KULTURBOLSCHEWISMUS
paragraph of his letter is pure doubletalk: of course there are only
"a few primary and truly great" creators in every age, but the
question is precisely does Mann agree with Brooks' definition of
who these are today? The implication, which he lacks courage to
state openly, is that he does. But Mann read Brooks hastily when
he speaks of "a few" great creators. Brooks mentions
only one
of
our age, and that one happens to be none other than . .. Thomas
Mann. So we see Mann accepting the flattery and assenting to
Brooks' barbaric attack on all the other great writers of our age.
The most obvious comment on the two lists of writers given
above is also the most important: all the primary writers except
Mann* are of the past, while the scope of the "coterie" classifica–
tion includes practically every significant modern writer, of every
school from Paul Valery to James
T.
FarrelL Now it would be
logically
possible
that many writers in the past and no writers
today might measure up to a given esthetic standard.
But
Brooks
is not making an esthetic judgment-in fact one of his chief quar–
rels with the coterie writers is their preoccupation with "mere"
esthetics. He is making a
historical
judgment: he claims that Eliot,
Joyce and the rest are bad writers because they don't truly render
the "sense of the age." This is the point at issue. For, if we over–
look the crudity of Brooks' .formulations, we can agree with him
that the coterie writers don't believe in progress and the "march
of humanity," that they are inclined to be sceptical and critical,
that they are not at all popular, and that they represent the end
and not the beginning of a culture. But the real questions are: Is
their scepticism justified? Are their audiences small because popu–
lar cultural values are debased or because they perversely prefer
to isolate themselves from "humanity"?
Is
bourgeois society–
which I assume Brooks would grant is the society of the period
and writers in question-dying, or is it entering on a new life?
For all his boldness, Brooks nowhere dares to assert that bour–
geois society in this century is in a flourishing condition. He simply
assumes
this crucial point-or, more accurately, doesn't seem
*This exception is in appearance only. Brooks dubs Mann "primary" not because
of his
work,
which is patently "secondary" in its pessimism, scepticism and world–
weariness, but because of his ego, because "the Goethe-intoxicated Mann" alone of
modern writers is preoccupied with "the idea of greatness." What irony, that the
foible of a great crP.ative talrnt, which leadr. him to pose as
Goethe redivivus,
should
be to Brooks precisely Mann's passport to the ranks of the "primary" writers!
