Auberon Waugh on an old friend
Whenever conversation turns to that vexed question: whither the novel?-1 always think of my old friend Nichol Fleming. He left Christ Church, Oxford, at the same time as I did, and for the same reasons. Since then, I learn from the dustcover, he has worked briefly in publishing and in television. He has also, if we believe the photograph on his latest work, changed from a handsome and athletic young man into a fairly attractive young woman. But by far the most startling revelation in the brief biography he supplies is at the end : 'On the acceptance of his first book for publication he left television to become a full-time writer.'
Does this cold statement hide some tragic bereavement in the Fleming family? Nichol never gave the impression of enjoying a sub- stantial private income, or even any income at all. No, it is plain that he has set himself a task in life, like Edward Gibbon, and Anthony Powell before him. Nichol Fleming is going to rehabilitate the English novelist, turn him from the pathetic creature he is, insulted by dons and publishers, cringing before editors, scratching a poor livelihood by insulting his fellow-novelists, as the only people humble enough for him to insult— Nichol Fleming is going to turn the British novelist into something proud and defiant, a respected and self-respecting member of society. In other words, he is going to show how novelists can still make themselves rich. Somewhere, he feels, there is a philosopher's stone; it will 'persuade the British public to eschew public libraries, with their notorious hazards (are there any official figures for the transmission of infectious diseases from hooks? It is true they were compiled) and fall over itself to buy novels. If only Nichol Fleming can find the formula.
Nobody should be better equipped for the task than. he. By Strix out of Celia Johnson, a nephew of James Bond ... save the novel? Nichol Fleming ought to be able to save lovely Sally Vincent from a meeting of the Scottish parliamentary press lobby on Burns' Night. With three novels out already—the first two might be'described as ranging shots —he seems to be getting very close to his target. The formula seems to be this: a hopeless, semi-satirical mission; a hero in- competent at everything except sexual inter- course; comic misadventures leading to an endless chase, preferably by land, sea and air; and whenever the story seems to be flag- ging, a little sexual intercourse for man- appeal. At times, the formula shows through, and one longs to shrill out: Look behind you, Nichol—your formula is showing. This scene, for instance, occurs during a break in the car chase:
"How long will you be?" asked Leo- polda.
"I don't know. About five or ten minutes." He left us and cut back into the wood. The girl and I sat down on the river bank. "Hey. Jess," said Leopolda. "Do you think we've got time?"
"What for?"
"A quickie."
"I don't see why not."
She ran into the wood, throwing off her clothes as she went. I followed.'
Within seconds, they are really into their 'quickie'. This is exactly thirteen pages after their previous one. Needless to say, the book ends with yet another The convention of ending novels with a description of sexual intercourse has become more firmly estab- lished since I last wrote about it. Once, I suppose, it was a brave new idea. When I wrote, it seemed to have become a cliché. Now it has gone beyond that, becoming for- malistic ritual, like Japanese opera or the Shakespearian epilogue. One can only judge a writer by how he manages inside the rigid conventions of the modern novel. Often, in my experience, one is unaccountably embar- rassed to read one's friends' more lurid descriptions of sexual passion ('she shut her eyes. Her body came up to meet mine. As we joined, her eyes opened briefly' really, Nichol?) but there is a sublime unlikelihood in these particular encounters which some- how removes any possibility of offence, The story is easily told. Two friends in London decide to smuggle £500-worth of hashish out of Morocco and into England. They outwit an attempt to swindle them by Major Brompton, their Tangerine drug- pusher. are chased by Spanish customs in a boat. Spanish police in motor cars and a French pilot in an aeroplane, but are beaten in the end by Major Brompton, who follows them all the way back to London. It is a slightly up-dated version of one of those ex- cellent wartime films starring Will Hay; the enemy is nowadays a little different—police and customs officials rather than Gestapo officers—and a little sex has been added. But nobody who enjoyed those Will Hay films need doubt that they will enjoy this book, and those students of the Nichol Fleming oeuvre will join with me in welcoming a worthy addition to it.
Plainly it would be absurd to describe this author as a spokesman for modern youth in all its diversity. His background is that of Eton and Oxford, and although Eton is famous for producing people who get along with all classes of people, of course, there are nevertheless great gaps between the Etonian and those who did not actually go to Eton : 'The sun gleamed on the Major's liquorice-coloured hair. I noticed he was wearing the tie of the Bols Snipper Club. which is awarded only to those who achieve the rare feat of a left and right at woodcock'. Not everybody, alas, would even know what he means by a left and a right at woodcock. The many interlocking insights into contem- porary society which his completed oeuvre will afford must be restricted to a certain time and a certain class. Few people will ever know whether Major Brompton, the pasty Tangerine drug-pusher, is modelled on Julian Symons, the celebrated litterateur, or whether the sleepy Spanish customs officer in chapter five is based upon Mr Cyril Connolly. I think this reviewer may be called Sebastian, a handsome, rich, French-speak- ing adventurer.
If Mr Fleming is not representative of modern youth he might be thought repre- sentatWe of his generation who went to a good public school and 9xford, but not even this is true. One could argue that his work provides an insight into those who left Christ Church prematurely in June 1960, and who later took up writing as a career. Even that highly restricted class divides quite sharply into its Fleming and its Walloon. No, Mr Fleming belongs in his own class and must be judged by the extent to which he suc- ceeds in what he sets out to do. which is to sell his book. For my own part, I doubt whether he has yet quite found the right formula for this. Endless chases through foreign countries must have a fairly limited appeal. I once read a book by Gavin Lyall which described in the most minute detail for its entire length a car journey through France. In suburban society you ask your neighbours to watch lantern slides of your foreign holiday over coffee, but I have never heard that anybody enjoyed it. This is not the way to sell novels, but it is very nice for the rest of us to watch Mr Fleming struggling with his 'quickies' while the present formula lasts.
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