In praise of hypocrisy and other news
I remember reading once, don’t ask me where, that one of the vices most despised by those surveyed was: “hypocrisy”. I have a very different view on this vice – I think a certain amount of hypocrisy is both necessary, desirable and completely forgivable. “Principled” morons who follow a particular path in life without looking “left” or “right” are far more annoying than hypocrites. If there is one expression that gets right on my nerves it is “I won’t do it on principle.” Normally, this expression means “I am too dim and lazy to try and come to a conclusion on this tricky choice I have to make and so instead I will pretend to be a man/woman of “principle”.
At least hypocrites are, mostly, transparent and everyone can form their own judgements and conclusions. The principled lot are just a pain to have around. I mention this because I am really beginning to appreciate Victorian hypocrisies. They’ve been slammed for so long now I shall become their apologist. It is of course true that most Victorian hypocrites claimed to be principled – so its all a bit confusing really but I shall have a go.
Last Sunday evening, I watched the last episode of Tess of the D’Urbervilles. I sat alone, G. having decided to give this one a skip, and wept as Angel St Clair (the principled idiot) wept for his beautiful Tess. I have never read the actual book but seen Roman Polanski version a couple of times – years ago. Had forgotten most of the plot. In fact I missed the first episode – thought it would be yet another BBC period drama. Yawn. It was fantastic though. Great actress and actors.
In the same way that I am a firm believer in allowing a little bit of cheese into ones everyday life, so I am a firm believer in the Victorian novel. Its impossible, nowadays, to write such high drama. Self-sacrifice no longer exists and yet it is precisely the denial of temptation that creates the passions for a wonderful story. It would, for example, be impossible to write a tale about lovers denying each other physical and emotional love because the protagonist had been seduced by a monster, had mothered a child with said “monster” and was, as a result, no longer “pure”. A lengthy period of separation and hardship ensues resulting in tragedy.
Victorian morals may have been hypocritical; they may have been stifling; they may have been misjudged – but they did allow for superb drama. Katherine and Heathcliff have got to be one of the all time greatest passionate lovers – and this was written by a spinster who had lived a sheltered life in the Yorkshire moors with nothing to inspire her other than wild weather and a great imagination of what life could have been like.
“Great” contemporary literature centres around protagonists wheedling their way out of responsibility and no plot is complete without marital infidelity. G. bought me a copy of Fiona Neill (aka Lucy Sweeney’s) “Diary of a Slummy Mummy” a few months ago when he returned from a trip to the UK. Sweeney’s “slummy Mummy” column in The Times is hugely popular in the UK given that she is supposed to represent the slightly whacky contemporary middle-class Mum.
It began rather promising and her description of domestic life looked horribly familiar to our own. I gave up half-way through though when she makes a “secret” arrangement to meet “sexy domestic Dad down the pub” of all places. Where, I ask you, is the romance in that? I also got fed-up when she began to describe how she saw her husband, shortly before they got married, having sex with a girl in someone’s front garden. How on earth she went on to marry the man after such an experience is quite beyond me.
OK, a slummy Mummy diary isn’t exactly high-brow literature nor is it intended to be – but give me Victorian drama any day over and above such tat. I can just imagine the publisher of a “Slummy Mummy” insisting that her book will not sell if there is no illicit activity outside of the marital home.
In other news:
I should probably try my hand at writing “tat” and see if I can make a nice little earner out of it. Our roof is leaking – again and it looks more than likely that we will have to replace it. Its been leaking, in different patches, every winter, spring and autumn since we bought the place. So far we have managed to make local repairs but I wonder if this winter is the winter where we need a complete over haul.
On Friday Inne is arriving from the Ukraine. She has no military training but we are in negotiations with Sir Alan Sugar about finalising an expensive training programme called MET (Military Endurance Test) whereby future spies and SAS grandees come to live with us for a whole month to see if they can survive the mental anguish. G thinks this will be a lot more profitable than my tatty novels and help pay for the leaking roof.
J. is loving his football. He’s such a happy little boy and has become a lot calmer now that he spends six hours a week running around a field and getting completely exhausted. On Saturday he scored three goals. The team lost 6-5 but we were, needless to say, very proud of him.
Yesterday was teacher-training day so I had the kids at home. We were joined by Charlotte, Nicholas and Thomas. It was full house but lots of fun. The kids kept themselves amused which meant I could get on with other things.
At least hypocrites are, mostly, transparent and everyone can form their own judgements and conclusions. The principled lot are just a pain to have around. I mention this because I am really beginning to appreciate Victorian hypocrisies. They’ve been slammed for so long now I shall become their apologist. It is of course true that most Victorian hypocrites claimed to be principled – so its all a bit confusing really but I shall have a go.
Last Sunday evening, I watched the last episode of Tess of the D’Urbervilles. I sat alone, G. having decided to give this one a skip, and wept as Angel St Clair (the principled idiot) wept for his beautiful Tess. I have never read the actual book but seen Roman Polanski version a couple of times – years ago. Had forgotten most of the plot. In fact I missed the first episode – thought it would be yet another BBC period drama. Yawn. It was fantastic though. Great actress and actors.
In the same way that I am a firm believer in allowing a little bit of cheese into ones everyday life, so I am a firm believer in the Victorian novel. Its impossible, nowadays, to write such high drama. Self-sacrifice no longer exists and yet it is precisely the denial of temptation that creates the passions for a wonderful story. It would, for example, be impossible to write a tale about lovers denying each other physical and emotional love because the protagonist had been seduced by a monster, had mothered a child with said “monster” and was, as a result, no longer “pure”. A lengthy period of separation and hardship ensues resulting in tragedy.
Victorian morals may have been hypocritical; they may have been stifling; they may have been misjudged – but they did allow for superb drama. Katherine and Heathcliff have got to be one of the all time greatest passionate lovers – and this was written by a spinster who had lived a sheltered life in the Yorkshire moors with nothing to inspire her other than wild weather and a great imagination of what life could have been like.
“Great” contemporary literature centres around protagonists wheedling their way out of responsibility and no plot is complete without marital infidelity. G. bought me a copy of Fiona Neill (aka Lucy Sweeney’s) “Diary of a Slummy Mummy” a few months ago when he returned from a trip to the UK. Sweeney’s “slummy Mummy” column in The Times is hugely popular in the UK given that she is supposed to represent the slightly whacky contemporary middle-class Mum.
It began rather promising and her description of domestic life looked horribly familiar to our own. I gave up half-way through though when she makes a “secret” arrangement to meet “sexy domestic Dad down the pub” of all places. Where, I ask you, is the romance in that? I also got fed-up when she began to describe how she saw her husband, shortly before they got married, having sex with a girl in someone’s front garden. How on earth she went on to marry the man after such an experience is quite beyond me.
OK, a slummy Mummy diary isn’t exactly high-brow literature nor is it intended to be – but give me Victorian drama any day over and above such tat. I can just imagine the publisher of a “Slummy Mummy” insisting that her book will not sell if there is no illicit activity outside of the marital home.
In other news:
I should probably try my hand at writing “tat” and see if I can make a nice little earner out of it. Our roof is leaking – again and it looks more than likely that we will have to replace it. Its been leaking, in different patches, every winter, spring and autumn since we bought the place. So far we have managed to make local repairs but I wonder if this winter is the winter where we need a complete over haul.
On Friday Inne is arriving from the Ukraine. She has no military training but we are in negotiations with Sir Alan Sugar about finalising an expensive training programme called MET (Military Endurance Test) whereby future spies and SAS grandees come to live with us for a whole month to see if they can survive the mental anguish. G thinks this will be a lot more profitable than my tatty novels and help pay for the leaking roof.
J. is loving his football. He’s such a happy little boy and has become a lot calmer now that he spends six hours a week running around a field and getting completely exhausted. On Saturday he scored three goals. The team lost 6-5 but we were, needless to say, very proud of him.
Yesterday was teacher-training day so I had the kids at home. We were joined by Charlotte, Nicholas and Thomas. It was full house but lots of fun. The kids kept themselves amused which meant I could get on with other things.
posted by Kathleen at 2:59 AM
1 Comments:
Well done Jakob! Three out of five goals - that's impressive!
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