It would seem to us as if this most interesting and penetrating series of essays should prove to be of greater interest to American than to English readers. Mr. Chesterton came, saw, and pondered, and the results of his meditations are a series of enlightening essays dealing with everything in America and American life from a discussion of what America is, and what manner of men Americans are, to Prohibition and the Irish question.
The author never comments on any subject as you would expect him to. His impressions of the material and the abstract, of which we have formed no very definite opinion because of what might be called that contempt bred of familiarity, come to us as truths which are as worthy of our consideration as they merit the laughter of the foreigner.
When he tells you that he is not sure that the outcome of the Civil War may not have been for the best and that he believes that Walt Whitman was the greatest American poet, you may be inclined to disagree, but you will be forced to admit that, as he himself would say, his reasons are reasonable. Nor does this Englishman spare his own country in many of his comparisons. The book is not one to be read through in a sitting; it is something to be picked up and read one part at a time. There is none of the parts but will bear a second and even a third reading, for many of its truths are buried deep. It is a text-book in the art of the appreciation of foreign lands, and its teachings, if followed, would bring more lasting harmony among all peoples than the League of Nations it condemns.
M. T.
Aaron’s Rod. By D. H. Lawrence. (Martin Secker.)
Mr. Lawrence is undoubtedly the most consistent of the so-called moderns on either side of the Atlantic. His novels, thus far, have set an average standard far above that of his closest rival, Mr. James Joyce. Mr. Lawrence’s books are always readable; Mr. Joyce’s, seldom, but they both have gifts of sincerity and mental acuteness which lift them from the ruck of the ordinary incomprehensible. Their pungent observations on types, existing conditions, and each other, are amusing to say the least.
We have heard Mr. Lawrence’s name bandied promiscuously about as a realist. Nothing could be less real than “Aaron’s Rod”. The action and dialogue never took place on this earth, nor does it seem probable that they ever will. There is an odd, pervasive sense of violence saturating this novel. The Great War has evidently left its stamp on the intellects of these younger British geniuses, for their work has a tense, strained quality which is disquieting in the extreme. The characters of “Aaron’s Rod” move ceaselessly back and forth like a scurrying body of ants; they jabber in a rather inhuman way about love, socialism, Italian scenery, and Christmas trees.
There is no action, no story to speak of: A coal miner runs off to London, thence to Italy, from one of the larger Midland towns, for no reason whatsoever except that his wife is fond of him. Persons appear on Mr. Lawrence’s stage, speak their lines, and hurry off again, no one seems to know whither. Nevertheless, these characters are interesting by virtue of Mr. Lawrence’s positive genius for purely physical portraiture. Josephine, Aaron Sisson’s first incidental “amoureuse”, is particularly well done, from a pictorial standpoint. Scarcely a page is given to her, yet she leaves an impression on our minds far more lasting than that of Aaron himself. Pains have been taken with Lady Franks in the same way; it seems as if Mr. Lawrence loses interest in his major characters. He must be on to pastures new.
“Aaron’s Rod” can scarcely be called a “good” novel. It contains many advanced ideas in the field of sociology which we found rather difficult to agree with. However, the world may in time grow up to Mr. Lawrence and until then we should seize the opportunity of reading his descriptions of luxurious interiors, and the Alps. They are remarkably able bits of writing.
Mr. Lawrence is an important novelist now, but it is in his power to do much better things than he has done so far. If he would lessen his tone of violent indignation, if he would tincture his spiritual realism a little less with impure physical realism, he might be considered one of the great novelists of our time. As it is, his achievement in “Aaron’s Rod” is remarkable in that he has stripped off everything unnecessary, merely giving us the essentials on just about every topic known as a “world problem”. However, we should prefer the doses one at a time; all at once they seem a rather large gulp.