Soul of Gossip
Letters to a Friend, 1950-1952. By Rose Macaulay. (Collins, 25s.)
THESE letters of Rose Macaulay's to Father Johnson, an Anglican priest, `posted' at the time to the Cowley Fathers' Community at Boston, Mass., are not entirely religious and certainly they are not, as has foolishly been hinted, the letters of a penitent to her confessor. They cover, in a fresh but often repetitive and, for some people's taste. too childish manner, most of the subjects Miss Macaulay was interested in: that is, apart from religion, swimming, travel, books, people and the pleasures and pains of daily life, for which she had so splendid a fer- vour. There is nothing mean in this character, nothing malicious, though she could be sharp, and no harm in the letters at all; nothing meant to injure and no sinfulness of a serious sort, though she makes much of her feelings of guilt for an old love affair.
Yet faults there are, of judgment and some- times of taste. It is curious, for instance, that a lady so classically educated can discuss in serious terms a book which is little more than a novelette, and can he so anxious that her corre- spondent shall receive her own books, which she sends him, and read them. She will say in one letter, 'I am sending you my last novel, but do not bother to write about it.' Then, in a later letter (and this first makes one wonder if, when she says, Put these letters in your in- cinerator,' she means it), `Did you get my book, what do you think about it?'
This often happens and is most understand- able and human. But what self-knowledge does it show? There is not, I think, great self-know- ledge in this character. She accuses herself of great sinfulness in the affair. We cannot judge. But the affair seems to grow 'built up,' it becomes like a situation in a novel—the sad- ness of impossible marriage, the death of the beloved, the repentance. It is romantic, but she does not think it is; she is innocent here, as I think always—innocent, limpid, sometimes enfant terrible. It is like a young girl of spirit, well brought • up and good at her books, but lacking the hard core of experience faced squarely and accepted.
Miss Constance Babington Smith has made a fine work, of her editorship, has translated every Latin phrase—even Theft, fugaces'—and has scrupulously followed up any personal reference which might cause offence. For instance, when the author writcs, of Miss Kathleen Raine's brief sojourn in the Roman fold; 'She told me the other day that she came out after six months because she couldn't bear the intolerant attitude,' Miss Babington Smith's footnote runs: `Kath- leen Raine has explained that her reason for withdrawing from Roman Catholicism . . . was not antipathy towards the Church but doubt as to the usefulness for her of any formal religious tradition.' Miss Macaulay's version (it cannot but strike the candid reader) is less damaging to Miss Raine's intelligence and modesty. Faith, not convenience, is the governing factor in these choices.
What is entirely enjoyable in these letters is Miss Macaulay's affection for the Anglican Church and the shrewdness of her thrusts against Rome. She points out that there has been too much of a fashionable swing to Rome on the part of our intellectuals and that the time has come to look again at Rome's opposition to truth and falsification of history. In fact, when our ancestors thought of Rome as a slippery customer, they were not so far wrong as is some-
times thought. She does not bring up, as she well might, the Coulton-Gasquet controversy, so instructive to the unprejudiced, but she has this to say about Monsignor Ronald Knox's New Testament: 'Some of his translations seem a little disingenuous . . . also his notes on them. E.g. St. Matt. 1, 25, which he renders "and he had not known her when she bore a son" explaining that a more literal translation would be "till she bore a son" but that this "might impugn the perpetual virginity of Our Lady." He shouldn't be thinking about this in translat- ing.' Indeed, he should not.
Yes, there is much to interest and like in these letters. And yet they are burdensome in a way, and this she must have felt, for she often told her correspondent that she realised he could not answer all her letters, or all the questions she asks. These questions come in the end to batter upon one like a child's sweet pestering—shall she do this, shall she do that, who was the man in the Lisbon earthquake and isn't it fascinating? (she does not mention the holocaust of heretics, burnt alive to appease a loving God), and are not she and her correspondent fourth cousins three times removed, and does he remember about Aunt So-and-So and Great-Grandfather Conybeare? . . . and, and, and. I think Miss Macaulay liked inconsequentiality, and indeed it has charm. But what a dangerous charm it is, leaving a smear of triviality where often nothing trivial was felt or meant.
STEVIE SMITH
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