Middle age lament

Wednesday, November 29th., Comarques, Thorpe-le-Soken.

I have hardly done any work since I came back from Dublin in September. Quite why, I don't know. I still seem to be busy, but not the sort of busyness that brings in money. Marguerite is spending at a good rate, especially on clothes. I feel a bit discontented, out of sorts, in need of a change. But no change in prospect. Of course I have now reached the age of fifty which is something of a milestone, and it is getting dark so early, and feel I would be happier were I single again. A middle-aged man's lament.

I have been reading Swinnerton's "Nocturne". Good. Perhaps very good. Only a short novel and all set in the course of a few hours, with only five characters. No plot as such, Swinnerton's intention being to 'get inside' the heads of his characters. And he succeeds pretty well. The setting is a 'respectable' working class home somewhere in London where live two sisters and their father who is more or less helpless, needing constant care. Both sisters are desperate for love and for some sort of escape from their dreary existence. Jenny, the younger, is a romantic, sharply intelligent, unpredictable, a dreamer. Emmy, the elder, is conventional, unimaginative, caring, with a deep reservoir of love for the right man if she can find him. By the end, Emmy is on the road to happiness, whilst Jenny looks likely to continue to be dissatisfied.

I can't quite decide whether this would have been better edited to become a short story, or extended to a normal size novel. Probably the latter had I been dealing with it. There is very little back story which could, I think, have been introduced to advantage. There is also very little description of the sisters' home. I could have made a lot of that. Swinnerton is excellent in describing a visit to a music hall, and could have done more to flesh out the context of the sisters' lives. Also, we get privileged access to the characters thoughts but not so much about how their thoughts and emotions express themselves in nuances of behaviour; the sort of thing that Conrad is a master of. I enjoyed the read. It could reasonably be described as a tour de force, and I think it will sell well.

In the Telegraph today was a letter from Lord Lansdowne calling for a re-think on the possibility of a negotiated peace with Germany. A brave gesture by a man who has been Foreign Secretary, and therefore should be heeded. But I have no doubt that there will be a predictable response tomorrow, with the word 'traitor' to the fore. Essentially Lansdowne argues that the allies should restate their war aims in an attempt to bring about peace before the prolongation of the war leads to the ruin of the civilized world. I agree completely, but I have no intention of saying so in public. If pressed I shall be non-commital.