Literary Censorship
To The Pure . . . By Morris L. Ernst and William Beagle. (Jonathan Cape. 10s. 6d.) IF the problem of literary censorship could be solved by merely proving that the present laws in Great Britain and America are arbitrary, chaotic, and ridiculous, Messrs. Morris L. Ernst and William Seagle would have solved it completely. The study by these two American authors of the working of the censorship—so to describe the present laws on obscenity— in both countries is brilliantly written and arranged. But what then ? As we read the book we kept asking ourselves that question. Their solution seems to us to be no solution. They say in-so many words that aesthetic values and judgments should be substituted for moral values and judgments. Let us quote them :—
" Food, religion, the State—then sex. What next ? Will those who want to control the thoughts and emotions of others shift to new unleavened realms of taste and aesthetics ? Are we at the dawn of an era when the word obscene' will be replaced by
unaesthetic "lewd ' by ' in poor taste,' and `filthy' by ugly' ? Must the tiranny of words proceed for ever ? Possibly some divine power ordains that intellectual stamina and emotional peace can only be acquired by conquest over censors."
If this were to be the method of censorship how would it work ? A bestial book would pass muster apparently if written with a certain artistry. We say a " certain " artistry because obviously the standard in an imperfect world could not be placed too high. And who would judge the aesthetic value of a book ? If the verdict were in the hands of magis- trates, as now, our last state would be worse than the first. If a Board of men of letters were appointed—not that the authors have any such idea in their minds, but public opinion would probably want to make their theory practical—there would be another sort of censorship. " New Presbyter is but Old Priest writ large."
The truth is that we cannot allow everything to be published, There must be a rule or a limit somewhere. Yet there is no possibility of an exact, still less of an enduring, definition, for the authors of this book prove beyond question that what is considered obscene in one generation may not raise a single qualm of conscience in the next. Harriet Martineau actually condemned Thackeray's Vanity Fair ! " I cannot read it,'' she said, " from the moral disgust it occasions." It looks as though common sense must be our anchor—the common sense which each generation develops for itself out of its own environment. This was Ruskin's solution, and we believe that he was not far wrong though the authors place his words among the impossibles. Ruskin said :—
" For the moral tendency of books, no such practical sagacity is needed to determine that. The sense to a healthy mind of being strengthened or enervated by reading is just as definite and un- mistakable as the sense to a healthy body of being in fresh or foul air."
There have been some notorious prosecutions lately in England, and for our part we are content to await the whole- some effect which they will probably have on questionable works of fiction in the immediate future. We utterly dis- believe in a State Censorship. We would not trust any State official with the powers of a censor. One man might discharge the duties reasonably and fairly, but they would soon fall into other hands, and the time might easily come when a new Areopagitiea would be needed. The mischief of obscene books is that they set up a ghastly rivalry ; the pace is being con-
tinuously forced to make sure of the market. Nothing could be more unfair than that to publishers who refuse to issue modern obscene fiction. The only sort of censorship which we can conceive as being perhaps necessary—in a worse age than our own—for protecting reputable publishers would be a scheme resembling that which was proposed by the Com- mission on the Drama in 1909. It was then recommended that the Lord Chamberlain's Office should be superseded by a voluntary censorship. Playwrights who received the approval of the new Board would be safe from prosecution, but those who did not submit their plays to the Board would be subject to the rigours of the law without extenuation. We hope that even such a half-way scheme as this may never be necessary. Perhaps the decisive reason against all literary censorship, properly so called, is that the standard of what is deemed decent could not be placed very high, yet every book passed by the Censor would have received his imprimatur.
Having made these strong reservations, we can praise the pitiless logic with which the authors demonstrate the absurd ups and downs—conviction being often quickly followed by exculpation—in the attempts in England and America to apply the definitions of obscenity. The authors follow a favourite practice in showing that suppression invariably increases the notoriety of the book, but they forget to admit that the suppression of one book with this unfortunate result may prevent the publication of a long succession of similar books. Nor can we quite follow their surprise at a play being prohibited though the words of the play are not banned in book form. It is well known that actions may be imported into a play that is innocence itself when it is read in a book. Leers and gestures are not part of an author's outfit.
The authors write slightingly of the attempt of Mr. St. Loe Strachey to secure a moral censorship of fiction, but they seem to be unaware that he would have fought as indignantly and as gallantly as any man of letters against an attempt to apply a censorship to " classical " works. Few men had a fuller know- ledge than he had of the Elizabethan and Restoration dramas. It may be said that he was setting up a kind of Statute of Limitations for indecency. Well, why not ? Common sense is not logical. We cannot remember whether Mr. Strachey ever quoted what Macaulay said when it was suggested that Restoration plays ought to be suppressed, but we will end by quoting Macaulay's words because they are an admirable example of common-sense in a man who held a high standard for his own generation :—
" We find it difficult to believe, that in a world so full of tempt- ation as this, any gentleman, whose life would have been virtuous if he had not read Aristophanes and Juvenal, will be made vicious by reading them. A man who, exposed to all the influences of such a state of society as that in which we live, is yet afraid of exposing himself to the influence of a few Greek or Latin verses, acts, we think, much like the felon who begged the sheriffs to let him have an umbrella held over his head from the door of Newgate to the gal- lows, because it was a drizzling morning and he was apt to take cold. The virtue which the world wants is a healthful virtue, a virtue which can expose itself to the risks inseparable from all spirited exertion—not a virtue which keeps out of the common air for fear of infection, and eschews the common food as too stimu- lating. It would be, indeed, absurd to attempt to keep men from acquiring those qualifications which fit them to play their part in life with honour to themselves and advantage to their country, for the sake of preserving a delicacy which cannot be preserved— delicacy which a walk from Westminster to the Temple is sufficient to destroy."
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