G. K. Chesterton, A Critical Study Part 2

Strindberg, Weininger, Maupa.s.sant, Jules de Goncourt, knew too much about s.e.x, and they all went mad, although it is usual to disguise the fact in the less familiar terms of medical science. Madness itself is another such subject. There are writers who dwell on madness because they cannot help themselves--Strindberg, Edgar Allan Poe, Gogol, and many others--but they scarcely produce the same nauseating sensation as the sudden introduction of the note of insanity into a hitherto normal setting. The harnessing of the horror into which the discovery of insanity reacts is a favourite device of the feeble craftsman, but it is illegitimate. It is absolutely opposed to those elementary canons of good taste which decree that we may not jest at the expense of certain things, either because they are too sacred or not sacred enough. The opposite of a decadent author is not necessarily a writer who attacks decadents. Many decadents have attacked themselves, by committing suicide, for example. The opposite of a decadent author is one to whom decadent ideas and imagery are alien, which is a very different thing.

For example, the whole story _The Wrong Shape_ is filled with decadent ideas; one is sure that Baudelaire would have entirely approved of it.

It includes a decadent poet, living in wildly Oriental surroundings, attended by a Hindoo servant. Even the air of the place is decadent; Father Brown on entering the house learns instinctively from it that a crime is to be committed.

Considered purely as detective stories, these cannot be granted a very good mark. There is scarcely a story that has not a serious flaw in it.

A man--Flambeau, of whom more later--gains admittance to a small and select dinner party and almost succeeds in stealing the silver, by the device of turning up and pretending to be a guest when among the waiters, and a waiter when among the guests. But it is not explained what he did during the first two courses of that dinner, when he obviously had to be either a waiter or a guest, and could not keep up both parts, as when the guests were arriving. Another man, a "Priest of Apollo," is wors.h.i.+pping the sun on the top of a "sky-sc.r.a.ping" block of offices in Westminster, while a woman falls down a lift-shaft and is killed. Father Brown immediately concludes that the priest is guilty of the murder because, had he been unprepared, he would have started and looked round at the scream and the crash of the victim falling. But a man absorbed in prayer on, let us say, a tenth floor, is, in point of fact, quite unlikely to hear a crash in the bas.e.m.e.nt, or a scream even nearer to him. But the most astonis.h.i.+ng thing about _The Eye of Apollo_ is the staging. In order to provide the essentials, Mr. Chesterton has to place "the heiress of a crest and half a county, as well as great wealth," who is blind, in a typist's office! The collocation is somewhat too singular. One might go right through the Father Brown stories in this manner. But, if the reader wishes to draw the maximum of enjoyment out of them, he will do nothing of the sort. He will believe, as fervently as Alfred de Vigny, that L'Idee C'est Tout, and lay down all petty regard for detail at the feet of Father Brown. This little Roman cleric has listened to so many confessions (he calls himself "a man who does next to nothing but hear men's real sins," but this seems to be excessive, even for a Roman Catholic) that he is really well acquainted with the human soul. He is also extremely observant. And his greatest friend is Flambeau, whom he once brings to judgment, twice hinders in crime, and thenceforward accompanies on detective expeditions.

_The Innocence of Father Brown_ had a _sequel_, _The Wisdom of Father Brown_, distinctly less effective, as sequels always are, than the predecessor. But the underlying ideas are the same. In the first place there is a deep detestation of "Science" (whatever that is) and the maintenance of the theory incarnate in Father Brown, that he who can read the human soul knows all things. The detestation of science (of which, one gathers, Chesterton knows nothing) is carried to the same absurd length as in _The Ball and the Cross_. In the very first story, Father Brown calls on a criminologist ostensibly in order to consult him, actually in order to show the unfortunate man, who had retired from business fourteen years ago, what an extraordinary fool he was.

The Father Brown of these stories--moon-faced little man--is a peculiar creation. No other author would have taken the trouble to excogitate him, and then treat him so badly. As a detective he never gets a fair chance. He is always on the spot when a murder is due to be committed, generally speaking he is there before time. When an absconding banker commits suicide under peculiar circ.u.mstances in Italian mountains, when a French publicist advertises himself by fighting duels with himself (very nearly), when a murder is committed in the dressing-room corridor of a theatre, when a miser and blackmailer kills himself, when a lunatic admiral attempts murder and then commits suicide, when amid much incoherence a Voodoo murder takes place, when somebody tries to kill a colonel by playing on his superst.i.tions (and by other methods), and when a gentleman commits suicide from envy, Father Brown is always there. One might almost interpret the Father Brown stories by suggesting that their author had written them in order to ill.u.s.trate the sudden impetus given to murder and suicide by the appearance of a Roman priest.

Here we may suspend our reviews of Chestertonian romance. There remains yet _The Flying Inn_, which shall be duly considered along with the other debris of its author. In summing up, it may be said of Chesterton that at his best he invented new possibilities of romance and a new and hearty laugh. It may be said of the decadents of the eighteen nineties, that if their motto wasn't "Let's all go bad," it should have been. So one may say of Chesterton that if he has not selected "Let's all go mad"

as a text, he should have done. Madness, in the Chestertonian, whatever it is in the pathological sense, is a defiance of convention, a loosening of visible bonds in order to show the strength of the invisible ones; perhaps, as savages are said to regard lunatics with great respect, holding them to be nearer the Deity than most, so Chesterton believes of his own madmen. Innocent Smith, of course, the simple fool, the blithering idiot, is a truly wise man.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Chesterton jeers at this man's "Scottish" ancestry because his surname was Gordon and he was obviously a Jew. The author is probably unaware that there are large numbers of Jews bearing that name in Russia. If he had made his Jew call himself Macpherson, the case would have been different.

[2] _All Things Considered_, p. 106.

III

THE MAKER OF MAGIC

CHESTERTON'S only play, _Magic_, was written at the suggestion of Mr.

Kenelm Foss and produced by him in November, 1913, at the Little Theatre, where it enjoyed a run of more than one hundred performances.

This charming thing does not make one wish that Chesterton was an habitual playwright, for one feels that _Magic_ was a sort of tank into which its author's dramatic talents had been draining for many years--although, in actual fact, Chesterton allowed newspaper interviewers to learn that the play had been written in a very short s.p.a.ce of time. His religious ideas were expressed in _Magic_ with great neatness. Most perhaps of all his works this is a quotable production.

Patricia Carleon, a niece of the Duke, her guardian, is in the habit of wandering about his grounds seeing fairies. On the night when her brother Morris is expected to return from America she is having a solitary moonlight stroll when she sees a Stranger, "a cloaked figure with a pointed hood," which last almost covers his face. She naturally asks him what he is doing there. He replies, mapping out the ground with his staff:

I have a hat, but not to wear; I have a sword, but not to slay; And ever in my bag I bear A pack of cards, but not to play.

This, he tells her, is the language of fairies. He tells her that fairies are not small things, but quite the reverse. After a few sentences have been spoken the prologue comes to an end, and the curtain rises upon the scene of the play, the drawing-room of the Duke. Here is seated the Rev. Cyril Smith, a young clergyman, "an honest man and not an a.s.s." To him enters the Duke's Secretary, to tell him the Duke is engaged at the moment, but will be down shortly. He is followed by Dr.

Grimthorpe, an elderly agnostic, the red lamp of whose house can be seen through the open French windows. Smith is erecting a model public-house in the village, and has come to ask the Duke for a contribution towards the cost. Grimthorpe is getting up a league for opposing the erection of the new public-house, and has also come to the Duke for help. They discover the nature of each other's errand. Smith's case is, "How can the Church have a right to make men fast if she does not allow them to feast?"; Grimthorpe's, that alcohol is not a food. The Duke's Secretary enters and gives Smith a cheque for 50, then he gives the Doctor another--also for 50. This is the first glimpse we have of the Duke's eccentricity, an excessive impartiality based on the theory that everybody "does a great deal of good in his own way," and on sheer absence of mind--an absence which sometimes is absolutely literal. The Doctor explains in confidence to the Clergyman that there is something wrong about the family of Patricia and Morris, who are of Irish origin. . . . "They saw fairies and things of that sort."

SMITH. And I suppose, to the medical mind, seeing fairies means much the same as seeing snakes?

DOCTOR. [_With a sour smile._] Well, they saw them in Ireland. I suppose it's quite correct to see fairies in Ireland. It's like gambling at Monte Carlo. It's quite respectable. But I do draw the line at their seeing fairies in England. I do object to their bringing their ghosts and goblins and witches into the poor Duke's own back garden and within a yard of my own red lamp. It shows a lack of tact.

Patricia, moreover, wanders about the park and the woods in the evenings. "Damp evenings for choice. She calls it the Celtic twilight.

I've no use for the Celtic twilight myself. It has a tendency to get on the chest." The Duke, annoyed by this love of fairies, has blundered, in his usual way, on an absurd compromise between the real and the ideal. A conjuror is to come that very night. When explanations have gone so far, the Duke at last makes his entry. The stage directions tell us that "in the present state of the peerage it is necessary to explain that the Duke, though an a.s.s, is a gentleman." His thoughts are the most casual on earth. He is always being reminded of something or somebody which has nothing to do with the case. As for instance, "I saw the place you're putting up . . . Mr. Smith. Very good work. Very good work, indeed. Art for the people, eh? I particularly liked that woodwork over the west door--I'm glad to see you're using the new sort of graining . . . why, it all reminds one of the French Revolution." After one or two dissociations of this sort, the expected Morris Carleon enters through the French window; he is rather young and excitable, and America has overlaid the original Irishman. Morris immediately asks for Patricia and is told that she is wandering in the garden. The Duke lets out that she sees fairies; Morris raves a bit about his sister being allowed out alone with anything in the nature of a man, when Patricia herself enters. She is in a slightly exalted state; she has just seen her fairy, him of the pointed hood. Morris, of course, is furious, not to say suspicious.

DOCTOR. [_Putting his hand on_ MORRIS'S _shoulder._] Come, you must allow a little more for poetry. We can't all feed on nothing but petrol.

DUKE. Quite right, quite right. And being Irish, don't you know, Celtic, as old Buffle used to say, charming songs, you know, about the Irish girl who has a plaid shawl--and a Banshee. [_Sighs profoundly._] Poor old Gladstone! [_Silence._]

SMITH. [_Speaking to_ DOCTOR.] I thought you yourself considered the family superst.i.tion bad for the health?

DOCTOR. I consider a family superst.i.tion is better for the health than a family quarrel.

A figure is seen to stand in front of the red lamp, blotting it out for a moment. Patricia calls to it, and the cloaked Stranger with the pointed hood enters. Morris at once calls him a fraud.

SMITH. [_Quickly._] Pardon me, I do not fancy that we know that. . . .

MORRIS. I didn't know you parsons stuck up for any fables but your own.

SMITH. I stick up for the thing every man has a right to. Perhaps the only thing every man has a right to.

MORRIS. And what is that?

SMITH. The benefit of the doubt.

Morris returns to the attack. The Stranger throws off his hood and reveals himself to the Duke. He is the Conjuror, ready for the evening's performance. All laugh at this _denouement_, except Patricia, between whom and the Conjuror this bit of dialogue ensues:

STRANGER. [_Very sadly._] I am very sorry I am not a wizard.

PATRICIA. I wish you were a thief instead.

STRANGER. Have I committed a worse crime than thieving?

PATRICIA. You have committed the cruellest crime, I think, that there is.

STRANGER. And what is the cruellest crime?

PATRICIA. Stealing a child's toy.

STRANGER. And what have I stolen?

PATRICIA. A fairy tale.

And the curtain falls upon the First Act.

An hour later the room is being prepared for the performance. The Conjuror is setting out his tricks, and the Duke is entangling him and the Secretary in his peculiar conversation. The following is characteristic:

THE SECRETARY. . . . The only other thing at all urgent is the Militant Vegetarians.

DUKE. Ah! The Militant Vegetarians! You've heard of them, I'm sure. Won't obey the law [_to the_ CONJUROR] so long as the Government serves out meat.

CONJUROR. Let them be comforted. There are a good many people who don't get much meat.

DUKE. Well, well, I'm bound to say they're very enthusiastic. Advanced, too--oh, certainly advanced. Like Joan of Arc.

[_Short silence, in which the_ CONJUROR _stares at him._]

CONJUROR. _Was_ Joan of Arc a Vegetarian?