Confessions of a Young Man - George Moore

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in that, he lives in squalid lodgings—or so they seem to a young man who has lived in Paris on a liberal allowance—and writes, writes, writes, writes … talking to his fellow lodgers, to the stupid servant who brings him his meals, and getting the materials for future books out of them. A candid record of these incidents, interwoven with eloquent self-analysis, keen and valid criticism of books and pictures, delightful reminiscences and furious dissertations upon morality, the whole story is given a special and, for its time, a rare interest by its utter lack of conventional reticence. He never spares himself. He has undertaken quite honestly to tell the truth. He has learned from Paris not to be ashamed of himself. And this, though he had not realized it, was what he had gone to Paris to learn.

      He had put himself instinctively in the way of receiving liberalizing influences. But it was, after all, an accident that he received those influences from France. He might conceivably have stayed at home and read Tolstoi or Walt Whitman! So indeed might the whole English literary revolt have taken its rise under different and perhaps happier influences. But it happened as it happened. And accidents are important. The accident of having to turn to France for moral support colored the whole English literary revolt. And the accident of going to Paris colored vividly the superficial layers of George Moore's soul. This book partly represents a flaunting of such borrowed colors. It was the fashion of the Parisian diabolists to gloat over cruelty, by way of showing their superiority to Christian morality. The enjoyment of others' suffering was a splendid pagan virtue. So George Moore kept a pet python, and cultivated paganness by watching it devour rabbits alive.

      It was the result of the same accident which caused him to conclude—and to preach at some length in this book—that art is aristocratic. It was the proper pagan thing to say, as he does here—"What care I that some millions of wretched Israelites died under Pharaoh's lash? They died that I might have the Pyramids to look on"—and other remarks even more shocking and jejune. It was this accident which made him write ineffable silliness in this and other early volumes about "virtue" and "vice," assume a man-about-town's attitude toward women, and fill pages with maudlin phrases about marble, perfumes, palm-trees, blood, lingerie, and moonlight. These were the follies of his teachers, to be faithfully imitated. If he had first heard the news that the body is good from Walt Whitman, or that the human soul contains lust and cruelty from Tolstoi, what canticles we should have had from George Moore on the subject of democracy in life and art!

      Deeper down, George Moore was already wiser than his masters. He was to write of the love-life of Evelyn Innes, and the common workaday tragedy of Esther Waters, with a tender and profound sympathy far removed from the sentiments he felt obliged to profess here. This book is a young man's attempt to be sincere. It is the story of a soul struggling to be free from British morality. It is eloquent, beautiful, and at times rather silly. It is a picture of an epoch.

      The result of the attempt to introduce diabolism to the English mind is well known. The Island somewhat violently repudiated and denounced the whole proceedings, as might have been expected. The French influence waned, and has now almost died out. But meanwhile another rediscovery of human nature (to which the work of a later Frenchman, Romain Rolland, has contributed its due effect) is slowly re-creating English literature. Under a Russian leadership less romantic than that of Gautier and less "frightful" than that of Baudelaire, with scientific support from Freud and Jung, and with some extremely able British and American lieutenants, the cause of unashamedness appears to be winning its way in literature. The George Moore of these Confessions stands to view as a reckless and courageous pioneer, a bad strategist but a faithful soldier, in the foolhardy, disastrous and gallant Campaign of the Nineties.

      Floyd Dell

      New York, May 26, 1917.

       Table of Contents

       Table of Contents

      My soul, so far as I understand it, has very kindly taken colour and form from the many various modes of life that self-will and an impetuous temperament have forced me to indulge in. Therefore I may say that I am free from original qualities, defects, tastes, etc. What I have I acquire, or, to speak more exactly, chance bestowed, and still bestows, upon me. I came into the world apparently with a nature like a smooth sheet of wax, bearing no impress, but capable of receiving any; of being moulded into all shapes. Nor am I exaggerating when I say I think that I might equally have been a Pharaoh, an ostler, a pimp, an archbishop, and that in the fulfilment of the duties of each a certain measure of success would have been mine. I have felt the goad of many impulses, I have hunted many a trail; when one scent failed another was taken up, and pursued with the pertinacity of an instinct, rather than the fervour of a reasoned conviction. Sometimes, it is true, there came moments of weariness, of despondency, but they were not enduring: a word spoken, a book read, or yielding to the attraction of environment, I was soon off in another direction, forgetful of past failures. Intricate, indeed, was the labyrinth of my desires; all lights were followed with the same ardour, all cries were eagerly responded to: they came from the right, they came from the left, from every side. But one cry was more persistent, and as the years passed I learned to follow it with increasing vigour, and my strayings grew fewer and the way wider.

      I was eleven years old when I first heard and obeyed this cry, or, shall I say, echo-augury?

      Scene: A great family coach, drawn by two powerful country horses, lumbers along a narrow Irish road. The ever recurrent signs—long ranges of blue mountains, the streak of bog, the rotting cabin, the flock of plover rising from the desolate water. Inside the coach there are two children. They are smart, with new jackets and neckties; their faces are pale with sleep, and the rolling of the coach makes them feel a little sick. It is seven o'clock in the morning. Opposite the children are their parents, and they are talking of a novel the world is reading. Did Lady Audley murder her husband? Lady Audley! What a beautiful name; and she, who is a slender, pale, fairy-like woman, killed her husband. Such thoughts flash through the boy's mind; his imagination is stirred and quickened, and he begs for an explanation. The coach lumbers along, it arrives at its destination, and Lady Audley is forgotten in the delight of tearing down fruit trees and killing a cat.

      But when we returned home I took the first opportunity of stealing the novel in question. I read it eagerly, passionately, vehemently. I read its successor and its successor. I read until I came to a book called "The Doctor's Wife"—a lady who loved Shelley and Byron. There was magic, there was revelation in the name, and Shelley became my soul's divinity. Why did I love Shelley? Why was I not attracted to Byron? I cannot say. Shelley! Oh, that crystal name, and his poetry also crystalline. I must see it, I must know him. Escaping from the schoolroom, I ransacked the library, and at last my ardour was rewarded. The book—a small pocket edition in red boards, no doubt long out of print—opened at the "Sensitive Plant." Was I disappointed? I think I had expected to understand better; but I had no difficulty in assuming that I was satisfied and delighted. And henceforth the little volume never left my pocket, and I read the dazzling stanzas by the shores of a pale green Irish lake, comprehending little, and loving a great deal. Byron, too, was often with me, and these poets were the ripening influence of years otherwise merely nervous and boisterous.

      And my poets were taken to school, because it pleased me to read "Queen Mab" and "Cain," amid the priests and ignorance of a hateful Roman Catholic college. And there my poets saved me from intellectual savagery; for I was incapable at that time of learning anything. What determined and incorrigible idleness! I used to gaze fondly on a book, holding my head between my hands, and allow my thoughts to wander far into dreams and thin imaginings. Neither Latin, nor Greek, nor French, nor History, nor English composition could I learn, unless, indeed, my curiosity or personal interest was excited—then I made rapid strides in that branch of knowledge to which my attention was directed. A mind hitherto dark seemed suddenly to grow clear, and it remained clear and bright enough so long as passion was in me; but as it died, so

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