Cakes and Ale

Following the end of the post of 5th July, I have now gone through ‘Cakes and Ale’ a couple of times – so despite what I am about to say the thing was clearly gripping to that extent.

The Kindle version included a substantial introduction from academe and a substantial preface by the author, the latter written some time after the event and covering, amongst other things, the allegation that he was having a pop at Hardy. Both interesting adjuncts to the text itself.

An easy enough read, but a rather awkward feeling book, with the framing device of have a first person narrator not working very well for me. Maybe writing a novel about writing & promoting novels is not that easy, even though it must be tempting; that is, after all, what a successful author of novels, even short ones, has had time to get to know about. Plus Somerset Maughan struck me as being rather bitchy, in the same sort of way although not as badly, as Evelyn Waugh. Maybe more than a touch of class snobbery towards those, like Hardy (and like himself) who were of modest origins, ambitious and keen to better themselves, this last including ingratiating themselves with people with little merit beyond their titles. He also struck me as being far too interested in the transient and confected nature of most literary fame, leaving the unfortunate impression that this was mainly because he suspected that his own was going to be very transitory. Confected in the sense that writing a good book was not really the point; it was knowing how to puff it that counted, knowing how to be nice to all the right people and how to get one’s face in all the right papers. Longevity was a help too – where Hardy scored big time. I note in passing that we have a recent demonstration of confection from the Potter stable.

And OK, some of it could be read as a bit of a pop at Hardy, a bit tactless perhaps given what was known about his relations with and his poetry about his first wife, not to mention the consequent insecurity and angst of his second wife, but it did not strike me as a big deal, although there were words about the not so nice details of looking after an old man, words which would strike a chord with anyone who has had a spell at it. Furthermore, a lot of novels of the time included pops at recognisable people, Aldous Huxley for example, a contemporary of Maughan who gets a slight mention in this novel, and with spot the model being a popular drawing room sport for the literati of the day. And what is more, I do not find his portrayal of himself, the narrator, as being at all flattering and in one memorable scene he portrays himself as a bit of a prat; a memorable scene which had a real life model which his contemporaries knew all about - so he did take it as well as dish it out. While Hardy was rather different in that a lot of his most memorable confections are taken from himself, his life or his wife: he stuck himself in the pillory, rather than others: very public spirited of him.

Nice tale about the author (the author in the book who can be taken for Hardy, Driffield, not the writer of the book itself or the other, younger, author in the book) doing a bunk in the middle of the night, leaving all his creditors in the lurch. A practise which was called shooting the moon, a natty bit of slang which I have not come across before and which Wikipedia/Google suggest is to do with a card game called 'Hearts' in which shooting the moon is a known gambit. Not a game I have ever heard of.

An interesting read, but I don’t think I shall be venturing further into the Maughan oeuvre.