Swift and Stella

5Q8 THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO QUARTERLY could not, during this warj echo Sir Robert .Borden's, complaint that Hhe was being kept in almost complete jgnoranc;e of what was being done save what he could snatch from the newspapers,'; was somewhat premature. On January 28, 1942, Mr King, answering ' a question about Canada's representation on the Pacilic War Councjl, said, "I might say _ that such information as I have about 'the proposed Pacific Council, '"is what I read in Mr Chur.chill's speech of yesterday.'" Mr King's comment, however, 'was not, like Sir Robert Borden's, accompanied by a complaint. Perhaps this is what Professor.Dawson meant. F. R. SCOTT SWIFT AND STELLA· RICARDO QUINTANA STELLA died in Dublin in 1728. It is difficult to say exactly when and how the perfectly understandable DubEn gossip regarding her relations with Swift ceased to be mere loc~1 gossip. But in one way or another the entire English-speaking world had, by the close .' of the eighteenth century, come into possession of a great mystery_ Only those who have studied Swift and all things pertaining to him in the grim manner prescribed by modern research know, in full detail, the bizarre forms which, this mystery has assumed and the fantastic solutions to it still being offered us. The shade of Bickerstaff , in a peculiarly irresponsible mood, would seem to' have taken over command of things from the start, suggesting, that a person called Jonathan Swift was in fact the bastard child of Sir William Temple, discovering later ori that Stella was likewise Temple's jllegitimate offspring, and only recently insp·lring the theory that Swift, so far from 'being Stella's half-brother, was as a matter of fact only her half-uncle. ,Such are the more sensational explanations of why Swift refused to marry Stella, or of why, granting the s'tory that a marriage ceremony took place, they chose never to live together as man and wife. But.whatever the precise facts, it was clear to nearly everyone that here was the strangest pair anywherestrange , romantic, with sinister possibilities. Sentimentalists like Thacker~y used to become enraged at Swift's fancied brutality to Stella and weep tenderly over her broken heart. Critics of a later *S/ella: .d Gentlewoman ofthe Eighteenth Century, by HERBERT DAVIS. -New York, Macmillan Co. [Toronto, Macmillan Company of Canada}, 1942, $2.00. r l REVIEWS 509 day, abandoning sentimentality for psychiatry, have disclosed the mental and physical ills-alarmingly named-which stood between this eighteenth-century Abelard and Eloisa. The comedy of it all is, there is so little behind this enormous d'eal of gossip, chit-chat, and idle speculation. Only a great Queen. Anne wit, a wise woman, and a friendship sustained wit~ humour and insight. True, the problem of a marriage remain~; some Swift scholars believe there was one, others do not. A~d for a space the tragic figure of Vanessa cast her shadow over the friend-. ship. But a friendship it remained, and it can be said that of few friendships do we have a fuller record. Taken together, the 'Journal to Stella'and Swift's many verses addressed to Esther Johnson tell th~ story in ample detail. They tell it, further~ore, with an intonation and a richness of shading that attest its psychological truth. It is a sad.commentary on the dullness of critics, biographers, and common readers that the perfectly open record, so straightforward in facts but so subtle in its revelation of attitudes, should have been persistently disregarded in favour of sensational rumours -and counter-rumours. . . In his three short and delightful essays entitled Stella: A Gentlewoman of the Eighteenth Century-essays based on the Alexander lectures given at the University of Toronto in 1942-MrDavis wisely refers to the great mystery as little as possible.' In ' his·introduction, he does mention Mr Denis Johnstan - and Mr Johnston's uncle theory, but this only by way of clearing the atmosphere. Later on he has a little to say of Thackeray, and quo.tes one of the priceless passages from the lecture on Swift to good and well-deserved effect. In his...