Self Condemned

Wyndham Lewis

Description

Self Condemned tells the story of Professor Renarding who finds himself reduced to a position at a second-rate university in Canada after his resignation as an academic in London. He and his wife suffer through a bleak and oppressive isolation in a dreary and alien city.
The novel, a devastating, disturbing satire of life in wartime Canada, explores the difficulty individuals face as they struggle to adapt to new surroundings while preserving their sense of wholeness, as well as the bond that develops between people during a shared experience of isolation.

Sujets

• History
• Military
• Histoire

Informations

• Publié par: Rare Treasure Editions
• Date de parution: 05 novembre 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781774643082
• Langue: English

Extrait

Self Condemned
by Wyndham Lewis

First published in 1954
This edition published by Rare Treasures
Victoria, BC Canada with branch offices in the Czech Republic and Germany
[e-mail]
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except in the case of excerpts by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

SELF CONDEMNED

by WYNDHAM LEWIS

[Pg 1]
Part One
THE RESIGNATION
[Pg 2] [Pg 3]
CHAPTER I
That Other Man Again
'If you call five six , you embarrass five, seeing that peoplethen are going to expect of him the refulgence of six.' Helooked up, coughed and continued. 'If you rename six seven ,far more bustle is expected of him. I have been speaking,naturally, of the ante-meridian. In the post-meridian it is thereverse. Put your clock on, call five-thirty six-thirty, andpeople will exclaim how much more light six-thirty has. Youpush back the night. If you call Clara Stella, people wouldsay how dull Stella has become, or how bright Clara has become.Five and six, post-meridian, are like Stella and Clara.See?'
'The little girl sees,' Essie Harding said.
From the other side of the breakfast table Essie had staredat her husband under a wide clear brow, with blankly bold,large, wide-open eyes. It was a mature face, the natural wide-opennessnot disagreeably exploited: the remains of the child-mindwere encouraged to appear in the clear depths of thegrey-blue. But as he spoke of five and six, she thought, rather,of forty-seven and of thirty-seven (but not of thirty-four andtwenty-four). She renamed ages: as her husband spoke ofrenaming the hours of daybreak and the sunset, she shuffledabout the years of life, calling thirty forty and vice versa. Asto the explanation of what occurred when you put the clockforward or backward, Essie did not follow or would not follow.Allergic to learning, as are many children, for her the teacherwas a life-long enemy. As she had stared, wide-eyed and withher mind a wilful blank, at her mistress as a child, her eyeshung open like a gaping mouth; and the fact that her husbandwas a professional teacher, a trained imparter of knowledge,caused Essie all the more readily to drop back into the mulishtrance of childhood; expertly unreceptive she stripped herlarge defiant eyes of all intelligence, and left them there staring [Pg 4] at his face, while her moist red lips were parted as she slowlyraised a fresh spoonful of sugared porridge.
'Have I made it clear what it means to put the clock on?' heenquired, with no expectancy that the reply would be that hehad.
'No.' She shook her head.
He laughed.
'You are lazy,' he told her. 'Had you been a boy, and hadyou lived a few decades ago, your bottom would have beenfurrowed up by the cane; fessée after fessée would have beenyour lot.'
She slowly sucked the spoon, and there was substituted inher eyes for the aggressive blank, an amorous and invitinglight, as he had expected.
Deliberately he had referred to the caned posterior, as if itwere a bait the other way round in order to provoke the reactionin question. He looked at her curiously. For a momenthe almost embarked upon a didactic account of the periodicnature of sexual desire in the animal kingdom. Instead heenquired, 'Why this sudden interest in daylight saving?'
'Rosemary . . .'
'Ah. I see. Just repeat what I said about calling five six. Sheis a bright child, you will not have to interpret.'
Essie laughed. 'Any more questions of that sort and I shallexplain that I am dumb, and that she must wait until Gladysgets well. She has one of those enquiring minds. I think she isan awful little brat, between ourselves.'
'Her mama has an enquiring mind, too. It's a beastly thingto have, I agree.'
He lighted a cigarette and watched her almost furtively fora few seconds. Then he placed his hand upon an open letter atthe side of his plate.
'What shall we do about Richard?'
'When does he want us to go?'
'About the tenth, I think, of next month. How do you feelabout it?'
She sat with her hands behind her head, staring silently atthe wall behind his head. Neither spoke for some minutes.
'I do not feel terribly like the idyllic landscape of England [Pg 5] just at present,' he observed. 'Do you feel like going downyourself for a week-end? It would do you good.'
'Not by myself; because I look countryfied, they wouldwant me to milk their cow and draw water from their well.I came back last time from their place thoroughly wornout.'
'Right. Anything would be better than bucolic England justat present, for me. I must write him.'
A bell in the little hallway exploded into hysterical life. Adoor, from behind which the hum of a vacuum cleaner had forsome time been heard, opened, and one of London's Dickensiancharladies stood there without moving for a moment, a smallbird-like figure with a white crest, which bobbed backwardsand forwards, and an irascible eye. This eye was directedacross the breakfast table towards the front door. The charladypropelled herself around the room, head shooting in andout, and darted at the front door, ready for battle. Her smallraucous challenge was heard, 'What is it? Ooder ye want?'The landing was extremely dark, and Mrs. Harradson nevercould see who her enemy was. In the present case a telegramappeared out of the shadows impolitely near her little beak.She seized it, and, with considerable suspicion, holding itbetween thumb and forefinger, she re-entered the breakfastroom.
'It's for you Professor Harding, sir.'
'Thank you, Mrs. Harradson.'
'Shall I tell 'im there's an answer, sir?'
Harding opened the telegram, and shook his head. 'No,thank you, no reply.'
Having banged the front door upon the uniformedintruder, Mrs. Harradson with her violent gait re-enteredthe bedroom, from whence she had come, and almoston the instant there came the angry hum of the indignantvacuum.
It was a large, gaunt and very dark room in which they sat.It was lighted only by one window in the extreme corner,opening on to the central air-hole. Between the window and thefront door was a shadowy dresser, and a minute water-closetnestled indelicately in the small hall, the first thing to confront [Pg 6] the visitor. The room in which the Hardings sat was eccentricallywithdrawn from the light of day, as though Londonhad been Cadiz: had it not been for the electric light they couldnot have seen to eat. For more than half the year no more thana token daylight found its way through the corner window.'The house was designed by an imbecile or an Eskimo,'Harding would say. 'Why do we stop here?' To which Essiewould reply, 'That I have often wondered myself.' It was anincomplete cylinder, for its central air-hole was little morethan a semi-circle, the back yard of another house completingit on one side. Opening off this cavernous chamber (dining-room,kitchen, 'store-room', all in one) were a bedroom andsitting-room. Both of these were, in the ordinary way, day-lit:but because of the tower-like design of the building, they hada somewhat eccentric shape.
Rainfall was occurring, a thunderstorm threatening London,and the immured Hardings felt the need of more light. RenéHarding sprang up to switch on a standing lamp.
'Another beastly day,' he said absentmindedly.
'From whom is the telegram?' Essie enquired.
'From Canada. It is from a colleague of mine with someinformation I required.'
Essie was looking at him, as if expecting the answer aboutthe telegram to complete itself. Professor René Harding wastall, about five foot eleven with broad shoulders and suchmarkedly narrow hips that the lower part of his jacket wasinclined to flap. His beard did not crudely blot out his face,nesting his eyes in a blue-black bush or surrounding them witha disturbing red vegetation. It merely lengthened the face, andstylistically grained and striped it with a soft material notdiffering greatly from it in tone, reminiscent of the elegantstone hair which leaved, curled upon, and grooved the longFrench faces upon the west façade at Chartres. His eyes wereof a brown to match the somewhat sallow skin. When helaughed, rather than bisecting his face laterally, he thrust forwardhis bristling mouth in what might be called the ho-ho-hoposition, employed by the actor if he wishes to give the idea ofsomething stiltedly primitive. Should it be one of an archaicallymasculine, bearded chorus of uncouth warriors that he [Pg 7] has to represent, that is when he ho-ho-ho's (not ha-ha-ha's).René's eyes were at the cat-like angle, glittering out of a slitrather than, as with his wife, showing the eye in its full circularexpansion. He was one of those men it is difficult to imaginewithout a beard: and who one felt was very handsomebearded, but did not feel sure about its being so becoming werehe to be beardless.
Speaking generally, he was inclined to furrow up his foreheadà la Descartes, and to assume half-recumbent attitudesby choice, rather than to sit erect.
These physical idiosyncrasies corresponded to an innatepreference for the dressed rather than the undressed, even ifthe costume or the disguise was nothing more than hair. Hiswife was of course a born nudist; and he had recently, it istrue, come to feel, especially at breakfast time, that he was ina nudist camp.