Back To Whiskers

hy P. . WODEHOUSE

generally agreed, I think and what I think today Manchester thinks tomorrow that something has got to be done to restore vigor and vitality to literary criticism. There was a time, not so long ago, when reviewers were reviewers. They lived on raw meat and spoke their minds, and an author who published a book did so at his own risk. If he got by without severe contusions of his self-esteem, he knew that he must be pretty good. And if the reception of his first novel left him feeling as if he had been drawn through a wringer or forcibly unclothed in public, that was an excellent thing for his Art. It put him on his toes. If he had the stuff, he persevered. If he had not, he gave it up.
JLT IS PRETTY

Today, the question, "Have you read any good books lately?" is one which it is impossible to answer. There are no good books nowadays only superb books, astounding books, genuine masterpieces, and books which we are not ashamed to say brought tears to our eyes. Some people (who ought to be ashamed of themselves) say that the reason for this tidal wave of sweetness and amiability is the fact that reviewers today are all novelists themselves. Old Bill, they claim, who does the literary page of the Scrutineer, is not going to jump on Old Joe's Sundered Souls when he knows that his own Storm over Flatbush is coming out next week and that Joe runs the book column of the Spokesman. This, of course, is not so. Nobody who really knows novelists and their flaming integrity would believe it for a moment. It is with

genuine surprise that William, having added Sundered Souls to the list of the world's masterpieces, finds that Joseph, a week later, has done the same by Storm over Flatbush. An odd coincidence, he feels. No, the root of the whole trouble is that critics today, with the exception of a few of the younger set who have a sort of unpleasant downy growth alongside the ears, are all clean-shaven. Whether the old critics were bitter because they had beards or grew beards because they were bitter is beside the point. The fact remains that all the great literary rows you read of were between bearded men, whiskered men, critics who looked like burst horsehair sofas, and novelists who had forgotten to shave for years. The Edinburgh reviewers were beavers to a man. The connection between whiskers and caustic criticism is not hard to see. There is probably nothing which so soothes a man and puts him in a frame of mind to see only good in everything as a nice clean shave. He feels his smooth pink cheeks, and the milk of human kindness begins to gurgle within him. What a day! he says, as he looks out of the window. What a kipper! he says, as he starts his breakfast. And if he is a literary critic. What a book! he feels, as he picks up the latest ghastly effort of some author who ought to be selling coals instead of writing novels.
LONG WHISKER SHORT TEMPER

flJfuT LET a man omit to shave, even for a single day, and mark the result. He feels hot and scrubby. Within twelve hours his outlook

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED

THE FORIIM has become jaundiced and captious. If his interests lie in the direction of politics, he goes out and throws a bomb at someone. If he is an employer of labor, he starts a lockout. If he is a critic, he sits down to write his criticism with the determination that the author shall know that he has been in a fight. You have only to look about you to appreciate the truth of this. All whiskered things are short-tempered pumas, wildcats, Bernard Shaw, and in the mating season shrimps. Can you imagine a nation of spruce, cleanshaven Bolsheviks smelling of bay rum ? Would Ben Jonson have knifed a man on account of some literary disagreement if he had not been bearded to the eyebrows? There is only one thing to be done. We must go back to whiskers. And there must be no half-measures. It is not enough for a critic to have a beard like Frank Swinnerton's, which, though technically a beard, is not bushy enough to sour the natural kindliness of his disposition. We must have the old Assyrian stuff, the sort of beards Hebrew minor prophets wore great cascading, spade-shaped things such as the great Victorians grew (whether under glass or not has never been ascertained). I realize that I shall suffer myself by the change. There will be no more of those eulogies for my work like "Another Wodehouse" or "8 X io>^, 315 pp," which I have been pasting in my scrapbook for so many years. But I am prepared to sacrifice myself for the sake of Literature and I know that a sudden ebullition of whiskers among critics would raise the whole standard of writing. A young author would think twice before starting his introspective novel of adolescence, if he knew that when published it would be handed over for review to somebody who looked like General Grant at the age of eighteen. Nervous women would stop writing altogether, and what a break that would be for the reading public. The only novelists who would carry on would be a small, select group of tough eggs who had the stuff. And it is useless for the critics to protest their inability to fall in with the idea. It is perfectly easy to grow whiskers. There is a whiskered all-in wrestler named Hairy Dean. He did it. Are Clifton Fadiman and Harry Hansen going to tell me that they are inferior in will power and determination to an all-in wrestler? Tush! is about what it amounts to.

(The Woman's Angle)

Repent and Be Shaved!

Sir Hubert Wilkins, Bernard Shaw, And Santa Claus are welcome to 'Their beards, but I lay down the law. My darling, when it comes to you. Tour face was smooth when you began To court me. I was young and rash. I yielded; now that we are man And wije, you nurture a mustache! Tet you protest you love me more Than life. Well, maybe so, but save Those kisses. Keep them all in store Until you see the light, and shave! Margaret Fishback

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED