Arthur Machen: Surface Realities or Essence of Spirit

38 REVIEW ARTICLE ARTHUR MACHEN: SURFACE REALITIES OR ESSENCE OF SPIRIT By Wesley D. Sweetser (University of Nebraska) Aidan Reynolds and William Charlton. ARTHUR MACHEN: A SHORT ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE AND WORK. Lond: Richards P, 1963. 30/-. This biography, appearing on the centenary of Machen's birth, assists in filling one of the gaps in the scholarship of minor figures of the nineties. Machen, like his contemporaries Beerbohm and Shaw, long outlived his period of creativity. Born in VJales, nurtured on legend, learned and devout in religious principles, exposed in his formative years as a writer to occult and erotic works, Machen became a romancer of an order all his own, D. B. Wyndham Lewis recaptures the rare and cryptic quality of Arthur Machen in his introduction to this work. Reynolds and Charlton, on the other hand, stick mainly to the facts. They cover Machen's childhood near Caerleon-on-Usk and his education at Hereford Cathedral School. The Welsh countryside provided Machen with the setting for many of his tales, and his solid foundation in the French language later enabled him to translate Beroalde de Vervilie's LE MOYEN DE PARVENIR; THE HEPTAMERON by Marguerite, Queen of Navarre; and THE MEMOIRS OF JACQUES CASANOVA, at the same time when he was serving his apprenticeship to the literary profession by cataloging rare and occult books for George Redway and, later, the firm of Robson and Karslake. Machen's period of greatest literary creativity fell roughly in the nineties. His father's death provided Machen with an inheritance which made him independent to pursue a literary career. Also he was happily married to Amelia Hogg. Before 1900, he created most of the works for which he Is likely to be remembered: THE GREAT GOD PAN, THE THREE IMPOSTORS, HIEROGLYPHICS, THE WHITE PEOPLE, and THE HILL OF DREAMS. Only the first two of these were immediately published: the publisher, John Lane of Bodley Head. Machen was thereafter linked with THE YELLOW BOOK tradition, which gave him a somewhat unsavory reputation as a writer of nauseating and far-fetched fantasies. Though Machen was acquainted with Wilde, Yeats, Moore, Beerbohm, and M. P. Shiel, he was intimate with none, except A. E. Walte, and claimed to be no part of the age. The death of his wife In July, 1899, destroyed his inspiration to write. In his grief he sought new outlets, did outlandish things, even joined the Order of the Golden Dawn. The next decade, Reynolds and Charlton categorize as that of the strolling player, the period when Machen joined the Frank Benson Repertory Company and became an actor. He married again in 1903, this time Dorothie Purefoy Hudleston, sister of one of his best friends, and once more, between acting tours, resumed his interest in writing. Most of his work of the nineties was either published or republished during this decade, though without noticeable impact on the public. In addition, he finished A FRAGMENT OF LIFE, DR. STIGGINS, and THE SECRET GLORY, the last of which was not published until the twenties. In 1906, Machen joined the New Bohemians, a fringe intellectual society of which Edgar Jepson, Henry Savage, and Richard Middleton were members. Here Machen met Lord Alfred Douglas, who invited him to act as religious editor for THE ACADEMY. Machen wrote some of his most scholarly exposition on the Holy Graal for this periodical. When T. 39 W. H. Crosland became editor, Machen was ousted. In I9IO, after a brief tenure with T. P.'s WEEKLY, Machen made his farewell to the beloved stage and went into involuntary servitude with THE EVENING NEWS as the star reporter for the next eleven years. Although Machen found some of the assignments onerous, Alfred Turner, the editor, gave him an opportunity to do some creative writing; and "The Bowmen," later published in THE ANGELS OF MONS, was Machen's only popular success during his lifetime. Other works written for THE EVENING NEWS were THE TERROR, THE CONFESSIONS OF A LITERARY MAN (later published as FAR OFF THINGS), and THE GREAT RETURN. Vincent Starrett in America discovered Machen through some of these works, sought out the earlier ones, and publicized them highly. James...