Spokesman for the in-betweens

AUBERON WAUGH

Play t Man an Peter Forster (Eyre and Spot- tiswoode 35s) •

There is a whole generation tucked away between those writers like Hugo Charteris, Patrick Leigh-Fermor and Peter Kemp, who fought in-the last War, and those like Simon Raven, Bernard Levin and Frederic Raphael who conspicuously" didn't. This generation consists of thOSe who joined up towards the end of the war and endured the brutalities of wartime basic training' but never actually experienced combat, with all the self-know- ledge, compassion, esprit de corps, respect for the British working man, gratitude for survival etc which experience of combat alone appears able to teach.• Peter Forster is easily their most genial spokesman. Gen- iality is in fact his most immediately appar- ent characteristic, and it is not necessarily one whch lends itself to describing the callousness and incompetent`e of the,-period with the bitterness or intensity: which- one feels they deserve. Never mind. Bitter and intense writers are twol penny: geniality is a much rarer 'qiiality and for . that reason doubly welcomg. It also lends a certain poignancy to Mr Forster's accbunt.of how, he was maltreated in the Navy, reminiscent of P. G, W.odehouse's account of his perse- cution at the hands of the unspeakable Coo- per and his British gbvernment propaganda machine during the war-Here is Mr FoiSte'r on the question- of the working classes: • 'Yet I wanted to-like- people, and hatred had no part in My donditionihg:savetov■.ards the Gerrhans who provoked wars and deaths.

was for whatever wpuld imnrove the lot of ' the ordinary man—yet now 1 'was, presumably,- meeting the -or.dinary man for the fast time, and wfth the, best will in the

world. I.could find no joyous comradeship. Every ideal mocked, every personality denigrated, every attitude based on selfishness-, greed and intolerance: I believed in the theory of democracy but was appalled by my but companions . . . certainly, any belief in human perfectibility died for me in the barrack room.'

' One could point out to him, -I suppose, 'that-he was 'meeting there:people in an ex- • Chisively male atmosphere: that they were probably better. 'or at any rate less reptilSive.' among their own womenfork. It might not be true.. of course, but Mr Forster is.plainly. rather worried by his own reactions to the -experiences he describes. I have noticed similar reactions among writers and ac. 'ottaintances wfio failed to get a commiccion during their national service.' Those who were commissioned usually seem to have

• come away with the contrary opinion. that the other ranks are fealty the most splendid people after all. One clue 'may be that. Mr Forster 'c hero has an unsatisfactory vela- ' tionship with a' chief petty officer: 'But it occurred to me that Chief Petty Officer Roberts.wOuld not have been out of Mace at „Oroilruf.,, or Nordhausen. or . Buchenwald. or Belsen. _And though it -worked insidiously.. as on a slow fuse this thought has. been Qllq pf the ,most sapping and influential of my life.'

- Play the Man is the 'second in MO Forster's -trilogy about the career of a middle-class, minor public school hero called Tony Bevan. It traces his experiences in the Navy and takes him from there to the unimaginative joys of civvy street,' where nurses are readily- available and the Continong beckons with the delights of a week with you'r friend and schoolmate in Gay Paree. It is written in 71' genial tone, marred only very occasional' by excursions into fine writing: '1 hate n word more than discipline. The illegitima• brother of self-control. The word used make people do what they do not war to do . .' One could say that tr, jocularity is curiously dated: that the secor dary hero, called Alexander Cadwalladc Smith, is a straight crib from Wodehou• and a pale shadow of the great Psmitl that the dialogue is callow and en barrassingly unfunny, the story in consequential and pointless. All that woul be true, up to a point, and if one wa determined not to be entertained by M Forster's book, or to dislike ivei-yfifin which Mr Forster stands for then it would h the entire truth. But it would be kinder. and think equally true, to: say that the book i• almost overpoweringly evocative of thi period it describes: that the charac . tern—including Smith—are painfully true tt life modelling themselves On Wodehoust heroes; that the dialogue is an enact descrip tion of how people froin a certair background once talked at a certain time 01 their lives.: and that the story, if in consequential, is no more' so tHhn• mos. .people's lives and is extremely'readable.

That said, one might go On wondei

whether the effect is entirely intentional whether Mr FOrster, hitting caught the ful flavour of the period. has ever entirely lost it Does he quite realise how outres his characters are, for_ instance, or how exactly he catches. the ghastly urisureness of tWenty- • year-old wit? One hears echoes of it. even now, in El Vino's, and the bars of Fleet Street. On vr day, for instance:

'Alex produced a silver 'knobbed walking stick - . It was a sword stick, and at the bar

of Scott's Restaurant near any Circus. Alex asked if there was any gin. and flashy ' the sword at the barman. "One moment, sir. said the barman. Bending down, he emerge with a sword far larger and more lethal mock duel was fought with me as referee Gin was had by everyone On another occasion, the pals walk through Soho arm in arm. misdirecting the traffic-After a wedd'mg narty. the bride and- bridegfooni 'got into Ken's Ausfin 'Seven festooned with boots and .bows and daubed with•slogans: and 'we waved as they drove of) Brighton on the wrong side of Wimpole Street towards B r

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Shades of Doctor in the House. Carry on Nurse and Kenneth More in Genevieve. the vintage motor car. 1 don't see that it matters whether Mr Forster realises- quite the sort-at period flavour his jokes now have, or whether he' really thinks they are funny. Many people undoubtedly will still think them funny. and wish they could link arms in 'SOho again and 'stop* the traffic Mr Forster gives no indication which type. of reader he prefers. In both cases. he has pro; vided a most enjoyable five hours' read, and don't gee how anybody can reasonably ex- pectipor than that. If his intention is en- tirely unsatirical. one can only say he pro- vides another of those raS,inalinn fil■.-cipses into thg writer's own idea of normality. .

Mr Forster's is a generation which is largely unsung, and which a few might decide would-be better left unsung' For my • own' part-I shall' always be grateful for the insight into a society where people exclaim : 'The trouble with us is that we never Mad any jettnesse', when Orford Was full' of' 'twenty- five rear old-rontors ith the oso -debugging each other a bit too roughly for it to be

furiny.' _ -