Ford Madox Ford is to be found on almost every recognized list of the world’s literature. A review of Parade’s End need says little more than it is all that. Agreed it is all that. And maybe that is all you need to know.
I feel the need to speak in defense or to warn several possible readers. Then I wiil allow myself some time to post some of what I went through sometimes working and other times racing to the end of Parade’s End.
To those who will complain that at over 900 pages it is too long. First it is 4 books each a more tolerable 230 odd pages and therefor no one book is that long. Second, there are many passages that at the time will seem redundant or unnecessary, only to later prove to be vastly important and with the several points of view being critical.
Next there are a number of modern audiences that will protest that this is too much about the patrimony, toxic testosterone and never sufficiently pro woman. At several levels this justifiable and if this is why you hate it, I can only equivocate. Our Hero, he is much more than the Main Male character is a self admittedly last of the old school Tories and we are told he is by 1920 standards at least 100 years out of date. It will be a tuff sell to make of him a 2023 cultural standard bearer.
Parade’s End is also highly touted as one of the best novels about World War I. It is only incidentally about WWI. That portion of the book that takes place in or near the front carries a lot of legitimacy. The portion of the book that deals with the politics of and high command personality plays concurrent with modern war also has an authenticity. Much of this is also satire, and opinion. While the novel(s) are more about its characters than any consistent need to speak to the reality of modern industrial war.
Christopher Tietjens is the younger son to an old and establish country squire. He is man of many prejudices and determined traditional sense of honor and obligations. To borrow an expression, he is a “Slave to Duty”. Emphasizing his nearly mechanical view of the world he is a statistician. He is charged with creating the numbers to justify government policy, but always under protest that these are not the most ‘correct’ numbers. That the correct number are always in favor of his politics never seems to cause him a moments reflection. For example, he is against what is being proposed as a public healthcare system because he is certain that people will only ever get as sick as they can afford. He will always prefer things British over all other choices, and the nearer to his estates the better. But in practice, he has 2 classifications for all humans. People of personal integrity and mission and people who exist to fill cemeteries. Whatever his other prejudices, he will always prefer persons of integrity over cemetery fillers. One of the coarsening effects of WWI is that he will see humans as potential meat bags, subject to random and violent death, whatever their personal merits. Of himself he is rigid about holding himself to very high standards and will sacrifice, without self-pity rather than compromise on his values.
We are immediately told that he allowed himself to be tricked into marriage by a scheming and serially unfaithful wife, the Lady Sylvia Tietjens. A lady of goddess like beauty and presence. She has a love of misery, often referred to as cutting the shower curtain rings. By page ten we know she has publicly betrayed him, run off to marry a much inferior man and, on terms to her advantage returns to Tietjens. All of this done is such a way that she retains her reputation and he is cast into doubt as to his faithfulness and rumored improprieties. It is beneath Christopher to speak publicly in his own defense, especially if to do so sullies the honor of his lady.
Tietjens meets and falls in love with Valentine Wannop. She is a very modern woman. Initially a suffragette, but ultimately her own person independent of mind and self-sufficient. Think of a virginal Romeo and Juillet.
The rest of the several plots are about character development and would be best appreciated by reading the often-brilliant writing of the author. I found much of book one to be like the best of Noel Coward. And I was beginning to think of this as a comedy. Later in the beginning of book 2 I thought I was reading a less obscure version of Waiting for Godot. Some might liken some of the disjointed time lines as like unto other authors, but the analogies will have to be in favor of the better authors. Ford Madox Ford (It seems usual to name him by all three names) Frequently I was confused by why so many issues had to hashed out only to find that chapiters and even books later it would become clear that everything everybody knew about the facts, were wrong and that having them right was the difference in how people were to be understood.
Ultimately Christopher Tietjens undergoes the trials and challenges like unto those of Homer’s Ulysses but it is on the reader to judge to degree to which he is changed. Homer’s hero is a hero in part because he is unaffected no matter what. Is the better hero one who is scared, bloodied , unbowed, but to some degree, bettered by experience? Tietjens will help many around him to be better than they were and he will return loyalty to at least some who have not been as loyal. Again, Ulysses seems to be that much paler by the comparison.
Because Tietjens is so absolutist in his world view, he will often disparage the need for the political leadership to sacrifice soldiers in the field in the name of political decisions. The case is made in blood for the reader. FMF is writing in the 1920’s. Hitler is not yet a threat. Yet FMF seems to reject the notion that war is, or can be a continuation of politics. In WWI, the politically driven decision to transfer troops to fight in Turkey was a disaster, justifying FMF’s hatred of Political interference in military decisions. In WWII not only would the politics of coalition create both good and bad decisions, the fruit of military decisions would contribute the political problems of the post WWII world. Politics and war cannot be separated. The good or evil will not be clear until later.
I had the most problems with the last book. It may not have been necessary, but. Several plot lines are cleared. The tensions of several inter character conflicts are relieved. The case can be made that at least one soul was saved. Is this a forced, tidy clean up or critical resolution of plot points. My respect for the writer causes me to hesitate.
Last point: The expression Parade’s End is explained to mean the last order given to a military unit that is to be disbanded, its mission and the need for its existence complete. Has FMF anticipated Robert Graves slightly later WWI autobio, Good By to All That? Discuss.
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Reviews with images
THE FONT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO READ UNLESS YOU ARE A FREAKIN ELF!!
The paperback version must be size 6 font. I kid you not. My eyes got tired after 2 pages, so I’m recycling it because its too late to return it. This trend of making books look like a “quick read” by shrinking the font needs to stop. At least warn customers so they can make an informed purchase!!! Feeling cheated…
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