Galt's 'The Radical' 1832

 

James Fraser first edition - 1832

My last Galt - another fictitious autobiography; but not as satisfying as The Member, The Provost or The Annals. Like The Member, its sales were disappointing.

I dislike radicalism, whether of the left or right, and found Nathan Butt, by and large, abhorrent. Thus, I agreed with his parents! As his father said, Nathan Butt, you have been from your infancy a turbulent child; and, later, you have from your youth upward, been contumacious to reproof... He wanted to abolish marriage (an obligation...at variance with the freedom which mankind have derived from nature), law, religion and property - all, in his mind, antipathetic to 'Nature'. In practice, like most narcissists, that meant the freedom to follow 'natural' impulses applied only to himself. He is no democrat -  the wise (i.e. himself) are few, and the foolish numerous. They are the bumpkin crowd. In some ways, Galt's novel is remarkably contemporary - the humourless extremists that people the so-called social media show a tolerance only to their own viewpoint; cancelling is to be carried out on others, never themselves. Butt would find fellow worshippers these days amongst the 'woke' fraternity.

Due to the above, I struggled on with the novel, even though I understood the author's purpose. A self-regarding, humourless character taking centre stage throughout does not lead to a happy reading. I see I pencilled in at the top of page 7, "what a brat!"

There are some useful points from three modern critics:

Ian Gordon (1972) comments:  The Radical is less concerned with the politics of power (than The Member) - indeed the hero, Nathan Butt, barely gains his seat in Parliament when an election committee of the House ejects him, ruling that he has been returned by perjury. Rather, it is a skilful psychological study of the development of a natural rebel...

P. H. Scott (1985) suggests that The Radical has none of the distinctive qualities of Galt at his best....it shows how much Galt loses when he denies himself his facility in Scots...[it] is written in English in a rotund and abstract style. There is more theorising than narrative, few dialogues and such characters as there are have little life and individuality...there is self-revelation but without much subtlety, some pathos, but no comedy. Surely, Scott is correct, when he sees the novel simply as a political pamphlet. Galt deliberately carried the ideas of the Radicals to a anarchistic extreme as a plea for caution towards the dismantling of the complex restraints which society had imposed on natural impulses.

Gordon Millar (2017) says that The Radical is a wry portrait of a hypocritical extremist...who professes to love mankind in general. He cannot, however, treat those close to him with kindness...Butt's Radicalism is based not on extending the franchise as far as possible, but on rule by the wise few, of whom he thinks he is naturally a member.

Butt's behaviour towards his father and mother (I really felt that the demise of my worthy mother left me freer to pursue the course of my endeavours to improve the condition of man); towards his uncle; the girl who he seduced; his wife; all were the hallmarks of an obnoxious, selfish egomaniac. Thank goodness he was quickly booted out of Parliament! 

I found it interesting that (on page 95) Galt makes reference, through Butt, to the ineffectuality of the Scottish Radical campaign. Before I read Maggie Craig's One Week in April: The Scottish Radical Rising of 1820 (2020), I knew nothing of it. (See my Blog of 31st January).