Parade's End [Some Do Not (1924), No More Parades (1925), A Man Could Stand Up (1926), and The Last Post (1928)] (1924-1928)
Modern Library Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century (57)
Ford Madox Ford is another one of those writers who is basically only
read and respected by other authors. (In fact, these books tend to
go out of print and stay out for long periods of time.) His other
entry on this list,
The Good Soldier
(1915), was mildly diverting, but this monstrosity eluded me completely.
On its surface this quartet of novels would seem to be exactly the type
of thing I'd be drawn towards. Christopher Tietjens, the hero of
the books, is supposed to be the "last Tory", a man of 19th Century sensibilities
and morals, who tries to maintain these standards in the face of the First
World War and the changes it has wrought. But it seems like the only
values that he is really imbued with are patience and tolerance, verging
on masochism. So his great virtue proves to be his refusal to retaliate
against the horrific wife who cuckolds and harasses him, in an attempt
to get him to succumb the same human weaknesses that she has yielded to
so willingly. I have trouble buying this line of reasoning.
Acquiescing in your wife's misbehavior doesn't strike me as a plausible
basis for personal morality. In fact, on some level, choosing to
accept her outrageous behavior, rather than confront it at the risk of
causing a scene, strikes me as a form of moral cowardice. Moreover
it is ultimately pretty selfish; Tietjens demonstrates his own "superiority"
by not reacting in kind, and doesn't even make an effort to change her
self-destructive behavior. Suffice it to say that there are no characters
here that we feel much empathy for, and, not caring for them, it's
hard to care what happens to them.
(Reviewed:)
Grade: (D+)
