Susie Gharib is a graduate of the University of Strathclyde with a Ph.D. on the work of D.H. Lawrence. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in multiple venues including Adelaide Literary Magazine, The Curlew, The Ink Pantry, A New Ulster, Down in the Dirt, the PLJ, and Mad Swirl.
High Critics and the Body-Snatchers of Literature
Adapted for television
FADE IN:
INT. LIBRARY – PICCADILY – NIGHT
Gilbert is playing Chopin on the piano and Ernest is looking at a memoir entitled Reminiscences.
GILBERT
What are you laughing at?
ERNEST
An amusing story in this book.
GILBERT
I haven’t read it yet. Any good?
ERNEST
As a rule, I dislike memoirs because they’re
generally written by people who have either
lost their memories, or have never done anything
worth remembering, which explains their
popularity with the English public who feel
at ease when addressed by mediocrity.
GILBERT
Yes, the public’s tolerance forgives everything
but genius, but I do like memoirs. In literature,
mere egotism is delightful. Humanity will
always love Rousseau for having confessed his
sins, not to a priest, but to the world, which never
grows tired of watching a troubled soul in
its progress from darkness to darkness. In actual
life, egotism is attractive too. We find people
who talk about others dull, but the moment they
talk about themselves, they become interesting.
ERNEST
But if every man becomes his own Boswell,
what would become of our compilers of
lives and recollections?
GILBERT
They are the pest of the age. Every great man
nowadays has his disciples, and it is always
Judas who writes his biography. We used to
canonize our heroes. Now we vulgarise them.
I find cheap editions of great men detestable.
ERNEST
May I ask to whom you allude?
GILBERT
To all second-rate littérateurs, who at the
death of an artist arrive at the house along
with the undertaker and forget their duty to
behave as mutes. They’re the body-snatchers
of literature. The dust and ashes are given to
them, but the soul remains out of their reach.
Let’s not talk about them. Shall I play Chopin
or Dvořák?
ERNEST
I don’t want music just now. Talk to me.
GILBERT
I’m not in the mood for talking tonight.
Where are the cigarettes? How exquisite
these single daffodils are! They seem to be
made of amber and cool ivory. They are like
Greek things of the best period. After playing
Chopin, I feel as if I had been weeping over
sins that I had never committed. What was
the amusing story in the book that made you
laugh? Amuse me.
ERNEST
It’s an admirable illustration of the true
value of ordinary art-criticism. A lady
asked the Academician if his celebrated
picture was all painted by hand?
GILBERT
And was it?
ERNEST
What’s the use of art-criticism? Why cannot
the artist be left alone to create a new world
if he wishes to? The imagination works best
in silence and solitude. Why should the artist
be troubled by the shrill clamour of criticism?
Why should those who cannot create assess
the value of creative work? If a man’s work is
easy to understand, an explanation is unnecessary.
GILBERT
And if his work is incomprehensible, an explanation
is wicked. Nowadays few mysteries are left to us.
The members of the Browning Society spend their
time in trying to explain their divinity away. When
one hoped that Browning was a mystic, they have
sought to show that he was simply inarticulate.
Taken as a whole the man was great. His work is
marred by struggle, violence, and effort. Rhyme,
which can turn man’s utterance to the speech of
gods, became in his hands a misshapen thing.
And though he turned language into ignoble
clay, he made from it living people. He’s the
most Shakespearean creature since Shakespeare.
Because of his unrivalled sense of dramatic
situation, he will be remembered as a great
writer of fiction, but let’s return to our subject.
ERNEST
I believe that in the best days of art there were
no art-critics. No irresponsible chatter or tedious
journalism disturbed the artist. The Greeks had
no art-critics.
GILBERT
I’m afraid your views are unsound. It’s not my
business to defend journalism. It justifies its
own existence by the Darwinian principle of
the survival of the vulgarest. The Greeks were
a nation of art-critics, but I do not desire to talk
learnedly. Learned conversation is either the
affectation of the ignorant or the profession of
the mentally unemployed. Let me play to you
some scarlet thing by Dvořák. We are born in
an age when only the dull are treated seriously.
Don’t degrade me into the position of giving
you useful information. Nothing that is worth
knowing can be taught. Let us go into the night.
Thought is wonderful but adventure is more
wonderful still.
ERNEST
I insist on discussing art criticism.
GILBERT
Our primary debt to the Greeks is the critical
spirit. They elaborated the criticism of language.
They studied the metrical movements of prose as
a modern musician studies harmony. The voice
was the medium and the ear the critic. Since the
invention of printing, our literature appeals to
the eye and less to the ear. We must return to the
voice. I see the moon is hiding behind a sulphur-
coloured cloud. I need a cigarette.
ERNEST
Try one of mine. I get them direct from Cairo.
The only use of attachés is that they supply their
friends with excellent tobacco. I admit that the
Greeks were a nation of art-critics, but I feel
sorry for them because the creative faculty is
higher than the critical one.
GILBERT
No one who does not possess this critical faculty
can create anything in art. Arnold who defined
literature as a criticism of life showed how keenly
he recognized the importance of the critical
element in all creative work.
ERNEST
But you must admit that the great poems of the
early world were the result of the imagination
of the races rather than of the individual.
GILBERT
Behind everything that is wonderful stands the
individual man who creates the age. It is not
the moment that makes the man. It is the man
who creates the age.
ERNEST
What about modern criticism, which I believe
to be valueless?
GILBERT
So is modern creative work, mediocrity
weighing mediocrity in the balance. Criticism
demands more cultivation than creation does.
ERNEST
Really?
GILBERT
Certainly. Anybody can write a three-
volumed novel. It requires a complete
ignorance both of life and literature.
Poor reviewers do not read the works
they criticize or they would become
confirmed misanthropes.
ERNEST
But you must admit that it is much more
difficult to do a thing than to talk about it.
GILBERT
That’s a gross mistake. Take actual life.
Anybody can make history. Only a great
man can write it.
ERNEST
I agree with you, but does this apply to art
and criticism?
GILBERT
Criticism itself is an art and creative too.
ERNEST
Creative?
GILBERT
It works with materials and puts them into a
new and beautiful form. The highest criticism
is the record of one’s soul. It is the only civilized
form of autobiography. The critic’s sole aim is
to chronicle his own impressions. Criticism’s
most perfect form is subjective. Who cares
whether Ruskin’s views on Turner are sound
or not? His mighty and majestic prose is as
great as a work of art. Like that of music,
the beauty of the visible arts is impressive
and it is marred by an excess of intellectual
intention on the artist’s part.
ERNEST
But is this criticism?
GILBERT
It is the highest criticism. It criticizes not
merely the individual work of art but Beauty
itself.
ERNEST
Then the critic’s primary aim is to see the
object as it is not.
GILBERT
Yes, to the critic the work of art is simply
a suggestion for a new work of his own.
I see it’s time for supper. After we’ve
discussed some Chambertin and a few
ortolans, we will move to the question
of the critic as an interpreter.
ERNEST
Then you admit that the critic may
occasionally be allowed to see the
object as it really is.
GILBERT
I’m not sure. I may admit it after supper,
which has a subtle influence.
[They dine.]
ERNEST
The food was perfect. Let us return to
our subject.
GILBERT
Don’t let us do that. Conversation
should touch everything but should
focus on nothing. Let’s talk about
Moral Indignation, its Cause and Cure.
ERNEST
No, I want to discuss the critic and
criticism. Tell me, will not the critic
be sometimes a real interpreter?
GILBERT
Yes, if he chooses. He can shift from
his impression of the work of art to its
analysis or exposition. It is by intensifying
his personality that the critic can interpret
the personality and work of others.
ERNEST
Would not personality be a disturbing
element?
GILBERT
No, in order to understand others you
need to intensify your individualism.
ERNEST
What would be the result?
GILBERT
I can tell you best by example. When
Rubinstein plays to us the Sonata
Appassionata of Beethoven, he gives
us not merely Beethoven but also himself,
and so gives Beethoven reinterpreted
through a rich, artistic nature made vivid
by a new intense personality. Great works
of art are living things. The critical and
cultured spirits of the age will grow less
interested in life and will seek to gain
their impressions from what art has touched.
ERNEST
Life then is a failure.
GILBERT
From the artistic point of view it is.
Behind you stands The Divine Comedy
and I know that if I open it at a certain place,
I shall be filled with hatred for some one
who had never wronged me, or stirred by
love for some one whom I shall never meet.
And if we desire to realize our age in all its
weariness and sin, are there not books that
can make us live more in one hour than life
can make us live in a score of shameful
years? Close to your hand lies Baudelaire’s
masterpiece Les Fleurs du Mal.
ERNEST
Must we go to Art for everything?
GILBERT
Yes, because Art does not hurt us. We
weep, but we are not wounded.
ERNEST
It seems to me that in everything that
you’ve said there is something radically
immoral.
GILBERT
All art is immoral.
ERNEST
All art?
GILBERT
Yes. Emotion for the sake of emotion
is the aim of art, and emotion for the sake
of action is the aim of life. Society exists
for the concentration of human energy.
In its opinion, contemplation is the greatest
sin of which any citizen can be guilty,
whereas in the opinion of the highest
culture contemplation is the proper
occupation of man.
ERNEST
Contemplation!
GILBERT
Contemplation. To do nothing is the
most intellectual and difficult thing in
the world.
ERNEST
We exist then to do nothing!
GILBERT
It is to do nothing that the elect exist.
ERNEST
What do you propose?
GILBERT
With the development of the critical
spirit we shall be able to realize the
collective life of the race. The scientific
principle of Heredity has become the
warrant for the contemplative life. It
comes to us with strange temperaments
and susceptibilities. And so it is not our
life that we live, but the lives of the dead.
It’s the imagination that helps us to live
countless lives and the imagination is the
result of heredity. It is simply concentrated
race-experience. The true critic is the one
who bears within himself the dreams, ideas,
and feelings of myriad generations.
ERNEST
But such work as you’ve described the critic
producing is purely subjective whereas the
greatest work is objective and impersonal.
GILBERT
All artistic creation is absolutely subjective.
The objective form is the most subjective in
matter. Man is least himself when he talks in
his own person. Give him a mask, and he will
tell you the truth.
ERNEST
The critic then will be limited to the subjective
form.
GILBERT
No, the methods of drama and epos are his too.
He may use dialogue, which is a wonderful
literary form that enables the critic to reveal
and conceal himself.
ERNEST
What are the qualities of the good critic?
GILBERT
A temperament exquisitely susceptible to beauty.
There is in us a beauty sense, separate from other
senses and above them, a sense that leads some
to create and others to contemplate. This sense
requires some form of exquisite environment.
The true aim of education is the love of beauty.
Beautiful surroundings, as Plato recommended,
can prepare one for the reception of spiritual
beauty.
ERNEST
What future has criticism?
GILBERT
It is to criticism that the future belongs. It
creates the intellectual atmosphere of the age.
It guides us through the monstrous multitudinous
books that the world has produced. It will
annihilate race-prejudices by insisting on the
unity of the human mind.
ERNEST
My friend you’re a dreamer.
GILBERT
Yes, I am. For a dreamer is one who can find
his way by moonlight and his punishment is
that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world.
ERNEST
His punishment?
GILBERT
And his reward, but see it’s dawn already and
too late to sleep. I am tired of thought.
ERNEST
Let us lie on the grass and enjoy Nature.
GILBERT
Enjoy Nature! I can not do that. People tell us
that Art makes us love Nature, revealing to us
her secrets. What Art really reveals is her lack of
design, her crudities and monotony, and unfinished
condition. Art is our gallant attempt to teach Nature
her proper place.
ERNEST
You need not look at the landscape. We can lie on
the grass and have a smoke.
GILBERT
But Nature is uncomfortable with its lumpy,
damp grass and its dreadful insects. If Nature
had been comfortable, mankind would never
have invented architecture. I prefer houses to
the open air. In a house, everything is fashioned
for our use and pleasure, boosting our egotism,
which is necessary to a proper use of human
dignity. Nature is so indifferent and unappreciative.
She hates Mind. Fortunately, in England thought is
not catching. Our splendid physique is due to our
national stupidity. However, we’re beginning to
be over-educated. Everybody who is incapable of
learning has taken to teaching. Go to nature and
leave me to correct my proofs.
ERNEST
Writing an article! What is it about?
GILBERT
I intend to call it The Decay of Lying: A Protest.
ERNEST
Lying, but have not our politicians kept the habit?
GILBERT
No, they never rise beyond the level of
misrepresentation. Perhaps lawyers and journalists
but not much can be said in their favour. Besides,
what I’m pleading for is Lying in Art. Shall I read
you what I’ve written?
ERNEST
Certainly.
GILBERT
One of the chief causes for the commonplace
character of most of the literature of the age
is the decay of lying as an art, a science, and
a social pleasure. The ancient historians gave
us delightful fiction in the form of fact. The
modern novelist presents us with dull facts
under the guise of fiction. Lying and poetry
are arts, connected with each other. As one
knows the poet by his fine music, so one can
recognize the liar by his rich rhythmic utterance.
In modern days, the fashion of lying has almost
fallen into disrepute. Many a young man starts
in life with a natural gift for exaggeration which,
if nurtured in sympathetic surroundings, might
grow into something great and wonderful. But
as a rule, he either falls into careless habits of
accuracy or takes to frequenting the society
of the aged and the well-informed. Both are
fatal to the imagination and in a short time
he develops a morbid and unhealthy faculty
of truth-telling. If this monstrous worship of
facts is not checked, Art will become sterile
and beauty will vanish from the land. Facts
have invaded the kingdom of Romance, chilling
everything. They are vulgarizing mankind.
The crude commercialism of America and
its indifference to the poetical side of things
are due to the adoption of George Washington
as its national hero, a man who was incapable
of telling a lie. Society must return to its lost
leader, the cultured and fascinating liar,
whose aim is simply to charm, delight, and
give pleasure. He is the very basis of civilized
society, and without him a dinner-party is as
dull as a lecture at the Royal Society. Art,
breaking from the prison-house of realism,
will run to greet him, and will kiss his false,
beautiful lips. Life will follow meekly after
him and try to reproduce, in her own simple
way, some of the marvels of which he talks.
What we have to do is revive the old art of
Lying. Lying for the sake of a monthly salary
is well known in Fleet Street, and the
profession of a political leader-writer is
not without its advantages, but it’s a dull
occupation.
ERNEST
What do you recommend?
GILBERT
I recommend lying for its own sake
and its highest development is lying
in Art. When the day dawns, Truth
will be found mourning over her fetters
and Romance will return to the land.
Out of the sea will rise Leviathan and
the Phoenix will soar from her nest of fire
into the air. Lying, the telling of beautiful,
untrue things, is the proper aim of Art. Let
us go out on the terrace. At dawn, nature
becomes a suggestive effect whose chief
use is to illustrate quotations from poets.
Come! We have talked long enough.
FADE OUT.
THE END
impspired 