The Soldier's Art by Anthony Powell Page A

while he glared at me.
    “Why not?” he
asked at last.
    He spoke very
sternly. I tried to think of an answer. From the past, a few worn shreds of
long-forgotten literary criticism were just pliant enough to be patched
hurriedly together in substitute for a more suitable garment to cover the
dialectic nakedness of the statement just made.
    “… the style …
certain repetitive tricks of phrasing … psychology often unconvincing …
sometimes downright dishonest in treating of individual relationships … women
don’t analyse their own predicaments as there represented … in fact, the author
does more thinking than feeling …  of course, possessor of enormous narrative
gifts … marshalling material … all that amounting to genius … certain sense of
character, even if stylised … and naturally as a picture of the times …”
    “Rubbish,”
said General Liddament.
    He sounded
very angry indeed. All the good humour brought about by the defeat of the Blue
Force had been dissipated by a thoughtless expression of literary prejudice on
my own part. It might have been wiser to have passed some noncommittal judgment.
Possibly I should be put under arrest for holding such mutinous views. The
General thought for a long time, perhaps pondering that question. Then he
picked up the second chair from the floor where it had fallen on its side. He
set it, carefully, quietly, at the right distance and angle in relation to
himself. Once more he placed his feet on the seat. Giving a great sigh, he
tilted back his own chair until its joints gave a loud crack. This physical
relaxation seemed to infuse him with a greater, quite unexpected composure.
    “All I can say
is you miss a lot.”
    He spoke
mildly.
    “So I’ve often
been told, sir.”
    “Whom do you
like, if you don’t like Trollope?”
    For the
moment, I could not remember the name of a single novelist, good or bad, in the
whole history of literature. Who was there? Then, slowly, a few admired figures
came to mind – Choderlos de Laclos – Lermontov – Svevo. … Somehow these did not
have quite the right sound. The impression given was altogether too recondite,
too eclectic. Seeking to nominate for favour an author not too dissimilar from
Trollope in material and method of handling, at the same time in contrast with
him, not only in being approved by myself – in possessing great variety and
range, the
Comédie Humaine
suddenly suggested itself.
    “There’s
Balzac, sir.”
    “
Balzac
!”
    General
Liddament roared the name. It was impossible to know whether Balzac had been a
very good answer or a very bad one. Nothing was left to be considered between.
The violence of the exclamation indicated that beyond argument. The General
brought the legs of the chair down level with the floor again. He thought for a
moment. Fearing cross-examination, I began to try and recall the plots of all
the Balzac books, by no means a large number in relation to the whole, I had
ever read. However, the next question switched discussion away from the sphere
of literary criticism as such.
    “Read him in
French?”
    “I have, sir.”
    “Get along all
right?”
    “I’m held up
with occasional technical descriptions – how to run a provincial printing press
economically on borrowed money, what makes the best roofing for a sheepcote in
winter, that sort of thing. I usually have a fairly good grasp of the
narrative.”
    The General
was no longer listening.
    “You must be
pretty bored with your present job,” he said.
    He pronounced
these words deliberately, as if he had given the matter much thought. I was so
surprised that, before I could make any answer or comment, he had begun to
speak again; now seeming to have lost all his former interest in writers and
writing.
    “When’s your
next leave due?”
    “In a week’s
time, sir.”
    “It is, by
God?”
    I gave the
exact date, unable to imagine what might be coming next.
    “Go through
London?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “And