Smith, Elder & Co. first edition - 1888
Robert Elsmere is about a young clergyman, trained in Oxford, who begins to doubt the doctrines of the Anglican Church after reading the writings of 19th century German rationalists and imbibing the ideas of English thinkers such as Thomas Hill Green (Mr Grey in the novel) and Mark Pattison (the Squire Wendover in the story). Instead of turning to Roman Catholicism, as did clergy such as Newman earlier in the century, or to atheism, Elsmere takes up constructive liberalism, stressing social work amongst the poverty-stricken and uneducated. The three volumes are split into seven unequal length Books:
Volume I pp. 1-292 Westmorland - where Elsmere successfully woos Catherine Leyburn, a pious young lady, deeply attached to her late clergyman father's straightforward Anglicanism; pp. 295-371 Surrey - where the newly-weds settle down to a seemingly successful ministry in the deepest southern county. Volume II pp. 3-120 Surrey - where the first strains start to emerge pp. 123-274 The Squire; - here the squire's Library and convictions lead on to the next section; pp.277-374 Crisis - where Elsmere finds he cannot square his conscience with the teachings (particularly with regards to miracles) of the Established Church. Volume III pp. 3-137 Rose, where the focus is more on Catherine's younger, more flighty sister, but also highlights the deepening division between Robert and Catherine; pp. 141-306 New Openings - where Elsmere, supported by his sister-in-law Rose's hopeful partner Hugh Flaxman, is able to open a New Brotherhood Club for the working class; and, finally, pp. 309-411 Gain and Loss - the gains are the success of the Institute and Flaxman gaining Rose's hand, but the loss is the major one of Elsmere's premature death, through overwork and a frail constitution (perhaps J.R. Green's early death supplied the idea for Elsmere's end from tuberculosis. Green was another East End pioneer in real life.)
Mary Augusta Ward
Mary Ward took infinite pains over her novel, the composition dragging out from March 1885 to February 1888. Stages included 'thinking about the novel' (March-November 1885); 'writing the novel' (November 1885-March 1887); and 'revising the novel' (March 1887 to January 1888). This first draft was simply too long. The publisher informed Mary that the work came to 1,358 pages, around three-quarters of a million words. 250,000 comprised a long three-decker. There had to be a savage reduction. Up to half the novel had to be excised. Two criticisms later levelled at the novel appear to be a direct result of this wholesale pruning. Robert Elsmere's character is insufficiently built up - his childhood is blank; his years at Oxford hurried over; his crucial relationship with his dominating mother sketchy. Secondly, the supporting arguments on behalf of the Established doctrines are woefully thin when matched against Squire Wendover - his Library and his rational scepticism. Catherine, who represents the Thirty-Nine Articles, is pushed into the background, whilst Wendover reigns supreme. The excisions in the middle of the novel were mainly from Elsmere's defence of his Anglicanism. As Gladstone was later to object, this rendered the hero intellectually spineless.
Although the initial sales were mediocre, thanks in part to Gladstone's long (and difficult to read for this 'modern' mind) critique, a buying tsunami took hold, particularly in America. Between July 1888 and September 1889, the publisher issued 17 editions of the one-volume 6s. form of the novel, amounting to 38,000 copies in all. The sale of 3,500 three-volume copies yielded the author £950. Some 20,000 of the half crown edition were sold between January and December 1890, yielding £500. The author had done very well financially.
Some interesting extracts:
The early Elsmere at Oxford:
The sacramental, ceremonial view of the Church never took hold upon him. But to the English Church as a great national institution for the promotion of God's work on earth no one could have been more deeply loyal, and none coming close to him could mistake the fervour and passion of his Christian feeling.
Catherine Leyburn knew of no supreme right but the right of God to the obedience of man.
From the High Churchman, the Vicar of Mottringham, Mr Newcombe:
'Tolerance! he said with irritable vehemence - 'tolerance! Simply another name for betrayal, cowardice, desertion - nothing else. God, Heaven, Salvation on the one side, the Devil and Hell on the other - and one miserable life, one wretched sin-stained will, to win the battle with'...
The only constant defence which the poor have against such physical conditions as those which prevailed at Mile End (the downtrodden hamlet in Elsmere's Surrey parish) is apathy.
Elsmere's 'Confession' to his wife:
'For six or seven months, Catherine - really for much longer, though I never knew it - I have been fighting with doubt - doubt of orthodox Christianity - doubt of what the Church teaches - of what I have to say and preach every Sunday...I could not hold my faith by a mere tenure of tyranny and fear. Faith that is not free - that is not the faith of the whole creature, body, soul, and intellect - seemed to me a faith worthless both to God and man!' and later, Christianity seems to me something small and local...it is not that Christianity is false, but that it is only an imperfect human reflexion of a part of truth. Truth has never been, can never be, contained in any one creed or system!'
Truth holds a special place in the hearts of men who can neither accept fairy tales, nor reconcile themselves to a world without faith.
On Elsmere: It was the penalty of a highly strung nature set with exclusive intensity towards certain spiritual ends.
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I learned a new word from the novel: Comtist.
Based on the ideas of Isidore Marie Auguste Francois Xavier Comte (1798-1857), who formulated the doctrine of positivism. He developed the idea of a religion of humanity and his injunction to "vivre pour autrui" ("live for others"), is the origin of the word 'altruism'.
Political phenomena are as capable of being grouped under laws as other phenomena; the true destination of philosophy must be social, and the true object of the thinker must be the reorganisation of the moral, religious and political systems.
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