Between Impressionism and Modernism: Some Do Not. . ., A Poetics of the Entre-Deux
Résumé
Ford’s writing in Parade's End appears in many respects as operating an unfinished transition between tradition and modernity. I propose to examine in Some Do Not . . . how, while acknowledging his literary heritage and prolonging it through his practice of impressionism, Ford strives to negotiate with the process of breaking with the past, of radical innovation underlying the 'modernist' movements. How is the aporia between tradition and modernity resolved – or perhaps deliberately left unresolved?
Ford initiated an aesthetic movement – literary impressionism – that he delineated in several of his theoretical works. He believed in representing the characters’ perspectives on and reactions to events, instead of the events themselves. This aesthetics breaks away from realism in that the centre of representation appears empty: indeed, in Some Do Not . . ., the different points of view never converge towards a meeting point. However, unlike a fully Cubist aesthetics where the centre would have utterly vanished, the centre of representation remains latent in Ford’s writing – it is continually hinted at as a presence-absence. The text keeps pointing towards a spectral meaning which is never fully revealed, yet underlies the various perspectives.
When brought to its absolute point, however, literary impressionism such as it is theorized and practiced by Ford leads to a deadlock and is doomed to silence. This may explain why the writing in Some Do Not . . . wavers between a practice of impressionist principles and a more “modern” aesthetic. The text reveals an eclecticism which makes it appear at times as a collage of various literary orientations, never quite deciding between them – perhaps precisely, resolving not to decide. The novel may seem as suspended in a no man’s land between tradition and modernity. An overview of the poetics of spaces in Some Do Not . . . confirms indeed the notion that the text – its characters, aesthetics, and reader – is situated within a gap, an interval. The whole novel can be read as a transitory space in which the reader, like Tietjens, moves along an ever-undecided path. Similarly, the multiple and contradictory aesthetic orientations show a text in writing, and point to an author forever groping for a definite aesthetic.