Table Of ContentTHE NOVELS OF ANTHONY POWELL
The Novels of
Anthony Powell
James Tucker
©James Tucker 1976
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1976 978-0-333-17261-2
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without permission
First published 1976 by
THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
London and Basingstoke
Associated companies in New York
Dublin Melbourne Johannesburg and Madras
SBN 333 17261 2
ISBN 978-1-349-02383-7 ISBN 978-1-349-02381-3 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-02381-3
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Contents
Preface vii
Biographical Note ix
Abbreviations
X
INTRODUCTION 1
EARLY NOVELS
Afternoon Men 9
Venus berg 19
From a View to a Death 27
Agents and Patients 34
What's Become of Waring 37
A DANCE TO THE MUSIC OF TIME
Who's Who 41
Theme 77
Style 89
Narrative Method 100
Love, Sex and Marriage 119
The Volumes in Sequence:
A Question of Upbringing 129
A Buyer's Market 135
The Acceptance World 141
At Lady Molly's 146
Casanova's Chinese Restaurant 151
The Kindly Ones 157
The Valley of Bones 163
The Soldier's Art 169
The Military Philosophers 174
Books Do Furnish a Room 179
Temporary Kings 183
Hearing Secret Harmonies 188
Further Reading 193
Index 195
Preface
The form of this book gave me some problems. In one sense it
seemed wrong not to start with Powell's main achievement, the
Music of Time sequence. Yet it was necessary to show how the early,
pre-war novels pointed towards this later work. I decided to take
the early novels first (several deserve full consideration on their
own account, anyway, not just for what they promised) and try to
correct any consequent loss of proportion by attempting early a
general picture in the Introduction. It is an Introduction which, I
suppose, might almost just as appositely have come as a conclusion;
though in a section headed Conclusion there would be pretensions
to a certainty and definiteness which I am happy to avoid.
How to treat the Music of Time sequence itself also raised some
questions. I wanted to look overall at the work, to try to draw its
general qualities together for discussion, but was also aware that
many readers might know only some of the twelve books. My com
promise, not altogether satisfactory, is to give first a simplified route
through the twelve volumes by means of a Who's Who of characters;
then to examine certain important features of the sequence; and
lastly - this being the most difficult - to take the books in chrono
logical order of publication, say briefly what each is about, while
treating also what seem to me the most interesting critical aspects
raised: some of my choices may seem arbitrary, but I could think of
no other way of tackling such varied yet unified subject matter.
Throughout discussion of A Dance to the Music of Time I have
been inclined to use the word 'novel' for the whole sequence and
'book' or 'volume' for its separate parts. If there are inconsistencies
I hope the reader will be able to deduce from the context which is
meant.
I would like to thank Professor Gwyn Jones of University College,
Cardiff, for reading much of the text and for making a great number
Preface viii
of helpful suggestions. John Grigg, also of the college, and a Powell
devotee, read the draft and donated some excellent insights, as well
as proposing a beneficial cut or two. My wife, Marian, helped con
siderably with the checking of names, but any errors are mine.
Some of the abbreviated titles look formidable, but I think the
reader will get used to them. I am grateful to William Heinemann
Ltd, Powell's publishers, for allowing me to quote extensively. The
Who's Who appeared slightly shortened in The New Review.
J.T.
Biographical Note
Anthony Powell was born in 1905, the son of a regular army officer
in the Welch Regiment. He was educated at Eton and Oxford. He
now lives in Somerset.
After Oxford he worked for Duckworth, the publishers, who
brought out his first four novels. He left publishing to become a
film scriptwriter for a short time and has also worked in literary
journalism. From 1952 to 1958 he was literary editor of Punch. At
present he reviews regularly for the Daily Telegraph.
During the war he served in the Welch Regiment and the In
telligence Corps, becoming a major. He was awarded several foreign
decorations. In 1956 he was made a C.B.E. He is a Trustee of the
National Portrait Gallery.
At Lady Molly's (1957) won the James Tait Black prize; and
Temporary Kings (1973) the W. H. Smith fiction award. He is a
D.Litt. of the University of Sussex (1971).
In 1934 he married Lady Violet Pakenham and has two sons. Be
sides the works dealt with here he has written John Aubrey and His
Friends (London, 1948) and two plays, The Garden God and The
Rest I'll Whistle (London, 1971). He has edited Novels of High
Society from the Victorian Age (London, 1947) and Brief Lives and
Other Selected Writings of John Aubrey (London, 1949). He has·
contributed 'This Wat'ry Glade' [Eton] to The Old School. Essays
by Divers Hands, edited by Graham Greene (London, 1934); 'Proust
as a Soldier' to Marcel Proust 1871-1922, A Centenary Volume,
edited by Peter Quennell (London, 1971); 'A Memoir' to Constant
Lambert, by Richard Shead (London, 1973).
Abbreviations
Afternoon Men (1931) AM
Venusberg (1932) v
From a View to a Death (1933) FAVTAD
Agents and Patients (1936) AAP
What's Become of Waring (1939) WBOW
A Dance to the Music of Time ADTTMOT
A Question of Upbringing (1951) AQOU
A Buyer's Market (1952) ABM
The Acceptance World (1955) TAW
At Lady Molly's (1957) ALM
Casanova's Chinese Restaurant (1960) CCR
The Kindly Ones (1962) TKO
The Valley of Bones (1964) TVOB
The Soldier's Art (1966) TSA
The Military Philosophers (1968) TMP
Books Do Furnish a Room (1971) BDFAR
Temporary Kings (1973) TK
Hearing Secret Harmonies (1975) HSH
Times Literary Supplement TLS
New Statesman and Nation NS&N
Introduction
Anyone wanting to give a general idea of Anthony Powell's novels
will find himself talking pretty soon about an easily recognised prose
style and a steady concern with the well-hom, well-off and well
educated. As it happens, the writing changes sharply between the
early books and ADTTMOT; for that matter, there are changes
within ADTTMOT. But a distinctive polish, restraint and wit do run
through all, and touches of learning are fairly regular. As to class,
a few books may glance at lowish, or even low, life but this is not
typical and usually signals a trip to bohemia, a barracks or-in
HSH - to Cultsville.
One further common quality needs to be mentioned early: a
constant aim to be readable, to entertain, for the most part wonder
fully realised. To draw the three elements together, one can say
that much of this readability in ADTTMOT and in several of the
earlier books comes from the elegantly deadpan treatment of liber
ated upper-class behaviour, and especially sexual behaviour: the low
down on high life in charming undemonstrative prose.
If Powell's work went only this far it would be slight: no more
than a slick and funny expose of the privileged. That is not how it
turns out. Certainly the novels occupy themselves at some length
with shallow, possibly effete, lives and skilfully create the right
drifting, inconstant, often anarchic tone of the society they inhabit.
What seems to give the books their substance is this unflurried will
ingness to see high life as it is and accept its rough edges; while
suggesting in a moderate, not too convinced manner that it is better
on the whole to do things in a humane, temperate way free from
self-obsession and from cruelty. About this light-hearted compli
ance with the world's uneven style is something of what Orwell saw
and liked in Henry Miller, though Powell and Miller are, of course,
looking at very different pictures. Tolerance, humanity, decency
