Conceptual Curzon Continued

Following a tangent from Hanna's post:

There was a letter from Emily too--full of the shy half-declarations of love which were as far as Emily could be expected to write and as far as Curzon wished. Burning phrases in black and white would have made Curzon uncomfortable; he was well satisfied with Emily's saying that she missed him and hoped he would soon be back again with her, and with the timid 'dears', three in all, interpolated in the halting sentences.
...
Curzon wrote back the next day, bluffly as usual. The only dear he was able to put itno his letter was the one that came in 'my dear wife', and the only sentiment appeared in the bits addressed in reply to Emily's statement that she missed him.
...
He did not think the letter inadequate (nor did Emily when she received it) but it was a relief to turn aside from these barren literary labours and to plunge once more into the living business of the Army. The Division arrived, and Curzon rode over to join it with all the thrill and anticipation of a lover

First of all, he's uncomfortable with his wife saying that she loves him. What?!

The misprioritization of passion here is glaring. Time and time again, Curzon shows so little capacity for emotion towards human beings but charges up like a firecracker when axioms or institutions are at stake. The Army spoken of above, towards which he feels such love and anticipation, is not, despite being called "living business", the Army that is made up of its various members; it is not its human populace that Curzon cares for. In the passage below, there is a distinct detachment from the Army's human populace on his part:

So Brigadier-General Webb was unstuck and sent home, and lost his chance of ever commanding a division. The last Curzon saw of him was when he left Divisional Headquarters. There was actually a tear--a ridiculous tear--on one cheek just below his blue eye as he went away, but Curzon felt neither pity for him nor dislike.

No, he is in love with the notion of the Army, the axiomatic and unassailable greatness of the thing that is an Army, the Army that feeds its successes to the axiomatic and unassailable greatness of the thing that is Britain, also totally unrelated to its human populace. He is wedded to concept.



"'Perhaps', said Frobisher, 'it might be wise to quiet down for a bit, sir?'
'No, it's not good for the men,' replied Curzon.
'Casualties are getting a bit high,' said Frobisher.
'You can't make war without casualties,' said Curzon. He had been a casualty himself, once, and he had freely exposed himself to the chance of its occuring again.
'Wellington tried to keep 'em down, sir,' said Frobisher, suddenly bold.
'What on earth do you mean, boy?' asked Curzon.
'Wellington always discouraged sniping and outpost fighting and that sort of thing.'
'Good God!' said Curzon. 'Wellington lived a hundred years ago.'
'Human nature's the same now, though, sir.'
'Human nature? What in hell are you talking about?'"

The hilarity of this last statement comes in its seeming hyperbolic. However, it is the whole truth, the plainest summation of Curzon's appaling state of mind. He just cannot get his head around this 'people' and 'sympathy' and 'not dying' business. His consideration is reserved for the Army and its tenets, its cherished abstractions. To preserve the ethereal notion of Bringing Glory to the British Empire, there is no life on earth worth as much, his own included. Curzon is not a person, he's an animated ledger of Army commandments.



'Drafts have got to be found, all the same,' said Curzon. He thought of the effect it would have on his own attitude if he were warned that the supply of recruits was dwindling. It would mean caution; it would mean an encroachment upon his liberty to attack; it would mean thinking twice about every offensive movement, and an inevitable inclination towards a defensive attitude; it might concievably come to mean the breaking up of some of the units which had been built up with such care--the Ninety-first Division even.
He was filled with a genuine horror at such a prospect--a horror that made him almost voluble. He laid down as stiffly and as definitely as he possibly could the extreme urgency of a lavish supply of recruits. He thumped his knee with his hand to make himself quite clear on the subject.

This passage describes what is arguably the most intense feeling Curzon has in The General. It's not about his wife, child, in-laws, the searing blame of his extended family, his own life--but about the prospect of having an insufficient number of casualties to sacrifice in forthcoming battles. The successful flank attack sitting up in the ether that all of this is leading to cannot be sparsely manned. The possibility is anathemic to the careful stockpile of Glorious Plans occupying Curzon's emotional center--it horrifies him.

Conversely...

After all, it would be as bad taste to force these inevitable details of war upon the notice of these women and civilians as it would be to do the same with the details of digestive processes or any other natural occurence.

In his mind, the memory of a general trembling like a leaf as he's multiply bombarded and about to die, is a detail. It isn't so monstrous to want to shy from these topics in frail company, it is the trivialization of the thing, the discompassionate way he can merely remember, that marks his distinct separation from humanity. For a war which carried away from it millions of irreparably shaken, broken people, a man who remains stable throughout did not actually start at the same point in human development.

(more to come)