Temporary Kings - Anthony Powell [2]
‘You, too?’
‘Not without resistance on my own part I had planned a lot of work this long vac. Mark positively nagged me into it. He can be very tyrannical.’
‘I resisted too, but was in difficulties about a book. It seemed a way out.’
To say that was to make the best of things, let oneself down gently. Writing may not be enjoyable, its discontinuance can be worse, though Members himself must by then have been safely beyond any such gnawings of guilt. By now he was a hardened frequenter of international gatherings for ‘intellectuals’ of every sort. He had been at the game for years. The activity suited him. It brought out hitherto dormant capabilities for organization and oratory, neither given a fair chance in the course of an author’s routine dealings with publishers and editors; nor for that matter – Members having tried reversing the roles – trafficking with authors as editor or publisher. The then ever-widening field of cultural congresses pleased and stimulated his temperament. At one of them he had even found a wife, an American lady, author and journalist, a few years older than himself, excellently preserved, not without name and useful connexions in her own country. She was also, as Members himself boasted, ‘inured to writers and their inconsequent ways’. That was probably true, as Members was her fourth husband. The marriage still remained in a reasonably flourishing condition, in spite of hints (from the critic; Bernard Shernmaker, chiefly) that Members had dropped out of the Venetian rendezvous because another, smaller conference was to include a female novelist in whom he was interested. A reason for supposing that particular imputation unjust was that several other literary figures had thought the rival conference more tempting. These differed in this from Members only insomuch as he had played some part in organization of the Venetian gathering at the London end. That was why, to avoid becoming vulnerable in his own apostasy, he had to find, at short notice, one or two substitutes like Dr Brightman and myself. He brushed aside pretexts that I never took part in such activities.
‘All the more reason to go, Nicholas, see what such meetings of true minds have to offer. I should not be at all surprised if you did not succumb to the drug. It’s quite a potent one, as I’ve found to my cost. Besides, even at our age, there’s a certain sense of adventure at such jamborees. You meet interesting people – if writers and suchlike can be called interesting, something you and I must often have doubted in the course of our via dolorosa towards literary crucifixion. At worst it makes a change, provides a virtually free holiday, or something not far removed. Come along, Nicholas, bestir yourself. Say yes. Don’t be apathetic.
Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop;
Seek we sepulture
On a tall mountain, citied to the top,
Crowded with culture!
It’s not sepulture, and a tall mountain, this time, but the Piazza San Marco – my patron saint, please remember – and a lot of parties, not only crowded with culture, but excellent food and drink thrown in. There’s the Biennale, and the Film Festival the following week, if you feel like staying for it. Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn? Take a chance on it. You’ll live like a king once you get there.’
‘One of those temporary kings in The Golden Bough, everything at their disposal for a year or a month or a day – then execution? Death in Venice?’
‘Only ritual execution in more enlightened times – the image of a declining virility. A Mann’s a man for a’ that. Being the temporary king is what matters. The retribution of congress kings only takes the form, severe