The Memoirs of a Modern Gnostic: Politics, People and Places (Part 2)

170 Pages·1979·3.999 MB·English

by  Edward Conze

THE MEMOIRS OF
A MODERN GNOSTIC
BY
E C
dward onze
PART II
POLITICS, PEOPLE AND PLACES
The
SAMIZDAT
Publishing Company
Sherborne
© Edward Conze, 1979
Privately Printed
Printed by
Frederick Law & Co. Ltd.,
Manchester
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART II: POLITICS, PEOPLE and PLACES
Preface iii
Section 1: Politics
a. On being a German abroad..........................................................1
b. A few recollections from my CP days......................................... 6
c. First contact with Marxism, and later doubts about it............15
d. Unkind remarks about Buddhist Societies at home and
abroad.........................................................................................30
Section 2: People
a. Etienne Lamotte......................................................................... 42
b. Giuseppe Tucci........................................................................... 47
c. Some Cambridge personalities................................................... 53
d. E. F. Schumacher.......................................................................60
e. Providence and my friend Dr. Diederichs............................... 66
f. Heinrich Scholz and a syphilitic girl......................................... 70
g. On people in general................................................................... 75
Section 3: Places
a. Visits to Italy............................................................................... 88
b. Visit to the Soviet Union in 1960............................................... 91
c. Visits to the United States, 1963-1973.................................... 105
d. Visit to Bonn in 1969-1970...................................................... 119
Appendix 1: Joseph Needham’s Letter of 1960.......................... 131
2: A Bird’s Eye View of Part III...................................132
3: List of Dates...............................................................136
4: List of Abbreviations.................................................138
10: The Foreign Quotations........................................... 139
Additions........................................................................................... 149
Index of Names
PART III: FORBIDDEN THOUGHTS AND BANISHED TOPICS
Chapter 1. On German antisemitism
2. My verdict on America
3. The War in Vietnam
4. Arthur Waley
5. Christmas Humphreys
6. C. E. M. Joad and Lady Barbara Wootton
7. Enemies of the Peace
8. Some American Orientalists
9. Astrological Considerations
Appendix 1: 1968 Letter to Dean Cartwright
2: T. C. Humphreys as he sees himself and as
others see him
3: Barbara Wootton’s Testimonial of 1941
4: Passages bowdlerized in Parts I and II
5: The American Visa
6: Sundry Documents
ii
PART II. POLITICS, PEOPLE AND PLACES
Preface
Like all my books this one has been written three times. For the
first version (marked DTI) I just dictated everything which came
into my head. Those who saw the result advised me to divide the
text into two parts, the first giving the story of my life, and the
second my comments on all sorts of things. This version was called
RT1. My friends’ comments on RT1, as well as the legal scrutiny of
DTI, led to the present division into three parts. The forbidden
sections are now stored away in Part III. The revised Parts I and II
called RT2’ have been duplicated and sent out to about fifty
persons. Their comments revealed many minor errors. For
instance, in 1961 the population of Sherborne was 7,300, and not
6,000; the gypsies in Godshill lived not in a quarry but in a sandpit;
the successor to Dr. Lietz and Hitler’s Minister of Culture are not
the same person; and so on and so on! These mistakes have been
listed at the end of the duplicated edition of Part II. Now and then I
hesitated about making the desired corrections. On page 44 I
describe the incident of the bomber in Godshill as I remembered it.
Dr. Westlake assures me that on that evening ‘there were no fire
watchers at the post on Good Friday Hill, as the rota had got mixed
up for the first and only time’. It is difficult to know what to make
of that. Furthermore those most concerned could draw my
attention to remarks which they might regard as untrue or
offensive. These could then be removed in the interest of peace and
goodwill. Another 1,000 copies will soon be produced by some
electronic process. They will be given away to Institutions or sold to
wellwishers.
On reflection the title ‘Memoirs of a Modern Gnostic’ seems well
chosen and stands the test of time in that it expresses my basic
attitude in all phases of my life. The day after completing this
autobiography I came by some chance across a saying (on.49) of
the Lord Jesus in the ‘Gospel of St. Thomas’ which lays bare its
U have made great efforts to recover all the copies of DTI and RT1, but regret to
say that a few people seem to have taken photocopies of them. In so far as these
superseded drafts contain libellous matter I must warn those who distribute them
that it is they, and not I, who legally speaking commit the libel. — RT3 indicates
that RT2 has been retyped once again.
Ill
basic theme and could well be used as a motto for it. ‘Jesus said:
Blessed are the solitary (monachos) and the elect. For you will find
the Kingdom! Because you have issued from it, you will again
return to it’. The title has, however, two small drawbacks. Many
people seem not to know what a ‘Gnostic* is, and for the French
translation the title will probably have to be altered1.
The first of these points reminds me of a problem which I have
been unable to resolve. Some readers have suggested that I should
add a Glossary, explaining all foreign words, allusions to historical
figures and events, psychological jargon and philosophical
profundities. I would be grateful to hear the opinions of others. On
the whole I am against the idea and that not only from laziness. All
literature depends for its effects on allusions and overtones. Its
charm evaporates when everything is explained in footnotes, just as
jokes wither when explained. In the course of my life I must have
heard thousands of sexual jokes. They interest me so little that my
mind refuses to admit them, and I can never remember any. Except
perhaps one from America of which I am reminded each time I see
our local Sherborne Liberal News Sheet, which is called FOCUS.
Here is the joke: Two Swedish house maids are having their picture
taken. ‘Why is he looking at us like that?’ ‘He has got to focus.’
‘No, tell him just to take the picture first. He is sure to rumple our
best dress.’ If you know of the position of Swedes in 19th Century
Mid-West society* this is really quite funny; but not otherwise.
In addition to the tediousness of these explanations there seems
also to be no limit to them. Here is another story from Wisconsin,
illustrating the pitfalls of East-West relations. A Japanese Professor
approaches me reverently, assures me that I have a great reputation
for the clarity of my literary style, but confesses that he himself
could not get any meaning whatsoever out of the following
sentence in the Introduction to my ‘Buddhist Scriptures’ (p.16).
This is what he read out to me, ‘When, like others before me, in the
middle of my journey through life I had strayed away from the
right road, it was he (D. T. Suzuki) who re-opened my eyes to the
splendour of the Buddha’s message’. To which I replied, ‘This
Tor Mgr. Lamotte’s comments see Appendix 10, no. (01).
2<For on the plains where once there roamed the Indian and the Scout,
The Swede with alcoholic breath plants rows of cabbage out.’
refers to, Nel mezzo dell’camin di nostra vita — Mi ritrovai nel una
selv’oscura — Che la diritta via era smaritta.’ He wrinkled his
eyebrows in pained disbelief, and I added, ‘These are, as you know,
the first lines of Dante’s Divine Comedy. ’ He gave the em­
barrassed laugh which you hear from Japanese when they feel that
you pull their legs, I saw the situation was hopeless and apologised
for my existence. I often wonder how many of such references we
miss in our own studies of Asian literatures. I have used the same
allusion in these ‘Memoirs’ on I, p.27. Should I explain it? If I did
where would I stop?
In the days when Ellen Wilkinson used to teach me how to write
English she constantly reminded me, ‘Edward, never forget that
people expect to be told that C,A,T, spells cat.’ This advice has
done much for my prose style. On the other hand it may be more
applicable to the readers of the ‘Daily Express’ than to those whom
I expect for this SAGA. That became clear to me when recently I
said to a friend, ‘Now that we have had De Medietate Lunae and
have seen what Malachy meant by his motto1, we must wonder
whether he was also right about his three successors, particularly in
view of what Huang Hua, the Chinese Foreign Secretary, told us
today about the prospects of an Atomic World War.’ What, of
course St. Malachy prophesies is that the third Pope from now,
near A.D. 2,000, will be the last one and will see the end of life on
earth2.1 soon wished that I had expressed myself a bit more directly
because the explanations had to be multiplied endlessly. So I feel
that on the whole I have done right in bravely aiming at an
educated public. It is ironic that the audience which I envisage
should have largely ceased to exist3, but it is symptomatic of much
of my life. Again and again the rug has been pulled away from
underneath my feet.
The Index of Names is the work of an old and trusted friend,
H.e. Pope John Paul was installed on September 3rd, the day following the New
Moon of September 2nd, and he died on September 28th, four days before the New
Moon of October 2nd. His reign lasted almost exactly one Lunar Month or ‘between
two Moons*.
2Perhaps Maggie and her Shylock may after all be permitted to do their bit for
the Freedom of the West.
3Fifty years ago D. H. Lawrence predicted the collapse of this class in his
masterly, ‘How Beastly the Bourgeois is —* (The Complete Poems II, 1957, pp. 159-160).
It is too long to be inserted here.
Marianne Winder, a librarian, who twenty years ago translated
‘Buddhist Texts’ into German. She emphasizes that she does not
associate herself with all the views expressed in this autobiography,
least of all with the passages about Christmas Humphreys who, she
declares, has been the most beneficent influence in her life. For a
time I had the assistance of Mrs. Rosemary Holland, who had just
graduated in History from Kings College, and who verified many
facts for me. For the German period I have also had help from
Herrn Herbert Elbrecht in Frankfurt, a helpmate whom I have
never met. The mechanics of the enterprise have been in the capable
hands of Mrs. Daphne Mitchell. Her birthday falls on nearly the
same day as my mother’s and it is thus no surprise that she should
share her ready intelligence, effortless competence and prompt and
precise performance. As indispensible as she was my friend Dr. F.
G. Brook with whom, up to August, 1978, I discussed every
sentence, often at great lengths. He has preserved me from many
infelicities. Now that he has been taken away from us, there is no
one to quite take his place.
The intellect of people with Mercury in Pisces is well known to be
more fertile than accurate. I have often been surprised by the
elementary nature of my mistakes on matters of detail, and the
unreliability of my memory. What has heartened me, however, is
that all the errors discovered so far have been due to sheer careless­
ness, and none seems to be self-serving. The list of those who have
sent in corrections fills two pages, and I have decided to scrap it.1
Not everyone concerned would wish their names to be associated
with a work of this character. May it suffice to say that my brother
has seen to it that nothing detrimental to the honour of the Conze
family has survived, while my wife Muriel has endeavoured to
expunge whatever might be to my discredit, or make me appear
small or miserable. Nevertheless a few awkward facts may have
seeped through here and there.
October, 1978
*Now that the printing has been accomplished, I cannot, however, omit to thank
Dr. Lance Cousins, of the Department of Comparative Religion at the University of
Manchester, a keen Buddhist scholar who has been on the spot to smooth over many
difficulties.
SECTION 1: POLITICS
a. On Being a German Abroad.
On re-reading what I have dictated so far it becomes clear to me
as never before how much I have remained unassimilated in spite of
strenuous efforts at outward conformity to my English environ­
ment. Here in Sherborne, whether I go to a cocktail party, to a
private house or a wine tasting, to a meeting of the Rotarians or of
the Historical Society, — the reaction of the Establishment to my
existence is always the same. Suspicion, bewilderment, desperate
attempts to determine my accent and to classify that which is odd
and to be nice to what turns out to be a German, and, as a result,
awkwardness all round. I cannot deny that I feel snubbed and
bruised every time, and recall Thomas à Kempis (1.20) 'As often as
I went into Society I came out a lesser man’.1 The spiritual benefits
of this are considerable but nevertheless it is pretty unpleasant.
Whole areas of English life have remained closed to me. I cannot,
for instance, be natural with an English child whom I invariably
put off by the academic convolutions of my speech. Nor has my
upbringing prepared me to see the world with English eyes. One of
the heroes of my youth was the Boer General Botha who, solitary
and fearless, with a rifle flung over his shoulder, frugal like a noble
Tuareg, rode over the veldt stalking the British invader of his
homeland. I had heard much of British Concentration camps in
South Africa long before the Nazis so greatly improved on the
original model2. When we played Engländer and Sinnfeiner I took
great care never to be one of the Engländer. Also I had, of course,
been brought up in a belief in German superiority and, after 1933,1
found myself in a country which then still believed that British
things were the finest in the world. Most of the inventions and
achievements which I had credited to Germans now turned out to
be the work of some British Popov. Nor have I ever got used to the
‘See Appendix 10, no. (1)
2The Century was but young. Though Kitchener was severe on the Boer
Untermenschen whom he described as ‘uncivilised Afrikander savages with a thin
white veneer’, the camps never contained more than about 100,000 inmates, and the
death rate never exceeded 344 per 1,000, or 629 per 1,000 for children. (E. Holt, The
Boer War, 1958, p.268). One of the victims was the mother of my friend Diederichs.
It is not surprising that he studied in Germany and not in England and later on
drained much wealth out of this country with his Kruger rands.
1
regularity with which the English ooze moral indignation and sit in
judgement on other Nations. Likewise it was not easy for me to
shed my Teutonic conviction that Democracy is a mere sham for
dirty deeds done in the dark. In the meantime I have learnt to
conceal my thoughts on this. But in the beginning there was some
friction over it. In the East End I once gave a talk on Nazi
Germany. When my Chairman, the archetypal bumbling Labour
Aiderman, introduced me he said of my move from Germany to
England that ‘Hitler’s loss is our gain’. This struck me as funny. In
the discussion someone asked how one could convince the Germans
of the superior virtues of democracy. In a flash and without
thinking I replied, — ‘All you will have to do is send them a film of
London East of the Bank of England with the caption, ‘This is
what Democracy has done for us’. That will show them the error of
their ways!’ The aiderman began to doubt whether I was really so
much of a gain as he had thought at first.
The fact of the matter is, of course, that there is nothing English
about me at all, — except for my dear mother’s presence in London
when I was born. When one sees in my Bonn Chapter that I am as
estranged from Germany and as remote from the people there, one
realizes that I do not have to go into the Egyptian desert because I
carry it about with me.
Nevertheless this development strikes me as strange when I
remember that it was the attempt to assimilate myself in England
which imposed the first strain on my marriage to Dorothea. She
naturally disapproved of my attempt to improve my knowledge of
the indigenous language ‘by sleeping with a dictionary’. Worse was
the fundamental difference in our reaction to German society and
to German culture. She had the typical Jewish longing to become a
part of it. I, on the other hand, had become thoroughly disgusted
by the way in which both the legal colleagues of my father in
Duesseldorf and the Professors in Hamburg had reacted to the
victory of the Nazis, revealing an abject cowardice and slimy
duplicity which I would not have believed possible. In consequence
I decided that I would no longer wish to use a language degraded so
much by this contemptible rabble (Sauvolk). We would therefore
speak only English at home and my daughter Jane would learn no
German at all. An additional reason for this decision was that I had
2