I don't suppose George Moore (that's him above, drawn by Manet) is much read these days, though his Esther Waters is still in print, and it was televised as recently as 1977 (recently? That's getting on for half a century ago.) It's a fine realist novel that is still, I think, worth reading – I've read it twice, and also tackled Moore's Confessions of a Young Man, his lively memoir of life among the Impressionists in the Paris of the 1870s and 80s, but I don't think I finished that one; I seem to remember something vaguely off-putting in the tone.
It seems that putting people off was rather his métier, especially as he grew older and more irascible, falling out with many friends, including Yeats. Oliver St John Gogarty said of him: 'It was impossible to be a friend of his, as he was incapable of gratitude.' Much of his work (including Esther Waters) was controversial in its time, and he was happy to court controversy. One of his later novels, The Brook Kerith, sounds interesting (and controversial), relating how a purely human Jesus did not die on the cross, but survived, was nursed back to health, and lived to repent his pride in declaring himself the Son of God. Moore travelled to Jerusalem to research this one, and it was presumably what was on his mind when Edith Sitwell had the misfortune to cross his path, at the Regent's Park home of Sir Edmund and Lady Gosse (as she recalls in Taken Care Of):
'Mr Moore had not, I think, arrived in a very happy frame of mind; and this state was aggravated by the conversational habits of another guest. At first Mr Moore remained steeped in an impenetrable gloom, but after a while he turned to me, and in a voice shaking with indignation, hissed: "Yes, yes, yes, forty million thousand yes's. How can I talk when someone says yes, yes, yes?"
To this question, no answer could be returned, so I remained silent. Afterwards Mr Moore relented so far as to speak of a most interesting book called the Bible, which contained the intimate history of a most interesting people, the Jews, and, as well, to inform me that he had discovered there was a vehicle called an omnibus which would take one to any destination, should one be fortunate enough to attract its attention. As we left the house Mr Moore perceived one of these vehicles, and rushed towards it crying "Omnibus, Omnibus!" But alas, he was not fortunate on this occasion, and did not attract he attention of the omnibus, which went on its way without him.'
Evelyn Waugh to Nancy Mitford, 10 May 1952:
ReplyDelete"You should have heard the wireless programme commemorating the centenary of George Moore's birthday. They had been at work on it for years collecting reports from everyone who had ever known him from the groom at Moore Park to Dublin literary colleagues. one after another the cracked old Irish voices took up the tale for nearly two hours, each diminishing bit by bit every corner of his reputation. That was Ireland all right."
But I suppose Edith Sitwell cannot be considered Irish. It is true that W.B. Yeats, in his Autobiographies does give Moore a good thrashing.
Thanks, George. I'm almost beginning to feel sorry for Moore, tho he does seem to have been an impossible man to get along with (or to like).
Delete