LONDON LETTER
285
ing the southern English landscape seemed under the pale wintry sun:
Devon melancholy and undulating, with its tiny fields and meditative
horses; then over the bleaker, dimmer stretches of the Hardy country
into the comfortable Thames Valley; finally, into the wastes of outer
London and the fog. Everywhere was the same muffled quiet. Even
the London traffic, now almost as heavy as New York's, though
slower, seemed subdued and painstaking. From October onward, there
is always a thin veil of mist over England that unpicks all detail. Even
the ponderous, wealthy Edwardian facades of London seemed queerly
undefined, insubstantial, as though they were about to dissolve away.
You drift out from the hushed, echoing church of a station, and the
evening fog goes over you like sleep. After a lifetime in England an
eternity in Limbo will be nothing.
The same still emptiness seemed to cling to the London literary
jungle, where the knives usually are sharp and ready enough. But in No–
vember nothing was happening. There were no crazes, no cocktail party
manias. This, heaven knows, was a relief. Last time I arrived from the
States, London was
en plein
Colin Wilson. Now Mr. Wilson's name is
mentioned only in the dailies, and that only when his stove blows up or
someone threatens to horsewhip him. The madness has now passed and
poor Mr. Wilson has been knocked down again by the same people
who set him up. In the whole nasty business there remains only one
real puzzle: why none of the dirt came off on his original boosters.
After all, when Mr. Wilson's second book was panned for lacking the
stamina, style and "importance" of
The Outsider,
he announced that
the two books had originally been one; he had separated them only for
the convenience of his publisher. Had this kind of mistake been made in
the properly public world the government officials to blame would have
acknowledged their irresponsibility by resigning. Yet only Philip Toynbee
gave reasons for changing his mind. But then, what can Dame Edith Sit–
well and Mr. Cyril Connolly resign from? The Cult of Personality? Since
most reviewing has no more definite basis than that, the stars can no
more resign or acknowledge their mistakes than Prince Ras Monalulu
can apologize for a bad tip (the "Prince" is a famous Negro showman
who tours the English racecourses, where he sells tips and tells funny
stories). The craze is dead, long live the craze.
The literary calm was, however, largely due to the fact that most of
the brighter younger men (comparatives are now in order since all of
them are, at least, well into their thirties) were in the States: Kingsley
Amis at Princeton, John Wain at the MacDowell Colony, Philip Toynbee
on tour and Ken Tynan in New York. And for those left behind the
