Radio Times, June 3, 1955 - solearabiantree

June 3, 1955 • RADIO TIMES 5
. A Romance of . Richard Lion .. Heart
Maurice Hewlett's vivid historical romances were very popula" in his lifetime, but·
since his death most of them have he en neglected. - One - of the ·best, 'Richard
Yea and Nay,' is now to be presented asa tw,eive-pat.t radio serial,-beginning on
Thursday (Home Services except Scottish), Here ALAN DENT considers Hewlett's
style and introduces. the tale of Coeur-ode-Lion and }ehane Saint-Pol
, Too strong a wine, belike, for some stomachs,
for there's honey in it, and a dibbet of gore, with
other condiments. Yet Mistress Clio (with whom,
some say, Mistress Thalia, that sweet hoyden)
brewed it: she, not I, who do but hand the cup
round by her warrant and good favour. Her
guests, not mine, you shall take it or leave itspill
it untasted or quaff a bellyful.'
- THIS-SO like the introduction to any of
Maurice Hewlett's historical novels-is
really the beginning of Max Beerbohm's
exquisite parody entitled ' Fond Hearts Askew.'
His title fits any of the series of novels beginning
with The Forest Lovers (1898) and continuing
with Richard Yea and Nay (1900), which
Wilfrid Grantham has now made into a radio
serial.
Richard is a romance of the Third Crusade.
It is the Abbot Milo, confessor and friend of
Richard Creur-de-Lion, who tells the story and
'hands the cup round.' The royal crusader is
called' Yea and Nay' bya troubadour because
of the strange contradictions that mark his
nature-'· the loved and loathed,' 'king and
beggar,' 'SPOTt of two fates,' , god and man.'
. Jehane Saint-Pol is the beautiful girl he loved
. and wronged. He renounced her, saying Nay to
his heart, but stole her back from before the
altar, saying Nay to his head. Richard made this
wild young thing Countess of Anjou, but later
he repudiated her when he chose to marry
Berengere whose excellent dowry supplied the
needs of his expedition to the Holy Land.
However, Richard remained faithful to Jehane
in his fashion. .We are told that he made
Berengere his queen but not his wife, because he
stayed true to the memory of J ehane. She, on
her side, 'sacrificed all" for Richard, even
though it meant-in order to save' her royal
lover's life-entering the harem of an extraordinary
character called the Old Man of Musse
who dwelt on Lebanon. She first came into
his' presence wearing a purple vest thickly
embroidered with gold and pearls, underdrawers
of scarlet silk, and gauze trousers of many folds.
Over her head was a thick white veil heavily
fringed with gold. Round her ankles were little early romantic novels brought him:, 'The rest
bells of gold, and on her feet were scarlet of his life was spent in combating this fame,
slippers. By. comparison the Old Man looked which he always' felt to be, in its origin and
like chastity's very self, 'blkched as a swan, proportion, unbalanced and stultifying to his
robed all in white, white-bearded.' We are in- proper reputation.'
formed in plain words that the Old Man bored My own view is that no author-not even
Jehane, but in equally plain words we are told Sir Hugh himself-has ever combated his own
that she bore him 'at .least four children.' Yet," fame very impressively. Besides, Hewlett wrote
at· the end of it all Richard of the Lion Heart, his romantic tales with an unmistakable relish.
and of the Yea and Nay, died in Jehane's arms, Any page of Richard might easily be Beerbohmthe
romantic hero-of true chivalry. esque parody: 'The country took tints of
Maurice. Hewlett's career can- be conveniently: -Jehane, her shape; her ·fine ·nobility . _. ,instill."
divided into three decades-one of historical green water he read the secret of her eyes; in the
romances (of which Richard Yea' and Nay is a milk of October dawns her calm brows had been
superb example), one of modern novels (his Open dipped .. .'
Country is enchanting and unforgettable), and Romantic nonsense? Perhaps; but it was cerone-
of poems and essays (his Song of the Plow tainly nothing to be seriously ashamed of.
has been authoritatively called' one of the five Besides, if this author was genuinely ashamed'of
epics of English poetry '). Sir Hugh Walpole, his fluency as a historical romancer, why did
who knew him well, seriously maintained that he follow The Forest Lovers with Richard, and
Hewlett was ashamed of the fame which the Richard with The Queen's Quair?
'Holiday Land': a Betti C~medy 'The Nigger of the ."Narcissus." ,
Sunday and Saturday, Third
Monday, Home Service
HE humour of Italians is very like our own, but there is this H ELM'S a-lee! Raise, tacks and sheets! Mainsail haul! These
T
difference in their comic drama:' they like the fun to go on, if orders for ' putting about' a square-rigged sailing ship seem so far
possible, the whole time. They spare us those moments of pie-faced back in time that they might belong to the days of Frobisher and
solemnity with which comic dramatists here are wont to becloud their
activities, and which give us the feeling that however funny an Engli'Sh
Drake. Yet there are many men ;llive today who slipped and struggled
along a foam-washed deck to obey them; who hauled, cursing, on the
writer may be, he is always trying to make us vote for somebody.' braces as the great yards swung round; or 'laid out' on an upper topsail
In the same way, it may be remarked that Italian seribus or tragic drama yard while great ocean rollers roared and surged a hundred feet below.
gets 'along very well without the intervention of the comic landlady It is this background which Conrad uses for The Nigger of the
or servant, so often thought .necessary to hold the attention on our own 'Narcissus,' his stirring, macabre tale of an ocean-:-going sailing ship
stage.
homeward-bound from Bombay to London. In the centre of this cockpit
Third Programme listeners will already know Ugo Betti as a serious of human conflict stands (or rather, lies) James Wait, the Negro seaman.
writer. But Holiday Land is not at all serious; it is one of a group of Is Wait sick-or malingering? Whichever it is, he creates an explosive
,three lively comedies first performed in the early years of the war. These atmosphere ready for any man with a spark of malice to touch it off.
comedies stand sharply apart from the rest of Betti's work, and Italian And the man is there all right-Donkin, the vicious guttersnipe' who
critics, with the impressive whole of th~t. work before them, seem a little cannot steer or splice, who, aloft, holds on with both arms and legs, who
to regret their existence.
curses the sea while others work.' You cannot talk your way out of reality
But I am sure they can be quite easily put up with: they are respectably at sea-especially in a windjammer rounding the Cape of Good Hope in
and blessedly escapist, but not into a world of fantasy, only into the winter, drenched, hungry, benumbed-with a great hulking Negro lying
pleasanter parts of reality. Everything in them is, in fact, real enough: at ease in his berth. Remember~ they are short-handed in the Narcissus;
the people, the dialogue, the events, the laughs. The action is well thought a man must be badly incapacitated before others will do his 'pulley-hauley.'
out, the characters well thought into., Is 'James. Wait sick? It is: around this question that the ,story revolves;
And what is Holiday Land about, roughly? Well, many Italian Conrad was born in Poland in 1857 (his family name was Korzeniowski),
comedies of the sixteenth century, and the English comedies based on son of a landed family who had no connection whatever with England or
them, have as their main character a girl trying to persuade the hero that. the sea. In 1874 he left home, despite family remonstrance and, after
she is a boy. Holiday. Land has a girl trying~rather.more desperately, various adventures, made his, way to. England where he signed on· as
to' persuade, the hero that she, is a girl During, the twenty-odd years. of 'ordinary .. seaman in a.woolclipper on the Australian.nm; ,Two,years later",
their acquaintance. he has overlooked.this. point. , he passed his examination- f-or officer. and .rhen' roamed the world·under-the, ,
.Francesca and Alberto have spent.everyholiday.next,door to.each other;, ·red ensign; He became a naturalised British subjeet"in 18.8.6,' obtained his, ,.
he is now twenty~eightand',has'still not noticed. that: she •. now twenty-four, Master Mariner's Certificate the same year; and finally commanded the
is in love with him. The-long'scene, occupying, with interruptions; most," famous clipper ship -Tor:rens in 1893 .
. of act two, in which. Erancesca .attempts to make this clear,. is' among the ,. " .' Polish--deck-hand to· British Master. -Marined Most. men wouI&have
most skilful co;nic scenes I have ever come. across anywhere. It. offers. a , been satisfied. with this, achievement but not,Conrad. ,While: still sailoring'
. great deal to the actors who. are . to' . perform it;, and inevitably; demands ii:!' . he .. was writing" novels---'in - English" .. And so well- had. he mastered the.
great deal also. Holid'l.Y Land is an actors' piece througho.ut ~ that, at any, language of his adopted country,. that he became and.has.remained:famous
rate, it has in common with the:' serious' Betti. But that is. about an .. as a great artist:ofEnghsh prose. He died in 1924 while still working.
HENRY REED on his last novel Suspense. DICK CROSS