The Late New Left Rachel Powell,
Maurice Butterworth. Michael Kirkham
Castro's Cuba Alfred Sherman Gascoigne on O'Casey E. Goldsworthy Spare Parts B. Duncan German Pipe-Dreams Sarah Gainham Domestic Utility Gilbert Seldes Russian Bonds I. B. Snell Cut Hint Wife T'roat Out B. L. Macleavy Customs Union Sir Stephen King-Hall
THE LATE NEW LEFT
Sm,—Perhaps Mr. Martin does not mind a culture like the curate's egg. I do. But in spite of the dillerence between us, I have some sympathy with his sense of the bewildering size of the problem. I feel like this when my professional self worries at finish- ing those set books, doing all those appreciation exercises, and not forgetting. conscientiously, in the odd periods left, that jazz is culture too. Clearly some of the things we have between us mentioned are cultural in a more specialised sense, and a know- ledge of the inherited artistic tradition contained in them may add depth to our feeling for them. But this is secondary to our immediate experience of the kind of culture that surrounds us. If 1 have no right to he disgusted with what I see shaped around me, then I think Mr. Martin has no right to be disgusted with my view. 1 do not like the ugliness of our social attitudes, and I respond to them as a person, not as a sociologist or a literary critic. 1 reject Mr. Martin's enormous division between the artist and his audience, because to me cultdre is only metaphysic unless it is an experience that can be shared by both. I do not see the point in listening to the opinions of even the best equipped cultural expert if I am supposed to have no equipment of experience and understanding to hear with. But of course we all have; we hear as persons, not as store- houses of knowledge. The mistake is to regard culture, even in its Spectator aspect, as something that can be imposed by tuition on the few who are able to absorb it. To me it seems that culture is for living, not dispensing. I'm afraid, however, that Mr. Martin is accusing rile of disrespect towards contemporary artists. It is true that for some I have very little respect, because of the mean and narrow range of their thought, or the sterile self-security of their expression: but when I complain of the cultural content of our society I put the blame rather on the social institutions that force such an unreal rigidity on both man and artist. The monopoly ownership of newspapers, magazines and cinema circuits is one kind of inhibiting factor, nut poverty-stricken education system is another. We have left the creative mind so little room that Perhaps I should have complained rather of our cultural emptiness. Think of the great wastes of cipigland, where King and Rank keep all in order due • • . To me, and I think to many. the artists whose work has an untemporised strength are exactly those who write or work in opposition to the cultural stream, and often in real anger about it. Whereupon according to the engaging manner of our cultural satraps, their personal lives betome linniec-liaielY much more relevant than their actual art. And if it is not this sour gossip, then what passes f or discussion of culture is too often the smart, with-it posturing of elite groups. Is it any wonder, for
instance, that the theatre almost belongs to a certain sort of people, and that 'plays' for the rest of us have come to mean spy-drama on the telly?
It will take enormous democratic pressure to alter the means of financing or distributing cultural opportunity, and something like a miracle of genius to reform the attitudes and basis of our school system. At present, most of us have very little to offer mandarin scholarship, and nothing big enough to offer the ITV magnates. But is this all? I do not believe that we are yet quite powerless to find a third alternative, since the increasingly familiar sight of at- least the tools of culture is spreading the desire, the determination, to use them for our thoughts and our satisfaction; but if this should disastrously and finally be all, if so few can share what we have, if there is nothing else besides what we have, and we're offered only the neo-Confucian advice to lie right back and enjoy it—can't Mr. Martin see? This is why I'm disgusted
London New Left Review Club, 7 Carlisle Street. W I
RACHEL POWELL
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