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Decline and Fall

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Waugh's gift, so apparent in this novelette, is to fill his books with incident, but to do it in such a way that it never seems gratuitous. Who else could have a drunk misfire the starting pistol at a boy's school's games, have the bullet hit a poor kid's foot, cause the kind of damage that necessitates the removal of the foot, and still have us smiling at the audaciousness of it all? So don't worry, this slim little volume is a full meal, and a very satisfying one. Waugh is also economical - characters regularly return for yet another go at having an effect upon the fate of the main character (reminiscent of "Tom Jones"). T.S. Eliot lovers will also have a pleasant surprise waiting for them: Toward the end of the book, Waugh has a character explaining the meaning of life that sounds suspiciously like a passage from Eliot's "Four Quartets." But you don't have to know that, or anything else really, to get great pleasure from reading "Decline and Fall." Make it your next book.

Evelyn Waugh's first novel "Decline and Fall" pops like a cork from a bottle of champagne. While many authors take years and volumes to find just the right tone, the 25-year-old Waugh, who had just published a biography of Dante Rossetti, seems to have had his literary concept perfectly in mind from the start and hit the ground running with this raucously funny yet astonishingly mature debut.

The hero (although Waugh would disagree with the term) is Paul Pennyfeather, a divinity student at Scone College, Oxford, who as the book begins is expelled for "indecent behavior" of which he is actually innocent, and is promptly disowned by his guardian over the shame educed by this incident. Now, in need of money, he searches for a job, and the only one he can get is a teaching position at a small boys' school located in a Welsh castle called Llanabba.

Llanabba, while not quite rivaling Dotheboys Hall of "Nicholas Nickleby," is a woefully undignified educational facility, an institution of incompetence. The headmaster is a crafty curmudgeon named Dr. Fagan, the butler Philbrick is a criminal who prospers by constantly falsifying his identity, and the boys are an undisciplined and ungifted lot. The other instructors seem to have been deposited there for having failed elsewhere: Mr. Prendergast, a clergyman who has left the Church because of "Doubts," and Captain Grimes, a maimed ex-soldier ("Think I lost it in the war," he tells Pennyfeather about his missing leg) who is continually "in the soup" but always manages to extricate himself.

Romance, or rather that badinage between the sexes that passes for romance in Waugh's world, turns out to be Pennyfeather's bane, initiating his misadventures in the second half of the novel. His engagement to marry the voluptuous Mrs. Beste-Chetwynde, the widowed mother of one of the Llanabba boys, is interrupted by his incarceration for unwittingly assisting her business of procuring prostitutes, one of whom is Grimes's wife; in prison he unsurprisingly encounters some old friends who can help him break free, and by the author's grace everything comes full circle in the end.

One of Waugh's many strengths is his ability to create a multitude of humorous characters out of completely original cloth. There is a family whose names are inspired by geometry: a Llanabba boy named Tangent and his mother, the globular Lady Circumference, whose boorish manners belie her title. The indirect cause of Pennyfeather's predicament, and his eventual savior, is the young dandy Sir Alistair Trumpington, who makes a major appearance in Waugh's later novel "Put Out More Flags." And the brainiest character in the novel is Otto Silenus, a young German architect with a philosophical outlook and a radical style who is hired by Mrs. Beste-Chetwynde to renovate her celebrated country house called King's Thursday.

Silenus's concluding metaphor about life--a spinning wheel on which some people are meant to be riders and the rest spectators--is not as silly as it sounds; it seems as if Waugh's authorial impulse is to exhibit the contrast between the two types of people and observe the comical results when the boundary is crossed.

It's not uncommon that the books we're assigned in high school or even college sail by the larger portions of our young brains. Not only are, ahem, "other things" clamoring for our attention when we are that age but for a great number of us, it isn't the ideal time to be turned on to subtlety. We're too raw. For example, even though I enjoyed the poetry of Wordsworth in undergraduate school, I was told by my professors that I would only truly come to appreciate him once I'd gotten a little older.

Which brings me to Evelyn Waugh, and the novel Decline and Fall. I can certainly remember ... well, not /hating/ the book when I read it for a class in the Comic Novel, but now that I return to it a few decades later, well, sheesh, the thing has me in stitches!

Waugh is definitely a "deadpan" humorist. It may seem strange to claim that "deadpan" actually covers a wide range of styles, but it does. There's the literal (!) deadpan of Buster Keaton. There's the deadpan camera of Jim Jarmusch. There's the kinda-stoned but hysterical deadpan of MST3K's Joel Hodgson. And then there's the deadpan of Evelyn Waugh:

"My boy has been injured in the foot," said Lady Circumference coldly.

"Dear me! Not badly, I hope? Did he twist his ankle in the jumping?"

"No," said Lady Circumference, "he was shot at by one of the assistant masters. But it is kind of you to inquire."

I can still recall my professor's joy when she read this passage to us. I doubt most of us "got it" past the point of a distracted snicker or two. Wow, though, do I get it now. It's subtle, but it's also like a cannon disguised as a lemonade stand.

To be sure, this novel requires that you allow yourself to ease into the rhythms and language and concerns of English school life, which may seem a bit alien to many of us. But once you are there, it is a delight to just relax, get to know Waugh's stable of eccentrics and then let the laughs wash up, out of and over you.

Although this book is lighter than air, the satire also cuts deeply, and as a result I find Waugh far more satisfying than, say, P. G. Wodehouse, who on the surface travels through similar realms. If you are overstressed, overtired or fear you have lost your sense of humor at the already-worn horrors of the 21st century, there are worse remedies than turning to this delightful novel.

In this story of Paul Pennyfather's disaster of a life Waugh takes his first satirical shots at just about every establishment and class in England at the time. Pennyfather suffers almost every possible misfortune though his life, from being sent down from university for indecent behaviour to imprisonment for white slave trading. Despite being innocent of all crime Paul allows misfortune and punishment to visit him almost unprotesting. It is as though Waugh punishes him for his insignificance and his lack of substance and that is his true crime. I am a huge fan of Waugh and find the satire and cutting wit outrageously funny, but beyond the humor there are more relevant messages for the society of his time and it's establishment figures. I cannot recommend any of Waugh's novels highly enough and this, his first, is no exception.

Rarely does a debutant written such a novel with perfect pitch and right tone. Evelyn Waugh is one of those few talented people who can make an unforgettable impression with their very first work, "Decline and Fall". Book after book, he proved that this one was not a fluke and all the talent he promised here was confirmed later on.

As he tells halfway through the narrative, `the whole of this book is really an account of the mysterious disappearance of Paul Pennyfeather', and its pages tells us who is and what happened to the character. He is a strange man from the beginning when he is kicked out of college because of indecent exposure -not his fault, actually - and ends up forced to work as a schoolmaster.

In his new position Pennyfeather will meet many interesting characters that eventually will lead to his fall. These people - mostly Margot and her son Peter - will change his life, mostly for worse, until he disappears - but there is more in Waugh witty narrative.

With his main character, the writer depicted those kind of people who never acts, only reacts and therefore goes through the motions of life. Pennyfeather always seems to have a supporting role in his own life, and all the events that affects him take places much without his involvement.

Waugh's talent resides, among other places, in his ability to make ordinary situations become funny with his clever approach. For most of the time we don't laugh out loud, just smile, but when the laughs come they are unstoppable. With this device, the writer is making an acid critic of his society. Many contemporary writers who are desperate to make important and strong comments about our contemporary world should read Waugh and learn something from the master.

Waugh's debut novel has the scattershot approach of a boy with his first bee-bee gun. The church, the gentry, public schools, the penal system, the judiciary, token blacks and the aristocracy. If he missed anything or anybody, that's the biggest accident of all.

Paul Pennyfather is the transparent vessel that is acted upon by all the howling winds of hypocrisy. I liked Paul and always expected him to muddle through with his excellent manners ("always a gentleman.") He is sent down from an Oxford look-alike under the cloud of "indecent behavior" when he is the victim of a hazing incident that leaves him trouserless on the common. His guardian cancels his allowance for the shame of it, and Paul is forced to take a position in sub-par boys school in Wales. The cast of characters is well used, whoever he meets always returns later in the story until Waugh settles them or kills them off, whichever suits his fancy. As wild as the ride is, the story ends tidily with Paul in exactly the same position as when he started.

There is an undertone of iron in this biting tale. I think Waugh already was getting his religious visions in place. "Decline and Fall" is brilliant, but moody. Your discomfort level might rise even while you are laughing. "Decline and Fall" is an excellent introduction to Evelyn Waugh's works. If all else fails, as another reviewer mentioned, pretend it's a Monty Python sketch.
-sweetmolly-Amazon Reviewer

Waugh is currently my favorite writer -- it's a joy to give yourself over to his world. I tell all of my smart friends to read him; you should probably start with Scoop, then Brideshead, then read them in chronological order. (Oh, and if you want to be extra clever, the "E" in "Evelyn" is pronounced like "evening" not like "ever."

More deadpan than hilarious, "Decline and Fall" is the story of Paul Pennyfeather, who seems not only to attract misfortune but to embrace it as his due. While depicting Pennyfeather's downward trajectory, Waugh skewers the pretensions and mocks the hypocrisy of every class of British society. Although I trust Waugh did not mean for the reader to sympathize with Pennyfeather, who is truly an apathetic oaf, I (ironically) found him surprisingly likable.

Blameless throughout, Pennyweather resignedly and almost eagerly accepts punishment for crimes committed by others. (In prison, he positively enjoys solitary confinement for its regimen and its lack of stress.) Some of Waugh's commentary is a bit pedestrian, especially to modern readers, but he occasionally and fearlessly tackles weighty and "scandalous" themes: the apostasy of the clergy ("modern churchmen who drew their pay without the necessity of the commitment to any religious belief"), the excesses of the prison reform movement ("So far as possible, I like the prisoners to carry on with their avocations in civilized life. What's this man's profession, officer?" "White Slave traffic, sir."), and societal attitudes towards an aristocratic lady who takes a black American lover (and her own patronizing posture). This last subplot, it must be said, makes uncomfortable reading, because the black character barely rises above stereotype, because Waugh unflinchingly uses racial epithet, and because ultimately the reader is not quite sure where Waugh is coming from.

Much of Waugh's satire is dated, but (like Candide) Paul Pennyweather is a virtuous nobody whose misadventures transcend time. The edition from Everyman Library also includes an astute introduction from the critic Frank Kermode, who provides useful background for the book instead of assuming you've already read it.

On one level, "Decline and Fall" is a wild farce of English manners complete with odd characters, dry humor, and impossible situations. In Waugh's humor, you can see the foundation for many British comics to come. (As an example, the "Sports" chapter alone could easily be transformed into a Monty Python skit.) Within his breezy and compact prose, Waugh delivers consistent laughs -- which makes the novel an enjoyable read.

But underneath the surface, Waugh is a wicked and sharp satirist who takes on many of the pillars of British culture c.1920 including the church, the schools, class structure, and the prisons. He occasionally uses ghastly imagery to make his point. But the tone never falters, and the reader may choose not to give second thought to all the pillorying going on. (As an aside, "Decline and Fall" would make an excellent selection for a student required to read "satire". It is much more accessible than, say, Candide.)

Poor Paul Pennyfeather! As the "hero" of Evelyn Waugh's first novel he is barely worth a cent and light as pillow stuffing. This flimsiness of character may cause concern unto lack of concern in the reader who wishes to strongly identify with the protagonist, but halfway through the book, Waugh's narrator assures us that Pennyfeather's hollowness is intentional:

"In fact, the whole of this book is really an account of the mysterious disappearance of Paul Pennyfeather, so that readers must not complain if the shadow which took his name does not amply fill the important part of hero for which he was originally cast."

Pennyfeather is someone who is acted upon more than he acts--perhaps it is better to say he is more sinned against than sinning--his story begins when he is attacked in an Oxford quad by a group of his snobbish bully classmates. They strip him naked from the waist down and before he knows it the university has expelled him for indecent behavior. He then loses his allowance and ends up teaching in a disreputable prep school in Wales where adventures continue to be inflicted upon him.

Waugh never allows Pennyfeather to defend himself, his satirical point being that an English gentleman wouldn't stoop to blame those who had wronged him, even if it means he goes to jail. After all, his irrepressible fellow teacher Grimes tells Paul, no matter how bad things get, there is "a blessed equity in the English social system that insures the public school man [public schools in England are actually private] against starvation." It's that social system that the young Waugh, twenty-five when this book was published, enjoys puffing up just to tear it down. Waugh maintains a light narrative touch though his subject matter is often serious and occasionally outrageous. He structures the book well and has a sharp appreciation for the absurdities of the English upper classes in the 1920s that is not inapplicable to many other time periods and cultures.

DECLINE AND FALL did not make me laugh as much as I thought it might. There are funnier English campus comedies out there, notably Kingsley Amis's LUCKY JIM and the first part of Waugh's own BRIDESHEAD REVISITED. Waugh was one of the twentieth century's great stylists, however, and I look forward to reading his second book, VILE BODIES.