First off,
let me welcome you to the 1960’s! This
journey began back in 1923, and we are finally cutting into the 5th decade. Ironically, our first step
forward is a step backward as we return to number 39 on our list, the
twelve-volume work by Anthony Powell, A Dance to the Music of Time.
My editions
of A Dance to the Music of Time comes in four volumes, each volume
titled as a “movement,” as in a symphonic work.
This format naturally gathers the books into four sets of three. As I was well into Book V, however, it seemed
to me that the books might want to be three sets of four, for it feels like Casanova’s
Chinese Restaurant is the beginning of something new. The first of the two factors that give it
that feeling is the opening scene of a bombed-out pub. The war, looming in the background of At
Lady Molly’s, has struck London at last.
Of course, the entire story is told as memories spurred on by that
opening scene, so the war is held at bay for at least one more novel, but the
faded scene of destruction colors the whole of the activity that follows
it. The second factor is the postponing of
most of the familiar story lines that we have followed thus far in favor of
introducing us to new characters.
Widmerpool makes only the briefest of appearances; Templer is absent
entirely, as are his sister Jean and his ex-wife Mona; Quiggin is nowhere to be
seen and Members pops in for one short scene.
We spend more time with the Tollands, but mostly with characters we
missed out on in previous novels. All of
this gives the impression that Powell is setting the stage for some new events
to unfold in the upcoming novels.
Unfortunately,
I found Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant, in spite of its fantastic title,
to be one of the least interesting entries in the series. It felt like it had a lot of potential to
make great connections, but finally failed to do so. The big political event, for example, that
places us in time is the abdication of Edward VII in 1936. This idea of abdication was hinted at in
other relationships too, as in Maclintick and his wife, and Moreland’s
potential abdication of his responsibilities toward Matilda. As I looked about for more thematic
connections, I was left holding a handful of ideas without any real textual
evidence to bind them together. More
than abdication, Powell is looking at the institution of marriage and the
pressures it places on the people at its center—which is a topic that Powell
has already plumbed in previous novels.
Another
theme seemed to be the collision of the old with the new, as emblematized by
the titular restaurant:
The name Casanova’s Chinese Restaurant offered one of those unequivocal blendings of disparate elements of the imagination which suggest a whole new state of mind or way of life. The idea of Casanova giving his name to a Chinese restaurant linked not only the East with the West, the present with the past, but also, more parochially, suggested by its own incongruity an immensely suitable place for all of us to have dinner that night.
I saw traces
of this theme in the weakening of Jeavons and the passing of St. John Clare, as
well as the way that local deaths and events were overshadowed by the looming
crisis in Europe. But like the idea of
abdication, these connections seem to be more in my mind than textually
grounded in any thorough way. And like his handling of marriage, Powell has been dealing with these clashes from the beginning of the series, so again there is not much new here. I am
perhaps asking too much of the novel to draw out these connections and to play
with these themes. Presumably the novel
does precisely what Powell wants it to do.
I was just left a little flat when it was all said and done.
The novel is
of course excellently written and the characters are as compelling as always,
but the trend of each novel being better than the last in the series has
faltered here. I expect that it has done
so to introduce new characters and complications to be mined in the novels
still to come. Only time will tell. I’ll pick up with the sixth book in the
series, The Kindly Ones, after another seven novels, when I reach 1962.
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