Vyacheslav Ivanov and C.M. Bowra: a ... - UCL Discovery

of personal experience that was also shared by Ivanov.
This awareness was translated into action during the war, aptly characterised by
Cyril Connolly as Bowra's ‘initiation into life’. 11 Bowra was still eighteen when he was
called up at the beginning of 1917 and not yet twenty-one when he was demobilized in
February 1919. 12 These were highly impressionable years: as he later recalled in
Memories, life in the army made him realise the necessity of maintaining some sort of
‘inner life’. 13 When the front was quiet, he read the classics (Homer, Virgil, Tacitus),
French literature (Anatole France) and modern English poetry (Hardy, Yeats and Eliot) –
a poignant image of the ‘inner life’ mounting its cultural defences against the ravages of
war.
We can see, therefore, that even before he began his studies at Oxford, Bowra
was already in possession of three abiding elements of his future development: a love of
the exotic and foreign, a thorough grounding in the classics, and the seeds of his love of
Russian culture. These ingredients combined together to sustain his passion for
exploring other cultures, formed the basis of his academic career, and prompted his later
attraction to Ivanov.
In April 1919 Bowra went up to New College, Oxford to study ‘Greats’, a
challenging combination of Greek and Latin literature, philosophy and ancient history.
His natural wit and talent for conversation led him to become the leader of a brilliant
group of students. 14 Although his tutor in philosophy, H.W.B. Joseph, intimidated him
and, in Isaiah Berlin's opinion, ‘undermined his faith in his own intellectual capacity’, 15
he was greatly inspired by the classes of Gilbert Murray, the Regius Professor of Greek,
11 Cyril Connolly, ‘Hedonist and Stoic’, in Lloyd-Jones (ed.), Maurice Bowra: A Celebration, 44.
12
Bowra, Memories, 71, 88, 93.
13
Ibid., 88.
14
The Times, ‘A Brilliant Oxford Figure’, 10.
15
Berlin, ‘Memorial Address in St Mary’s’, 17.
34