1961 Nobel Lit Prize finalist: E.M. Forster

This piece, the second out of a planned seven (but only these two were written then), was originally posted in January 2012 on Gogol's Overcoat.  Perhaps I will write pieces in the near future on the other five named finalists for the 1961 Nobel Prize in Literature.


In last week’s post, I analyzed some of the reasons why J.R.R. Tolkien’s recently-revealed nomination for the 1961 Nobel Prize for Literature was shot down by committee members.  This week, the focus shifts to British novelist E.M. Forster, who was most well-known for the following novels at the time of his nomination:  Where Angels Fear to Tread (1905), The Longest Journey (1907),  A Room With a View (1908), Howards End (1910), and A Passage to India (1924).  Whereas Tolkien was relatively little-known globally in 1961, Forster’s fame had passed its zenith almost four decades before.  In reading four of these novels (excluding The Longest Journey), I found it difficult to disagree with the committee’s assessment of him as being “a shadow of his former self,” as these mostly Edwardian era stories almost certainly had to feel like living fossils during the most heated part of the Cold War and the decolonization movements of the 1940s-1960s.

Noting this does not diminish what Forster accomplished in these novels; it merely acknowledges that in judging his body of work in context of Nobel’s provision for literary awards for works of “an ideal direction,” Forster’s work in 1961 would feel out of touch with the then-current times.  His treatment of relationships feels rather quaint and outmoded a century after most of his works were compiled and even fifty-one years ago, such sentiments had gone out of vogue.  Yet when one examines the heart of his most famous works, it is easy to find much that  is a pleasure to read, whether one reads for the sparkling prose or for the deft characterizations.

When it was written in 1905, Where Angels Fear to Tread likely provoked some strong reaction in England, as at its heart was a strong, independent woman, the widow Lilia, who during her travel to Italy falls in love with Gino, with whom she falls in love and marries against her former in-laws’ wishes.  This short novel, barely 150 pages in print, is a masterful character piece, starring Lilia’s traveling companion, Caroline, and her in-law, Philip, who unsuccessfully tries to prevent Lilia’s marriage to Gino, before the main action of the novel’s second part occurs.  Yet the prose feels odd here, particularly near the end of the novel, when this declaration by Caroline to Philip takes place:

“”You’ve upset me.”  She stifled something that was perilously near hysterics.  ” I thought I was past all this.  You’re taking it wrongly.  I’m in love with Gino – don’t pass it off – I mean it crudely – you know what I mean.  So laugh at me.”

“Laugh at love?” asked Philip.

“Yes.  Pull it to pieces.  Tell me I’m a fool or worse – that he’s a cad.  Say all you said when Lilia fell in love with im.  That’s the help I want.  I dare tell you this because I like you – and because you’re without passion; you look on life as a spectacle; you don’t enter it; you only find it funny or beautiful.  So I can trust you to cure me.  Mr. Herriton, isn’t it funny?” She tried to laugh herself, but became frightened and had to stop.  “He’s not a gentleman, nor a Christian, nor good in any way.  He’s never flattered me nor honoured me.  But because he’s handsome, that’s been enough.  The son of an Italian dentist, with a pretty face.”  She repeated the phrase as if it was a charm against passion.  “Oh, Mr. Herriton, isn’t it funny!”  Then, to his relief, she began to cry. “I love him, and I’m not ashamed of it.  I love him, and I’m going to Sawston, and if I mayn’t speak about him to you sometimes, I shall die.”

In that terrible discovery Philip managed to think not of himself but of her.  He did not lament.  He did not even speak to her kindly, for he saw that she could not stand it.  A flippant reply was what she asked and needed – something flippant and a little cynical.  And indeed it was the only reply he could trust himself to make.

“Perhaps it is what the books call ‘a passing fancy’?”

When read in context of the novel, Forster captures almost perfectly the tensions and self-denials of these two and their friends and families.    We sense the quivering, wavering resolution behind Caroline’s declaration of love and the situational irony of her address to Philip, who has begun to love her.  The niceties of polite conversation are shown here to be deceptions that have to be stripped away before honest, frank emotions can be exchanged between the two.  It is well-done – for a time that had already passed within twenty years of its initial publication.

A Room With a View revisits the Italian location and Forster’s examination of Edwardian English society and its social conventions.  It builds upon Where Angels Fear to Tread‘s exploration of love amidst filial and class obligations and gender expectations.  Below is a telling passage, where one of the major characters, Lucy, muses on “unladylike” things:

Conversation was tedious; she wanted something big, and she believed that it would have come to her on the wind-swept platform of an electric tram.  This she might not attempt.  It was unladylike.  Why?  Why were most big things unladylike?  Charlotte had once explained to her why.  It was not that ladies were inferior to men; it was that they were different.  Their mission was to inspire others to achievement rather than to achieve themselves.  Indirectly, by means of tact and a spotless name, a lady could accomplish much.  But if she rushed into the fray herself she would be first censured, then despised, and finally ignored.  Poems had been written to illustrate this point.

This passage goes right to the heart of the hypocrisies of Edwardian English social conventions (remnants of which persist even today).  This easily could have been a passage from a suffragette pamphlet of the times.  Yet despite the now-antiquated setting (hard to imagine groups of gallivanting sirs and ladies traipsing in groups to Italy for an “exotic” tour, lest one considers the recent season of Jersey Shore to be the 21st century equivalent), this is one of the few themes in Forster’s work, that of the oppressed/repressed needing to have their own voices considered on their own merits, that feels just as vital today as when it was published.  Perhaps it is for scenes such as this and later on in A Passage to India that Forster was nominated in 1961, as there’s a strong social statement made fifty years prior that still needed to be heard over a half-century after this novel’s initial publication.
Howards End takes a much more direct approach to the issue of class conflict.  Forster uses verbal irony in several places to skewer contemporary beliefs regarding the poor and the working class, such as the beginning paragraph to Chapter VI:

WE are not concerned with the very poor.  They are unthinkable and only to be approached by the statistician or the poet.  This story deals with gentlefolk, or with those who are obliged to pretend that they are gentlefolk.

Through this ironic use of “WE,” we the readers now have to react to what is being said.  Who speaks for “WE?”  Surely not the gentlefolk who then, as today, so often ignore the teeming masses that support their consumptive lifestyles.  Forster uses this to set up the main conflicts in the novel in a way that the reader acutely experiences the frustrations, repressions, and conflicts that beset English society during this gilded age before the outbreak of World War I.  Although many of the conflicts are in the past today, several of the then-prevalent social prejudices still eek out an existence even today (which can be readily seen in some of the debates and commentaries by certain American and British politicians, among others of their ilk).

Forster’s most well-known novel, A Passage to India, also explores the dichotomies of social conflicts.  Here, instead of the issue being between the upper and lower classes of English society, the main conflict is between the English administrators of India and the natives.  After a misunderstanding occurs that leads to a prominent Indian Muslim, Dr. Aziz, being accused of “insulting a lady’s honor” (presumably, in less chaste terms a sexual assault was attempted), the story proceeds to explore the dynamics of British rule and how the subjugated Indians, whether they be Hindu, Muslim, or Sikh, are treated as children by their English overlords.  Of the four novels that I read, A Passage to India resonated the most with me, for its keen treatment of racial prejudices and how it was the so-called “progressives” that tended to be the worst offenders.

As a novelist, Forster wrote superb novels where the characters were well-rounded and dynamic, with evocative prose.  Yet at the time that he was being considered for the 1961 Nobel, his days as a novelist were well in the past.  The issues that he explored so deftly had already been transformed in the intervening four decades.  Bra burning, the Equal Rights Amendment in the US, and the Summer of Love were much closer to 1961 than were Forster’s novels and this likely prejudiced the committee’s viewpoint.  If Forster had been selected in the 1920s or 1930s, his work likely would have been hailed as representing a sea-change in attitudes toward gender and class relations.  But in 1961?  The world had changed and a novel about British imperialist attitudes fourteen years after a now-divided India gained its independence would seem hopelessly out of date with the fast-changing times.  In this context, it is not surprising that Forster was rejected for his age and his lack of recent output, but conversely, it could also be noted that he would have been a more than deserving winner if he had been selected two or three decades before.

1961 Nobel Lit Prize finalist: J.R.R. Tolkien (thoughts on why he didn't deserve the award)

This was originally posted on Gogol's Overcoat in January 2012.  I had intended to do a series of posts on the authors mentioned in the below article link, but due to a series of events at the time, I only managed to write three pieces.  Perhaps I'll re-visit this in the near future.

 
Back on January 5, The Guardian posted an article highlighting the previously-unreleased commentaries regarding works considered for the 1961 Nobel Prize in Literature.  Although it is fair to say that the article slants the coverage of the notes of one of that year’s judges, Anders Österling, especially in regards to the somewhat surprising inclusion of J.R.R. Tolkien on the list, this column received quite a bit of discussion in divers corners over the past week and a half.  Some have questioned the validity of Österling’s comments on E.M. Forster and Robert Frost, which referred to their advanced age (both died within a decade of the 1961 prize being awarded to Ivo Andrić), while others have speculated that in the case of Tolkien somehow “genre bias” was involved.
Since the list of eight novelists that were mentioned in the article are fairly well-known (to the above mentioned four, Graham Greene, the eventual runner-up; Karen Blixen, who wrote under the pseudonymn of Isaak Dinesan, finished third; and Italian writer Alberto Moravia) to many readers, over the next several weeks (mostly on Saturdays or Sundays), there will be columns devoted to discussing these seven writers and how their writings compare to previous Nobel winners and to the criteria set forth in Alfred Nobel’s will:

“The said interest shall be divided into five equal parts, which shall be apportioned as follows: /- – -/ one part to the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction …”

Since the criteria for being selected to be a Nobel laureate in Literature are not similar to a “year’s best,” in that the committee is charged to consider the author’s full work and not just a singular work, not to mention the above-quoted part on “most outstanding work in an ideal direction,” the works considered generally possess a high degree of craftsmanship (in the three genres of poetry, drama, and prose) and have something to contribute to the global “conversation” regarding the human condition(s).  When considered through this evaluative lens, several works that have enjoyed widespread popularity over the years are going to be dismissed due to some combination of their writing and/or the lack of “an ideal direction.”

This seems to be the case with J.R.R. Tolkien.  Out of the seven mentioned for consideration, his is the most intriguing.  If one dismisses the probable bias of his friend and colleague C.S. Lewis (who, after all, was privy to Tolkien’s development of the Middle-Earth mythos for most of the 1930s-1950s period) and accepts his work as a serious candidate for the award, then what should one make of his work in light of the criteria mentioned above?  Does one agree with Österling’s assertion that Tolkien’s prose “has not in any way measured up to storytelling of the highest quality?”  Or were there other factors at play when his work was rejected in 1961?

In evaluating Tolkien’s candidacy, one has to strip away all memories and associations with his posthumous works and legacy.  There is no “Tolkien as the founder of modern epic fantasy” to be considered here; after all, in 1961 he did not enjoy a huge international reputation, although a few translations of his work were beginning to be published then.  Nor was he associated in public or academic opinion with a particular genre, since there were no marketing spheres then labeled “fantasy.”  If anything, one will have to consider Professor Tolkien as the translator of some Midlands lays from a non-London Middle English dialect who created some quaint tales that were then compared to the works of the 19th century socialist William Morris and early 20th century academic/writer E.R. Eddison.

If evaluated in light of Morris’ lush The Well at the World’s End, which utilizes archaic speech to create an atmospheric effect of loss and desire, Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings would doubtless appear to be wooden and turgid in comparison.  Consider the early parts of The Fellowship of the Ring, namely the part where Frodo discusses the Black Riders with the elf Gildor:

‘I am deeply grateful,’ said Frodo; ‘but I wish you would tell me plainly what the Black Riders are.  If I take your advice I may not see Gandalf for a long while, and I ought to know what is the danger that pursues me.’

‘Is it not enough to know that they are servants of the Enemy?’ answered Gildor.  ‘Flee them!  Speak no words to them!  They are deadly.  Ask no more of me!  But my heart forbodes that, ere all is ended, you, Frodo son of Drogo, will know more of these fell things than Gildor Inglorion.  May Elbereth protect you!’

There is a narrative dissonance here, between the plain hobbit speech of Frodo (despite being educated and well-versed in at least the basics of the Elvish tongues) and the elevated diction of Gildor.  Although Tolkien notes that this effect was intentional, what it also does in certain other occasions, namely in the fighting in the halls of Moria is to create dialogue that sounds odd, if not ridiculous, to the ears of those who are equally familiar with epic poetry of the classical and medieval eras as well as with more modern prose:

‘One for the Shire!’ cried Aragorn.  ‘The hobbit’s bite is deep!  You have a good blade, Frodo son of Drogo!’

The problem here is that Tolkien is trying to adapt the structure of an early medieval saga to the novel genre.  Although there are cases in his writing (although very rare in his pre-1961 original fiction) where Tolkien manages to achieve a striking literary effect through the use of alliteration and judicious repetition of patronymic phrases, often, as in the case above, the desired effect is not achieved.  Those familiar with the “source material” possibly could be left feeling as though Tolkien had struck a flat note, as the dialogue feels off and somewhat anachronistic, especially when the lower speech of the hobbits clash with those of the knights and elves.  In addition, Tolkien is handicapped by his need to introduce elements of his invented setting into the narrative.  Although certainly this is appealing to readers who are familiar with the existence of The Silmarillion, in 1961, the overall effect was, for several readers at least, the sense that the importance of the narrative was being continually interrupted by those other creations.  As a member of the Inklings society, of which Tolkien was a member, was reported to say,  “Oh God, not another fucking elf!”, so might several contemporary readers have reacted to another poem fragment about Eärendil or Elbereth with an eye roll or a despairing thought about another intrusion into the narrative.  Today, such elements are (sometimes pejoratively) referred to as “infodumps”; for others then, they were considered to be asides that weakened the focus on the narrative.

Therefore, when strictly considered on the prose level, Tolkien’s writing plausibly can be seen as not being at the same level of the others considered in 1961.  As will be seen later when I cover their works, there is not the same degree of focus on the narrative, on the characterizations, or on thematic issues, all of which are essential items usually considered by the Nobel committee.  Tolkien in 1961 had not “founded” anything; he was a respected academic who contributed heavily to the understanding of the poems and songs of the Midlands during the Anglo-Saxon through the Plantagenet eras, but his fiction was more of a curiosity than a key contributor to global belles-lettres.  Although Österling’s criticism in the abstract sounds rather harsh to those familiar with Tolkien’s writings in 2012, in 1961 it certainly is a justifiable commentary on his work in comparison to not just the others, but also in how well he was adapt to adapt the mechanics of saga storytelling to the novel mode.  Although short shrift has been given here to comparing Tolkien’s writing to the provision spelled out in Nobel’s will regarding works of “an ideal direction,” it should suffice to say that a work that was considered to be an interesting yet flawed exploration of mapping out a fictional equivalent to a national English mythology was not going to be considered in the same light as those other works who spoke of more contemporary and less mythical social concerns.  Tolkien’s work is undoubtedly influential nearly 40 years after his death, but it would be a disservice to what he did accomplish to claim that his work would fit in well with those who were awarded Nobel prizes in Literature because his prose is not as polished nor are the thematic issues of his pre-1961 works a natural fit with the prize’s legacy.  If it had to be placed among the seven, it likely would rank at or very near the bottom due to the reasons mentioned above.  This may be a harsh assessment, but in light of the others considered in that year, it is the fairest.