Morning Read: No hay que proseguir
¶ To say that Lord Chesterfield advises against laughter is severe understatement.
Having mentioned laughing, I must particularly warn you against it: and I could heartily wish that you may often be seen to smile, but never heard to laugh while you live. … In my mind there is nothing so illiberal, and so ill-bred, as audible laughter. True wit, or sense, never yet made anybody laugh; they are above it: they show the mind, and give a cheerfulness to the countenance. … I am neither of a melancholy nor a cyunical disposition, and am as willing and as apt to be pleased as anybody; butr I am sure that since I have had the full use of my reason, nobody has ever heard me laugh.
Hopelessly Irish, perhaps, I must confess that nothing draws laughter out of me more surely or inevitably than wit and sense. One might as well never weep.
¶ Chapter 41: “Moby-Dick.” The overwriting is not so thick that I can’t see through it to the craft of Melville’s composition. From a cloud of rumor about sperm whales generally, fear of the dreadful White Whale emerges in the round, so malevolent (at least to whalers) that “every dismembering or death that he caused, was not wholly regarded as having been inflicted by an unintelligible agent.” (What a constipating construction for a tale of adventure!)
Melville’s shift of the spotlight from prize to pursuer is very well done. The possessive pronoun at the start is fearfully ambiguous.
His three boats stove around him, and oars and men both whirling in eddies; one captain, seizing the line-knife from his broken prow, had dashed at the whale, as an Arkansas duellist at his foe, blindly seeking with a six inch blade to reach the fathom-deep life of the whale. That captain was Ahab.
Looking forward and back, however, I’m dismayed at how badly I’m doing, not learning how to read this inexplicable book.
¶ I’m getting to like Dorotea, or Princess Micomicona, as she’s reminded to call herself.
“That is just what I meant,” said Dorotea.
“And now that is settled, said the priest, “and Your Majesty can continue.”
“There is no need to continue,” responded Dorotea, “except to say in conclusion that my good fortune has been so great in finding Don Quixote that I already consider and think of myself as queen and mistress of my entire kingdom, for he, in his courtesy…” &c &c
The high point of the chapter, of course, is Sancho’s anger with Quixote’s determination not to marry the Princess — as how can he, if he is to remain true to Dulcinea.
I vow and I swear, Señor Don Quixote, that your grace is not in your right mind. How can your grace have any doubts about marrying a princess as noble as this one? Does your grace think fate will offer you good fortune like this around every corner? Is my lady Dulcinea, by some chance, more beautiful? No, certainly not, not even by half, and I’d go so far as to say that she can’t even touch the shoes of the lady we have before us. So woe is me, I’ll never get the rank I’m hoping for if your grace goes around asking for the moon. Marry, marry right now, Satan take you, and take the kingdom that has dropped into your hands without you lifting a finger, and when you’re king make me a marquis or a governor, and then the devil can make off with all the rest.”
Don Quixote could not endure hearing such blasphemies said against his lady Dulcinea; he raised his lance, and without saying a word to Sancho, in absolute silence, he struck him twice with blows so hard he knocked him to the ground, and if Dorotea…” &c &c
¶ In Squillions, an interesting exchange between Coward and John Gielgud. Coward apologizes for having walked out on a Gielgud show but explains that he couldn’t stand Gielgud’s overacting. Gielgud’s reply:
Thank you very much for writing as you did. I was very upset at the time because, as you know, I have always admired you and your work so very much and also because in a way I have always thought my success in the theatre only began after The Vortex time. This play was my own discovery and I had much to do with the casting and getting produced so naturally I was very anxious that you of all people should like it. But you are quite right, of course. I act very badly in it sometimes, more especially I think when I know people who matter are in front. And such a small theatre as the Criterion is difficult for me, who am used to the wastes of the Old Vic and His Majesty’s. If I play down, they write and say I’m inaudible. And if I act too much the effect is dire. Now and again one can strike the happy mien and give a good performance. But then, it is no use trying to excuse myself. I played ever so much better today after reading your letter — and I am really glad when I get honest criticism, though sometimes it’s a bit hard to decide whom to listen to and whom to ignore. One day you must produce me in a play, and I believe I might do you credit. I think it was like you to write like that and I do appreciate it.
What an extraordinary closing.
¶ AN Wilson writes about the wartime radio: the three “traitors,” William Joyce (Lord Haw Haw), Ezra Pound, and PG Wodehouse; Churchill’s not-very-numerous speeches, and the BBC.
BE Nicholls, the Reithian controller of programmes, implored the Variety Department to play ‘waltzes, marches and cheerful music’ rather than jazz. Reith shared Hitler’s hatred of jazz, though probably not for Hitler’s racialist reasons. But simple waltzes were not what people wanted to hear when they could be listening to Jack Payne, Geraldo, Joe Loss, Harry Roy, Victor Silvester, Billy Cotton, or the phenomenally popular Glenn Miller, who sacrificed a lucrative career to serve in the USÂ atrmy and who was lost, mysteriously, in a small plane just before the war ended. The hectic tones of Miller’s trombones and sax make even the stiffest and the shyest listener want to roll up the carpet and dance.