Customer Reviews

The Way of All Flesh

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"The Way of All Flesh" seems to be best known as the Victorian novel that thumbed its nose at Victorian novels. For this reason, it's frequently mentioned in talks of literary history, but I don't ever hear of anyone praising Samuel Butler's novel from an artistic perspective. Actually, I find the book more interesting for its story than for its place in the development of 19th and 20th century literature.

I tried to read this novel once and only got through the first 100 pages or so. I found it remarkably dull and dry, and the tone of the first-person narrator (Mr. Overton), who stops the action every 10 pages or so to offer personal asides that reveal more about him than about the characters he's writing about, I thought to be snide and irritating.

But I hate not finishing a book, so I picked it up again, this time understanding that it would be a dry read and prepared to appreciate it for its historical context. To my surprise, I found myself caught up in the story and thought the whole thing very funny. I can't believe I missed all the humour the first time through.

I hesitate to give this novel too much credit for deflating the pompous bubble of Victorian morality, because other authors writing at the same time as Butler were doing the same thing (Dickens for one can be incredibly caustic). But there is a maturity to Butler's writing that is not present in other Victorian writers. This novel feels much more modern than anything else written pre-1900, and even feels more modern than some books written after. Unlike Dickens, whose characters are either all good or all bad and have about as much depth as the characters you'd find in a comic book (this isn't a criticism--I like Dickens), Butler's characters (at least Ernest, his protagonist) seem very much alive and flawed. Ernest is easily influenced by everyone around him and makes decisions based on how he thinks he should act rather than how he wants to act. He doesn't know what he wants out of life, he's a screw up, he's got lousy luck. All of these things make him quite endearing because they make him so human. The scathing criticism of religious hypocrisy and moral bombast exhibited by the majority of people in Ernest's life can be funny, especially if you agree with it (as I do), but the story itself is much more interesting than the social commentary.

I would definitely recommend this book. It's not necessarily a page turner, but it consistently held my interest. Just remember that it's supposed to be funny. Think of Butler as a 19th century Evelyn Waugh, and you should do just fine.

The Way of All Flesh covers six generations of strife in the Pontifex family, and spans a period from 1750 to 1880. However, the bulk of the story concerns the life of Ernest Pontifex, from about age 5 up to age 28, and describes his unsatisfactory relations with his parents, his school, his church, his wife, and his friends. Sometimes we feel sorry for Ernest, because many of his problems are caused by unbelievably cruel or thoughtless people, and sometimes we're furious with him, because he himself is the author of at least half of his troubles, but either way his misfortunes make him stronger and move him steadily along the path to maturity. Throughout, the book remains an easy read, although the writing is very witty and often rewards close examination.

Even today, 100 years after the book's publication, a reader finds many things to identify with. Anyone who felt unjustly treated by his or her parents or teachers will find much to sympathize with here. Anyone who has wrestled with the conflict between Reason and Faith will find much to think about here. Given how much change the last century has seen, it's surprising how many of the issues still seem fresh and relevant, and the book definitely makes you think about them. It is easy to see how many people have described reading The Way of All Flesh as a turning point in their lives.

A point worth keeping in mind: the characters are all described from Ernest's point of view. Several clues tell us that Ernest exaggerates the cruelty of various characters - some of whom seem evil beyond belief, and I think it's quite clear that, at these points, we're supposed to smile at Ernest - not shake our heads at the author. This is most obvious with Ernest's schoolmaster, Dr. Skinner, whom Ernest consistently sees as a pompous fool, but who we also know is very popular with the best students, and who shows other signs of being a much better man than Ernest believes him to be.

The footnotes in my edition (Penguin Classics 1986) are very skimpy, focusing on comparing elements from Ernest's fictional life to Samuel Butler's real one. The failure of the notes to translate passages in French or Latin, or to explain very contemporary references, is inexcusable. (E.g. but for the recent controversy over his Beatification, we'd have no clue that "Pio Nono" was Pope Pius IX.) Hoggart's introduction (1966) is decent but a bit dated, not having weathered as well as the book itself!

I read this book after reading all the reviews on Amazon not knowing what to expect: Incredibly boring or amazing insightful? I have read many books written in that same time period. I believe this to be the most mature work to come out of England in the late 19th Century(although it was published later). I enjoy Dickens, Hardy, and Eliot very much, but Butler makes their works look like grocery store fiction. I can see how many people might be bored if they were expecting a great story. While the story is excellent, it is more a book about ideas. Butler uses his hero to voice his commentary on Victorian ideals. Most of it is still very relevant today, though. I think it will be most relevant for people that have been exposed to the religious right wing who still hold many Victorian values. I enjoyed the characters and the story was compelling. There are many beautiful passages. It was very funny at times and somewhat sarcastic. The narrator reminded me of Hemmingway born 50 years earlier in England. What impressed me the most was Butler's modern style of writing. Much less wordy than Dickens. Dickens would have taken 800 pages to express the same thoughts. I also felt a real kindred to the main character Ernest. This is ultimately a coming of age book which most people will be able to relate to in one way or another (unless you haven't grown up yet). I would recommend it to all serious readers.

This is a book written ostensibly by a godfather, chronicling the family history and the unusual life of Earnest Pontifex, the only son of a very upright and religiously correct Christian minister. It is reportedly an almost autobiographical account of the author's own life and reflects his own lifetime revelations with regard to society, religion and morality. It goes extensively into the lives of his parents and their parents, allowing the reader to fully appreciate the inevitable life into which Ernest is born. The Way Of All Flesh explores the difficult struggles of a naiive young man coming to terms with his parents' and society's expectations of him while he endeavors to find his place in the world. His life begins as an avalanche of yesteryear--Victorian and Christian values are laid out, explored, tried, tested, examined and rejected as Earnest muddles his way to true happiness and a life worth living. If it were published during Samuel Butler's life, it would surely have resulted in some kind of social or legal censure as a shocking indictment of the establishment of the day. In many respects, it is still as revealing, shocking and valid as it was when it was written.

A rich, intelligent, historically informative masterpiece that tells the modern reader about the concerns, delusions, pretensions and prejudices of Englishmen of the 1700s and 1800s.

Much more than just a novel, this work offers Butler's opinions upon philosophy, child-rearing and religion. The events of the novel serve to illustrate and reinforce the points made. It is a hybrid, a novel/essay, and rare at that. More essayists should spice up their arguments by dressing them with vivid characters and a decent plot, as Butler has.

Rich in wit, satire, sarcasm, humor, insight, and not without flashes of bitterness and anger.

If you read only a hundred books in your lifetime, this would not be such a bad choice for the eightieth or eighty-first. Towers above most novels that cover this long period in history (some hundred years or so, spanning four or more generations).

This book did cause quite a stir when it was published. Samuel Butler wrote in a "no-holds-barred" style that attacked the Victorian era at its core. He shows the family as a tormented assembly bound together by illusion and make-believe, or even by hatred, fear and hypocrisy. As shocking as this was at the time, Mr. Butler was actually revealing secrets from his own family. He doesn't stop at the family. He put holes in the marital institution, the Church and at educational facilities. I know this sounds like a toxic book, but it is really not. Only true genius can write a book like this one. It is a book where the author's temperament comes shining through its pages. If nothing else, it's an honest a picture that you'll get anywhere of Victorian life.

I won't pretend that this book is a quick page-turner, full of sparkle and a romp. In fact it gets bogged down rather too often in discussions about how ironically we conduct our lives and what would be the intelligent alternative. But it is a fine achievement nonetheless and a good cautionary tale about people taking themselves and their lives way too seriously. The depiction of family life reminded me of Satykov-Schedrin's "The Family Golovlyov," that savage recounting of the ultimate dysfunctional family: Some of Butler's exposing of each family member's real agenda is a supreme hoot, and very perceptive indeed. Please know too that "The Way of All Flesh," published in 1903, is an acknowledged precursor to much of our greatest Twentieth Century literature. George Bernard Shaw has admitted his debt, but I also wonder how James Joyce must have been affected, and many, many others. But for us, as we begin the Twenty-First Century, "The Way of All Flesh" is at least a delicious book to savor and to open our eyes.

According to my edition (Penguin), a large part of the credit for this book is due to Eliza Savage, Butler's close friend and unofficial editor, who died before she could improve the conclusion. I think I can spot the moment where her influence ends.

Up until then the book is great. The hero is Ernest Pontifex, but Butler begins *three* generations (along the male line) before Ernest, spending considerably more time on each succeeding generation. This works wonders. For one thing, it enables us to feel alternate loathing *and* sympathy for the book's ogre, Theodore Pontifex - often simultaneous loathing and sympathy. Every single generation shows a kind of promise which is nipped in the bud, in a different way each time. Also we get a good feeling that the story is the story of the nineteenth century as a whole.

Once Ernest is born the author begins to slow down, dawdle, digress and meander, never in a boring way, until a several perfectly believable crisis points follow each other in rapid succession, after which ...

... after which Eliza Savage dies, or something of the kind happens, and the book collapses. It's a pity. I was certain Butler was on to something great, but he doesn't really know how to end it all. We get the kind of unsatisfactory solution that H.G. Wells, at his laziest, would come up with. Ernest even begins to behave like one of Wells's supermen.

There *had* been one flaw before the collapse. Butler would often make keen observations, and then use them to launch into philosophy. Although Butler was am intelligent man he had all the philosophical ability of a taxi driver, and a taxi driver's willingness to share his thoughts. We can easily forgive him as long as the narrative is still strong and he prefaces the philosophical twaddle with intelligent remarks; but not otherwise.

There's also the feeling that Butler is reigning in his horses at the end, unwilling to get stuck into Christianity and the Anglican Church as they really deserve to be stuck into. We tend to forget how much power these institutions had, and how much they abused it. Once we are reminded, Butler's willingness to allow the abuse to continue is puzzling. (Butler's remarks on Christianity are not nearly as disturbing as his remarks on art. That the official doctrine about the resurrection of Christ is absurd, is old news, and was old even when Butler wrote. The claim that Beethoven and Shakespeare were pretentious humbugs is much more shocking.)

A pity about the ending - the book could have been great. Read it all the same.

It's a hoot to read the clipped, sullen dismissals of this book by readers from Topeka to Boston. They obviously hate Butler's novel, and for good reason: the mealymouthed, Christian, moneygrubbing Victorian family on which he spits with such accuracy moved west in the course of the twentieth century. It is now only rarely to be found in England; its true home is...Topeka...and Boston...and a thousand other American whited sepulchres. One reviewer whines that this is the "irrelevant" story of "an average middle-class man from an average middle-class family." What an interesting form of "irrelevance"!

In fact, the novel is brilliant and has endured surprisingly well. To see its relevance, all you need do is move its setting 3.000 miles to the West.

I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about this book after just reading it. I feel that Butler was able to capture the complexity of familial relationships tainted with puritanical religious beliefs. I think he really does a good job of showing the hypocrisy of certain religious beliefs. I think he challenges one not to blindly accept things without questioning them. The only problem I had with the book is that it is filled with Victorian and religious allusions that I did not understand. Also, there is a fair amount of Latin phrases that I could not translate myself. Those parts of the book will forever remain a mystery to me.