"The Past is a foreign country: they do things differently there." Referring to L. P. Hartley's novel "The Go-Between" and Philip Larkin's poetry anthology "The Whitsun Weddings", explore the significance of the past.

Victoria Houghton

“The Past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.” Referring to L. P. Hartley’s novel “The Go-Between” and Philip Larkin’s poetry anthology “The Whitsun Weddings”, explore the significance of the past.

“What’s gone and what’s past help, should be past grief.” L. P. Hartley’s novel and Larkin’s poetry demonstrate the lack of reality in this philosophy, a point that Shakespeare clearly implies with the use of the auxiliary verb “should”. Although “a foreign country” our capacity of memory allows us to continue living in that strange land making the events that occurred there very much present grief. The devastating history of The Go-Between epitomises the power that the past has to dictate our lives. That one summer in adolescence can affect the next fifty years of a man’s life illustrates the influence that the past has on the present. Similarly, the poetry of Philip Larkin portrays how alive and existing the past is, in memorabilia, in our children, in artifacts and in ourselves.

A “post mortem” of Leo Colston’s metaphorical death, the novel The Go-Between, tells the account of how a boy was prematurely forced into adulthood, an adulthood never lived out. The events that occurred at the age of twelve crippled Leo to such an extent that even in his sixties he has not recovered; he is “dried up, the husk of a man”. One summer in his youth holds more significance for him than any other time, it is the only time in his life that Leo lived but also the time at which he gave up on his existence and died. The Leo Colston of pre-1900 remained at Brandham Hall, where “they do things differently”, and it is only at the age of sixty-four when he returns in person that he is able and dares to start living once more. After opening Pandora’s box, his diary from that eventful year, he decides to confront the past. Despite Leo’s advance in age he still possesses childhood nostalgia contained in a box, which like him is “battered”, all these years later. He stored away memorabilia from his early days, evidence that he had not recovered from what happened in the past. In this “searching exploration of the nature of memory” as termed by Douglas Brooks-Davies, we are shown the ability that the faculty has, as well as memorabilia, to contain the past. Colston was unable to throw away his physical memories just as much as he was unable to rid them from his mind; he did not have closure on the events that took place in Norfolk, it was unfinished business. The prologue of this bildungsroman sees Leo Colston unable to resist the “enervating power” of his boyhood diary, and so he once again opens the door to his disturbing past. Both the prologue and epilogue of the novel are evidence of the great significance the author places on the past, shown in the pathetic life he has created for “green” Leo Colston, a now “cindery creature”, “a dull dog”.

Many factors contributed to the “breakdown” of the young go-between, not solely the revelation of the sexual act. The twelve-year-old Leo Colston was emotionally immature. He knew nothing of the facts of life and believed that by being a go-between he was a “messenger of the gods” so high were the Maudsleys in his esteem. Therefore when plunged into water too deep for him, acting as “the lynch-pin of the whole business”, he was destined to get hurt. After weeks of manipulation by his adored “Maid Marian”, amounting to psychological child abuse on her part, he was then sadistically forced by a hysterical Mrs. Maudsley to witness the “two bodies moving like one”. Leo’s downfall had almost reached its peak. The climax arrived however with the news that Ted Burgess “had gone home and shot himself”, releasing the metaphorical trigger that was to kill Leo the schoolboy and force him into an unpleasant adult world.

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The “Diary for the year 1900” is a snapshot of naivety, as regards to both Leo and society, echoing the line from Philip Larkin’s poem MCMXIV: “Never such innocence again”. Both Leo and England were ignorant of the capabilities of man. Later England was to be disillusioned by the atrocities of two world wars and on a personal scale Leo was to lose his faith in the morality of man. It could be argued that had this novel not been set at the turn of the twentieth century but one hundred years later at the turn of the millennium, Leo Colston would not have suffered a nervous breakdown. Due to advancements in technology there would have been no need for a messenger to aid a secret love affair. The romance between Marian Maudsley, aristocrat and the farmer Ted Burgess would probably not have needed to be a secret at all due to the lack of such a segregated class system in today’s society, and also due to the much improved status of women who are now far more liberated as regards sexual relationships and marriage. It is also improbable that an adolescent approaching thirteen in today’s society could be as naïve as Leo concerning the facts of life. The past therefore also has significance in terms of context and as the setting for L. P. Hartley’s novel. In The Go-Between L.P.Hartley accurately recaptures the mood of the late Victorian period, through his novel the reader is allowed to witness not only Leo’s past but also the age in which Leslie Poles Hartley lived. The novel contains many similarities to the author’s life and to a certain extent is autobiographical. Lord David Cecil praised Hartley’s ability as a historical and social commentator believing him to be “One of the most distinguished of modern novelists…(and) a sharp-eyed chronicler of the social scene”.

The Epilogue of the novel shows most effectively the relationship between the past and present. When Leo Colston returns to the village near Norwich where the “frightful trouble” occurred, it is to a landscape as foreign to him then as when he first arrived there as a pubescent schoolboy. Whilst Leo has lived a monotonous existence for fifty years “the most changeful half a century in history” has taken place in the world around him. Yet other things remained unaltered. Marian Maudsley still has the power to bewitch Leo, to emotionally blackmail him, to make him carry out a final “errand of love”. Despite himself Leo is compelled to enter the world of Brandham Hall once more to deliver Marian’s words to her grandson, Ted Burgess’ grandson, the character of Edward symbolising the legacy we create in our children. As long as people continue to procreate they will never truly die, but live on through their offspring. Although his farmer friend had taken his own life all those years ago, Leo sees Ted Burgess once more in the face of his grandchild. On seeing the Hall, Leo allows himself to start recollecting fully the time he spent there. As he revisits the “foreign country” of his past he allows himself to stop being a stranger there and to understand that past land and the events that took place there. Also “a foreigner in the world of emotion” his entire adult life, Leo Colston will be no longer as he attempts to lay his ghosts to rest.

In his anthology The Whitsun Weddings Philip Larkin explores the concept of past and its different aspects. With Afternoons he examines the passing of time; generations growing old without hardly noticing, then looking back at their pasts, their youths, from the “hollows of afternoons”. Mr. Bleaney was a person of the past and yet his personality lives on through the tales of his landlady and the stamp of bleakness that he left on the “hired box”. Yet it is in poems such as Love Songs in Age where Larkin truly observes the role that the past plays in our everyday lives, the ability nostalgic souvenirs have to comfort and move us as well as to disappoint. As in The Go-Between a tatty keepsake is the key to unlocking the past, again memories both fond and painful.

The tone of the first verse is very matter of fact, simply informing the reader of how a widow accidentally stumbles upon some old, uncared for songbooks. Although unloved she could not face throwing them away as “they took so little space”. The simplicity of the language used complements the everyday value of the subject matter whilst at the same time informing the reader of the domestic situation of the lady in question. The repetition of “One” emphasises the lack of importance that the items held for the widow, but almost as though they knew of their own significance “they had waited”. Now however, in the autumn of her life they awaken nostalgic recollections as she vividly remembers “the unfailing sense of being young” and in love. The second stanza of the poem creates an optimistic mood, an illusion of sentimental love that makes her feel youthful once more “like a spring-woken tree”. Yet in the closing stanza Larkin’s underlying theme of cynicism emerges as the widow realises that the ideal of love portrayed in the song words is merely an illusion. Alliteration emphasises the lack of truth in the promise love makes “to solve, satisfy and set unchangeably in order.” In confronting this painful reminder from the past the widow also has to face the reality of the present, the two are entwined. The sentimental illusion of romance aimed too high and could not fulfil its promises; “It had not done so then, and could not do so now.”

Although appearing to have a cynical view of love in the poem Larkin does in fact not doubt love, but the expectations that we have of it. In the words of Andrew Swarbrick, Larkin expresses not feelings of bitterness or pessimism but “of pathos, of a tender sympathy for the widow who recalls dreams knowing they are best forgotten.” Though sometimes pleasurable reminiscing can reveal hopes that were unfulfilled, dreams never lived out, good times we can never experience again. Therefore what we perceive to be pessimism in Larkin is, in this instance, simply realism, an understanding of the illusions contained in the world, making him “less deceived” as a result. He once remarked, “Poetry is an affair of sanity, of seeing things as they really are” it was for him a way of being honest, not overestimating the value of things. Nonetheless, in the final poem of The Whitsun Weddings, An Arundel Tomb, Larkin hints at his belief in love. Despite not having a successful love life himself he still implies that he has faith in its existence, the ultimate word of the anthology being the abstract noun, “love”. This line is a testament to its endurance and strength, “What will survive of us is love.” John Saunders likens these lines containing the “prove/love” rhyme to Shakespeare’s attempt to define true love in Sonnet 73, Larkin’s concluding line echoing the rhyming couplet, “If this be error, and upon me proved I never wrote, nor no man ever loved.”

An Arundel Tomb concentrates on the historical aspect of the past. The persona in the poem, which is in fact Larkin, examines the concept of artifacts, how something set in stone can withstand the test of time regardless of whether it actually existed in the first place. Visiting a Sussex churchyard Larkin sees an example of love that both moves and intrigues him, had it not been for the incongruity of two linked hands displayed on the tomb he would have walked by. It is a gesture small yet touching but the cynic in Larkin questions its validity presuming it to be a case of “a sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace” rather than a symbol of a long and devoted marriage. Together in death the couples’ “faces blurred” but the husband is still “holding her hand”. Over time their features have been weathered but their effigy remains as a reminder of their lives, a monument to their love. Archaic language is used to complement the subject matter of the poem, capturing a bygone time so unlike today’s “unarmorial age”. Further manipulation of syntax is evident with the effective juxtaposition of the adjectives “sharp” and “tender”, conveying simply but perfectly Larkin’s confused and mixed reaction to the union of the stone hands. There is debate over Larkin’s true feelings towards the real meaning of the “faithfulness in effigy”. Whether or not he again intended the pun with the use of the verb “lie” just as lovers were “lying together” in bed is unclear. As Brother Anthony (An Sonjae) points out in his paper Without Metaphysics there is a huge diversity in the interpretations of Larkin’s intended meaning in his work, it is up to the reader to determine their own response “which is good for the reader, but a challenge too”.

Does the poet believe that “love survives” not only in stone? Or as Andrew Swarbrick quite rightly points out does he “almost” believe it as the penultimate line suggests? “Our almost-instinct almost true” therefore cancels out the optimism of the following statement. Here we witness Larkin lowering his defenses, allowing himself to hope for the best, to want love to be “that much mentioned brilliance” but he cannot do so completely for fear of it being an illusion. Although hinting at what he truly believes it is as though he will not allow himself to trust it in case he is mistaken. Yet whether love survives or not it lives on in Arundel where “only an attitude remains”. This is also true of Larkin’s poetry, and in fact to the whole genre. Whereas fictional characters and places from novels are lost, forgotten, poetry allows thoughts to survive as art long after the death of the artist. Larkin wrote of this inspiring philosophy in 1955, contained in a statement to D. J. Enright he explained, “I write poems to preserve things I have seen/thought/felt…I think the impulse to preserve lies at the bottom of all art.” Yet as mentioned previously the meaning of Larkin’s literature is not always clear, just like he could only assume the significance of the joined hands we can only guess at the thoughts of Philip Larkin which are contained and live on in his verse.

The poem Dockery and Son relates the events and emotions that occur when Philip Larkin revisits his old college, steps back into the past only to be disappointed with what he finds there. An outsider there, he no longer belongs and finds himself a stranger in his own past, as well as physically being unable to enter his past residence “the door of where (he) used to live” is also “locked” metaphorically. However, the most disturbing thing for Larkin is the news that one of his peers now has at son at Oxford: Dockery unlike Larkin with “no son, no wife, no house or land” is a success story. The door to fatherhood is therefore also “locked” for Larkin. By starting with dialogue the poem is made more authentic as it adds an injection of reality to the verse. It also alerts Larkin to the fact that he is no longer part of that world, of public school boys and ranks, he, unlike Dockery, has no reason to revisit that part of his life. He feels “ignored”. As in The Whitsun Weddings Larkin philosophizes whilst on a train which is not only a vehicle in the normal sense of the noun but a vehicle for his thoughts and also a metaphor for direction, moving forward in life. The simplistic repetition in the third stanza “How much…How little…” conveys Larkin’s disappointment in himself as he contemplates his own achievements in comparison with those of Dockery. Whereas Leo Colston benefited from his nostalgic visit to the past it has been a negative experience for Larkin who should never have returned.

Both Larkin and Hartley present philosophies on the past in two contrasting but equally effective genres, which themselves give insight into the pasts of the authors. The past is, as both pieces of literature show, inevitably significant to us all. How we are affected by it however, either negatively or positively, is to some extent in our own hands. “Even a god cannot change the past” (Agathon 445 BC) yet we can move on, learn from our experiences and in the future be “less deceived”. L. P. Hartley’s novel is a message to us all that we should not dwell on what has come before, but concentrate on living the present, Leo recognized that he “should not be sitting alone” before it was too late. In reality the past does not fully exist; in the words of Larkin it is a “love song” that can never sound the same, a “locked” door which we can never be reopened, “only an attitude” that lives on in our minds. We may try to capture moments and emotions in stone, or in verse yet the only place where they truly exist is in our memory. We have the ability to dictate the significance the past holds for us. And so whilst we cannot change our pasts, we have the ability to change our future; Shakespeare declared that “What’s past is prologue” yet we can determine what is contained in the epilogue.

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