550
secondary; let us assume that Tril–
ling does hold the views imputed
to him by Farrell. In the context
of this story, that does not mat–
ter. For the story is not a thesis or
an argument; it is, however im–
perfectly executed, a work of art.
It is therefore concerned with and
dipped into
emotional ambiguity;
it pictures a situation of conflict
between ideas about race, class, and
morality and deeply-imbued folk
attitudes. Had it been Trilling's
purpose to advance a thesis on
morality, he would have written an
essay. His purpose was rather to
dramatize a situation. Farrell re–
fuses to recognize this simple fact
when he denounces Trilling for
"not [being] curious enough to
ask himself what conditions in the
lives of bus drivers and maids
might contribute to rudeness.... "
It
seems likely that Trilling knows
about the social conditions which
contribute to rudeness; his story is
an attempt to realize the fact that
ideological awareness does not pre–
vent one (even Farrell) from be–
ing irritated by rude bus drivers.
But Farrell, high on his moral
tower, will not countenance an ad–
mission of such contradictions; he
thereby
denudes
literature. This re–
jection of ambiguity as a major
substance of literature can lead
only to a palsied view of art and
eventually of morality.
Critical calcification and novel–
istic depreciation.
Farrell's increas–
ing difficulties as novelist are close–
ly correlated with his increasing
rigidity as critic. The depreciation
of creative achievement from
Studs
PARTISAN REVIEW
to
Bernard Clare
is reflected in
hi~
harsh denunciations of writing
which seeks its image of experience
in a less naturalistic vision than
Farrell's; his criticism becomes a
defense of his creative work. In
a review of Isaac Rosenfeld's
Pas–
sage from Home (New Interna–
tional,
April, 1947) Farrell attacks
that novel on grounds which,
if
taken seriously, would dispose of
a startling quantity of contempor–
ary writing: it "presents as the
hero, the observer rather than the
actor"; its "conclusions do not car–
ry the hero into the world to per–
form his acts of wisdom and cour–
age in public struggle"; it is "es–
capist ... into cultural narcissism."
In these remarks the arteries of
critical sensibility are hardened
under the weight of self-justifica–
tion; what is attacked is
not
Rosen–
feld's novel but the entire novel of
introspection. When one relates this
excommunication with Farrell's
weird overpraise for Calder Will–
ingham's
End as a Man>·
and when
one adds Farrell's deprecation of
Henry James for being "relatively
pale" in his "moral protest" be–
cause he equates morals with man–
ners (as if in the Jamesian novel
manners are mere rules of etiquette
rather than the most pervasive and
fundamental manifestations of
morality!)-then it is not difficult
to discover the connection between
novelistic depreciation and critical
calcification.
Style as a burden.
Why does Far–
rell write so badly? Why in his
latest book such bloopers as "art
... presents
imaginary images
of
