernad ette dies, leaving the statue to
watch over the two little boys as they sleep
in their attic room, resembling neith er of
them, but reminding them of the moth er they
knew. And so an icon remains with the
wro ng ow ners, standing for the heavenl y and
the ea rth ly, the living and the dead. It is one
of the many devices that draw this novel
together, a book which is both very swee t and
very smart.
By the time the twent y-four hour s that
mak e up the main story begin , Doyle is the
ex -mayor of Boston , driven out of offic e by
the wrongdoing of his eldes t son, Sullivan,
now in Afric a. Tip studies ichth yolo gy at
--------------------------~--------------------------
Down to earth
1. 1. P URDO N
Willi am Gib son
SPOO K C OUNT RY
384pp. Viking. £ 18.99.
978 06709 1494 4
ver since his first nove l, Willi am
E
Gib son has been o n a crash cour se
with the prese nt. A far-future trilo gy,
beginni ng with the cult noir cyber-thriller
Neu romance r (1984) , was foll owed by three
book s centred on an apocalyptic , thou gh rec-
og nizably pro xim ate, San Francisco. By the
time of Pattern Recognition (200 3), which
predict ed the imminent rise of YouTube and
vira l web-base d video, Gibson' s chara cters
were outlined against the alien citysca pes of
contemp orary To kyo, London and Moscow.
Spook Country, a de facto sequel to Pat-
tern Recognition, is the fir st of Gib son ' s
book s to bear a date stamp: 2006 . It intro-
duces Holl is Henr y, a form er rock star, now a
journalist wor king for the techno-culture
magazin e Node ("a Europea n version of
Wired") . Sm art , savvy, attuned to the hleed-
ing edge of submerge d urban cool , Holli s is a
familiar Gib son heroin e. When the novel
opens, she is writing a featur e on "locati ve
art" : site-spec ific virtua l sculptures beam ed
throu gh wireless network s and G PS satel-
lites.
With out exce ption, Gib son ' s narrati ves
foll ow the tradit ional structure of the quest,
as refr acted throu gh detecti ve ficti on and the
film s of Alfr ed Hitchcock. The M acguffin in
this case is a shipping container lost en route
from Iran , after an aborted und erco ver raid
by the CIA. Holli s soo n find s herself
FICTION
Saints in the family
ROZALIND DIN E E N
A nn P at ch ett
R UN
295pp. Bloomsbury. £ 14.99.
978074759 1146
Harvard and would prefer to be among fish
rather than people. Teddy is the kind best
friend of his elderly uncle, a priest whose
hospital bed is dail y di sturb ed by Bostoni ans
who believe he ca n heal them with a touch.
Tedd y shoos the sick aw ay and spends his
time with the dying man. Privileged , funn y,
successful with wo men, smart or sw ee t or
haunt ed, the sons are all an unspoken dis-
appointm ent to their fath er because non e of
them will go into politi cs - thou gh Teddy ca n
recite ream s of Martin Luther King and
Eugene V. Debs, and the broth ers were repeat-
edy dragged to see politic al spe akers befor e
they were old enough to realize that they
were being "dragged toward s the cau se of
leadership " . On the night that the story starts,
Doyle is sav ing seats for Tedd y and Tip in an
auditorium where Jesse Jackson is about to
spea k. The boys arrive late and when , hour s
employed to track down this consignme nt,
while Tit o - a young "fa cilitator" in the
Cuban Am eri can mafia - and Mil grim , a
junkie tran slator of Russian, are pressed into
employ ment by the laconi c Brown, who may
or may not be working for gove rnment intelli-
gence .
Like Raymond Chandler, to whom he is
some times compared , Gib son is a virtuoso
simile-artist. For eve ry apt infelicit y ("the
light on the beach was like a sinus head-
ache" ) there is a welcome flouri sh: the back
sea ts of a luxury car, "upholstered in that gun-
metal lamb , obviously reclin ed , becoming
bed s, or possibl y chair s for high-end elective
surge ry" . Cars and aircraft are parti cular
favourit es for this treatm ent , since Gibson's
characters live in perm anent tran sit, occup y-
Another Arrow
Sarge nt would have painted that toxophilite
in a stiff white dress
pinned to a backdrop of yew trees.
Her boot s firm on the vicarage lawn ,
eve rything as imm obil e as the church tower
that tops the yews ,
except for the stra ining bow
and her elbow .
Just before four
on an August afterno on;
eve ryone of us tied to that target
aw aiting the first arrow.
MI CH A EL MO TT
TLS SEP TE M BER 14 200 7
later , the spea ker ackno wledges his applause,
T ip hurri es away dram atically from his father
and broth er, having promi sed him self it will
be his last eve r exit from a politi cal address .
He walks straight into the path of an on-
com ing SUV and is pushed out of the way by
an unkno wn woman, Tennessee, who takes
the brunt of the colli sion and is rushed to
hospital. Doyle, Tip and Tedd y are left with
Te nnessee 's eleve n-year -old-daughter Kenya,
Tip's injur ed ankle and the snow. Now the
tightenin g mechani sm s begin to whirr.
When Tedd y sits in hospit al with Kenya
later , he tries to comfort her by recitin g:
" Yes, the newspaper s were right snow was
fallin g general all over Ireland . . . fallin g
softly upon the Bog of Alien and, furth er
wes twa rd, softly fallin g into the dark muti-
nous Shannon waves". Whil e James Joyces
snow falls on the living and the dead, unitin g
them , An n Patchett' s snow provides a pure
white canvas on which the crispness of
the differenc es between characters shows
clearly: we see their outlines and follo w them
as they brave the bad wea ther, travellin g
bet ween the hospit al and the fine Doyle resi-
dence, the hospital and the poor hou sin g
developm ent , the hospit al and Harvard . Th e
ing rented apa rtments and indu strial non-
spaces filled with over-engineered goods . At
the beginnin g of this novel, Holli s wa kes in a
plu sh LA hotel roo m:
She turned on the bedside lamp, illuminating
the previous eve ning's empty can of Asahi
Draft, from the Pink Dot, and her sticker-
encrusted PowerBook, closed and sleeping.
She envied it.
Every object here - not ju st the sticker-
encrus ted PowerBoo k - has its marqu e
similarly displayed und er thick layers of
adjec tiva l lacqu er: "The matt e indi go of her
G irba ud blazer" ; "The high-t opp ed black
shoes" , with their "white-and-blue Adid as
logo-tags". In its fetishistic attention to brand-
ing and pro venanc e, Spook Country is less
remi niscent of Cha ndler 's hard-b oiled
austerity than of Ian Fleming' s aspirational
fussiness. Indeed , Agent 007 gets three
menti ons in the course of the book .
Gib son shares both Fleming 's talent for
fact that life is less fair to some than to others
is made brittl e on a snowy day. Kenya, who
usuall y lives with her moth er in a dark small
flat, wakes in the boys' bedro om , und er the
gaze of the statue of the Virgin, and wonders
whether the sunlight has been divided up so
that more of it ends up in better neighb ou r-
hoods. Th at "the law onl y go up to a certain
point and then it stops", is exa mined in the
novel, but without over-rehearsed cries of
social inju stice.
The real cri es here are of physical pain ,
physical cold and physical exe rtion which are
all describ ed with sometimes exc ruciating
clarity - Tip , the scientist, kno ws that he has
"dug the crutches into his brachi al plexus and
slowly cru shed it" , while Kenya, the runn er
of the title, "defies grav ity" whe n she is in
full flo w and is "a little bird comi ng into
land " when she slows down. Patchett writes
about the need to run, about physical se nsa-
tions such as a jo lt when a father' s and son's
knees touch unexpectedl y for the fir st time in
years as they sit togeth er in a cab . Run is a
novel about physicalit y yet it is held together
by a literary exe rtion that is unseen , un-
swea ted and unfelt (except for a mid-plot
instanc e in which one of the cast of dead is
given the chanc e to come back to life as a too
convenient plot-d evelop er); at times, it is as
Kenya' s runnin g coach describ es runnin g to
her: "Meditation in motion".
describing commodities and his lack of inter-
es t in differentiating peopl e: to all intent s and
purp oses, Holli s is a clone of Cayce from Pat-
tern Recognit ion. Brown and Mil grim would
recognize versions of them selves in any of
their creator ' s eight previous novels. Despite
its inclin ation towards neol ogism, too much
about this latest book feels seco nd-hand.
Holli s "c lamshe lls" her teleph one, rather
than simply closin g it. A headset- wearin g
sec urity guard is "b luetoothed". Appropri ate
as they are, these coin ages see m banal after
the definiti ve "cy berspace" , and the pitch-p er-
fect " zapruder" , a ve rb meaning "to spaw n
con spir acy theori es" , named for the creator
of the JFK assassi nation tape.
Pattern Recognit ion, widely regarded as a
return to form for Gibso n, pro vided an absorb-
ing plot along with timely analysis of an
emerging trend . Spook Country attempts a
similar fusion , but fails to build any real
suspense. Its theor etical insight s - on the
ubiquity of netw ork ed culture - do not see m
particul arly fresh; nor, when the significa nce
of the mysteriou s container is finally
divulged , is the revelation surprising enough
to ju stify the 350-page lead-in . The shipme nt
simply vanishes from the map: "The whole
business had to play out initiall y in spook
country, and might well remain there for a
very long time" .
In recent interviews, Gib son ha s sugges ted
that science ficti on' s functi on is now eva lua-
tive rather than speculative , "the exploration
of contempora ry realit y rather than any
attempt to predict where we are go ing" .
There are ves tigial trac es of SF-coo l in Spook
Country: cars that glide past silently, a bed
that floats on a magnetic field, "locative art" .
The differenc e is that all of the techn olo gy
depi cted here is already available , onl y a few
click s away on Goog le. Imagin ation, it
see ms, is no match for the Web. T ime 's
winge d chariot has outpaced the rock et ship.

he eight tales publ ished togeth er in
T The Deportees, Roddy Doyle ' s first
co llec tion of shor t stor ies, are set o n
the fa ult-lines bet ween old and new Irel and ,
where tho se born in the co untry meet the
immi gr ant s and refu gees who have flocked to
live there during its ec ono mic success of the
pa st twenty years. As in Doyles no vel s, the
settings are dom estic, but themes such as
identity, prejudice an d change have re le-
vance far beyond the kitchen sinks of the pro-
tagoni sts: an Irish father who co nside rs him-
se lf ope n-minded is surp rised by how uneasy
he feel s whe n his daught er brin gs a Nige rian
man hom e for dinn er ; a recent immigrant
learn s to swe ar like an Irishm an, find an Irish
girlfriend and stand up to exploitation.
In the title story, the most droll and subtle
of the co llec tion, Do yle returns to Jimmy
Rabbitte, found er of The Co mmitme nts, the
band at the cen tre of Doyle' s 1987 no vel of
that nam e. Rabbitte, now thirt y-six and feel-
ing shac kled by a preg nant wi fe and a brood
of small children, decides to form a new
band. Th is tim e, he rec ruits a gro up of immi-
gra nts to play covers of Wood y Guthrie
-------------~,-------------
A book of one's own
JO NATHA N K EA T ES
Al an B enn e t t
T H E UNC OMMON REA DE R
I24pp. FaberlProfile. £10.99.
978 1 84668049 6
ne of the mo de rn Briti sh royal
O famil y ' s mor e depend able trait s is an
almos t total indifferenc e to the wo rld
of art and high culture. Things we re not
always thu s. Meetin g Queen Victori a' s child-
ren, for exa mp le, we might have been
ex pec ted to play piano duet s with Prin ce
Leopold , to discuss George Eliot with the
Emp ress Frede rick or to ad mire the work of
her sculptress sister Loui se. The ir father
Prin ce Alb ert co llected Italian primitives and
design ed mo de l cott ages, while his moth er-
in-la w the Duchess of Kent was the co m-
poser of seve ral attractive lieder.
Nothing of these enthusias ms has survived
in the way of a ge netic inh erit ance. Th ere can
be no treason , however, in wishing thin gs
were othe rw ise, that Royal Asco t or hot
night s at Bo uj is and M ahi ki co uld now an d
then be supplemented, or even replaced, by
an even ing at the Wigmore Hall or a trip to
the Edinburg h Fes tival. This is the basis of
Al an Ben nett ' s The Uncommon Reader, a
what-if story which imagines Elizabeth Wind-
sor in the grip of a wholly unexpected oh ses-
sion with literature.
"She read, of co urse, as one did , but likin g
book s was so mething she left to other peopl e.
It was a hobb y and it was in the natur e of her
job that she didn 't have hobbi es." Her
unlik ely guru is Nor man Seak ings, a gay
kitche n port er who m she meet s while tryin g
to di slod ge her cor gis fro m the travellin g
library van park ed in a Buckin gh am Pa lace
courtyard. His tastes are somewhat mo no-
them atic - J. R. Ack erley, Cecil Beat on ,
Mary Renault - and it is under his tutelage
that Majes ty, over the soup at a state banqu et ,
FICTION
Just another biscuit
K ATHARI N E HIBB ER T
Rodd y Do yl e
THE D EP O RT EE S AN D OT HE R
STO RIES
242pp. Cape. £ 16.99.
978 0 22408061 3
songs on acc ordion, tru mp et and dj emb e
drum as we ll as electric gu itar. In a fin al mul-
ticultural flouri sh , they are a hit at a part y
held by the ow ner of the local Indi an restau-
rant , the Cel tic Ta ndoori .
In Do yles hand s, see ming ly co mmo n-
place detail s pro vid e insight s without break-
ing the flow of the story. Th e band are
bemu sed when Rabbitte tries to break the ice
by offe ring round a packet of Jaffa Ca kes,
that slightly comic childhood treat so famili ar
to peopl e born in Ireland and Brit ain, ju st
another bi scuit to oth ers. A white band mem-
butt onhol es the French President on the sub-
j ect of Jean Genet. "Homosexual and jailbird,
was he neverth eless as bad as he was
paint ed ?" Soo n enoug h the sove reign is
striking out for herself, co mpa ring Na ncy
Mitford with Ivy C ompton Burn ett , confi-
dently writing off Or John son as "opinion-
ated rubbi sh" and sighing "Oh do get on" to
Henr y Jam es. Th e courti ers, led by felin e
pri vate secre tary Sir Kevin, are predi ctabl y
horrorstruck as she rec om mends "The Co n-
verge nce of the Twain" to the Prime Mini ster
and begin s her Christmas bro adca st with the
opening lines of A Tale of Two Cities. On
royal wa lkabouts, volumes begin to take the
place of bouqu ets. " If I'd wa nted to cart
book s aro und, I'd have go t a job in Hatch-
ards", co mp lains a lady-in- waitin g. " I' rn
afra id Her M ajesty is getting to be what is
kno wn as a handful."
Enlarge d percepti on s make the Queen both
less self-ass ured and more tartl y epigra m-
matic. Returning to Co mpton Burn ett as a
cure for sleepless ness and sudde nly arres ted
by the writer's unsentiment al wisdo m, she
mutt ers "I have no vo ice" . An MI5 tran-
scriber, listenin g in, respond s "Well, if yo u
don 't , dear , I do n' t know who does" . Ta king
Prou st to Balmor al for discu ssion with the
now indi spensable Norma n, she settles down
to co mpos ing her own A la Recherche
(thou gh private ly doubting the efficacy of
Fulle r's ca kes as a su bs titute for the thauma-
turgic madeleine). Th e con sequ ences for the
nation are quit e devastatin g.
Benn ett' s absorption with royalt y in wor ks
like A Question of Attribution and The
Madness of George III has sometimes
see med mor e cosy than critica l, as if he we re
anxi ous to jo in the very es tablishment he pur-
port s to moc k. Subtler than either of these in
its playfuln ess, The Uncommon Reader
imp ro ves deli ghtfully on an oth er wise
depressing rea lity, while slily arraigning
the am biguo us Briti sh ro mance with the
mon arch y and its curre nt avatar.
TLS SEPTEMBER 14 200 7
ber has no problem s with any of his for eign
bandm ates but is shocked when Rabbitte
emp loys an Irish Travell er as a sec urity man,
hintin g at the histori cal fricti on s to which the
new rac ial tension s have been added .
The narrati ve style of the stories varies,
allow ing Doyle to display the ran ge of
techniques he has employe d in his novel s.
"Black Hoodi e" gains pace and charm from
its first-p er son present-t en se deli very, using
the perspecti ve of an Irish teena ger confro nt-
ing raci st adults. "New Boy" , the story of a
form er child so ldier tryin g to fit in with his
Irish classmates, is told in the clipp ed stacca to
sentences famili ar from The Woman Who
Walked Into Doors ( 1996) and Paula Spence r
(2006). But while Do yle brilli antl y captured a
child 's inner life in his Booker Prize-winning
Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha (1993), this boy
rem ains unsymp atheti c. His rational exa mina-
tion s of the incompr ehensibilities of his
schoo l day are improbabl y co ld, and his recol-
lecti on s of the horro rs he has lived throu gh
are dealt with heavy-h and edl y. Trying to
E m ma Te n na n t
CONFESS IONS OF A SUGA R
MU MMY
237pp. Gibson Square. £ 12.99.
978 19061420 18
hat can a wo man of a ce rtain
W age, possessed merely of a run-
do wn flat in a dismal part of Lon-
don, a knav ish ex-husband and a ske tchy
career as an interior decorator, do to ensure
a happy ending? Well : hope that the busi-
ness pick s up, the ex stays in hi s box and
the flat becom es unexp ectedly desirable.
For Sca rlett, heroin e of Em ma Tenn ant' s
mi schi evou s vignettes of life on the wro ng
side o f six ty , neith er of the first two w ishes
see ms destin ed to come true - but it does
see m that the capital's capricious prop erty
market might j ust be about to compensa te
her for life' s other disapp ointment s. Wh en
Scarletts two floo rs in M aida Hill look set
to bag her undreamt-of riches, it is not a
com fortable retirem ent she starts env isag -
ing; rath er, she rub s her hand s in glee at the
prospect of blowing the lot on a loun ge
lizard twent y yea rs (or mor e) her junior.
Alain is mar ried , pennil ess, hard-drink-
ing, unreli able and clearl y flaky - and,
21
wor k out what is happ enin g whe n a fello w
pupil picks a fight , Jo seph asks him self:
What did Christian Kelly mean? You are dead.
Joseph thinks about these words and it is not
too difficult. So, Christian Kelly's words must
refer to the future. You will be dead. All boys
must grow old and eventually die - Joseph
knows this; he has seen dead men and boys.
Christian Kelly' s words are clearly intended as
a threat, or promise .
Th e stories de rive their shared theme , as
well as their form at, from their ge nes is as
mo nthly 800- word instalm ents publi shed in
Metro Eireann, a magazine sta rted by and
aimed at immi grant s to Ireland. In his prefa ce
to this edition, Doyle ex plains that he wa nted
to co untera ct some of the raci st my th-ma king
about Poli sh pro stitutes, feckl ess Afric an
moth ers and cru el Mu slim ga ngs he has
enco untered. But these stories go so far in the
opposi te direction as to become fair y tales,
with the heroi c immi grant s always more
nobl e, intelli gent and good-loo king than their
Irish counterp art s, who are either irredeem-
abl y raci st baddi es or we ll-mean ing duffers
whose prejudices are based on ignoran ce
rather than ill- will. Each brief ch apter fin-
ishes with a slight clim ax of exc iteme nt, a
device which becom es tedi ou s whe n it occur s
eve ry few pages. Despit e their episodic for-
mat, these are not stor ies to be dipp ed into:
rea ding one instalm ent in isolation makes no
mor e sense than leafin g throu gh a few pages
of a novel.
Doyle admits that whe n he submits one
chapt er he rare ly knows what will happen in
the next , and the lack of planning and editing
is ev ide nt in the spraw ling and occas ionally
awkward plots. The author some times see ms
desperate to wrap up stories wh ich see m to be
spira lling o ut of control ; in "The Pram " , a
mild- mann ered , put-upo n Poli sh au pair
sudde nly turn s into a murd erin g, suicidal
psychop ath in a sing le bur st of 800 wor ds ,
solely in order to end a tale which could other-
wise have co ntinued indefinitely.
what is more, not eve n pro perly French. To
Sca rlett, ho wever, he is the esse nce of
ro mance and, she reflec ts, an obv ious candi-
date for the atte ntions of a suga r mummy.
The ensuing imbroglios revol ve around
Sca rlett pickin g up the tab for ex pe nsive
No tting Hill lunch es, limitless bottl es of
tequil a and a wo nde r bag of designer cos-
meti cs that promise to disgui se the advanc-
ing yea rs. And with Moll y, a best friend
with a withering line in realit y chec ks, an
amoro us Polish build er and a cas t of unscru-
pul ou s estate agen ts in tow, the prospect of
Sca rlett enticing her prey into her artfully
arranged love nest seems eve r slighter.
Te nnant is goo d on the indi gnit y that
houndl ess desire pro vok es in the old er
wo man : " I' rn suffering from sex ual fru stra-
tion when I should be collecting for Save
the Children", Scarlett ruefull y rem ark s.
And she also paint s a witty portr ait of a cer-
tain kind of shabby-ge ntee l Wes t Lond on
bohemia. As for whether her prot ago nist ' s
predic ament yields any adv ice worth fol-
lowin g, rea ders of Confess ions of a Sugar
Mummy might we ll decide that Moll y has
the shrew der take on grow ing old grace -
full y.
AL EX C LA R K
22 BIBLIOGRAPHY

ries to come, a pattern of cultural colli sion ,

Cold type resista nce and ass imilation familiar to tho se

study ing the place of print in support of Brit-
ish, French and other Europea n colonial
Empires durin g the same period.
n 1908, the Canadian editor of the Book- DAVID F IN KEL STE I N per specti ve. Canada is a particul ar case . Befor e the arrival of printin g offices in

I seller and Stationer asked, "What is a

Ca nadian book '!" Variation s on this ques-
tion have been posed by oth ers and they will
H IS T ORY OF T HE B O O K
I N CANA DA
Throughout its history, fir st as separate co lo-
nies of France and Britain , then as a Domin-
ion, then latterly as an independ ent nation in
Ca nadian territ ories, print ed materi al was the
privilege of a few hard y souls willing to wait
seve ral month s for it to arrive fro m Europe.
be famili ar to tho se interested in the study of Vo lume One: Beg innings to 1840 its ow n right , the country has been affec ted Books ordered by French fur trappers and
literary texts. Oft en at the heart of research Edited by Patricia LockhartFleming, Gilles by the cultural hegem on y of nea r neighb our s English employees of remote outpos ts of the
into national literatures and print culture is Gallichan and Yvan Lamonde and overseas patrons. As contributors to Hud son Bay Co mpany we re trekked from
the quest to es tablish what makes a text 500pp. £48 (Ca n$75). History of the Book in Canada (HBC) show , East coast port s by canoe. As sharply etched
(printed or oth erwise) uniqu e to a particular 978 0 8020 8943 4 the story of books and print in Canada is a chapters in Volum e One by Real Oull et,
country, and answer s to this question are Volume Two: 1840-1 91 8 fractur ed one, shaped by externa l politi cal, Christian Blais and lan Macla ren dem on-
frequ entl y couched in nationalist term s. Edited by Yvan Lamonde, Patricia Lockhart and cultural and commercial forc es, refl ect- strate, between 1530 and 1760 travel and mis-
Fleming and Fiona A. Black ing the hybri d natur e of the territory' s cul- sionary texts, produced "in the field" in diary
Respond ent s usuall y invok e literar y touch-
659p p. £48 (Ca n$85).
stones (Ch aucer as England's nati onal bard ; tural and soc ial infrastructure. Canada 's form by those scouting the upper North Amer-
978 0802080 127
Rob ert Burn s as Scotland' s poetic treasure), national literatures and texts (in Fre nch and ican interior, then res haped, edited and
Carole Gerson and Jacques Michon, editors
commemorate iconic texts (the English King Volume Thr ee: 1918-1 980
English) were frequentl y carve d out from or printed by Briti sh and Fre nch print ers and
James Bibl e, publi shed in Lond on in 1611 638p p. £55 (Ca n$85). defin ed by wor ks publi shed ove rseas or publi sher s, were often the main sources of
and a dominant force in cultu ral-religious 978 0 8020 9047 8 across the porous bord er of its US nei ghb our. inform ation about this New World space for
term s since; the United States Decl aration of University of Toro nto Press. Can$200 the set ; Its commercial infra stru cture was depend ent European readers. Te rritorial expansion west-
Independ ence, issued in 1776), and make distributed in the UK by Plymbridge. £ 130. on externa lly train ed wor kers, emigrants and ward continued in the nineteenth cen tury,
claim s for a national uniqu eness of theme, foreign ca pital, and its markets we re with printin g and publi shin g network s swiftly
language, or cultural view point (though Gutenbergs printin g press develop ed around frequentl y controlled and manipulated by becomin g part of new provincial settlements-
deem ed a world classic, Mi guel de Cerva n- 1440, the French-des igned paperm akin g foreign interests. Yet as case studies in these though mainl y throu gh the intervention of out-
tes' s Don Quixote, publi shed in 1605 , is machin e of 1799 set up in England for the volumes on Ge rma n, Arm eni an , Yiddi sh and siders with little direct knowledge of the area.
firml y established as a key text in modern Fourdrinier broth ers, or the publi shin g giants other allophone language publications demon- Books about the West, offering enthusias-
Spani sh literature). Harper and Ro w (US) and Willi am Co llins strate, Canada has always made space for dif- tic enco miums aimed at attra cting emigrants,
A focu s on material production and distri- (Scotl and ), found ed in the 1800s, which ferent re ligious, cultura l and lin guistic tradi- were often produc ed by comm ercial organiza-
bution will extol technol ogical inno vations have becom e the globally domin ant media tions. The HBC does a goo d job of tracin g tions with ulterior moti ves. From the 1870s
and business ventures that have allowe d conglomerate HarperCollin s. from where such traditions ema nate, and to onwa rds, the Ca nadian Pacific Railro ad
print ed communication to flouri sh outside Those answer s do not full y hold up when what extent they have contributed to Ca n- (CPR) company distributed thou sand s of
nation al bord ers - such as the German Joh ann view ing book histor y fro m a contempora ry ada 's soc ial land scape. They includ e the ora l pamphl ets throu gh British age ncies and
cultures and languages of the indi genou s stea mship companies, aim ed spec ifica lly at
First Peopl es, pol iticall y sensitive French- drawin g emigra nts to the Western territori es
and English-language reg ional identiti es set it controlled as part of its railro ad exp ansion
by exploration and colonization from the and developm ent. A CPR cam paign of
seve ntee nth ce ntury onwards, and the mult i- 1890- 93 adve rtised free fares to Winnip eg in
cultura l interests of more recent emigrant 1,200 US newspaper s, and led several thou-
communities from Eastern Europe, Afri ca sand farmer s to relocate across the bord er.
and Asia. Non-literary texts are not On arriva l, many found that the harsh
neglected, and there is much infor mation rea lities of life on the prairi e, with its seve re
about the sheer number of texts which we re clim ate, frequ ent drought s, grass hopper infes-
dissem inated across the region for religiou s, tation s, and inadequ ate roa ds and transport
politi cal and dida ctic purpo ses: the bibl es networ ks, did not match the glow ing promise
pro duced in Quebec and Nov a Scotia for of fertil e land and boundl ess opportunity
Catholic and Protestant com munities, mu sic extolled in such offici al publi cation s.
shee ts, almanacs, recip e book s, textbooks, Such fuzziness in print about the realiti es
bilin gual translati ons, prize books and spe- of Can adian geog raphy and landscape had
cialist publications. more seve re consequenc es for Sir John
Printing did not arrive in Ca nada until Franklin's expedition of 1819- 22 across the
1752 , when the first printin g office was set Canadian tundra. Franklin and his men lost
viewed
All booKS re up in Halifax. After a slow start, the industry their way attempting to follo w map s repro-
. lLS, and over. gained mom entum, in particul ar with the duced in chea p versions of Samu el Hearn es
In tne 'tles in pnnt, arriva l and install ation of new technol ogy 1790s expeditions across the same area . The
tner tl across most Ca nadian regions from the I 840s tragic outco me of such trust in the acc uracy
a m\l\\on 0 \Iable from
are ava \<.shOP on wards. Th e earlier history of indi genou s, of print was starvation and a loss of ma ny
,.\.5 600 native for ms of cultural transmi ssion, for the lives. More happil y, when the Briti sh Admi-
tne d prices witn indi genou s peoples of the provinces, how- ralty sponsored sailing expeditions, bet ween
at d\SCounte 'n tne UK. ever, was based on communication sys tems 1850 and 1854, in sea rch of Fra nklin and his
FREE delivery I including pictograph s, petrog lyphs, carvings crew , who this time had di sappeared alto-
on rock , bark and hide scrolls and on totem gether, they placed sma ll printin g presses on
. booK poles, and the "warnpurns" or shell heads of
d advice. hoard , w hich - operating in cramped corn ers
AsS\stance an mendat\On s up to eleven rows of 180 bead s made from below deck - churned out playbill s, song
reCom qu ahog clam s, which pro vided mnemonic sheets, broadsides and expedition news-
catalogues, gest\ons from
and sug d nelpful records and docum ent s of tribal histor y. papers as "w inter amuse me nts" for the crew.
able an Th ese "w riting sys tems", part of a fluid oral Before 1840 , a prepond erance of books
Knowledge bOOKsellers. and pict ori al sys te m of cultura l represent a- and print ed mat eri al was brou ght into Ca nada
tion , ca me into collision with the linear, from Fra nce and Britain to service co lonial
rational world of written and print communi- needs. The rise of an agg ress ive ly prot ection-
cation brou ght by miss ionaries, fur trapper s ist publi shin g indu stry in the US, in the latter
and colonizing powers between the sixtee nth half of the nineteent h century, had con se-
and eightee nth centuries. Print and writing quenc es for Ca nadian print culture: authors
would gove rn interpretation s of treati es nego- unable to earn a living throu gh Canadian
tiated , land claim ed , property redi stributed book and print opportunities often turn ed to
and people subdued and ruled over the cen tu- US publi sher s in New York and Boston , and

TLS SE PTEMBER 14 200 7


epic copyright battles were fought in Canada
from the 1840 s onwards, describ ed here in
seve ral fine essays by Geor ge L. Parker.
In more rece nt times, national bord ers have
proved increasingly irrelevant to multi-
nati onal media corpora tions such as Harper-
Coliins as they see k maximum profit for their
produ cts (of which book s, journ als, news -
papers and other print sources are merely a
subsidiary part). As the Canadian medi a
theori st Mar shall McLuhan noted , dur ing the
twenti eth centu ry global ec onomic interests
shifted from an era "when business was our
culture to one in which culture is our busi-
ness" . Ca nada is one country that has reali zed
belatedly the impact of such global shifts on
its book and print cultu re herit age. It was with
grea t alarm that Ca nadia ns learned , in the late
1970s, as HBC Volum e Three notes, that in
absolute value term s Ca nada was the greatest
importer of book s and pamphl ets in the
wor ld, buyin g 9- 16 per cent of the world's
total book exports. It was also the world's
grea test importer of newspapers and maga-
zines, buying 14-1 8 per cent of wor ld export
trade in that area. Canada's markets we re
domin ated by US, UK and French exports, a
fact that had not changed since the creation of
the Dominion in 1840 . In respon se to these
facts, highli ghted by the various commissions
and official surveys into the state of publi sh-
ing that report ed in the early 1970s, the
Canadian government initi ated a series of
gra nt schemes and publi shin g subsidies to
suppor t and pro tec t Ca nadian printin g and
publi shin g interests, a cultural subsidy that
largely ex ists to this day, and to which other
nation states with similar con cerns have
referred , asp ired and some times emulated.
Whil e there are enough facts, figur es and
dat asets in these volumes to keep the most
empirica lly mind ed of hi storian s and eco-
nomic statisticians bu sy for so me time, there
are also some exce lle nt essays and case stud-
ies, full of odd and quirk y item s that are a
plea sure to rea d. My favourit es includ e the
titles stocked by the shor t-lived, coo pera tive
"w he at po ol " lib raries started by farmers in
the Prairie pro vinces of Manitob a and
Sas katchewan in the 1920 s and 30s : these
included An Intern ational Treasury of
Leftwi ng Humou r ( 1945), published in Winni-
peg , and the coo pera tive retellin g of the
"Three Littl e Pigs" story, Porky , Rorky Goes
Co-op . The illu stration s include an 1888 pho-
tograph of a life- size statue of Gutenberg on a
float in a Quebecoi s parade, and a shot of the
flamb oyant publisher Jack McClelland giv-
ing away boo ks in Saska toon in 1972, attired
in a full-l ength fur coat. The acco mpany ing
ca ption announ ces that this was a mild prel-
ude to one of his more out rageou s stunts,
und ert aken in blizzard conditions in Ma rch
1980: dressed in a toga, McClell and dro ve a
c hario t do wn To ro nto's Yo nge Street to pro-
mote The Emperor's Virgi n by Sy lvia Fraser;
when a brok en ax le derailed the proc ession,
he walked the rest of the way acc ompanied
by the author and two shivering centurions.
These volumes are a scholarly achieve -
ment that dese rves a wide rea dership. They
present a narrati ve arc charting not so much a
national history as much as a trans-n ational
histor y. It is a multil ayered tale, vividly told,
often compe lling, and dem onstr ati ve of the
complex, multidisciplinary research work
needed to und er stand the place of books and
print in nati onal and internation al contexts.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 23
whose library forty books have been traced ;
Dutch papers Skemer locates Faber in his intellectu al con-
text at Leip zig and Bud weis and provides a
useful study of the produ ction and use of
almanacs and prognos tica . Willia m Kell y, in
few month s ago , boo k historians lost J O H N L. F L O O D the first part of a survey of largely forgott en
A one of their chief mentors whe n
Henri-Jean Martin , born in 1924,
reci pient of the Gutenberg Prize in 1998,
St eph an F u s s e l , e d it o r
holdin gs of early imprints from the Low
Countries in Scottis h libraries, highl ights
materi al in Aberdeen Univers ity Lib rary, the
died . Martin , "the inventor of the histor y of GUTEN BE RG J A HRB U C H 20 07 Leighton Library at Dunbl ane, and the
the book " and the author, with Luci en 396 pp. Wies baden: Harrassow itz. £75. National Library of Scotland.
Febvre, of the seminal L 'Apparition du li vre 9783 447 055253 In the con cluding sec tion, on the peri odic al
(1958) and of the four- volum e Histoire de press , British reader s will find Jane Potter's
I ' edition fra nca ise (1983- 6), is the subjec t of at Ta briz, Teh ran and Esfaha n between 1817 analys is of Hodd er & Stoughton's literary
a fine mem oir by Frederic Barbi er in Guten- and 1856 ; of the print er s them selves virtually monthl y, The Bookman , du ring the years
berg Jah rbucli 2007 . It is the sole co ntribu- nothin g is known. Finally, Brigitt e Schul ze 19/4-1 8, of interest. It serves as a valuable
tion from a Fre nch pen to the volume this exa mines six Russian, Poli sh and Czec h edi- indicator of war time readin g habit s and the
yea r, but Guten berg Jahrbuch is as pol yglot tion s of Wilh elm Busc h's Max und Moritz circ ulation of books and idea s, and is interest-
as eve r: nine ess ays are in English, eight in (18 65). Though this is generally held to be a ing not least because its voc iferously patri-
Ge rman, and one eac h in Spa nish and Italian. did actic childre n's book with text acco mpa - otic editors had strong connec tions with
The main essays are grouped in four broad nied by illustration s, the pictures in fact ca me the Asquith Governmen t. Jiirgen Wilke
sec tions, the first of which cove rs incun abul a first, and Busch intended the book for adults describ es how contem pora ry Germ an news -
and early printin g in Euro pe. Visually at as much as for children; furth ermore he had paper pro prietors are see king to compe nsate
least, the pick of the ten offerings here must no didactic intenti on. Schulze nea tly shows for the declin e in adve rtising income by
be Kurt- Georg Pfandtner' s study of the what repercu ssions these misapprehensions branchin g out into selling books at bargain
A ustrian National Library ' s copy of the have had on the recepti on of Max and Moritz prices. The Siiddeutsche Zeit ung led the way
G utenberg Bibl e - twent y-fo ur of Pfandt- in the Slavo nic wor ld, and it is interestin g to in 2004, with its hugely success ful "SZ-
ner ' s thirt y-seven illu stration s are in colour. compa re her findin gs with those of Greg ory Bibliothek" , a collection of "fifty of the best
He convincingly shows that the illumination Jones and Jane Brow n in their study of the novels by fifty of the best wri ters of the 20th
was the wor k of two artists in Vienn a itself , recepti on of Busch in Britain and Am erica ce ntury" . Oth er newp aper s foll owed, with
in the later 1450s, thu s confirming a sugges - (Papers of the Bibliog raphi cal Soc iety of the Hamburg wee kly Die Ze it selling 110,000
tion tent ati vely made by Eberhard Kiinig in America, 101: 2, Jun e 2007). sets of a six tee n-vo lume ency clopedia priced
1995. Severin Corsten, the veteran histori an Under library histor y, Don Skemer gives at €245 , for ex ample. Wilk e warns that there
of Colog ne printin g, reviews the chro nology an excellen t acco unt of the fifteenth- centu ry is a danger of newspapers losing sight of their
and technical aspects of the ea rlies t book s Bohemian astrologe r Wenzel Faber, from core busin ess: selling papers.
print ed by Ulrich Ze ll, that city's first printer,
and Jos Herm ans investigates book produc-
tion in the Dutc h town of Zwo lle in the period
1477-15 23, basing his study on so me 1,300
extan t copies of 267 works; he shows that the
books in Dutch required nearly as much
paper as the Latin book s, eve n though they
represe nted less than 20 per cent of the titles.
G isela Miincke offers a thorou gh analysis of
an extreme ly rare Co log ne pa mphlet of 1529,
written by Niko laus Ferber, Vicar-Ge nera l of
the Fra ncisca n orde r, deploring the Land-
g rave of He ssen' s pl an to seq ues trate the
monaster ies and turn them into charitable and
educational instituti on s. Angela Nuovo
describes the library of G ian Vincenzo Pinelli
(1535-1 60 I) at Padua, which possessed an
impressive collecti on of catalogues of some
fort y fifteenth- and sixtee nth-ce ntury librar-
ies (incl uding those of Pico della Mirandol a,
Cardinal Bessarion, and seve n Italian cardi-
nals), some of which have long since been dis-
persed or destroyed; the collecti on clearly
shows that Pinelli saw his library as pro vid-
ing aids for research espec ially in the field s
of medi cine, mathem atics, optics and botany.
In the second group of essays, on printing
histor y and book illu stration, Derm ot
Mc Gui nne outlines the history of irish types,
from the Queen Elizabeth font cut in 1571 to
one produ ced with the advice of Stanley
Mori son in the 1930s. Hans-Otto Keun ecke,
investigatin g famil y links bet ween print ers
and clergymen in seve nteen th-ce ntury Fra n-
coni a, interprets the fact that many clergy-
men's so ns became printers as an indication
of the high social stan ding of the book trad e.
Judit Vizkelety-Ecse dy traces the origins of
types used in seve ntee nth-ce ntury Hun gary
to Vienna, Po land and the Low Co untries.
Ulrich Marzolph discusses what he term s
"Persian incunabula" , the preci ous few books
printed fro m movable type, not lith ograph y,
TLS SEPTE MBER 14 20 0 7
24
Take the money
he lost oasis of Robert Twigger' s title
T is the legend ary Zerzura of Egy pt's
Western Desert. Explorers, adve ntur-
ers, jo urna lists, filibu sters and free-bo oters
have long pretend ed to search for this Los t
Oas is - though the direction s they mu st fol-
low, as given in a fifteenth-c entury work
known as The Book ofTreasures, have no geo -
gra phica l location:
Follow the valley until you meet another valley
to the west between two hills. In it you will
find a road. Follow it. It will lead to Zerzura.
You will find its gates closed. It is a white city
like a dove. By the gate you will find a bird
sc ulpted fro m stone. Stretc h up your hand to its
beak and take from it a key. Open the gate with
it and enter the city. You will find much wealth
and the king and the queen sleeping the sleep
of enc ha ntment. Do not go near the m . Ta ke the
treas ure and that is all.
Ze rzura has never been about findin g, it
ha s been about the search, the lure of the far
hori zon . It has also always been about back-
ers - those who ca n be found to pay for an
ex pedition to find what ca nnot be found.
It is as we ll to be full y awa re of the natur e
of the sea rch for the Lost Oasis of Ze rzura
before yo u open this book. Those readers hop-
ing to find a flu ent and accessible study of
some of the great themes of the Western
Desert should look elsew here. Tw igge r is not
the man to guide you throu gh the wor k of the
Egy ptian ex plore rs set within the fram e of
their ow n politi cal and personal motives. He
does not inqui re into the di stin cti ve Berb er
culture of the oas is communities of Siwa,
Dakhla and Bahari ya, nor the Co ptic ori gin s
of Christianity in the mon asteries of the wes t-
ern desert. He is not one to take an infor med
look at the Senu ssi Saharan Emp ire; nor
examine the rout es of the thou sand year
trans-S aharan slave and go ld trade, or the
habits of the Bedouin Arab tribes and the
Tebu ofthe Eas tern Sahara, or the fir st form a-
tio n of Egy pt fro m out of the climatic catastro-
phe that dro ve the Sahara n dwe llers eas t to
Have you
missed an issue?
To orde r past co pies please call 0207 740 02 17, emai l tls @ocsmed ia.net or write to:
TL S Back Issues, I-Il Ga lleywa ll Road, London, SE l 6 3PB, enclos ing a cheq ue made
paya ble to De S Wor ldw ide . Credit/de bit card payments are also acce pted. Back issues cos t
£3.5 0 per co py within the UK and £5.00 ove rseas (please note that not all iss ues are ava ilab le).
Please state the da te of eac h iss ue required.
An index of all pas t issues is ava ilable at www.ocsmedia.netltls
TRAVEL
B AR N ABY ROG ER SO N
R ob e rt T wi g g er
LO ST O ASIS
In searc h of para dise
240pp. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. £16.99.
978 0 29 7848 127
the Nile, or the mind s that sha ped the rock
carvings and rock paintin gs of the Sahara , or
the men who first spread Islam throu gh thi s
vast land scape.
Twigger ' s preferr ed reference points for
ex ploring the Wes tern Desert are the fami liar
cas t of Euro pean motori zed ex plore rs of the
1930 s and 40 s (Ra lph Bagnold , Laszlo
A lmasy and eo), coupl ed with inspir ation
drawn from film s set in the Western Desert
(such as lee Cold in Alex and The English
Patient), a childhoo d fascin ation for Autocar
and Jagu ar and Morgan cars tran sferr ed to
an ad ult obsess ion with the rival merit s of
various rival brand s of Land crui ser s. He also
has an arde nt desire to assembl e his ow n ille-
ga l collection of prehi storic shards and fos-
sils from the desert floor.
On this acco unt alon e man y scho lars might
dismi ss the Lost Oasis as a loath som e book ,
which enco urages Western ers to look on the
Egy ptian Sahara as a vast sa ndpit in which to
dri ve their cars while lookin g for ancient
trea sur es to steal. To do so, they will have
missed out on the rich vein of moc king self-
hum ou r that cou rses throu gh out these pages.
Tw igge r never pretend s to be a histori an of
early Islam , or an archaeologist mappin g out
the lost lake settle me nts : he is a man in
search of Ze rzura . W hich is to say that he is a
writer loo kin g for fund s, a way to meet "the
ignominiou s, eve r-prese nt need for mon ey" .
Fro m the first line of the book , he is refr esh-
ingly ca ndid abo ut the process.
Running out of money in Oxford and mar-
ried to an Egy ptian with two sma ll child ren to
look after, Twigger and hi s wife decid e it
TLS SEPTEMBER 14 200 7
John Mills and Sylvia Syms in/ce Cold ill A lex (1958)
would be cheaper to live in Egy pt than where
they are. "I could write a book there, which
would be cheaper than keepin g a hou se in
Eng land and makin g ex pe nsive research trip s
abroa d." So, "the next day I started research-
ing interestin g stor ies abo ut the desert , found
good mat erial about lost oases, threw in more
research I had done for my novel, and when
the publi sher s sa id, ' may be' we were set to
go" . Subsidized by an ad vance, Twigger sets
off for Egy pt. He pro vides us wi th a delight-
ful portra it of Ca iro, the closed socie ty of the
ex patriate Petroleum wives set aga inst vivid
de pictions of hi s wife 's Egy ptian famil y and
their intern al feud s. He rema ins ho nest
enoug h to obse rve that his qu est is dismi ssed
by informed local s. "W hen I met an artist
who lived on an island in the Nile he roll ed
his eyes and said, Yo u' re not doin g that
Ze rzura thin g too, are you?" This is ec hoed
by his wife 's Uncle Mahmoud , a military
man with grea t ex perience but very littl e
affec tio n for the desert. He rememb er s that
"neither the Ge rmans or the Briti sh left
proper mine maps. It was the Bedouin who
made the map s for us [the Egy ptian army ] by
losing their hand s and legs". Tw igger's explo-
ration of the desert is a series of comedy train-
ing trip s: practic e wa lks up a suburba n
Wadhi that leads to the Red Sea from Ca iro,
day-expeditions among a tou gh crow d of
motorbike-l ovin g Sca ndinav ian ex pats, the
Hypermarket
The carp arks divide
int o co ntine nts ;
the staff skate aro und, inside,
with hyperconfidenc e .
You go in lookin g
for a clock or a pear
and emerge , ho urs later,
with a deck chair;
crossing the wor ld
in search of the car
a fresh wind fill s the ca nvas
somew here off the coast of Afri ca.
A NDR EW JOH NS TO N
lon g-d ela yed acqui siti on of a desert ve hicle
hamp ered by using local ex perts such as
Ozman - " in his late forti es, bald , a heavy
smoker" - who is in possession of an age ing
Buic k. Twigger is in his eleme nt here, by
turn s enchanted, bemu sed and deli ght ed by
the work ings of Egy pt: the "power strugg les,
deceit , creative ways around see mingly insol-
uble probl em s" and the "strange way an
Egy ptia n can simulta neo usly like you, wa nt
to be your friend and wa nt to rip yo u for
eve ry penny that they can ge t" .
Twi gger becom es so much the Ze rzu ra
ma n that he remind s us of another grea t
figu re of Zerzura lor e from the 1980 s, Dr
Ca rlo Bergm ann . Ber gmann put for ward
near-fant astic cl aim s to have found the "old-
es t sto ne ma p in the wo rld" (po inting the
way to Ze rz ura of course) and then claimed
to have had hi s unique di scoveri e s plun-
dered by ri val Ge rma n scho lars who sto le
hi s manuscr ipt s. His doct or ate, as befits a
sa les ma n of th e Zerzura dr e am, was not in
arch aeol ogy but in mark etin g. But Berg-
ma nn for ged a life of adve nture for him self
neverthel ess, and tran sferr ed his desert lor e
to such real came l-riding ad venturer s as
A riia Baaij en s, who m he tau ght in exc ha nge
for sex ua l fa vours on the dun es. As Has-
soum con fesses to Tw igger, "the desert
rec ha rges my soul . . . I ca n live bett er afte r I
com e back from the desert " .

ihad, or holy war , is all the rage nowa-
J
days. Pope Bened ict XV I obliq uely dub s
it the essence of Islam, befo re retrac ting
his commen t, step by step, on the road to
Istanb ul. President Bus h define s it as the
major manifestation of "I slarno-fasc ism".
The intellectual star of European Islam, Ta riq
Ramadan, curre ntly of St Ant on y' s Co llege ,
Ox for d, claim s that the Grea t Jihad consists,
not in violence , but in the believer' s strugg le
to purify his ow n soul from sin. What all of
the above argumen ts have in common, how-
ever , is a lack of historical perspec tive . Such
a perspecti ve would tell us, first, that onl y
one (ext rem ist) M uslim sect, the Kharijit es,
puts j ihad among the pillars (arkan) , or
pivotal precepts of Islam. Yet, seco nd, most
orthodox juri sts and theologians wo uld place
jihad very high, that is on the rank immedi-
ately foll owin g the arkan . Indeed , alread y in
the Koran, j ihad looms large, in chap ters dat-
ing from the Prop het' s period in Medina, that
is when he beco mes - after his migra tio n
from Mecca - a maj or politica l actor. For
exam ple: "F ight them [the unb elievers] until
there is no disse nsion and the religion is
entirely Alla h's" (11, 193) .
The ultim ate aim is clearly hegemoni c.
The Koran tries to leg itima te the figh t aga inst
the paga n Bedo uin tribes. As such, the
,...
Heavyweight thinking,
featherweight prices.
Subscribe today and save over 40% on the usual
retail price. You will also receive a welcome gift
of two steel TLS bookmarks.
TlS
~
very sad after
Dear Engin ... I wa:i o n Remember what
our last conv:~::the ~ater wheel;
you to~d mi, a k friend, think back.
and th:cnk a~o' be moving slowly,
We may seen:' t 's ~we're moving .. ·
but the po a.n - ,
James Baldwin's letters to J stanbul
lames Campbell
R ELI GI ON
A spreading sway
E M MANUE L SIV A N
Mi ch a el B ann er
JI H A D I N I SL A MI C H IST ORY
Doctrines and practice
224pp. Princeton University Press. $22.95:
distributed iu the UK by Wiley. £14.95.
978069 1 125749
A dna n A . Mu s a ll a m
FROM SEC U LAR IS M TO JI H A D
Sa yy id Q utb and th e fo undations of radi cal
Islamism
256pp. Praeger. £25.95(US $44.95).
9780 2759859 I 2
Prophet accep ts the dom inant cen tra lity of
wa r as a regul ator y mech anism for inter-
gro up relations in Ara bia, in the struggle over
limited resources (above all water and graz -
ing gro und), and transforms it into a religious
cree d . This is quite in line with the major bent
of Muh amm ad' s effor t to repl ace a kin ship-
based soc io-politica l structure with one predi -
cated on transcendent al sanction. But though
paga ns are defined as the particul ar enemies
one should strive to dom inate, the door is left
open, eve n in Muh arnmad ' s days, for a contin-
uation of divinely sanctio ned hostilities
IDelivery direct to your
door every week
IFree access to our online
subscriber archive
Subscribe now by calling
+44 (0)1858 438 781
(quoting code SOI2) or visit
www,subscription.co.uk/tls/SOI2
Readers in the US sbould call
1-800 370 9040 or visit
www.t1s-subscription.com
(quoting code 207US)
The leadin g paper ill the
worldfor literary culture
TL S SEPTEMBER 142 007
25
aga inst adherent s of other religio ns outside ma le, pas t minorit y age and able-bod ied) to
Arabia. take part in faith-b ased war , it is eno ugh for
It is a moot - and co ntroversial - question the comm unity as a whole if some part of it is
among scholars, whether Mu hamm ad him- engaged in com bating non-believers. Seco nd,
self actua lly envisaged the mass ive cam - war is essen tially offen sive and hegemonic,
paigns which broke out almos t immedi ately j ustified in term s of Isla m' s mora l superiority
after his dea th. Muslim me n of relig ion argue and the need to spread its sway on earth:
that of course he did. Whateve r the case those killed in such a conflic t are martyrs and
might be, in the minds of Muh am mad ' s suc- are elig ible for heavenl y recomp en se (auto-
cessors a co ntinuity did exist bet ween his bat- matic entry to Paradise). But one should note
tles and thei rs. The belief in the innate moral that "sway" is defin ed as makin g Islami c law
and intellectu al superiority of Islam - as the prevalent in territories conquere d and not in
culmination of all previous monotheistic reve- term s of forcibly making their inhabit ant s
lation - is the explicit moor ing for the notion embrace Islam. It is suffic ient for a legal
of jih ad presen t in the Koran. sys tem to be imposed where by those who
Sha ria law, which barely began to evo lve em brace Islam get privileged treatment while
during the wars of co nquest and took its defi- the rest (prov ided they are not pagan) can still
nite form two cen turies later at the heig ht of mai ntain a mod icum of individu al and co m-
the Mu slim empire , wo uld give its stamp to munal right s based on the koranic rule of "no
this percep tion of intern ational relation s and co mpulsion in religion" . Third, as opposit ion
elabora te it in grea t det ail, as befit s a religion to jih ad is bound to rem ain a subs tantial fac-
intended above all to shape beh aviou r (ort ho- tor, a good part of the effor t wo uld, by neces -
prax is) and not belief (orthodoxy). sity, have to be channelled into defen sive
The brunt of this legal co nstruc t - which j ihad, whether to repel agg ressi on aga inst
held , with mi nor mod ifica tions, for ove r Mu slim s or their prop ert y, to preve nt the
eleve n ce nturies - may be set forth und er the oppressio n and persecution of Mu slims out-
foll owing headin gs: first, warfare is a major side the land s of Islam, or to retaliate for the
religiou s precept, but a co llec tive and not an breakin g of a pledge by the enemy .
individual one. That is, while it is highl y Four, the inhabited ea rth is co nsequen tly
recommended for the believer (prov ided he is divided bet ween the Abode of Islam (Dar al-
-----------------------------------------------------------~
,
Choos e your level of savin gs off the usual ret ail prices ,,,
Quarterly (save more with Direct Debit"')
12months-save32%
24mon th s-save41 ~
Title MrD MrsD MissD MsD
D u, m
D u" "
D UK1161
Other D ...
o Europe£34
o Europe£112
o Europe£196
D RaW'"
o ROWE132
o ROWE231 Ai
First name
Address....
Surname .
................................................................................................................................... PostcooejZIP ....
Telephone Mobile .
E-mail t ..
Easy ways to pay (please tick your preferred payment option)
1 0 Iendcse acheque for made payable toTheTimes literary Supplement Ltd.
20 Please charge tomy:Visa 0 Mastercard 0 Switch/Maestro0
Card No. IL -l._L-.L...L-L---l_L-...L....L.-l._L-.L...L-L---l---'
Valid from[ I ][ I ] EXPirydate[ I ][ I ] Cardissueno.[ I ] (ifapplicable)
(erdholders siqnature
Pleasecomplete thefollowi nginstruction toyour Bank orBuilding SocietytopaybyDirect Debit(UK only).
3 D '·'OirectOebit-payonlyWeachquarter(UKonly)
PleasepayThe Times Literary SupplementltdDirect Debitsfrom theecountdetailedonthisinstruction, subjecttothesateaoardsassured
bytheDirect Debit Guarantee. Iunderstand thatthis instruction may remainwithin The Times literary Supplement ttd,andifso,details
Date .
will bepassed electronically tomyBankorBuildingSociety. Banks andBuildingSocietiesmaynotacceptOirectOebitinstrudionsforsome
kinds ofaccounts.
Originator's identification number I5 I 9 I 9 I 1 I 2 I 1 I
Nameofaccount holder(s)....
To: The M a na~ er Bank/Buildin~ Society
Address....
...................................................................................................................................Postcode....
Branchsortcode 1....-l._L-.L...L-L-J AccountNo.....
1 -l.---'L-.L...L-L---l_J........J
This guaranteeisoffered byallBanksandBuilding Societiesthat take partintheDirect Debit scheme.The efficiencyandsecurityofthe
schemeis monitored andprotected byyour own BankorBuilding Society. Iftheamounts tobepaidor thepayment dates changeTheTimes
literary Supplement willnotify you 10wor.:ing daysinadvarxeofjuuraccount being debited eras otherwise agreed. Ifanerroris madeby
TheTimesLiterarySupplement oryourBank orBuilding Society, youareguaranteed afull andimmediaterefund from yourbranchofthe
amount paid.You cancancel a Direct Debitatanytime bywritingtoyour Banker Building Society.Please also send acopy ofyour letter tous.
t Bysupplying your e-mail address you arehappytoreceive offersvia e-men from orinassociation withThe Times Literary Supplement
(TlS). TheTLS is passionateabout seruring great promotions andoffersfor you. TheTLS directly(orviaitsagents) maymailorphone you
about newpromotions, products andservkes.Tickifyou don't want toreceive thesefrom us[ 1orcarefully selected companies[ 1
(Held underUK law.Seeourprivacy policyat www.nidp.com) Ref S012
Please return this coupon to: The TLS, Tower House , Sovereign Park ,
Market Harborough, LE16 9EF , UK.
26
Islam) - where sharia is the law of the land -
and the Abode of War (Dar al-Harb) , with
the implication that the normal type of rela-
tion s which should exist betw een them is
armed hostility. Yet, realistic as ever, the doc-
trin e of jihad admits that the power equation
may often be detrimental to Mu slims , as
indeed it was from the eleventh century on,
and thu s make s peac eful relations an expedi-
ent one can resort to, with the provi so that the
pacts such relations will be predicated on
should be limited in duration - truc e rather
than peace - though one can prolong them if
neces sity so requires.
To the extent that one can find any subs-
tantial chall enge to the jihad doctrin e, it arose
in and around the tenth centur y from the mysti-
cal movement of Sufism, which sought to
render supreme the predilection to turn
inward s, to emphasize purifying one ' s own
soul through contemplati on and intense ritual-
istic practice, and to privilege those precepts
which relate to interpersonal relations (rather
than politic s and other regimented form s of
collective endeavour). The Sufis dubb ed this
notion the "Great Jihad " (al-Jihad al-Akbar),
as distinct from the "Small Jihad" (al-Jihad
al-Asghar), that of warfare. It so happ ens that
the movement spread at a time when actual
warfare , by virtue of the de facto milita ry stale-
mate, had anyhow reduc ed the level of hostili-
ties. With the advent of the Crusa des , how-
ever, intensive (and defen sive) warfare was
impos ed on the lands of Islam , and Sufis
joined the fight with as much zeal as other
Mu slims. Whate ver ideological contradiction
there existed in theory, it evaporated durin g
centurie s of warfare again st Crusa ders and
Mongol s. At the level of the collectiv e con-
sciousness of these mystics some self-purifica-
tion should precede participation in jihad, but
the latter in turn enhances this moral uplifting.
For an elaborate yet cle ar survey of the
jihad doctrin e, as held between the mid-ninth
and the mid-tw entieth centuri es, one may turn
to Jihad in Islamic History: Doctrines and
practice by Mich ael Bonner. The trouble is
that history did not end in the 1950s. And the
past five decade s have witnessed its rhythm
accelerate in the Middl e East. Amon g other
tran sform ation s, the doctrine and practic e of
jihad underwent nothing short of a revolution ;
and one which has global implic ations. Bon-
ner seems to undere stimate the scope and
depth of this sea change. Which is perhaps
why he devotes to it barel y five of the book ' s
174 page s. Thank s to a resolute minorit y
which had occupi ed the moral high ground , a
brand new jihad culture challenged the estab-
lished doctrine and turned Holy War inward s,
namel y against fellow Mu slims, thereby dele-
gitimating the status quo and abo ve all the
nation state in the postcolonial age.
It is not ju st a matter of fringe groups
addict ed to violenc e, hut rather the spearhead
of opp osition in most Mu slim countries
(though it seized pow er onl y in Iran, and for a
while, in Sudan and Afghanistan). Moreover ,
it had become the onl y viabl e oppo sition to
the pow ers that be. Thi s clu ster of movem ent s
was the brainchild of three think ers working
in parall el: the Iranian Ruholla Khom eini , the
Paki stani Abu Ala al-M awdoodi and the
Egypti an Sayyid Qutb. (Th e new biography
of the latter, From Secularism to Jihad by
Adnan A. Mu sallam , breaks no new ground.)
All thre e were well ver sed in jihad tradition
and lore, but used it creatively as a pri sm to
RELIGION
look at current probl em s. The result was a dis-
tinct ruptur e, yet one operating within a mea s-
ure of continuity with the age-old norm s of
how to regul ate violence. It is this dialectical
relationship that Bonn er misses.
All thre e think er s began with a diagno sis:
Islam tod ay face s a mortal dang er , wor se
than anything it has known in the pa st. Thi s
dan ger com es this time from within , from
lead ers and movement s which are nomin ally
Mu slim and , in their own mann er , sincerely
devoted to the welfare of their peoples; and
yet they inadvertently bring about a cal amity
of spiritual extinction upon these peopl es,
becau se they are, in the apt term coined in
Iran, " Westoxicated" - that is, intoxicat ed by
Western idea s, totall y alien to Islam , such as
nation alism, socialism, liberali sm, economic
development , democracy, etc. By manipulat-
ing state-of-the-art audiovisual media, these
moderni sts - who are heavil y repr esented in
the political elites which mon opolize the
media - inculcate the se ideas into the subcon-
scious of the Mu slim ma sses and thu s pro-
mote addiction to modernity and to the "good
life" it promi ses. The upshot of it all is that
the world of Islam is in a state of virtual apos-
tasy, having for saken its faith for infid elit y, a
state of affairs all the more dangerou s for
bein g uncon sciou s. In Mu slim term s, we are
in a state of Jahiliyya - a barbarity wor se
than the one Arabi a lived in before the appear-
ance of the Proph et Muh ammad.
The cure they agreed on was for the faithful
of Islam to come back to the politic al arena
from which they have been absent for so
long. They should subject modernit y to a rig-
orou s and systematic critique in the name of
Mu slim authenticity. Thu s they must enhance
the religiou s awar ene ss of the ma sses and
es pecially of "brainw ashed youth" . Yet such
an educational end eavour risks failin g to
bring about structural chang e, given the
state's monopoly on the means of coercion as
well as on the media ; all the more so as the
state itself is addicted to the hedoni stic, secu-
lari st spirit. The Islamic radicals should not
dodg e, then, the inescapable conclu sion to be
drawn: delegitimation of the curr ent regimes.
Apostasy is worse than infidelit y, hence
"j ihad by word" should almo st inevitably
lead to "j ihad by hand " , violence counterin g
the state's violence. Tyrannicide and civil
war, it is true, violate two historical Islamic
taboo s, but one will have to infring e them in
extremis in the name of "internal jihad",
Old- style "external jih ad", say the radical s,
should go on wherever a Mu slim territory is
occupied by infidel forc es; and indeed the y
are fightin g it in Palestine, Chechny a, Afghan-
istan and Iraq. The bulk of their effort s,
howev er , are direct ed against allegedly
pseud o-Mu slim regimes. Violent operations
again st foreign pow ers of the al-Qa eda vari-
e ty ar e desi gn ed not to c onq ue r th em hut to
puni sh and weak en the se pow ers to the extent
that the y support (militarily and financiall y)
apo state Mu slim regim es (the United States
in Saudi Arabia, France in Algeria etc). In
extreme (and rare ) cases the major enem y is
not ju st the state and its serva nts, but the
whole of the popul ation , judged to have
becom e a lost ca se. The murd erou s campaign
again st all Iraqi Shias, spea rheaded by Abu
Mu sab al-Zarqawi, but pursued since his
assassination in June 2006, is a horribl e
reminder of the anarchic forc es unleashed by
the new- style jihad.
TLS S E PT EMB ER 14200 7
Transient record
his is a book for serious coffee tabl es. P ETER MARSHALL
T Although unencumbered by refer-
ences, and groaning under its weight
of col our illustration s, it manages to supply
Edward Norm an
both an interestin gly idiosyncratic histor y TH E ROMA N CA T H O LI C C HU R C H
of the Catholic Church, and a thoughtful An illust rated history
apologia for it. I92pp . Tham es and Hndson. £22.50.
To make sense of 2,000 years of develop- 9780 500 25132 4
US: University of California Press. $29.95.
ment in less than 200 pages (half of them given
9780 520 25251 6
over to pictures) is a difficult brief. Edwa rd
Norman's organizin g theme is "the Church in
the world", the often difficult relationship of
Catholic Christianity to the institution s and
mores of the societies in which it has rooted
itself. Seven chapters take us through the early
Church, the schism with Constantinople, the
feudaliz ation of the Church in the Middl e
Ages, the upheaval s of the Reformati on; and
on, via the expansion of Catholicism beyond
Europe, to the Church' s efforts to respond to
the catastroph e of the French Revolution, its
ultramontane moment in the nineteenth cen-
tury, and entanglements with authoritarian
regimes in the twentieth , through to the "uncer-
tain frontiers" of the contemporary world.
Along the way ther e are gem s of insightful
and compressed discu ssion : on the Greek
philo sophic origin s of Catholic doctrine, for
example , or on the parting of the wa ys with
the Orthodox. The latter , Norman sugges ts,
committed the truth s of the faith to litur gy,
and ther efore effectively pickl ed them ,
wherea s the Latin s entrus ted them to a tradi-
tion of scholarly teaching, which of necessity
would under go developm ent. It is salutary to
be reminded that the endemic quarrels
bet ween temporal and spiritual pow er in the
Middl e Ages were not Church- state conflicts
of a modern kind, but disput es about the bal-
ance of authority within a single Christian
ord er ; and that the papacy' s embrace ofsecu- Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows (Italy,
lar monarchical authority in the wak e of the eighteenth century) ; from The Heart, edited
defeat of N apoleonic Fra nce was a re ver sal by James Peto (254pp. Yale University
of a centuri es-old pol icy. Press. £16.99 . 978 0 300 12510 8)
Norman shows him self to be by instin ct a
feath er-ruffler. He is robu st about the Cru- takes a quaintly Victorian turn: mal e and
sades , for which modern Chri stian Churches femal e slaves at the court of tenth-century
should apologize when Islamic bodi es apol o- Moori sh Cordoba were , so Nor man inform s
gize for their earlier violent occupation of us, "subject to infelicitous indi gnitie s". I saw
Byzantin e territories and the Holy Land. He a handful of factual lapses on the part of
is revisioni st and rel ativi st about the sup- author or editor. Paul lIl ' s re-establi shm ent
posed exc esses of the Inqui sition (who se of the Roman Inqui sition is ass igned to the
modu s operandi he sees prefigur ed in the wrong century, and a French , rath er than
established here sy court s of Islamic Spain). Imperi al, arm y is said to have sacked Rom e
In contrast to some other cont emporary Cath- in 1527. English and Am eric an Purit ans
olic historians, he is notabl y unsceptic al hanged witche s rath er than burn ed them.
about the historicit y of Ju an Diego , the con- Nonetheless , among a plethora of single-
vert ed nativ e Mexican credited with deliv er- volume histori es of Catholicism , this can be
ing the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe. recommended. It is up to date without being
Some per son al pr eo ccupation s seem to col- undul y present-minded . Nor man wisely does
our the final chapter. There is sustained di s- not offer predictions or pre scriptions for the
cussion of the intellectual shortcomings of pontificate of Benedict XVI , thou gh along
Liberation Theology, but barel y a mention of with others he sees the centr e of gravity shift-
Humanae Vitae, the 1968 encyclical reaffirm- ing furth er to the global South. The book
ing the ban on artifici al contraception, or its open s with the observation that "there is a ten-
impli cation s for the authority of the papac y dency for adherent s of a religious institution
in the modern We stern world. to mistake what are in fact tran sient mom ent s
Norman writ es in an engag ingly clear of development for perm anent embodime nts
sty le, didactic but seldom preachy. There are of its founding ideals". Thi s sense of per spec-
hardl y any places where the text is allu sive or tive encourages the reassurin g thought that
obscure (thou gh non- speciali sts in the history church historians, eve n avowedly con serva-
of Portu gal may be puzzl ed by "Sebastian- tive one s like Edward Norman, can pro vide
ism" ). Just occasionally, however, the pro se an antidote to fundament alism.

ittgenstein' s Tractatus Logico-
W Philosophicus (192 1) is one of the
most intriguing philosop hica l
works of the pas t hundred years and also one
of the mos t baffli ng. Its import ance is indi s-
pu tab le; its ideas abo ut the taut ologou sness
of logic and the mean ing lessness of met a-
phys ics we re fu ndamental for the Logical
Positi vists and for ma ny who were influ-
enced by them. The interpretation of the
book , however, is hotl y disp uted.
One issue in part icular has been much dis-
cusse d rece ntly. The early part of the book
makes various (appa rent) ontological asse r-
tion s: "T he wor ld is all that is the case . The
world is the totality offacts and not of thin gs" ;
objec ts "are simple", and co nstitute the "un-
altera ble form" of the world; and so on. The
end of the boo k, however, may make one
wo nder about the status of these remar ks. In
the penul timate section , Wittgenstein writes :
"My statements are elucidatory in this way :
anyo ne who understands me eve ntually recog-
nizes them as nonsensical" . The final section
co nsists of a single orac ular sentence :
"Whereof one cannot spea k, thereof one mu st
be silent". These late sections sugges t that, far
from putting forward a metaph ysical view,
Wittgenstein is dismissing the apparent meta-
physics of the earlier parts of the book (along
with the wor ks of other phil osophers) as liter-
ally mean ingless, as say ing nothi ng at all.
How are these passages to be recon ciled ?
Until some twent y ye ars ago, co mmentators
ge nera lly deplo yed Witt gen stein ' s distin c-
tion between say ing and show ing . A sentence
such as "My car is gree n" says so mething
about the colour of my car but what it shows
is, perhaps, that "car" is a noun of which "is
green" can be meanin gfull y predicated. Witt-
gens tei n insists that, give n his sense of the dis-
tin ction , "[ W jhat can be show n ca nnot be
sai d" . This suggests a way of recon cilin g the
beginning of the book with the end: the early
--------------------------~,--------------------------
t is a commonplace to hold that art - be it
I at the lev el of appreciation or assessment
- is a thorou ghly subjective matter. Grad u-
ally, obje ctiv ity and rea lism see m to have lost
their phil osoph ical footh old, ceding gro und to
an idea of the experience of art as a conglom -
eration of highl y indi vidual ep isodes, whe re
correctness or incorrectness have no pur-
chase . The idea of an artwor k's value, in parti-
cular, seems to have becom e redu ced to the
matter of our own idiosync ratic enjoyment.
Th e notion of aes thetic taste, often cons idere d
to lie at the heart of artistic ap prec iation, has
co me to be domi nated by that of an almos t ran-
dom subje ctiv ity. Perhaps thi s is not surp ris-
ing, given that the pro blem of taste - in wh ich
the aes thetic judgement s even of "experts"
never coin cide abso lutely - has been give n so
much we ight in the philosophy of art. But the
subjectivity accorded to aes thetic taste did not
always imply bein g beyond co rrectness. For
thinkers such as Hum e and Kan t, for exa m-
ple, subje ctiv ism simp ly im plied a focus on
the subjec t - who deter min es the co ntent of
aesthetic j udge men t - and was perfectl y com -
patibl e with rejecti ng the claim that aes thetic
judge ments ca n have no more than a pure ly
person al validity .
John Hyrnan ' s The Objective Eye focu ses
o n the qu estion of whether the philo soph y of
art rea lly needs to be constr ained by the epis-
tem ological limit s ass ociated with subje ctiv-
PHIL O S OPHY
Not SO simple
P ET ER HYL TO N
M ar i e M c G inn
EL UCIDA TING THE " T R A C T A T U S "
Wittgenstein's early philosophy of log ic
and language
336pp. Oxford University Press. £40 (US $74) .
9780 19 924444 7
state ments are non sense because they attempt
to say what can only be show n. To acce pt
that, ho wever, we have to acce pt that there
are facts that can not be stated - facts, mor e-
over, that the book aims to con vey to us.
Cora Di amond , in an essay first publi shed
in 1988, mem orabl y spea ks of thi s line of
inter pretation as "c hicken ing out" . Diam ond ,
and those who have followed her, not abl y
James Conant, atte mpt to take with full
seriousness Wittgenste in' s saying that his
statements are "nonse nsica l". This new
approach faces serious diffi culti es of its own .
Some of the statements of Tractatus Logico-
Philosophicus presum abl y mu st be acce pted
as makin g sense - at least the remark abo ut
non sensicalit y itse lf and, by mos t advo cates
of this line, a few others as wel l. Nothing in
the text makes the di stincti on ev ide nt, ho w-
ever. We are also owed an acc ount of exac tly
how nonsen se can be "elucidatory" .
Such is the dia lectica l situation that M arie
McGi nn confro nts in her new book , Elucidat-
ing the " Tractatus", She arg ues that we
sho uld not attr ibute to Wittgenstein "a form
of realism that atte mp ts to gro und the logical
struc ture of o ur langua ge in the ind epend-
en tly co nstituted struc ture of realit y" . As
agai nst that idea, McGinn argues that what is
Real
realism
E LlSA BET H S CH ELL EK E NS
J ohn H ym an
THE O BJ E C TI V E EYE
300pp. University of Chicago Press. Paperback,
$35; distributed in the UK by Wiley. £20.
978 0226365534
ity If we look back and retrace the steps that
brou ght us to the prevalen t subjec tivist fram e-
work, do o ur c urre nt assum ptio ns aho ut the
epis temo log ica l limit ation s of artistic ex peri-
ence really remain safe? Co nce ntrating spec if-
icall y on the phil osoph y of pict ori al represen-
tation , or depi cti on , Hym an ' s answer is no.
Thr ee main themes are addresse d: the
natur e and metaph ysics of co lours and
sha pes , their represent ation in pictu res, and
the notion of real ism . Fun da mentally , Hym an
tell s us, "pictures co nsist of colours distrib-
uted on a plane" and as such, an "integrated
study of co lor and depiction" will shed light
on some of the most problematic aspects of
the philoso phy of pictorial repr esentation .
TL S SEPTEMBER 14 20 0 7
" P la in Salt (C a r d boa r d)" (1971); from
Robert Rauschenberg: Cardboards and
related pieces by Yve-Alain Bois, C Ia ir e
ElIiott and JosefHelfenstein (152p p.
Yal e Univer sity Press. £35 ; US $50.
9780300123784)
fund ament al to Witt gen stei n' s thought is the
ide a of rep resent ing the world , of makin g
cl aim s abo ut it which are determ inately true
or false. His aim, o n her acco unt, is "to make
perspicuo us . . . the essence of all represe nta-
tion of states of affairs". (The "metaphysical"
or dogm atic element which she finds in his
thou ght lies in the view that there is such an
essence.) She inter prets his app arent ontol ogi-
ca l cl aims as a refl ection of what he takes to
be the requirement s of any system of repr e-
sen tation. Any langu age that ca n make defi-
nite claim s abo ut the wor ld must co ntain
In the first instance, then, Hym an discusses
co lours, and the question of whether they only
ex ist in our mind s. Colours, we are told , are
not in any sense illusory : they may be relative
to their hum an perceivers, and so anthropo cen -
tric, but they are real nonetheless. Having
rejected Locke' s view of colour s as mere pow -
ers to produce certain sensations in us, Hyman
dr aws the co nclusion that although perceptu al
ex perience may be "the highest co urt of
appea l where the colours of objec ts are co n-
cerned ... it does not and can not fix the facts" .
Is it still the case that we must explain how
pictur es represent colours and shapes by
analysing the ex perience they produ ce in our
mind ? Hyrnan' s seco nd main theme sets up
the co ntras t between the "resemblance
theory" - the view that pictorial represent ation
is to be acco unted for in terms of the Platonic
notion of mimesis - and the " illusion theory"
- the position that suc h repr esentation is to be
understood in term s of the "imitated" ex peri-
ence that a marked surface produc es in our
mind. For Hyman, the latter (subjec tivist)
theory is to be reje cted wholehea rtedly, while
we can retain some (objec tivist) eleme nts of
the former account.
If rep resent ation does not ca ll for an ex pla-
nation in term s of the psycholog ica l effec t
that a picture pro duces in our min d, what of
realism ? Hym an addresses his thir d theme by
an analysis of the idea that pictur es are to be
27
simp le signs of a cer tain sor t; on her acc ount,
the asse rtio n that there are simple objec ts is
merely the reflecti on , on the non-li ngui stic
level , of thi s req uireme nt.
There is much to like and adm ire abo ut the
way in which McGinn car ries out this inter-
pret ation. She devotes the second and third
cha pters to a discu ssion of Witt gen stein' s
phil osophical back ground, in parti cul ar to his
res ponse to the work of Frege an d Russe ll.
This strategy pays off ; the chap ters give a
goo d sense of what Witt genstein took to be
the question s con fronting him . A grea t virtue
is that she is sys tematic , offering a reading
of almost eve ry sec tion. (I found myse lf
wishing that she had addressed the few topi cs
that she omits; it is not often that I wis h a
book of three hundred dense pages were
lon ger. ) The ge nera l approac h is not who lly
or igina l; M cGinn ge nero usly acknow ledges
the wor k of Hide Ishiguro, Br ian McGu in-
ness, Rush Rhees and others . No ne of tho se
authors, ho wever, atte mpts anything like the
sys tematic acco un t that McGinn offers.
McGinn claims a "fundamental sympathy"
with Diamond and tho se who have followed
her. She does not, however, esca pe the criti-
cism that they bring aga inst ear lier co mmenta-
tors. "What Wittgenstein teaches" , she says,
"is that our ability to repr esent the wor ld has
nothin g to do with metaphysics and every -
thin g to do with the logical order of a system
of representation ." So she appea rs to be com -
mitted to the idea that Diamond and others
most strenuously objec t to, namely that Witt-
gens tein both aims to teach us certain facts and
that he says that those facts cannot be stated.
Insisting that the releva nt facts co nce rn repre -
sentation, rather than metaphysics, does not
help with the cen tral diffi cult y here. To say
this is by no means to condemn McGin n' s
line of interpr etation , which has much
to reco mmend it; it is, however, to say that
Wittge nstein's Tractatus remains an enigma.
co nce ived as co nven tional signs of the obje ct
they depic t. But "realism", Hyman argues, is
not an honorific term , and the suggestion that
rea lism is re lative is simply false.
Hyman' s revisiona ry assessment see ms to
be both judiciously present ed and has co n-
siderable value as a cautiona ry tale to those
for who m relativism and "subjectivity"
extend to all areas of the philosoph y and appre-
ciation of art. Mu ch of the strength of his
approach derives from his willingness to dis-
cuss art objec ts much as if they were ordi nary
objec ts, independ entl y of their aes thetic sta-
tus. However, when Hym an seeks to re-
incorporate aesthetic notions into his acco unt,
it is prec isely in this respect that it becomes
most probl ematic. Indeed , the reade r may at
times wonder whether Hym an so much argues
for, or rather simply assumes , that discu ssions
cast mainl y in term s of vision, colour and per-
spec tive can yie ld insight s into pictori al art's
aesthetic charac ter. Hym an clearly intend s his
approach to shed light on the concept of
beaut y, for exa mple. But to what ex tent, if
any, can a philosop hica l theory of vision tell
us something significa nt abo ut the beaut y, for
exa mple, of Giottos "D orrnition of the Vir-
gin"? This is an important phi losophi cal ques-
tion in its own right , and until it has been dealt
with, one may be reluctant to accept some of
Hyrnan' s co nclusions despite the co nsiderable
reac h and power of many of his analyses.
28
Religion
Nicholas Guyatt
HAVE A N ICE DOOMSDAY
Why millions of Americans are looking
forward to the end of the world
3 12pp. Ebury Press. Paperback, £10.99 .
978 0091910877
US: HarperPerennial. $13.95.
9780 06 115 2245
a ve a Nice Doom sday is a journalistic
H essay built around intervie ws with a
handful of the most celebrated Am eric an
proph ets of the "imminent" End Tim e, includ-
ing Hal Lind say, whose 1970 blockbuster ,
The Late Great Planet Earth, sold 30 million
copi es, and T im La Haye, who with Jerry
Jenkin s created the phenom enally popular
Left Behind novels (later spun off into film s
and computer games) . What prop elled Nicho-
las Guyatt, a sober (English) historian of
American foreign polic y, into the und erbell y
of the Am eri can Bible Belt is a suspicion
that, however absurd the proph ets' idea s
appear to liberal intellectual s, they may be
influ encin g the Whit e Hou se.
Guyatt vividly evo kes the prophecy milieu
and gives a racy account of the main ideas.
He eve n interp olat es a painl ess summary of
the histor y of Jewish and Christian apocalyp-
tic movement s. There is no index, but a
decent biblio graphy masquerades as " Further
Readin g" .
Guyatt ' s proph ets meet an imp asse over
C hr is tia n political acti on in the fun-up to
Arm ageddon. Most of them see no role for
Am eric a in the proph ecies of Eze kiel or Dan-
iel, and some believe that such a large propor-
tion of Am erican s will be "R aptured" that the
country will implod e. Bolsterin g Israel
again st the forc es of Anti chri st or sav ing a
few more souls from the depr avity of modern
society has a natur al polit ical appeal; but such
polici es contradict the belief that the End
Ti me is already upo n us, cannot be held back ,
and indeed is welcome to Christians anticip at-
ing the Rapture. These are patrioti c Ameri-
can s on the populi st Right who reinfo rce a
simplistic division of the world into embat-
tled good and evil. But Guyatt fails to dem on-
strate that they have any significant influenc e
on Am erican foreign policy, despite their lob-
bying and their popular follo win g. Indeed ,
anyone trul y alarmed by these peopl e would
hardl y signal so man y bell y laughs. Guyatt' s
ow n material thro ws doubt on how literall y
the milli ons of fans (and eve n so me of the
authors) take the proph ec ies, and a comp ari-
son with fictional apoca lyptic fantasies might
have been illuminatin g. But wh at is chi efly
missing is an analys is of the soc io-political
fault-lin e in Am eric an society that has give n
rise to the Culture Wars of which the proph-
ecy milieu is a feature.
BERNI CE MARTI N
IN BRIEF
Frederick Carl Frieseke, Lady ill a Garden, c 1912 ; from Impressionist Giverny:
A colony ofartists, 1885-1915, edited by Katherine M. Bourguignon
(224pp. Terra Foundation for American Art. $49 . 978 0 932171 528)
History
David Pratt
TH E POLITI CAL THO UGHT OF KING
ALF RE D T HE GR EAT
418pp. Cambridge University Press. £60.
978 0 521 80350 2
A lfred "the Great" cas ts a long shadow
over A nglo-Sax on histori ograph y. With
some ju stific ation, his reign has often been
taken as a point of referenc e both for earlier
and later centuri es, for it was in his time that
the ancient kingdom s of Wessex and Mercia
we re fused and a foetal kingdom of the Eng-
lish concei ved . Stud y of Alfr ed ' s rule at the
end of the ninth century is greatly aided by
the survival of a numb er of key Old English
texts, including his law code, sections of the
Anglo-Saxon Chro nicle , and a tra nslation of
Bede ' s History. In crucial addition to these
are several tran slation s of major Latin wor ks
- Gregory the Grea t's Pastoral Care, St
Au gustin e ' s Soliloq uies, the first fift y psalm s
and Boethiu s' s Conso lation of Philosophy -
attributed to the King him self. These transla-
tion s are not literal; they regul arly rend er
meanin gs rather than words, and so reveal
something of the translator ' s mind. David
Pratts highl y impr essive clo se analysis of
these emphases exposes an Alfredian mani-
festo, one that sought not only to asse rt and
affirm the King' s central position in society,
but also to reassure his cleric al and lay lords
of their indi spen sabilit y and instruct them in
the necessity of ju stice and loyalty. Such read-
ings displ ay an extraordinarily coherent phi-
TLS SE PTEMBER 14 200 7
losoph y of theocratic royal rule, one which,
Pratt per suasively argues , was a fundam ent al
organ of Alfr edi an gove rnment.
Inevitabl y, issues remain. Amon g these is
whether ninth-ce ntury Wessex enjoyed
"unprecedented and enduring stability" that
enabled it to expand and transform. Alfr ed
legislated against disloyalt y with almo st Sta-
linist zea l and such measures may attest his
insecur ity. He was the fourth consecuti ve son
of King iEthelw ulf to accede, and on his
death , in 899, one of the nephews who had
been passed ove r as too young incited civil
war against Alfr ed ' s son, Edwa rd the Elder.
Such possibiliti es in no way undermine
Pratt's cent ral findin gs, but they do wa rn
aga inst a ubiquitous efficiency and effective-
ness which he occasionall y impli es. Neve rthe-
less, this heavyweight histor y is a substantial
contribution to our understandin g of the mind-
set of Alfr ed' s court, one that will help re-
invigor ate study of the peri od, and itself be
one of the works that loom over Alfredian his-
toriogr aph y for so me tim e to c ome.
ALEX BURGHART
Art History
Ingrid D. Rowland
FROM HEAV EN TO ARCADlA
The sacred and the profane in the Renaissance
300pp. New York Review Books. £ 14.99
(US $24.95).
978 I 590 17 123 3
I ngrid D. Rowland is a lively, learn ed and
percepti ve scholar. She writes with flair ,
and she is equally at hom e in antiquity and in
the era of the Renai ssance, which in this book
encompasses (appropriately) the seve ntee nth
century. Her forte is the world of art and
ideas, to which the seve ntee n essay-rev iews
collect ed here are devoted . They ra nge from
Egy ptoma nia to porn ograph y, from medals
to mirror s, from Bottic elli to Caravaggio,
from the self-image of Ve nice to the study of
the heavens.
Inevitabl y, there are repetitions (though
Virgil's "s unt lacrim ae rerum" did not per-
haps have to appear three times), and sma ll
slips (London, not Naples, own s Artemi sia ' s
self-portrait). But as a brightl y lit bustle
throu gh wide ly scattered topic s, From
Heaven to A rcadia offer s pleasures on almos t
eve ry page. The jud gem ent s are unequi vocal ,
includi ng serious reservation s about writers
as different as Lisa Jardin e, the late Edwar d
Said and Da vid Hockn ey. In genera l, how-
eve r, the essays are celebrations of the glories
of the Renai ssanc e and those who write about
them. If at times they delve at too much
length into the detail s of paintin gs, given that
there are only sixtee n plates; if they are too
often self-enclose d, summarizing a topi c but
not linkin g it to a larger understandin g of Ren-
aissance culture ; and if at tim es coherence is
lost in the attempt to assess a numb er of dispa-
rate books, then these are the unavoid able
effects of the happen stance of the parti cul ar
publication s or ex hibitions which prompted
the reviews.
Leon ardo' s fascinati on with eyes; the tra-
vails of Giordano Brun o or Galil eo' s daugh-
ter ; the resilienc e of Renaissanc e wome n
such as Caterina Sforz a: these and dozen s of
other themes receiv e swift, accurate and ani-
mated treatm ent. There is an occa sional
stretch for conte mporary referenc e or co llo-
quiali sm, but at all times one find s oneself
swe pt along by the energetic pro se. It is not
yet winter, but one cannot imagin e aficiona-
dos of the Renaissa nce findin g a more enter-
tainin g book to keep them comp any by the
firepl ace.
T HEO DO RE K. RABB
Biography
David Kempe
AN NA ELl ZA BRA Y
The life of an early Victorian writer
281pp. David Kempe, 7 Port Bredy, Barrack
Street, Bridport DT6 3PT. £ 11.50.
F eminist scholars have traditi onall y disp ar-
age d Robert Sou they as the beastly man
who advised a young Charlotte Bronte to
stop writing as "literature cannot be the busi-
ness of a woman's life, and it ought not to
be" . Readers of the late Da vid Kem pes self-
publi shed biograph y of his ancestor , Ann a
Eliza Bray, will discover an altoge ther differ-
ent Southey . In the 1830s a flirt atious and
inten se corres pondence develop ed bet ween
the Poet Laureate and Bray, a historical novel-
ist and biographer. Indeed , in Decemb er
1836, South ey was stay ing with Ann a and
her husband when Charlotte 's letter and
poem s arrived. But it see ms that his wa rning
to Miss Bront e was perhap s more about "busi-
ness" than about a "woman' s life". It was
celebrity culture which reall y dism ayed
South ey, and he wrote back caut ionin g her
against an unh ealth y longin g for fam e: "the
day dream s in which you habitu ally indul ge

are likel y to induc e a distempered state of
mind ". He had express ed a similar sentime nt
to Anna Bra y five years earli er: "to possess
our souls in peace is the greate st blessing in
the world, & we lose that if we rend er our-
selves dependent for happin ess upon the opin-
ion of the public". But he wished both
women well as writers, and his practical
encouragem ent of Ann as literar y career is
docum ented in numerou s letter s reprinted in
this volume.
One of Mr s Bra y' s most important works
was her ethnographical description of the
area of Devon in which she lived , The Bor-
ders of the Tamar and the Tavy: Their tradi-
tions, natural history, manners, customs,
superstitions, scenery, antiquities, biograph y
of eminent per sons (1836). South ey put her
up to this proj ect , encouraging her to docu-
ment "not the sketches/s tatistics; but every-
thing about a pari sh that can be made inter est-
ing; all of its history , tradit ion s, and mann ers
that can be saved from oblivion (for every
generation swee ps awa y much) , the changes
that have been and that are in progr ess" , add-
ing that "s uch works in general have been
und ertak en by dull men". He help ed her out ,
too , when , to her horror, her 1828 historical
nov el The Protestant was vilified in the press
bec ause it was assumed by some to be anti-
Catholic prop aganda.
There is little in the wa y of editorial com-
ment in this volume , and some of what ther e
is is a little odd , as when Kemp e excla ims
"not a happ y bunn y!" after an aged Bray com-
plain s of the neglect of her memory in a let-
ter, or comm ents "not much political correct-
ness in tho se days" after a letter from
Sou they hopin g that itinerant beggars ("ver-
min ") will not brin g the chol era into his dis-
trict durin g the epidemic of 1831. But it
would be churli sh not to welcome such a thor-
oughl y good-natured book, stuffed as it is
with hith erto unpubli shed letters and informa-
tion, which makes visibl e once more a writer
who was early included in the Diction ary of
National Biography and whose children ' s
book A Peep at the Pixies (1854) may well
have influ enced Bray' s young relativ e, Chris-
tina Rossetti , when she came to write her
extra ordinary long poem "Goblin Mark et" in
April 1859.
CLARE PETTITT
Literature
Forrest Reid
THE G ARDE N GOD
A tale of two boys
Edited by Michael Matthew Kaylor
102pp. Kansas City, MO: Valancourt Books.
$ 14.95; distributed in the UK by Bertram ' s.
Paperback, £7.99.
978 I 934 555 04 0
F orrest Reid was not a man with whom it
was politic to be too publicly associated.
His novel , The Garden God, published in
November 1905 in a lavish limited edition
bound in vellum and gold , was dedicated to
Henry Jame s ("this slight token of respect
and admiration" ) but , after reading it, Jame s
abruptly and irrevoc ably ceased all contact
with its author. Reid cut s no less troubling a
figur e to the modern eye. The writ er of six-
teen novels and two vo lumes of autobio-
graph y, he was the kind of man who made
friend s with other people' s children , who
IN BRIEF
took up sta mp coll ectin g so that he might
more eas ily approach small boy s and engag e
them in phil atelic chat. Though Reid ' s biogra-
pher, Brian Ta ylor, insists that "if ther e can
be such a thing as a puritanical pedera st,
Forr est Reid was that person" , Reid ' s career
was marr ed by inappropriate attachm ent s, by
whispers of sca ndal, by intimations of
thw arted desire.
The Garden God conc ern s the doom ed
friend ship bet ween two schoo lboys - the lan-
guid Graham Iddesleigh who se sole gift is a
"capacity for sitting in the sun" and the lis-
som Harold Brockl ehurst, who se "eyes were
blue and dark and clear , his nose stra ight, his
mouth extraordinarily fine , delicate; his dark
hair , soft and silky, fallin g in a single great
wav e over his shapely for ehead". On the ir
fir st meeting , Iddesleigh feel s "an ecstasy of
happiness ... as if the summer were quit e
suddenly and unexp ect edl y com e; as if the
whole world were full of happiness and sun-
shine", and swiftly find s him self desirin g that
the other boy' s hand s should be " laid softly
upon his own forehead, or over his mouth
and eyes " .
Thi s new edition from the American small
pre ss Valancourt Book s is scho larly, meticu-
lous and comprehen sive, with an introduc-
tion by its editor Mich ael Matthew Kaylor , in
which the ca se for Reid ' s literary rehabilit a-
tion and canonicity is energetically
rehe arsed. Nonetheless, it is not difficult to
und erstand Henry Jamess reaction . The Gar-
den God still feels dangerously overheat ed,
its pro se filled with the quality of overrip e
fruit - sensual and swee t, but with the pro-
mise of corruption underneath.
JO N BARNES
Spanish Literature
Iiiigo Garcia Ureta
ESCRITO EN BL ANCO
172pp. Madrid: Trama Editorial. € 15.
978 84 89239 75 3
" H appiness w rites w rite on white ; it
doe sn 't lea ve a trac e on the page." I' ve
seen this aphori sm attributed to Iris Murdoch,
but in Escrito en blanco ("W ritten in Whit e")
lnigo Garcfa Ureta attributes it to the French
writer Henri de Montherlant by way of Al
Al varez, who apparently uses the phrase as
the title of one of the chapters of his mem-
oir s. Garcfa Ureta quot es from memory, and
he cannot doubl e-ch eck becau se he has
return ed the book "to its rightful own er". But
whether or not he rem emb ers rightl y is reall y
be side the point. Thi s delightful coll ection of
impr ession s, profil es and recoll ections is a
book written from memory, in the best sense .
Whit e it doe sn 't wilfully misrepr esent any-
thing , it does not bow to the tyrann y of fact-
chec king either. In addition , as the title
impli es, it is a happy book. Mo stly writt en in
Lond on in 2006 , it contains profil es of Lon-
don ers like the design er Bank sy, the graffiti
arti st Harr y Beck , and the Cuba n-born writer
Guill ermo Ca brera Infant e. Anglophilia
aside, Garcf a Ureta's profil es range from
the world-famous (Duk e Ellington) to the
ob scure (Michael Fra ncis) . A porn actor
(Ron Jeremy Hyatt) precedes the Japanese
translator of The Satan ic Verses (Hitoshi
Igar ashi) .
Thi s is a book made of books, which it
liberall y uses as "sources" or inspirations.
TLS SEP T EM BE R [4 200 7
For instanc e, in one piece Garcfa Ureta
declares an interest in "Typhoid Mary", so he
get s the specifics from Anthony Bourd ain
and Judith WaIter Leavitt , and then retells the
story . There is a bit of a tradition in Spani sh
behind the mini-biograph y or cond en sed pro-
file. Javier Marias did something similar in
Written Lives, without bothering to menti on
that the form hark s back to Borges and his
"capsule biographi es", written for various
magazin es in the 1930s and publi shed posthu-
mou sly in Textos cautivos. Then again ,
Borge s pinch ed the idea from Marcel Sch-
wob's Vies imaginai res. No doubt the
success of this type of book depend s largely
on coverin g your traces, and even more so on
finding the right tone to recycle well-known
stories . Garcfa Ureta's con vention al prose,
with its tend enc y to whimsy, serves his pur-
pose well. Th ere is an inbuilt sense of fun
here. Ultimately the book goes so me way
toward s pro ving that Murdoch, or Monther-
lant , or Alvarez, was not ex actly right.
MARTI N SC H[FINO
Autobiography
Rory Spowers
A YEAR IN GREEN TE A
A ND T UK -T UKS
My unlikely adventure creating an organic
farm in Sri Lanka
295pp. HarperElement. Paperback, £8.99
(US $ 18).
978 0 00 723309 0
B efore the Sri Lank an adventure
recount ed in this lively book , Rory
Spowers had been a television programm e-
maker and a chef, and written a well-rece ived
histor y of green thought, Rising Tides (2002 ).
He was also the eo-founder of the online eco-
logical resourc e, Th e Web of Hope , whose
philo soph y is articulated in the final third of
A Year in Green Tea and Tuk-t uks. This phi-
losoph y of sustainable livin g and "reconnec-
tion" with the natur al world, especially
through grow ing food, is embodied in the Sri
Lank an proj ect that the rest of the book
describes.
In 2004, Spower s moved with his young
famil y to Ga lle in the south-wes t corner of
Sri Lanka and then purch ased a sixty-acre
form er tea plant ation twent y kilometres
inland. Work on "Samakanda" (Peac eful
Hill ) was del ayed by the tsun ami . For seve ral
month s, Spo wer s devoted him self to relief
work, alongs ide other expatriates proving
them selv es to be more than the "gin-soaked,
neocolonial lotu s-eaters" of popular reput a-
tion. Like seve ral observers of the post-
tsun ami mind set, Spo wer s was at once
impr essed by a serenely Buddhistic accept-
ance of the disaster and repelled by a ten-
denc y on the part o f so me to view it as a
"blessing" for ha ving cleared the shore line of
unsightl y shanty town s.
Samakanda is more than the "organic
farm" referred to in the subtitle. It is, in
modern agro- speak, a "forest garden", a
plac e for "companion planting" of many
trees, plant s, herb s and vege tables in clo se,
mutu all y benefici al pro ximit y. It is also, as
Spowers call s it, a "bio-versity" , an ecolog i-
cal learning centr e for students to visit. Thi s
ped ago gic al functi on merges smoo thly with a
role as a thriving eco-tourist site.
Spowe rs's story is not an idyll. Illness,
29
venomous reptiles and insect s - but, above
all, the rec alcitranc e, dishon esty and pot en-
tial violence of some local employees - brin g
him to the point of abandoning the proj ect.
But despite "the Horror" the place could
sometimes induc e, Spow ers is able to recap-
ture "all the thin gs I love about Sri Lanka". In
an elegiac "Epilogue", recording a walk at
dusk among rock s, mosses and trees, Spo w-
er s discern s in the firefli es that suddenly
appear "little seeds of light " that dispel "the
Horror".
D AVID E . COOP ER
Barbara Hulanicki
FROM A TO BIB A
The autobiography of Barbara Hulanicki
179pp. V & A Publications.
Paperback , £8.99 (US $ 15.95).
978 I 85 17 75 14 9
B iba was one of the favourite brand s of
the 1960 s and early 70s, fam ed for
the mini-dresses and boh emian sensibilities
that rem ain its legacy. From A to BlBA ,
packed with wonderfully ludicrous stories, is
the autobiography of its creator, Barbara
Hul anicki.
Bib a began in the early 60 s with a sleeve -
less short gingha m dre ss that Hulanicki
design ed and that was featur ed in the Daily
Mirror. Within days she and her husband
Stephen Fitz-Simon (known to all as Fitz)
had rece ived 17,000 ord ers, carried into their
flat in postal sacks. Shortl y after ward s they
opened their fir st tin y shop, which on the fir st
day sold its entire stock so quickly that manic
shoppers began to buy the cloth es stra ight
from the deliv ery van. Less then a decad e
later , Biba was ava ilable in thirt y countri es
and had moved into a hug e store on Ken sing-
ton High Str eet.
Th e story of Biba would be diffi cult to
invent : the lease of one of the shops was
secured becau se its landlord was an amateur
phrenologist who liked the shape of Fitzs
head ; on e mini skirt becam e a supe r-s hort
micro becau se the jersey had been wrongly
treated; the security guards were constantl y
takin g LSD ; 30,000 perfume bottl es
explod ed because they had been filled too
full and, on one occ asion , whe n a supplier
could no longer keep up with the dem and , he
per suaded hi s broth er, who was man agin g a
competitor' s factory, to complete the orders
secretly and at night.
Both Hul anicki and Fitz remained
involved in eve ry last detail of the business.
In their emporium on Ken sington High
Street, for exa mple, Hul anicki laid out every
single item on the 100,000- square-feet shop
floor. But when they tried to expa nd the busi-
ness to mail ord er, the y began to lose money
and were forc ed to sell 75 per cent of their
company to another retail er, later bou ght by
the prop erty develop er Briti sh Land. Hulan-
icki and Fitz lost control, and eve ntually left
Biba.
Th e book ' s strength lies in the pace of the
narrati ve, though not in the writing style,
which is pepp ered with cliches such as "we
got on like a house on fire" or "the co smetic s
we nt off like a rock et". That aside, From A to
BlBA entert ainingly illustrat es the power of
pure determin ation , and brin gs to life London
in the 1960 s.
A NDREA W ULF
 CLASSIFIED
AWARDS &
FELLOWSHIPS

O~..
v:H l.J
.6,.,
S
'/.
B , .'''-1-

' C'£ N"r ~ 'l-'

~
'"
Fellowship opportunity on
science, humanities, and the
concept of "the human"
Prince ton University
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY
SOCIETY OFFELLOWS
v
The Bibliographical Society
Major Grants for Bibliographical Research
INTHE LIBERAL ARTS Applica tions are invited from scholars engaged in bibliog raphical research (on, for example,
boo k history, textual transmission, pub lishing, printing , boo kbind ing, book-o wnersh ip and
The National Humaniti es Center offers several fellowsh ips of Threeyearpostdoctoralfellowships 08- boo k-collect ing) for Major Grants to be awarded in 2008. The Soc iety hopes to make awards
up to $75 ,000 as part of its project "Autonomy, Sing ularity, 11forrecentPhDs (Jan.2005-June2008) bot h for immed iate research needs , such as for microfilms or travelling expenses , and for
longer-term support, for examp le to assist with prolonged visits to libraries and arc hives.
Creativity," an inquiry into the impact of recent scienti fic and in humanities or social sciences. Five Several Major Grants, up to £2,000 each, will be awarde d.
technological advances upon traditional notions of "the human ." appointments to pursueresearch and
teach half-time. Open discipline (two Pantzer Research Fellowship In the History of the Printed Book
"Whereas, in t he past, poets and philosophers asked what it The Society has rece ived a generous beques t from the estate of the distinguished bib liographer
fellowships); Judaic Studies; LGBT Katharine F.Pantzer Jr and has establishe d awards in her memory. Appli cations are now invited
means to be human, scientists today are asking what it is to be for the Pantzer Fellowship , worth up to £4,000, which is to be awarded for the first tim e in 2008.
Studies; Raceand/or Ethnicity Studies.
human," says Geoffrey Harph am, President and Director of the Applicants ' research must be within the field of the bibliograp hical or book-histor ical study of
Annual stipend: approx. $66,500. the pr inted boo k In the hand-press period, that Is up to c:l830.
Natio nal Humanities Cente r. Scholars whose work is related Application deadline: October8, 2007.
to this quest ion are encou raged to app ly for six to nine month For details. see website The Society also accepts bid for Minor Grants (£50-£200) at any time during t he year.
reside ntial fellowships at the National Huma nit ies Cente r. wwwprinceton.edu/-s f Ap plications must be rece ived by 1 December 2007.
For further information on feilowships and appiication material, see
Further details of all awards and app lication for ms may be fou nd on the Society 's webstte •
http ://nationalhumanitiescenter.orgj www.blbaoc.org.uk - or fro m:

or write to National Humanities Center, Or John Hlnks

Secretary: Fellowships & Bursaries Subcom mittee
Box 12256, Research Triangle Park, HOLIDAYS The Bibliograph ical Society
NC 27709. Centre for Urba n Histo ry
University of Leicester
Leicester LE! 7RH
Appiication deadiine October 15, 2007. • Rome - historical centre - one bedroom apart- E-mail: jh24 1@le.ac.uk
ment available for short term rent al. Images on
http://www.paulahowarth.net

BOOKS & PRINTS

Book Search
Books Bought & Sold
Old, Rare & Out ofPrint Books
Marsha J . Shapiro
355 West 85th Street, Apt. 77
New York, N.Y.10024
212·595-4219; fax 212-875-1948
UNIVERSITY
APPOINTMENTS
BOOKFINDING SERVICE
Out-of-print titles. All subjects.
Visa and MasterCard welcome.
Books are willingly mailed overseas.
Bar low Moor Books, 29 Chu rchwood Road
Didsbu ry, Manche ster M20 6TZ
Tel: 0161 434 5073 Fax: 0161 448 2491
e-mail : books @barl owmoorbooks.com
PUBLISHING &
RIGHTS
.PUBLISHER WANTED: Experienced author
seeks sympathetic though solvent publisher with
a view to supporting his latest project: A Subject
Bibliography of the First World War: Books in
English 1950-2007. If interested please contact
Gerald, 79 The Street. Brooke, Norwich, I\"R15
lIT, or by email: gerald.gliddon@btinteme t.com
for further information .
Coming up in the TLS...
21st September - Politics & Law
28th September - Frankfurt
5th October - Cla ssics
For more information and to find out about our online
advertising packages, please contact Linsey Kenhard on
02077824974 or e-mail: linsey.kenhard@newsint.co.uk

Head of Research
The Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) seeks a Head of Research to oversee the development of the Center's research culture.

The activities of the Research Department include the organization of scholarly events and public programs, undergraduate and graduate teaching
initiatives, programmatic support for Center exhibitions, and running the fellowship program as well as other research opportunities at the Center.
The Research Department also incorporates the Center's Education Department, which oversees a thriving program for Yale undergraduates,
regional school children, and the public at large . The Head of Research over sees a department o f 8-10 including an Associate Head of Research.
The Head of Research will run the department, overseeing the development and execution of scholarly, public and educational programs, which
currently include over 300 events per year.
As an active member of a renowned teaching institution, the Head of Research will oversee and enhance the use of the Center' s collections and
exhibitions in teaching, in collaboration with members of the faculty and with members of the staff. The Head of Research will also collaborate
with the Paul Mellon Centre for Stud ies in Brit ish Art in London to help to coord inate Yale-in-London, Yale's undergraduate study program in the
United Kingdom .
The Head of Research is expected to pursue scholarship in the history of British art and to part icipate fully in the intellectual life of the university.
S/he will have one day a week for research, plus four weeks for research each summer. S/he will also be encouraged to teach one graduate or
undergraduate course each year , as the university course schedule allows.
Applications for this position arc sought from schol ars in the history of British art who hold the PhD and have at least five years of professional
experience. Preference may be given to those who have worked in both academic and museum settings and who are familiar with the running of
research centers. A collaborative spirit is required, along with excellent communication, mana gement and leadership skills, and a proven track
record of scholarship in the field.
Please send a letter of application, CV, and a copy of a recently published article or book chapter to: Amy Meyers, Director, Yale Center for
British Art, p.a . Box 208280, New Haven CT 06520-8280. Three letters of recommendation should reach the same address by the closing date of
October 31, 2007. Please also apply online at www.yale .edu/jobs For requisition 1795BR .

Anthony Alofsin is a Fellow at the Center
for Adv anced Studies in the Visual Ar ts,
Nat ional Ga llery of Art, Wa shin gton , DC.
His most recent boo k is The Struggle for Mod-
ernism: A rchit ectu re, landscape arc hitec ture
and city planni ng at Har var d, 2002 .
Jon Barness first novel, The Som nambulist,
was published earlier th is yea r.
Ad am Bresni ck teaches English at Co lle-
giate Sch ool in New York .
Alex Burghart is Postgradu ate Research
Assistant in the Department of Histor y,
King' s Co llege London.
Alex CIark is dep uty Literar y Editor at the
Ob serv er.
P aula M arantz Co he n , Distingui shed
Profe ssor of English at Drexel University in
Ph iladelphi a, is the author of Alfred Hitch-
cock: The legacy of Victorianism , 1995 , and
Silent Film and the Triumph of the American
Myth , 2001.
Da vid E. Co ope r is Professor of Phil osophy
at the University of Durh am. His most recent
book is A Philosophy of Ga rdens , pub lished
last year. The second edition of his Ex isten-
tiali sm : A reco nst ruct ion appeared in 1999 .
Ri ch ard Dav enport-Hines is the author of
The Pursuit of Obli vion, 200 I , and A Ni ght at
the Maj estic, pub lished last yea r. He is com -
pletin g a biograp hy of Lady Desborou gh.
P aul Du guid is Visiting Professor at the
Sch ool of Infor mation and Mana gem ent
Systems at the University of Ca liforn ia, M ich ae l G reenberg is a writer living in New
Berkeley. His book The Soc ial Life of York . His mem oir of the experience of mad -
Inf ormation appea red in 2000. ness in the famil y, Hu rry Down Suns hine ,
will be publi shed next yea r.
E liza be th E dwa r ds teaches the Nor thern
Renaissanc e and Dutch Golden Age Poli tics Ste phe n H eni gh an ' s short story co llection ,
and Culture at the University of Kent. Her A Grave in the Ai r, will be publi shed
books include Raw Histories: Photograph s, later this year. His novel, The St reets of
31
anth ropology and mu seums, 200 I , and Winter , appeared in 2004 . University of Warwick. His most recent book
An throp ology and Photog raphy, 1860-1920, is M other Leakey and the Bishop: A ghos t
1992 . Katharine Hi bb ert was shortlisted as story, published earlier this yea r.
Youn g Journalist of the Year in the 200 6
Ca r r ie E tt er is an Assoc iate Lecturer in British Press Award s for her work at the Michael M ott' s most recent co llection of
Crea tive Wri ting at Bath Spa University. Sunday Times Magazine. poem s is The World of Richard Dadd, 2005.
David F ink elstein is Research Professor of Pet er H ylton' s book Quine was pub lished Cla re Pettitt is a lecturer at King' s College
Medi a and Pr int Culture at Q ueen Margaret ea rlier this yea r, and his Russell, Idealism, London . Her book s include Paten t
University, Edinburg h. He is the author of and the Emergence of A nalytic Phil osophy Inventions: Intellectual prop erty and the
The House of Black wood: A uthor-publi sher appeared in 1990 . He is Professor of Ph ilo- Victorian novel , 2004 , and the forth coming
relation s in the Victor ian era, 2002 , and the sophy in the Univer sity of Illinois at Ch icag o. "D r Livingstone, I Presum e ?": Missiona ries,
co-ed itor of the fourth volume of the journalists, empi re.
Edinbur gh History of the Book in Scot land, Nich olas J a rdine is a Fellow of Darw in
Professionalism and Diversity, 1880- 2000 , College and Professor of History and Ph ilo- J. J . Purdon read English at Emmanuel
to be pub lished later this ye ar. sophy of the Scien ce s at the Univer sity of Co llege, Ca mbridge .
Ca mbridge . He is Editor of Studies in History
Judlth F la nde rs ' s most recent book , Con- and Phil osophy of Scie nce, and is writing a T heo dore K. R ab b is Pro fessor of History at
sum ing Pass ions: Leisure and p leasu re in book on the historiography of the sciences . Pr inceton University. His mo st recent book,
Victorian Britain, was publi shed last year. The Last Days of the Renaissance and the
She is the author of The Victorian House: An drew J ohnst on' s The Open Window: March to Moderni ty, will be reissued in
Domesti c life fro m childbirth to deathbed, N ew and selected poe ms appea red in 1999 . paperb ack shortly .
200 3, and A Circle of Sisters, 200 I.
Jonathan Keatess book s include The Siege Barnab y Roger son is the author of A Travel-
J ohn L. Fl ood is Past President of the of Venice, 2005 , the novel Smile Please, ler 's History of Nort h Af rica, 2000 , and
Bibliograph ical Society. He is the author of 2000 , and Handel: The ma n and his mu sic, The Prophet Muh ammad: A biograph y,
Poets Lau reat e of the Holy Rom an Empi re: A 1985. 200 3. He is writing a book on the Last
bio-bibliog raph ica l handb ook, pub lished last Crusa de.
yea r in four volumes , and the editor of The L aurie Maguire is a Tu tor ial Fellow in
Germa n Book 1450-/750 , 1995. English at Magdal en College, Oxford , and E lisa be th Sche lleke ns is a lecturer in Ph ilos-
the author of How To Do Thin gs with oph y at the University of Durh am . She is
M ich ae l Foley' s most recent collec tion of Shakespea re, pub lished earlier this year. Her the author of A esthetics and Morality and the
poem s is Autum n Beguil es the Fatali st, new book , Shakespeare's Names, will be co-author of Who's Af raid of Concept ual
pub lished last yea r. published later this yea r. Art ?, both published this yea r.
Mar ia Frawley is the author of Invalidism Pet er Mand ler teaches Modern Histor y Mar tin Sc h ifino is a freelanc e jo urnali st
and Identity in Nine teenth-Cent ury Britain, at Go nville and Caius College , Ca mbridge . living in Lond on. He has tran slated This
2004 . She is Assoc iate Professor of English His recent book s include The Engli sh Breathin g Wor ld by Jose Luis de Juan,
at Ge orge Wash ington University. Na tional Character : The history of an idea publ ished th is yea r.
f rom Edm und Bu rke to Tony Blair, pub lished
last year. E m m a n ue l Siva n is Professor of Islamic His-
tory at the Hebrew University of Jeru salem .
Bernice M a rtin is Emeritus Read er in His book s include Radi cal Islam: M edieval
Sociology at the University of London . She is theology and modern po litics, 1990.
completing a book on Penteco stalism with
Da vid Martin . A ndrea Wulf is the co-author of This Other
Eden: Seve n great ga rdens and 300 years 0]
P et er Marsha ll is Professor of History at the Engli sh history, 2005.
TLS C ROSSWORD 710 T
E
H E H 0
Y R
S T
R
A G
R
E E R
I
I C
I
ACROSS DO WN S C R I P T U R E S E T o N
I A seat for Jonson at church (5) I Italian author who wrote of Frenc h T E H T G E U D
E A S H I 0 N P L A T E
4 Sell or not? prob lems for Italian folk clan (9)
M C N R I L R
verse (9) 2 Echo, for examp le, New York speed
C H A R I V A R I T W I C E
9 Spenserian grouse (9) (5) G S S S A H S L
to Agreeab le as Steinbec k's Thursday (5) 3 Young Harry ove r the valley as Collins 0 U S E L S y N n A C T y L
11 Port in which inhabitants of The Was h narrator (8) N 0 A U L S A
dodge some bad weat her (6) 4 Jacobs boo ked its co mpany (4) A L L A N B E R T R A M
G E 0 T E M L A
12 Like very close passage, as with fabled 5 Somewhat improper, it gave pain - and
A L T 0 Q u I N T I L I A N
flyer going by wild cher ry (8) wen t further ( 10)
L T 0 T 0 S 0
14 Hem ans brave boy in thi s Ita lian White 6 Children's writer points to piece (6)
L E E R . K E N S I N G T o N
House (10) 7 Wels h novelist puts the boot in as Nell
16 " whence all but he had - " (4) co mes up (9) SOL UTION TO CROSSWO RD 106
19 Eminent creative type from Norway (4) 8 Dramatist in a minor tone (5)
20 Some campers and stro llers used to 13 Mendicants such as he who is found in The winner of Crossword 706 is
jo in ( 10) C umberland ( 10) Eddie Looby, Birmingham.
22 Etch poorly and go through mill for 15 Shaw's maid (5, 4)
historical novelist (8) 17 Con fuse ed itors in co nfusion (9)
23 Tw ist in novel (6) 18 David seen as afterthought (student
being in a fog) (8) T he se nder of the first co rrec t
26 Mumb ai mounted policeman (5)
so lutio n opened on Octobe r 12
27 Elaine Feinstein offers some of the 2 1 Personification of the moon as sate llite
better seats (3, 6) w ill rece ive a cas h prize of £4 0.
(6)
Entries shou ld be ad dressed to
28 Leading charac ters like Krull or Nat 22 Marvellous quality of Southern
Turner (9) Christia n (5)
TLS Crossword 7 10,
T imes Hou se, 1 Penn in gton Stree t,
29 Spec ialized readers here recog nize j ug- 24 Office held in Wrexhill by Tro llope
characte r (5) Lond on E98 1BS.
gler and foo l (5)
25 "For yet a many of your horsemen - I
And ga llop o'er the field" (Henry V) (4)
T L S SE PTE M BER 14 2 0 07
32

T he announcement of the Man Book er

Prize shortlist see ms to invite ever ythin g
but liter ary speculation. New spap er s in Brit-
I
n a grisly variation on our Metafictional
themes, literary journalists have spent the
pas t wee k tryin g to come up with more exa m-
ain have, in fact , barely summoned the ples of writer-murderers to set alon gsid e
energy to comment on the list, notin g only Krystian Bala, the Poli sh crime writer con-
that the "fav ourite", Ian Mc Ewan (On Ches il victed of "orchestrating the killin g" of a busi-
Beach) has been j oined by five "little-know n nessm an whom he was allege d to have sus-
writers" , including Ann e Enright and Nicola pected of carr ying on an affair with his wife.
Barker, whose nam es, at least, would be
known to anyone who's been in a book shop
over the past two decad es.
Known knowns Bala publi shed a novel in which detail s of a
very similar crim e appeared, and once the
Poli sh polic e had been alerted to it, they
Elsew here, the " little kno wns" have been
Sunda y put it, "a massive plung e on an sized hardb ack , of 100 pages, with gener- made Bala their prim e suspect.
unkn own author from New Zea land" has go t ously space d type. But the new book is the
the occ asion of a bit of nationalist enthusi- In crim e fiction, it is not unkno wn for the
"bookmakers . . . in a tizzy " , with the now work of an emeritus professor of philo soph y murde rer to be a writer w hose " arrogance"
asm. So The Times of Indi a conc entrates on
Ind ra Sin gh ' s inclu sion for his novel about
obliga tory quote from the representati ve of at Princ eton that rea ds like (whisper it) a leads him to describe his crim e in print. Heart-
the Bhopal disaster, A nima l's Peopl e, while
William Hill. The appea rance of the latter, as straightforw ard philosophical essay. Whil e eningly, gen uine literary killers see m much
much a featur e of the shor tlist as the "snub" On Bullshit applied the rigour s of philo soph y rarer, and reporters have resorted to roping in
the Pakistan Dawn enthu ses about The Reluc-
tant Fund am entalist by Moshin Hamid . The
of a maj or author eve ry yea r, invites one to a saloon-bar conc ept , On Truth qui etl y William Burrou ghs, who shot his wife by
Times of Indi a eve n man ages to make some
more commercial thought. On the official goes about far more traditional analytic accid ent , and O. J. Simpso n, who was acquit-
Man Book er Prize we bsite, there is a link to business, invokin g Spino za, Montai gne and ted of his wife 's and anoth er' s murd er but
dubious politi cal milea ge from the inclu sion
of these two authors, und er the headlin e
the bookmakers, who see m to get a lot offree Kant to mount a defenc e of objecti vity. It' s wrote an imagin ary account of the incid ent
" Indo-Pak rivalry enters literar y territ or y".
publi cit y. The majorit y of reports on the actually quit e chall engin g, but it looks nice, in a chapter of his memoirs. We might enlist
The acco mpa nying articleprize, however, fail entirely to ment ion the which is the main thin g.
wishfully Jack Henr y Abb ott , the convicted murd erer
involvment of the Man group.
describ es rel ation s between the two countries (2) Do It For The Kids. Stephen Hawking turn ed author whose release from prison was
as a "neighbourly rivalry". may be the godfather of all publ ishers' assisted by the intervent ion of Norm an
ike publi c buildings, today ' s book s attempts to make a best-seller out of Mail er, but who committed anoth er murd er
In New Ze aland, support for Lloyd Joness
are meant to be accessibl e to all. Three unp romi singly difficult materi al (or an shortly after bein g let out. The sixtee nth-
Mi ster Pip has also move d into com mercial L
recent arriva ls offer instructi vely different appeal to readers ' intellectu al van ity). His century playwright Barnabe Barnes attem pted
territory, where most observers see m to feel
approaches to makin g the medi cine go down. guide to cosmology , A Brief History of Tim e, to murd er a record er in Berwick , but escaped
more comfortable. The depr essingly low
(I ) Stick To The Form at (even if the con- was publi shed alm ost twent y years ago, but con viction. The onl y reall y em inent writer
sales figur es for all the shortlisted book s
tent ha s cha nged). On Truth (Pirnli co, £9.99), eve n the ex istence of A Bri ef er History of with a delib erate homi cide on his hand s who
exce pt Mc Ewan' s (hy mid-August, only
Hamid had sold more than 1,000 copi es)
Harry G. Frankfurt' s sequel to On Bullshit , Time (2005) must have left some reader s a comes to mind, however, is Francois Villon ,
his best-sellin g attack on cant and hyp ocrisy , little hazy on the details. Now Professor who killed a cleric in 1455, thou gh he alleged
ha ve been almos t ignor ed in favour of the
comes, like its predecessor , in a neat , pock et- Hawkin g' s daught er, Lucy, author of two it was in self-defence. It is plea sing to think
new s that , as the sports pages of Sco tland on
novel s, has employed her fath er as a sort of that , despite the strictures of creative writing
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ----, very relia ble fact-ch ecker for a children ' s schools, the vast numb er of literary murd ers
novel that also happ en s to cont ain, as the are not the result of authors "writing what
blurb put s it, "lots of fascinating scientific they kno w" , but what they dream up.
facts about our Universe and the planets,
including the latest ideas about black holes
from Stephen Ha wkin g". George's Secret A
ccording to John Sm art, the lines below
are by a fift een- year-old W. H. Aud en,
Key to the Universe (Doubleday , £ 12.99) publi shed anonymously in 1922 in his school
may make conversations with inqui siti ve magazine, The Gresham .
children much hard er , unless, of course (and Splendid to be on Primrose Hill
here ' s the clever bit) , adult s read it too. At eve ning when the wor ld is still!
(3) Aim Low. Ourfirst two exa mples see m And City men, in bowler hats, return now
like laudabl e attempts to dem ystify complex day is done,
subje cts. lan Croftons Il isto ry Without the Rejo ici ng in the em bers of the sun.
Boring Bits (Quercus, £ 16.99), by contras t, is Mr Sm art is writing the biograph y of another
the sort of book that refer s to Hawkin g ' s pre- Old Greshamit e, John Hayward , friend and
decessor in the Luca sian Chair at Ca mbridge, criti c of T. S. Eliot, and this poem is one of
Sir Isaac Newton, as the " Inventor of [the] three Sm art has newly ascribed to Aud en.
catfl ap" . On Truth and George 's Sec ret Key But is it a "discovery" , as described in most
try to make philo sophy and cosmol ogy inter- newspapers? The editor of Auden ' s publi shed
esting; History Without the Bor ing Bits takes Juvenilia, Katherine Buckn ell, referred to a
an approa ch that would be the equiva lent of lost sonnet about Primro se Hill, and although
leaving out Spinoza and Co , or black holes, "Evening and Night on Primrose Hill" is not a
altoge ther. We are enco uraged to "imag ine a sonnet, Smart argues that this "must be the
histor y that spares you the detail s of such one". But Buckn ell tells the TLS that it is not
seminal eve nts as the First Crusa de", which, true to say, as report s have, that she "had never
like bein g told not to think about an elephant, seen old copies of The Gresha m": seve ral of
makes us think of little else . It' s not unint er- the poem s in the Ju venilia were taken from
esting to learn that in 1641 , a book was pub- there. She also refers to an article she pub-
lished in London about a pig-faced wo man, lished last year in the Auden Society News -
or that in 1643, Hatfi eld Chase was flooded , letter, in which she challenged Smart' s attribu-
thou gh we could have sworn that some thing tion of this and two other poems; and she reiter-
happened in between. Ala s, there is no entry ates that thou gh Auden might have written
for 1642. them, they are "certainly not in the canon".
D .H.

© The T imes Literary Su pple ment Limit ed , 200? Published and licensed for distribution in electronic and all other
derivative forms by The T imes Literary Supplement Limited, Time, House. I Pcnnington Street. London E'olK IBS, England. 3 7>
Telephone: 020 -7782 jOOlll'ax: 020-771124966 E-mail: lcrtcrstsrthc-tls.co.uk without whose express permission no part may
he reproduced. Printed by N.I.N. Ltd, Kitling Road. Prcscot, Merseyside, L34 9HN, England. El: RO PEAN PRI C ES '
Belgium El.lIS. France n.RS. Germany €4.20, Greece €4.20, Italy €4.00. Netherlands €4.20. Portugal £3. 10. Spain
€2.65.C A:'\ADIAN P RICES: Toronto $5.20. Outside $5.45. Subscri ption rates including postage arc: UK £115. Europe
£140, USA $ 169, Can311a$225, ROW £165. T LS su hscr tptien ra tes (12 months/52 issues): UK £115, Europe £140.
USA $169 , Canada (Air freight) $225 , Rest of World (Airmail) £165. Please send cheque or credit card details to: TL S
Subscriptions. Tower House, Sovereign Park. Market Harboro ugh. LEll7 4JJ, UK. Telephone 01ll5ll 43ll71H. For US and
Canada please send to: TL S Subscriptions, P.O . Box 3000 Dcnvillc NJ 071134, USA. Telephone 1-8003709040 (new
subscriptions only) and l-llOO711349m (general enquiries). The TL S (l SSN 0107661. USPS 021 -(26) is published weekly
and distributed in the USA by OCS Ameri ca Ine, 49 -27 31st Street. Long Island C ity. r-;Yl I101 -3113. Period ica ls postage
paid at Long Isla nd City NY and additional mailing offices. POST MASTE R: please send address corrections to TLS, PO
Box 3000. Dc nvillc , r-;J 071\34. USA

TLS SE PTEMBER 14 200 7