Satire in the Victorian Novel
9781465669988
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
“Are ye satirical, sir?” inquired the Ettrick Shepherd, warily suspicious of the cryptic eulogy just pronounced by his companion on the minds and manners of the English shopocracy. “I should be ashamed of myself if I were, James,” was the grieved reply. We know very well, however, that Christopher North was not ashamed of himself, at least not with the true contrition that leads to reformation. On the contrary, we fear that he cherished and cultivated quite shamelessly his gift of caustic wit. In any case, whether the disavowal came from ironic whim or from a concession to the popular attitude toward satire, it illustrates the first difficulty confronting the student of this indeterminate subject. To recognize the satirical at sight, to know whether a man is telling the truth, either when he claims to be a satirist or when he disclaims the charge, is something of an accomplishment. For the complex and Protean nature of satire, varium et mutabile semper, has naturally led to much disagreement not only as to its existence in certain cases, but as to its justification in general. To its eulogist, usually the satirist himself, satire is an instrument of discipline with a divine commission,—a Scourge of God. To its apologist, usually the detached observer, it is a more or less dubious means to a more or less necessary end. To its disparager, usually the satirized, it is a wanton mischief-maker, superfluous and intolerable. The personal resentment of this last may be fortified by the convenient logic which identifies the agent with the cause. “People who really dread the daring, original, impulsive character which is the foundation of the satirical,” says Hannay in one of his lectures on Satire, “ingenuously blame the satirist for the state of things which he attacks.” These varieties of attitude toward satire arise not only from varieties in temperament and satirical experience, but from the diverse manifestations of satire itself. Take, for instance, those characters in literature which seem to be an incarnation of the satiric spirit. Thersites is the dealer in personalities, scoffing and gibing at the élite with the licensed audacity of the court fool. Reynard is the satirical rogue who not only perceives the weaknesses of his fellow citizens but turns them to his own advantage. Alceste is the misanthrope, “critic,” as Meredith says, “of everybody save himself,” but lifting his strictures out of the merely personal by attaching them to a general interpretation of life. The Hebrew Adversary is the cynic with a scientific zest for experiment. He impugns motives, fleers at fair appearances, prides himself on his superior penetration, and questions the price for which a prosperous Job serves God. His loss of the wager through actual test of his theory has been taken as proof that such suspicions are unwarranted, and that the trust of the Divine Idealist in human nature was justified. This conclusion, however, must be qualified by the admission that the inductive process was conducted on limited data, and that if Eliphaz, Bildad, or Zophar had been chosen for the trial, the result might have been different. As it was, the final silence of the quenched satirist, and his absence from the happy ending may be construed as a sign of defeat in one instance that by no means invalidated his general attitude of doubt and interrogation.
