I
(New York _Evening Post_, July, 1922)
It is curious that the agencies for letting people know about the
things that really matter are so feeble and ineffective. There was
published in England, last February, a book called _Disenchantment_,
by C. E. Montague. It seems to us perhaps the first book we have seen
that tells truth about the war, tells it beautifully, with a power and
humour and tenderness that are palpable on every page. Five months have
elapsed, and yet we have heard no word as to its being published over
here. Worse still, we learn that more than one New York publisher,
after reading the book, reluctantly declined it. Sometimes one fears
that publishers are not unerring judges of what we all desire to read.
What does a man need to do to deserve well of his generation? Suppose
he had written a book that with quiet dignity and restraint summed up
the “ardours and endurances” of earth’s greatest crisis; a book that
showed sane and sweet knowledge of our poor, frail, tough, bedevilled
human nature; a book so delicately and firmly written that the manner
of it was no less potent than the matter; a book that dealt with
furious subjects calmly; that reviewed passion and misery with reason
and candour; a book that was bitter where bitterness was needed, but
with the bitterness of antiseptic. C. E. Montague has written such a
book. And even though it may be bad manners to speak about it publicly
before it has been published here, we venture do so in the hope of
speeding its coming. To confess a personal incident, when we were half
way through it we encountered one of our friends who is a sagacious
devourer of books. “What’s worth reading?” he said. “Sit down at your
desk and let me dictate a letter to you,” we replied. With admirable
docility this fine creature obeyed. We happened to know that he has
an account at Brentano’s, so we dictated thus: “Brentano’s, New
York. Gentlemen: Please order for me from Chatto & Windus, London,
three copies of _Disenchantment_, by C. E. Montague, and charge to
my account.” We watched carefully while our friend signed his name,
addressed and stamped the envelope, and dropped it down the chute.
By the time we had read him half a page of the book he had already
decided to whom he would give his two extra copies. He will never
regret the transaction, we swear.
We are anxious to put a brake on ourself in speaking of this book: if
we tried to tell you how deeply moving and true we found it, you might
be alarmed. We admit that we came to it favourably prejudiced, for Mr.
Montague’s name has been honourable to us ever since we read his novel
_The Morning’s War_, published in 1913. We had heard, also, of his
gallant record in the war: that in spite of his age (born in 1867), and
an occupation (he is one of the editors of the Manchester _Guardian_)
that many found a full excuse for non-combatancy, he enlisted as a
private in 1914, rose through the ranks to a captain’s commission, and
was three times mentioned in dispatches. We also knew (from _Who’s
Who_) that his recreation was mountaineering, and that he had been
awarded a medal “for saving life from drowning.” But we found in this
book so much more than we had imagined possible that we are at a loss
to describe it. It is the kind of book that, like its author, “saves
life from drowning.” It may save some foundering reason from the dark
tide of cynicism and disorder that is the natural result of the war
years. Even if we only persuaded every newspaper man in America to read
this book, we would have done a good stroke of achievement. It is a
book peculiarly necessary for journalists to meditate.
It is very plain that the world to-day has a bad case of acid mouth,
and Mr. Montague’s book (to use a very humble metaphor) is a kind of
litmus paper that shows the extent of our palate’s embitterment. His
reminiscent synopsis of the war’s moods and its increasing disillusions
and perplexities is the first account that seems to us to fit in with
those troubled, enigmatic, and fragmentary confessions that one hears
from those who saw the trouble from the under side; who are not always
very articulate, but spasmodically ejaculate that “The war didn’t
get into the papers.” The book deals with the greatest topic of our
age in a spirit of commensurate greatness. Of course we think we can
guess why some American publishers have been timid about it. In this
country we have not been anywhere nearly so close to the war as Britain
was. The war was still bullish with us when it suddenly ended. As a
nation, we had not been in it long enough to feel that infernal douche
of skepticism. England has been far, far more bitterly disillusioned.
The war left us economically troubled, but spiritually much the same.
The old bunkums, one suspects, still pass current here as they do not
any longer in England. And perhaps this book, conceived in suffering
and weariness, can be relished only by those who have been more deeply
immersed in horror than most of us. Even in England, we hear, its sale
has not been very large.
For, after all, humanity has an uncanny instinct to avoid truth as
long as it can. As we read this book of Mr. Montague’s we had a sudden
vision of it selling as well as H. G. Wells does--passing from hand to
hand, quoted, sermonized, becoming the fashionable topic of the season.
It even made our beloved Santayana seem dim and pale, in a way; for it
is so close and actual to our present moods and troubles. But then,
with a sigh, we abandoned that vision. Why, if this book were really
seized upon, gloried in as it deserves to be, if its eloquent humour
and generous brave spirit were really acclaimed.... No, we can’t quite
see it! The book is too beautiful, too true.