Arthur Machen: Weaver of Fantasy

by William F. Gekle

Machen was under the spell of a landscape bathed in a warm sun, with ruins standing close to roads, and wine flowing from vineyard to bottle to parched throats all within a few yards of enchanted space. This was a contrast indeed to the deep lanes of Gwent, the lonely ruins that stood in the shade and shadow of great hills and forests, and although Machen had spoken glowingly of the greenish-yellow cider of that land, still, he rather favored, in his mind at least, the wines of Touraine.

By night there was this magic of old books and by day there were the old books of magic, for the garret in Catherine Street was crowded with old and odd books of every sort, a collection that “represented that inclination of the human mind which may be a survival from the rites of the black swamp and the cave.” These studies did induce a frame of mind that might tend toward the strange and unusual. Living in this strange mixture of a glowing, gargantuan landscape and the dark labyrinths of the mediaeval mind, Machen tried, and sometimes desperately tried, to write.

“A man has no business to write,” said Machen many years later, “unless he has something in his heart, which, he feels cries out to be expressed.” And he had nothing to say—had only the urge to write, the vice of writing for writing’s sake—cacoethes scribendi—he called it! But then Machen has had time to reconsider his pronouncement of 1923, and to revise his opinion regarding men who wrote—and why they write.

In a “London Letter” to the New York Times Book Section, Herbert W. Horwill wrote, in September 1935: “A curious literary problem is posed by that veteran author, Arthur Machen, in John o’ London’s Weekly. Imagine a man marooned on a desert island, and certain that he would remain there for the rest of his life. Imagine, moreover, that he possessed the literary faculty, and had salvaged pens, ink and paper from the wreck or else had devised home-made substitutes for them. Would such a man write, knowing that whatever he wrote would never be seen by any eye but his own?

“Mr. Machen tells us that he once heard this question discussed among a group of friends. Some answered yes and some no, and, when pipes were knocked out for the night, the problem was no nearer solution, though, to the best of his recollection, the ayes were in the majority. He voted with them himself, and, after further reflection, he still believes he was right. The hypothetical Crusoe might have no better implements available than quills of parrots’ feathers, paper made out of the bark of the guru tree and ink obtained by macerating the root of a certain plant. But, granted his possession of the literary faculty, he would possess also the literary impulse. He would write because he liked writing, apart from whatever fate might be in store for the thing written. The true spring of imaginative literature, Mr. Machen reminds us, is the delight of the creator in creation.”

In the desert island of Clarendon Road, all through the summer of 1885, Machen wrote. He wrote because he had to, because he was under the spell of a master of gargantuan languages, because he was enamoured of the sound of words and because he had an ear for the rich and rolling phrase. And, of course, he wrote because he had the literary impulse. The pound a week he was paid by Redway could not afford him the rich living, the pleasures of Touraine. But then, after despair and after much almost pointless scribbling, he came at last upon the idea for the Great Romance.

It was to be a book in which Rabelais and Gwent were mingled ... and thus began the “History of the Nine Joyous Journeys ... in which were contained the amorous inventions and fanciful tales of Master Gervase Perrot, Gent.” Machen had prepared for this great undertaking by purchasing his ruled quarto paper, his pen points and his penholders. Quite possibly he envisioned a plaque on the door of his little cell at 23 Clarendon Road, announcing that Here Had the Great Romance been Written! There was, however, this difficulty—the vision of the great romance declined to be more specific. There were no hints as to plot, no guidance as to characters. He began, at any rate, a Prologue, written in a flowing and flowery 17th Century manner.

But now his cataloguing in Catherine Street had come to an end, and with it his pound or thereabouts per week. Nevertheless, he wrote on, even though he knew that his composition of the Great Romance might be abruptly terminated some three or four days in the future. Then, presumably, he would return to Caerleon, in all probability on foot. As it happened, he returned hurriedly by train. Just as he had come to the end of his tea and tobacco and rent money, he had word that his mother was dying. Aunt Maria thoughtfully sent his fare with the summons.

Later, he returned to the “great romance,” writing once more in the familiar room in the rectory where the fire burned and the winds howled down from Twyn Barlwyn and tossed the branches and beat upon the door. He wrote late into the morning, long after his father had knocked out his last pipe and gone upstairs. So passed the winter of 1885. Through the days he walked in the lovely Gwentian hills and looked down upon the white farm houses standing in the midst of encircling trees. At night he worked in that room where he had, as a boy, first read de Quincy and Scott and the other writers who had helped to bring about the “renascence of wonder.” And in the following year he was alone. His father died that spring.

This was the John Edward Jones whose homecoming from Jesus College, Oxford, is described in the opening pages of Things Near and Far. Now Machen was more truly alone than ever. His father had been to him a good companion in his earliest rambles about the countryside. It had been his father’s hope that Arthur might one day return to Gwent to live, buy a small newspaper and settle down to a quiet career in country journalism.