SATIRE IN THE VICTORIAN NOVEL

BY

FRANCES THERESA RUSSELL, Ph.D.

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH, STANFORD UNIVERSITY

SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE FACULTY OF PHILOSOPHY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

New York

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1920

All rights reserved

Copyright, 1920, By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

Set up and electrotyped. Published January, 1920.

VIRO DOCTISSIMO DAVID STARR JORDAN

ET

DIS MANIBUS GUILELMI JAMES

SACRUM QUI MIHI TEMPORE MEO GRAVISSIMO, NOVA SUPPEDITANTES OFFICIA NOVAM VITÆ SEMITAM MONSTRAVERUNT

[vii]

PREFACE

If the following monograph were to be presented from the point of view of a proponent, the author would be put triply on the defensive in relation to the theme. For, from one cause or another, the trio of terms in the title lies under a certain blight of critical opinion.

Satire, being a thistle “pricked from the thorny branches of reproof,” cannot expect to be cherished in the sensitive human bosom with the welcome accorded to the fair daffodil or the sweet violet. It must be content to be admired, if at all, from a safe distance, with the cold eye of intellectual appraisal.

Victorianism has the distinction of being the only period in literature whose very name savors of the byword and the reproach. To be an Elizabethan is to be envied for the gift of youthful exuberance and an exquisite joy in life. To be a Queen Annian (if the phrase may be adapted) is to be respected for the accomplishments of mature manhood,—a dignified mein, ripened judgment, and polished wit. To be a Victorian—that indeed provokes the question whether ’twere better to be or not to be. The chronological analogy cannot, however, be carried out, for the Victorian, whatever the cause of his unfortunate reputation, can hardly be accused of senility. On the contrary, the impression prevails that the startled ingenuousness, for instance, with which he opened his eyes at Darwin, Ibsen, and the iconoclasts in Higher Criticism; the vehemence with which he opposed and refuted and fulminated against everything hitherto undreampt[viii] of in his philosophy; the complacency with which he viewed himself and his achievements, were

attributes more appropriate to adolescence than to any later time of life. Withal there was little of the grace and gayety of youth, and not much more of the poise and humor of manhood. That the Victorian was never at ease, in Zion or elsewhere, that he was prone to take himself and his disjointed times very seriously, without achieving a proportionate reformation, is a charge from which he never can be acquitted. To our modern authorities, especially such dictators as Shaw and Wells, contemplating him from the vantage ground of a higher rung in the ladder of civilization, the Victorian looks as Wordsworth did to Lady Blandish, like “a very superior donkey,” protected by the side-blinders of conventionality, saddled and bridled by authority, and ridden around in a circle by sentiment (most tyrannical of drivers), with much cracking of whip and raising of dust, but no real change of intellectual or spiritual locality. Nor can all the cavorting fun of Dickens, all the pungent playfulness of Thackeray, all the sardonic

gibes of Carlyle, all the grotesque gesturing of Browning, all the winged irony of George Eliot and Matthew Arnold, not even all the quips and cranks in Punch itself, avail to quash the indictment. The Victorian may be defended, appreciated, exonerated even; he may in time succeed in living it down. But to live it down is not quite the same as to have had nothing that had to be lived down.

The Novel has been called the Cinderella of Literature. And it is true that while she may be useful, indispensable, a secret favorite of the whole family, no magic wand can give her the real enchantment of a caste that survives the stroke of twelve. She may act as the drudge to[ix] fetch and carry our theories, or the playmate to amuse our idle hours, but she must be kept in her place, and her place is with neither the esthetic aristocracy of poetry nor the didactic patricianism of philosophy and criticism. She has, indeed, recently been fitted with a golden slipper, but her Prince hails from the Kingdom of Dollars, and his rank is recorded in Bradstreet instead of the Peerage.

The indifferent or repellent nature of a subject, even though triple distilled, has nothing to do, however, with its value as a topic for investigation. I present this study neither as apologist nor enthusiast. If we expand Browning’s “development of a soul” to include the mental as well as the spiritual stages, as the poet himself did in actual practice, we must agree with him that “little else is worth study.” So persistent and insistent in the mind of man has been, and still is, the satiric mood, so devoted has he been from immemorial ages to the habit of story-telling (and seldom for the mere sake of the story), so voluminous and emphatic did he become in the nineteenth century, that no complete account of him can be rendered up until, amid the infinite variety of his aspects, he has been viewed as a Victorian satirist, using as his medium the English novel.

Whatever the result of this observation may be, the process has been one of continual delight, tempered by despair; for one enters as it were a room of tremendous size not only full of curious and challenging objects (over-furnished perhaps), but supplied also with numerous doors opening into other apartments, and these ask an amount of time and attention which only the span of a Methuselah could place at one’s disposal.

It must be admitted, though, that it is a happier lot to stand before open doors, even in dismay at the illimitable[x] vistas, than to confront closed doors or none at all. And I wish in this connection to offer my tribute of appreciation and admiration to one who has prëeminently the scholar’s talisman of Open Sesame into the many and rich realms of literature. It was my good fortune to prepare this study under the direction of Professor Ashley H. Thorndike, of Columbia University, by whose benignly severe criticism so many students have profited, by whose sure taste and searching wisdom so many have been guided. To him, to his colleagues in the English Department, and to the other officers of the University who helped to make my term of residence the satisfaction it has been, it is a pleasure to express my gratitude. To my Stanford colleague, Miss Elisabeth Lee Buckingham, I am indebted for the drudgery of copy-reading, both in manuscript and in proof, and for many valuable suggestions.

F. T. R.

[xi]

PART I PREMISES

[1]

Satire in the Victorian Novel

CHAPTER I THE SATIRIC SPIRIT

“Are ye satirical, sir?” inquired the Ettrick Shepherd, warily suspicious of the cryptic eulogy just pronounced by his companion on the minds and manners of the English shopocracy.

“I should be ashamed of myself if I were, James,” was the grieved reply.

We know very well, however, that Christopher North was not ashamed of himself, at least not with the true contrition that leads to reformation. On the contrary, we fear that he cherished and cultivated quite shamelessly his gift of caustic wit. In any case, whether the disavowal came from ironic whim or from a concession to the popular attitude toward satire, it illustrates the first difficulty confronting the student of this indeterminate subject.

To recognize the satirical at sight, to know whether a man is telling the truth, either when he claims to be a satirist or when he disclaims the charge, is something of an accomplishment. For the complex and Protean nature of satire, varium et mutabile semper, has naturally led to much disagreement not only as to its existence in certain cases, but as to its justification in general. To its eulogist, usually the satirist himself, satire is an instrument of discipline with a divine commission,—a[2] Scourge of God. To its apologist, usually the detached observer, it is a more or less dubious means to a more or less necessary end. To its disparager, usually the satirized, it is a wanton mischief-maker, superfluous and intolerable. The personal resentment of this last may be fortified by the convenient logic which identifies the agent with the cause. “People who really dread the daring, original, impulsive character which is the foundation of the satirical,” says Hannay in one of his lectures on Satire, “ingenuously blame the satirist for the state of things which he attacks.”

These varieties of attitude toward satire arise not only from varieties in temperament and satirical experience, but from the diverse manifestations of satire itself. Take, for instance, those characters in literature which seem to be an incarnation of the satiric spirit. Thersites is the dealer in personalities, scoffing and gibing at the élite with the licensed audacity of the court fool. Reynard is the satirical rogue who not only perceives the weaknesses of his fellow citizens but turns them to his own advantage. Alceste is the misanthrope, “critic,” as Meredith says, “of everybody save himself,” but lifting his strictures out of the merely personal by attaching them to a general interpretation of life. The Hebrew Adversary is the cynic with a scientific zest for experiment. He impugns motives, fleers at fair appearances, prides himself on his superior penetration, and questions the price for which a prosperous Job serves God. His loss of the wager through actual test of his theory has been taken as proof

that such suspicions are unwarranted, and that the trust of the Divine Idealist in human nature was justified. This conclusion, however, must be qualified by the admission that the inductive process was conducted[3] on limited data, and that if Eliphaz, Bildad, or Zophar had been chosen for the trial, the result might have been different. As it was, the final silence of the quenched satirist, and his absence from the happy ending may be construed as a sign of defeat in one instance that by no means invalidated his general attitude of doubt and interrogation.

Of all these embodiments, however, the most perfect representation of the satiric spirit is a product of English genius. The melancholy Jaques has abundant slings and arrows of his own wherewith to retaliate for those of outrageous fortune, but he never fails to wing them with laconic wit and imperturbable humor. He expressly denies being guilty of personalities.

He snubs with careless aplomb the too oratorical Orlando, and cannily avoids the too loquacious Duke. “I think of as many matters as he,” he observes, “but I give heaven thanks, and make no boast of them.” He reviews the career of man, and sees him proceeding with pretentious futility through his seven sad ages to an inglorious conclusion. And yet this philosopher admits his very pessimism to be something of a pose, and turns his humor reflexively against himself. All satirists have a fondness for sucking melancholy out of a song as a weasel sucks eggs; all are prone to rail at the first born of Egypt simply because they cannot sleep, but few have the honesty to acknowledge it. Meanwhile, although this courtier claims motley as his only wear, his companions perceive the genuineness of his humanity and the value of his protests.

[4]

And thus have diverse manifestations of the satiric spirit appeared from time to time. Few seem to be visible just at present, but we may be sure that the Spirit of Satire has not deserted our planet. Still is he busy walking up and down in the earth and going to and fro in it. Still does he probe and mock, sometimes with penetrative wisdom, sometimes in prejudice and error, but always as a challenge not to be ignored.

Satire has not only embodied itself in certain characters of literature, but has made and maintained for itself an important place in that realm. This place may be divided into two fairly distinct areas. The narrower one is known as formal satire, and has always been expressed in verse: the Latin hexameter, the Italian terza rima, the French Alexandrine, the English heroic couplet. The larger and less definite section is formed by surcharging with the satiric tone some other literary type. Such a combination is found in the Aristophanic comedy, the dialogues of Lucian, the romances of Rabelais, Cervantes, and Swift. Such also are The Rape of the Lock, Don Juan, The Bigelow Papers, Man and Superman, and countless others. In addition to these there is a third estate, the largest and most heterogeneous, consisting of writings mainly serious, with a more or less pronounced satiric flavor.

Any study, therefore, which tries to deal with satire as a mode rather than a form will profit by using the adjective instead of the noun. Without fully accepting the erasure of the old literary boundaries advocated by Croce, Spingarn, and the modern school, we may say[5] that in this particular field at least, the substitution of the descriptive satiric for the categoric satire shows that discretion which is the better part of valor. Still, since to avoid the responsibility of deciding whether or not a given production is a satire, by the non-committal device of calling it satiric, is only to beg the question so far as a definition is concerned, it is advisable to produce some identifying label. Stated in brief, satire is humorous criticism of human foibles and faults, or of life itself, directed especially against deception, and expressed with sufficient art to be accounted as literature.

When we say, however, that satire is a union of those two intangible, subjective elements, criticism and humor, we do not assume the equation fully to be expressed by the formula—Antagonism plus Amusement equals Satire. For neither is all criticism humorous nor all humor critical. The relation is that of two circles, not coincident but overlapping.

Confusion has arisen because, while the boundaries of the two separate circles are fairly distinct in our minds, the circumference made by their conjunction is merged in their respective planes. Accordingly, the term satire is sometimes used to denote humorless criticism,—which is really invective, denunciation, any sort of reprehension; and sometimes uncritical humor,—which is mere facetiousness and jocularity. Not every prophet, preacher, or pedagogue is a satirist, nor yet every merry clown, or exuberant youth, or mild worldly-wise man enjoying the blunders of innocent naïveté.

Professor Dewey reminds us that the ideal state of mind is “a nice balance between the playful and the serious.”[6] But in the satiric circle a nice balance would be found only at the center. Wherever there are boundaries, there are always some sections of the enclosure nearer the margin than others. Thus, although satire is a compound, it does not follow that its fractions stand in a constant uniform ratio. On the contrary, the proportion ranges all the way from a minimum of humor in a Juvenal or a Johnson to a minimum of criticism in a Horace, a Gay, or a Lamb. Either quality may reach the vanishing point, but when it passes it, the remaining one cannot alone create satire, any more than oxygen or hydrogen can be transformed into water.

Nor can either quality be defined in other than psychological terms. The critical sense is rooted in the instincts of attraction and repulsion, the reaction of an organism to any new stimulus being pro or con according to the preëstablished harmony or antagonism between them. As each human being grows to maturity by responding to experience, he acquires his individual set of opinions and ideals, largely borrowed from the habits and conventions of his groups, ethnic, social, and what not, with a small residue of his own originality. Equipped with this outfit of criteria he looks upon life and finds it complete or wanting, tests his fellow men and approves or condemns, examines all created things and calls them good or bad. But he is so constituted that his acquiescence is likely to be somewhat passive, and his protests active, his commendation grudging and qualified, his condemmation sweeping and thorough. Says an eighteenth century satirist,—[1]

The humorous sense is likewise an essence and an index of disposition. The inadequacy of most definitions of the ludicrous, from Aristotle’s “innocuous, unexpected incongruity,” to Bergson’s “mechanical inelasticity,” lies in their concentration on the objective side of it,—the stimulus to mirth,—whereas the subjective,—the mirthful person,—deserves the emphasis. Laughter throws a far more illuminating ray on the laugher than the laughed at, for it indicates not only taste and mood but the trend of one’s philosophy. In betraying a man’s idea of the incongruous, it implies his conception of the congruous, and reveals his whole coördination of life. We may, it is true, define humor by saying that intellectually it is a contemplation of life from the angle of amusement, and emotionally, a joyous effervescence over the absurdities in life ever present to the discerning eye; but we can never quite capture it, any more than pleasure or tragedy. We can, however, use these abstractions as refracted definers of character, by

noting what sort of a man it is who regards such and such things as amusing, or delightful, or unendurable. For not only as a man thinks, but also as he laughs and exults and censures and suffers, so is he.

That satire is woven from double strands, the blue of rebuke and the red of wit,—becoming thereby in a chromatic sense the purple patch of literature,—is testified to by satiric theory as well as practice. The critical element may of course be taken for granted, but since it has been sometimes over-emphasized at the expense of the humorous, some testimony as to the latter must be given.

It is to Horace that we are indebted not only for the first finished formal satire, but for the first attempt at[8] an analysis of the then newest literary type. He sketches the history of satire as an exposure of crime, but insists that this mission may be performed with courtesy and the light touch, since even weighty matters are sometimes settled more effectively by a jest than by grim asperity.

It is interesting to note that his own consistent practice in this matter is acknowledged by his successor Persius, who says of him,

When Jonson reintroduced the Aristophanic vehicle of comedy to carry his satire, though fashioned in a different style, he also re-voiced the Horatian satiric philosophy, promising realism,—such characters and actions as comedy would choose,

A writer of the Restoration Period carries on the tradition:

[9]

The spokesman of the eighteenth century on this point is Young.

“No man can converse much in the world but, at what he meets with, he must either be insensible, or grieve, or be angry, or smile. Some passion (if we are not impassive) must be moved; for the general conduct of mankind is by no means a thing indifferent to a reasonable and virtuous man. Now, to smile at it, and turn it into ridicule, I think most eligible; as it hurts ourselves least, and gives Vice and Folly the greatest offense.

“Laughing at the misconduct of the world will, in a great measure, ease us of any more disagreeable passion about it. One passion is more effectually driven out by another than by reason.”[6]

And about the same time our first satirical novelist was avowing his own creed and performance:

“If nature hath given me any talents at ridiculing vice and imposture, I shall not be indolent, nor afraid of exerting them.”[7]

Again: “I have employed all the wit and humour of which I am master in the following history; wherein I have endeavoured to laugh mankind out of their favorite follies and vices.”[8]

[10]

The self-conscious nineteenth century is full of comments on this topic, as on all others, but two or three representative ones will suffice as examples.