4 AHrJntAckbh nHTepaTypa john galsworthy

( 186 7- 1933)

John Galsworthy came of a well-to-do bourgeois family; after graduating from Oxford University he became a law­ yer but soon abandoned this profession to take up litera­ ture.

He began to write in the last years of the 19th century,

but his first works were not very important. His best novels were written in the first decade of the 20th century. In them the reader finds a reflection of the opposition of the pro­ gressive-minded people to imperialism, to Britain's Boer

War adventure.

In 1904 Galsworthy wrote The Island Pharisees. In it he

attacked the British privileged classes. He criticized them

for being content with the bourgeois way of life; he stressed the fact that their minds had become inert and lazy

In 1906 Galsworthy's best novel appeared. It was The Man of Properly. He achieved great heights of generali­ zation in this work. In it he told the story of the class that

dictated its laws to the country, the class of the bour-

geoisie. .

During the period 1907-1918 Galsworthy turned to

different subjects. He wrote many novels and plays. His

main object, however, always remained that of r flecting social contradictions and trying to find a humanist solution

to them.

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THE FORS YTE SAGA

In 1918 Galsworthy began to write the continuation to the novel The Man of Property. This developed into a great panorama of English life, covering nearly fifty years.

The composition of this important work is as follows: The first trilogy The Forsyte Saga consists of The Man of Property (1906), In Chancery (1920), To Let (1921). The second trilogy: A Modern Comedy consists of The White Monkey ( 1925); The Silver Spoon ( 1926 ), Swan Song ( 1928). Each trilogy has Interludes connecting the novels that compose it. In the first trilogy they are: The Indian Summer of a Forsyte ( 1918) and Awakening ( 1920); in The Modern Comedy: A Silent Wooing (1928) and Passers-By (1928).

In The Man of Property we read about the flourishing of the Forsytes and of forsyteism.

In the book In Chancery Galswodhy describes the beginning of the Forsytes' degradation. Historically it develops against the background of the shameful Boer War

In To Let we see the Forsytes after World War I. The

Forsyte way of life is now "to let" Galsworthy presents

a striking picture of the inevitable end of forsyteism.

The second trilogy is dedicated to the younger genera­ tion- "the lost generation" of the post-World War I peri­ od, with Fleur, Soames' daughter, as its central character.

The symbol of the young generation is The White Mon­

key, with its scepticism, its disillusionment. These feelings

are reflected in the character of Fleur

The Silver Spoon shows the emptiness of young people born with a silver spoon in their mouths. Galsworthy

birngs in the needy people to show the contrast between their poverty and the luxury of the rich.

Swan Song treats of the ruin of the hopes and illusions

of the old bourgeosie. Soames' efforts to save the beau­

ty- a collection of paintings that was his property- is the "swan song" of forsyteism.

World War I and the October Revolution in Russia influenced Galsworthy's world outlook greatly. The very existence of the bourgeois class seemed to be threatened.

Since he himself was a member of this class a note of sorrow sounded in the Saga cycle.

The best novel in the Saga trilogies is The Man of Pro­

perty. The action develops during 1886. It acquaints us

with three generations of Forsytes at the height of the

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Victorian era. These three generations of men and women live among their possessions; they consider themselves to bat the very top of the world. They are sure of their su­ rremacy and their imrortance, for they are, as the Eng­ lish say, the backbone of the country They arc quite certain that they will continue so for ever

The novel opens with the chapter At Home. It tells

about a party given by Old Jolyon to announce to the Forsyte family the engagement of his grand-daughter June Forsyte. Her fiance, Philip Bosinney is definitely an out­ sider among the Forsytes. He is a talented young architect,

but he is very poor and poverty is something the Forsytes can neither understand nor approve of. The marriage never takes place, however, for Bosinney falls deeply in love with Irene Forsyte, the beautiful wife of Soames Forsyte (one of the second generation of the Fors ytes ), and she reciproca­ tes his feelings.

For Soames, the man of property, beauty is something to be acquired. When he fell in love with Irene- a very

lovely girl but quite poor, also an outsider to the Forsy­ tes,- Soames was quite sure that his money would help him to win her affection. He managed to buy Irene's

beauty' but could not buy her love. She decided to leave him after the tragedy of Bosinney's death.

From the very moment they see each other at Old Jolyon's party, Bosinney and Irene are opposed to the Forsytes and their love of money. It is through these two characters, that are entirely free from the power of money, that Galsworthy discovers his aesthetic principle: art is the embodiment of beauty and goodness. This principle is opposed to the pursuit of property and money-making (or business) neither of which have any place for goodness.

The extract that is given below from The Man of Pro­

perty, clearly shows Galsworthy's attitude towards the so­

called "sense oi property" or "forsyteism" which he dis­ closes through a conversation between young Jolyon, (June's father) and Bosinney

Young Jolyon sal down not far oil, and began nervously to recon­ sider his position. He looked coverlly at Bosinney silting there unconsci· ous. The man was unusual, not eccentric, but unusual, he looked worn, too, haggard, hollow in the cheeks beneath those broad, high cheekbones, though without any arrearance or ill health. for he was strongly built, wilh curly hair lhat seemed to show all the vitality or a fine constitution.

Something in Bosinney's face and altitude touched young Jolyon. He

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knew what suffering was like, and this man looked as if he were suffering.

He got up and touched his arm.

Bosinney started, but exhibited no sign of embarrassment on seeing who it was.

Young Jolyon sal down.

"I haven't seen you for a long lime" he said. "How are you gelling on with my cousin's house?"

"It'll be finished in about a week"

"I congratulate you!"

"Thanks -I don't know thai it's much of a subjccl for congratu­

lation"

"No'" queried young Jolyon; "I should have thought you'd he glad to gel a long job like that off your hands; but I suppose you feel it much as

I do when I pari with a piclure- a sort of child?"

He looked kindly at Bosinney.

"Yes", said the taller more cordially, "Il goes out from you and there's an end of it. I didn't know you painted"

"Only water-colours; I can't say I believe in my work"

"Don't believe in iP Then how can you do it? Work's no use unless you believe in it!"

"Good" said young Jolyon; "it's exactly what I've always said. By­ the-bye, have you noticed thai whenever one says "Good", one always adds "it's exaclly what I've always saidl" But if you ask me how I do it, I answer, because I'rn a Forsyte"

"A Forsylel never thought of you as one!"

"A Forsyle" replied young Jolyon, "is not an uncommon animal. There are hundreds among the members of this Club. Hundreds out there in the streets; you meet them wherever you go!"

"And how do you tell them, may I ask?" said Bosinney.

"By their sense of properly A Forsyte takes a practical- one might say a commonsense- view of things, and a praclical view of things based fundamentally on a sense of properly. A Forsyte, you will notice, never gives himself away"

"Joking'"

Youne Jolyon's eye twinkled.

"Not much. As a Forsyle myself, I have no business to talk. But I'rn a kind of thoroughbred mongrel; now, there's no mistaking you. You're as different from me .as I am from my Uncle James, who is the perfect specimen of a Forsyle. His sense of properly is extreme, while you have practically none. Without me in between, you would seem like a different species. I'm the missine link. We are of course, all of us the slaves of property, and I adrnil that it's a question of degree, but what I call a "Forsyte" is a man who is decidedly rnore than less a slave of properly. He knows a good thing, he know5 a safe thing, and his grip on properly- it

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doesn't matter whether it he wives, houses, money, or reputation -is his hall-mark"

"You talk of them" said Bosinney, "as if they were half England" "They are", repealed young Jolyon, "half England, and lhe beller

half, too, the half thai counts. It's their wealth and security that makes everything possible, makes your art possible, makes lilerature, science, even religion, possible. Without Forsytes, who believe in none of these things, but turn them all to use, where should we be? My dear sir, the

^{Forsytes are the middlemen, the commercials, the pillars or society, every­}

thing that is admirable!"

Galsworthy paid great attention to the composition of his novels. Thus, the composition of The Man of Property is thoroughly worked out. The events are presented so vividly that the chapters may be easily staged, for instance At Home, Dinner at Swithin's, 'June's Treat and others.

Galsworthy's "feeling" for the language may be com­

pared with a painter's "feeling" for colour His choice of words is so accurate that it is difficult to paraphrase his sentences. He makes use of irony when describing his characters and the weaknesses of his own class.

John Galsworthy's contribution to the development of

the English novel was very important He was nearer than Wells and Shaw to his predecessors, the critical realists of the first half of the 19th century. Galsworthy brought the novel back to its former heights by creating a real "docu­ ment" of the epoch, a deep, realistic picture of the bour­ geois class_ The Forsyte Saga, his greatest achievement, is the culmination of English critical realism of the early 20th century.

L Describe the structure of The Forsyie Saga. 2. How can one apply the notion of "forsyteism" to Soames? 3. How does the author express his irony towards the Forsytes in young Jolyon's conversation with Bosin­ ney? 4. What is young Jolyon's explanation of the notions "sense of oroperly" and "forsyteism"?