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The Reputation of Ford Madox Ford

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Richard M. Ludwig
Richard M. Ludwig*
Affiliation:
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey
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Extract

Readers of The Times of London know Oliver Edwards' column as literary chat. It is no secret that Oliver Edwards is Sir William John Haley, editor of The Times and formerly Director-General of the B. B. C. In August 1957, on the publication in England of Gérard Jean-Aubry's biography of Joseph Conrad, Sir William launched an attack on Ford Madox Ford. “Time has an exorable way of taking its own revenge,” he begins. “When Joseph Conrad died, many who had affectionate regard for that master … were hurt or outraged at the way Ford Madox Ford seemed to cash in on the event. In a book about Conrad, in articles, and in other reminiscences the only purpose that could be discerned was to glorify Ford, even if that meant somewhat diminishing Conrad… . Ford's nature and experiences were such that by that stage in life he no longer had any touch with reality and had lost what little perspective he ever had.” As the column continues, the accusations become more personal. Ford was “a bit of a bounder,” he writes, whose “inaccuracies were … congenital and venial… . The question remains why Ford acted the way he did.”

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 76 , Issue 5 , December 1961 , pp. 544 - 551
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1961

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References

Note 1 in page 544 See Richard Aldington, D. H. Lawrence: Portrait of a Genius But … (New York, 1950) and David Garnett, The Golden Echo (New York, 1954).

Note 2 in page 544 Jocelyn Baines; Joseph Conrad: A Critical Biography (London, 1959), p. 216.

Note 8 in page 544 Gérard Jean-Aubry, The Sea Dreamer: A Definitive Biography of Joseph Conrad (London, 1957), p. 232. First published as Vie de Conrad (Paris, 1947).

Note 4 in page 544 Douglas Goldring has written two books on Ford, filled with first-hand impressions of the English Review Circle: South Lodge (London, 1943) and The Last Pre-Raphaelite (London, 1948). The latter was published in New York, 1949, as Trained for Genius. Goldring's work is highly colored by his own involvement in Ford's life and especially by his defense of Violet Hunt, the owner of South Lodge, the villa in Campden Hill Road, Kensington, which Ford occupied for several years. But to date these are the only biographical studies of Ford.

Note 5 in page 544 H. G. Wells, Experiment in Autobiography (New York, 1934), p. 526.

Note 6 in page 545 Ancient Lights and Certain New Reflections (London, 1911), p. XV. Published in New York, 1911, as Memories and Impressions.

Note 7 in page 545 Joseph Conrad, A Personal Remembrance (London, 1924), pp. 5, 6.

Note 8 in page 545 Return to Yesterday (London, 1931), pp. 17–18.

Note 9 in page 545 Ancient Lights, p. xi.

Note 10 in page 546 Provence (London, 1938), pp. 222–223.

Note 11 in page 546 The Sea Dreamer, p. 232.

Note 12 in page 546 Published with the permission of Mrs. Charles Lamb and the Ford Estate.

Note 13 in page 546 First published in Gérard Jean-Aubry, Joseph Conrad's Lije and Letters (London, 1927), I, 168n.

Note 14 in page 547 Published with the permission of the Trustees of the Conrad Estate, J. M. Dent & Sons, and the British Museum.

Note 15 in page 547 Published with the permission of Mr. Paul Bartlett and the Ford Estate.

Note 16 in page 547 Published with the permission of Mr. John D. Gordan and the Ford Estate.

Note 17 in page 548 Published with the permission of Mr. Edward Naumburg, Jr., and the Ford Estate.

Note 18 in page 548 Masie Ward, Gilbert Keith Chesterton (New York, 1943), p. 411.

Note 19 in page 548 Published with the permission of Mrs. C. F. G. Master-man and the Ford Estate.

Note 20 in page 549 Published with the permission of Sir Herbert Read and the Ford Estate.

Note 21 in page 549 Published with the permission of Mr. Edward Naumburg, Jr., and the Ford Estate.

Note 22 in page 549 The American edition was published in New York the same year under the title I Have This To Say.

Note 23 in page 549 Provence, p. 79. The text reads “Somewhere between Vienna and Valence,” but it is obviously a misprint.

Note 24 in page 549 Stella Bowen, Dram from Life (London, [1940]), p. 169.

Note 25 in page 550 Some Do Not … (London, 1924), p. 52. The ellipses in this passage are Ford's. They are part of his staccato style in recording conversation.

Note 26 in page 550 No More Parades (London, 1925), p. 148.

Note 27 in page 550 Ibid., pp. 196–197.

Note 28 in page 551 Some Do Not …, pp. 269–270.

Note 29 in page 551 A Man Could Stand Up (London, 1926), pp. 98, 100, 102.