The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists. Robert Tressell
This opens the way to there being a variety of realities, something which is implicit in the frequent references to the philanthropists each ‘telling a different story’ (p. 140). These stories are never heard; they are occluded by Owen’s lectures on socialism which thereby devalue the philanthropists’ experience in much the same way that the system itself does. This is consistent with the operation of ‘high’ culture in the novel; it is identified with ‘humanity’ whereas the workers with their ‘beer, football, betting and, of course, one other subject [are] ‘wild beasts’ (p. 545). Owen’s lectures and the artefacts of ‘high’ culture are used to place the workers at the bottom of the social hierarchy. This is exactly how the bible is used by the ruling class in the novel; its authority is used to maintain the workers in a subservient role. Owen, too, does not really want the philanthropists to have their own ideas but to agree with him. Once again, the novel seems to participate in the economy of repression that it sets out to criticise.
Although The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists seems, at times, to be a demonstration of how the system uses fiction and its power to situate persons in order to perpetuate itself, it is also the case that the novel encourages a sceptical approach to these aspects of textuality. The hallucinatory power of fiction is criticised in Chapter 29, ‘The Pandorama’, which contains the same ideas found in the rest of the novel but which presents them in a way which anticipates some of the techniques of Brecht’s epic theatre. The very fact that they are presented as scenes is itself a disruption of the written word, as are those diagrams, charts and worksheets found throughout the novel.
The scenes are commented upon by Bert, whose commentary prevents the audience from becoming too absorbed in what they see. This is further prevented by the scenes being complete in themselves. Hence a storm at sea is followed by police breaking up a crowd in Berlin. Such sharp juxtapositions encourage a detached scrutiny rather than an imaginative identification with what is depicted. The discrete procession of scenes breaks with the novel’s linked sequence of episodes which stimulate the reader to want to know what happens next rather than concentrate on what is happening now. The use of song either as a direct comment or else an ironic contrast is also used to break the spell of immediacy and inhibit the emotional involvement that characterises the rest of the novel. And, in Chapter 21, it is further suggested that the philanthropists can break the spell of fiction if they act it out, so distancing themselves from it.
The power of fiction to define and place people is also criticised even as it is practised in the novel. This is apparent when a speaker, who claims to believe every word in the bible, is challenged to drink poison which will not, says the bible, harm one of Christ’s followers. In declining the invitation the speaker undermines the authority of the bible to legitimise social divisions. Owen’s adherence to ‘high’ culture is also interrogated in the novel, primarily through his having to consistently argue his case with the philanthropists. Moreover, Owen’s negative attitude towards the body expressed in his unease at the philanthropists’ interest in sex (p.141) and in his revulsion at their humorous indulgence in ‘downward explosions of flatulence’ (p.220) gives his position a strictly abstract appeal. The culture of the philanthropists, with its emphasis on physical activities, has a certain vital energy that is missing from the ‘rational pleasure[s]’ (p. 494) of socialists. Indeed, it is this energy that is the source of the philanthropists’ occasional acts of resistance mentioned earlier.
Conclusion
The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists brims with ideas. Although written in the first decade of the twentieth century much of it still applies today. The economic revolution of the 1980s has led to an increase in poverty and greater job insecurity. There is fierce debate about whether ‘popular’ culture is a distraction from the ‘real’ problems or whether it can be a source of opposition to the dominant meanings in our society. Similarly, discussion rages over whether ‘high’ culture is elitist, or whether it answers the need for a felt depth in experience which is not catered for by the institutions of post-industrial capitalism. Tressell’s novel has much to say about all these issues. It portrays, in unremitting detail, the crushing despair of poverty, the brutality of labour relations and the blighting of hope. Its solution is socialism. But, like many of the ideas in the novel, socialism receives contradictory treatment and its relation to ‘high’ culture is certainly problematic.
The problems of the book should not be allowed to detract from its achievement of marrying art and politics in the English novel. Traditionally, these have been kept apart; art invites contemplation, politics action. This obscures the relation between them. Both evaluate life and, in finding it wanting, endeavour to endow it with significance. Socialism, wrote Arnold Wesker, ‘isn’t about talking all the time, it’s living, it’s singing, it’s dancing, it’s being interested in what [is] go[ing] on around you, it’s being concerned about people and the world.’14
Properly understood, politics makes good the promise of art. To this end The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists issues an emphatic challenge: ‘Every man who is not helping to bring about a better state of affairs for the future is helping to perpetuate the present misery and is therefore the enemy of his own children’ (pp.131-132). Such forthrightness cannot be ignored. It demands we learn more about the world, examine our consciences and evaluate our habits. It also demands we recognise the extent of our obligations and responsibilities, and then act accordingly. The novel, in short, invites us to live, in the largest sense of that word.
GARY DAY
November 1996
In writing this book my intention was to present, in the form of an interesting story, a faithful picture of working-class life – more especially of those engaged in the Building trades – in a small town in the south of England.
I wished to describe the relations existing between the workmen and their employers, the attitude and feelings of these two classes towards each other; the condition of the workers during the different seasons of the year, their circumstances when at work and when out of employment: their pleasures, their intellectual outlook, their religious and political opinions and ideals.
The action of the story covers a period of only a little over twelve months, but in order that the picture might be complete it was necessary to describe how the workers are circumstanced at all periods of their lives, from the cradle to the grave. Therefore the characters include women and children, a young boy – the apprentice – some improvers, journeymen in the prime of life, and worn-out old men.
I designed to show the conditions resulting from poverty and unemployment: to expose the futility of the measures taken to deal with them and to indicate what I believe to be the only real remedy, namely – Socialism. I intended to explain what Socialists understand by the word ‘Poverty’: to define the Socialist theory of the causes of poverty, and to explain how Socialists propose to abolish poverty.
It may be objected that, considering the number of books dealing with these subjects already existing, such a work as this was uncalled for. The answer is that not only are the majority of people opposed to Socialism, but a very brief conversation with an average anti-socialist is sufficient to show that he does not know what Socialism means. The same is true of all the anti-socialist writers and the ‘great statesmen’ who make anti-socialist speeches: unless we believe that they are all deliberate liars and imposters, who to serve their own interests labour to mislead other people, we must conclude that they do not understand Socialism. There is no other possible explanation of the extraordinary things they write and say. The thing they cry out against is not Socialism but a phantom of their own imagining.
Another answer is that ‘The Philanthropists’ is not a treatise or essay, but a novel. My main object was to write a readable story full of human interest and based on the happenings of everyday life, the subject of Socialism being treated incidentally.
This was the task I set myself. To what extent I have succeeded is for others