Paul Scott: Images of India

134 Pages·1980·13.21 MB·English

by  Patrick Swinden (auth.)

PAUL SCOTT: IMAGES OF INDIA
By the same author
AN INTRODUCTION TO SHAKESPEARE'S COMEDIES
UNOFFICIAL SELVES: CHARACTER IN THE NOVEL
FROM DICKENS TO THE PRESENT DAY
GEORGE ELIOT: MIDDLEMARCH (Casebook) (editor)
SHELLEY: SHORTER POEMS AND LYRICS (Casebook)
(editor)
Paul Scott: Images of India
Patrick Swinden
It was a survival of exiles. Their enemy was light, not dark, the
light of their own kind, of their own people at home from whom
they had been too long cut off so that, returning there briefly, a
deep and holy silence wrapped them and caused them to observe
what was real as miniature. In India they had been betrayed by
an illusion of topographical vastness into sins of pride that were
foreign to their insular, pygmy natures.
The Day of the Scorpion, n, ii, 4
© Patrick Swinden I g8o
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1980 978-1-349-16406-6
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be
reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
without permission
First published 1¢o by
THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
London and Basingstoke
Companies and representatives
throughout the world
Printed in Hong Kong
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Swinden, Patrick
Paul Scott, images of India
I. Scott, Paul-Criticism and interpretation
I. Title
823'.g'I4 PR6o6g.Csg6Z/
ISBN 978-1-349-16406-6 ISBN 978-1-349-16404-2 (eBook)
DOl 10.1007/978-1-349-16404-2
For Serena
Contents
Preface lX
I Paradise Lost: an Introduction
2 The Early Novels I I
Johnnie Sahib ( I 952) I I
The Alien Sky (I953) I9
A Male Child (I956) 25
The Mark of the Warrior ( I958) 30
3 Towards the Q_uartet 4I
The Chinese Love Pavilion (I 960) 4I
The Birds of Paradise (I962) 47
The Corrida at San Feliu (I 964) 57
4 The Raj Q_uartet 6s
5 Staying On ( I977) I03
Index 119
vii
Preface
Three years ago I had never heard of Paul Scott. Then, in
November 1977, he won the Booker prize for fiction; and a few
words about him and his novel Staying On appeared in the
newspapers. These included a brief comment, sympathetic and
admiring, by Philip Larkin, who was one of the judges. Less than
six months later he was dead.
Puzzled by the Booker award and saddened by news of Scott's
death so soon afterwards, I decided I should have a look at one of
his books. I had been given to understand that his largest
achievement was a tetralogy about the last days of the Raj in
India, so I started on a reading of the first novel in the series, The
Jewel in the Crown. On finishing the first Part of this long book,
'Miss Crane', I was convinced that I had encountered a novelist
of major stature. Nothing I have read of his since has made me
change my mind. Rather I was shocked that it had taken the
death of an author fifty-seven years old, with thirteen published
novels to his credit, to make me recognise his existence.
There is a moral in this. When I looked for Paul Scott's books
in public libraries, I discovered that most of them were on the
borrowed list. When I went into the bookshops, I found that
almost all the paperback volumes ·of the Raj Qyartet had been
sold, and replacements were on order. When I went into the
university library to check the stocks, I saw not a single novel by
Paul Scott in the shelves or the catalogues. In other words I was
not alone in my ignorance. But it was an ignorance shared mainly
by academics, not ordinary members of the general reading
public. Yet Scott's novels had been, for some time, well received
by reviewers-though the only extensive commentary on his
work that I could find in a public journal was Max Beloff's long
review of the Raj Quartet in Encounter (to which I refer at the
opening of my chapter on the Quartet).
I have written this book for three reasons: to alleviate my sense
IX
Priface
X
ofg uilt at failing to notice the work of a fine writer before he died;
to draw the attention of other people professionally concerned
with literature to the great merit ofPaul Scott's fiction; and to try
to encourage a wider public to read (and it seems it will often be
the case reread) some of these splendid novels.
There is so much to admire in Paul Scott's work that one is
aware that many gaps will be revealed in one's appreciation of it,
especially in a short book like this. But now is not the time for
long, painstaking analyses of the novels. What is required is a
briefbut, I hope, thoughtful and enthusiastic treatment of them.
Most of the general reasons for my admiration will appear in the
introduction to this book, and in the chapters that follow on the
individual novels. As a word of encouragement to the wary
reader, however, I should like to take this opportunity to suggest
two of those reasons in bold outline.
First, there is the consistency of Scott's achievement. With the
possible exception of The Bender, he has not written a single novel
which is not a fully serious and accomplished work of fiction. As
he gets into his stride the scope of his interest widens, the depth of
his understanding ofhuman nature becomes more profound, and
his technical resources grow more sophisticated as the subjects on
which they are brought to bear grow more complex. But his first
published novel, Johnnie Sahib, is, within its own terms of
reference (which are less narrow than its subject might lead one
to suppose), highly accomplished and well written throughout.
Second, there is the completeness of his achievement. On
receiving the Booker prize Scott said: 'I have finished with India
for ever. It just needed some little valedictory thing' (i.e. Staying
On). No one can say what fresh subject would have claimed his
attention had he survived his fifty-eighth year. But that confes
sion does indicate something that must surely be felt by the
author and his readers alike: that Staying On represents the end of
a long and important phase in Scott's career as a writer. In my
view, the thirteen novels as a whole add up to a finished
achievement, with everything said that needed to be said about
the interesting and varied subjects Scott had chosen to write
about so far. The Quartet, especially, demonstrates that he had
acquired as complete a mastery as one could legitimately expect
of an approach to the writing of fiction he had been developing
over the previous twenty-five years.
Priface
XI
I should like to thank friends and relatives with whom I have
discussed Paul Scott's work. Special thanks are owed to Judith
Brown, whose intimate and extensive knowledge of Indian
politics during the Independence period has prevented me from
making several errors of fact. Also toM. R. Elliott-Bateman, for
information he provided about the military aspect of the Anglo
Indian situation in Burma and Malaya during and immediately
after the Second World War. Any mistakes that remain are my
own responsibility. Penny Evans went to great trouble preparing
the typescript. My wife, Serena, whose interest in the novels
began at the same time as my own, has been a mine of
information and ideas; and deserves at least half the credit for
whatever is satisfactory in this book.
The author and publishers wish to thank the following who
have kindly given permission for the use of copyright material:
David Higham Associates Ltd on behalf of the Estate of Paul
Scott for extracts from The Birds of Paradise, Staying On, The Alien
Sky, A Division of the Spoils, Johnnie Sahib, The Chinese Love Pavilion,
The Mark of the Warrior, The Jewel in the Crown, A Male Child, The
Day oft he Scorpion, and The Corrida at San Feliu; and the Trustees of
the Joseph Conrad Estate for an extract from Lord Jim.
NOTE: In his Indian novels, Scott uses the term 'Eurasian' to
describe a person who is the offspring of a mixed marriage
between European and Asian parents. He uses the word 'Anglo
Indian' to describe the offspring of a mixed marriage between
English and Indian parents. And he has a number of ways of
referring to the British in India, 'British-Indian' being the most
frequently used. I have tried to simplifY things by using the word
'Eurasian' to denote any person who is the offspring of a mixed
marriage in Malaya, Burma, or India; reserving the word
'Anglo-Indian' for the English (and other British residents) in
India, in the sense in which it is commonly used-e.g. by George
Orwell in his essay on Kipling. I think the advantages outweigh
the disadvantages, especially the awkward substitution of
'British-Indian' for the less precise but more familiar 'Anglo
Indian' in the context of British rule in India.
Scott's novels can be read either in hardcover (Heinemann) or
in paperback (Panther) editions. These have different page
references and so when I quote from the text I provide references