Night Thoughts

The critical edition of Confessions of a Young Man that I'm preparing is based on the text of the second book version that George Moore published in 1889 (only a year after he published it as a book). One of the major changes he made for that version of the book was the insertion of additional chapter, just before the end of the book.

That chapter - chapter 12 of the 1889 version of Confessions - is another example of how Moore experiments with narrative form in his book. It is set up for the most part, like the script of a play and it consists largely of a dialogue staged between the narrator and his own conscience. The chapter has no subtitle in the English version of the text, but Moore first published this chapter within a French translation that appeared in 1888. In that version the chapter was subtitled 'Examen de Minuit' (Midnight Examination or Thoughts at Midnight). 

Some parts of Confessions deliberately complicate our understanding by introducing new or diverse voices. I'm thinking of the chapter set in the Nouvelle Athènes café or a chapter that consists largely of a letter from one of the narrator's former lovers (I discussed this in a previous post). Other parts of the book experiment with the form of the novel in order to explore the interior world and subjectivity of the narrator. I'm thinking here of 'Thoughts in a Strand Lodging' which I discussed last week. In comparison with those chapters, 'Examen de Minuit' deliberately fractures the voice and personality of the narrator to find a new way to dramatise self-reflection and self-scrutiny. 

The back and forth of the narrator's exchange with his conscience is largely good humoured, but it ranges widely. The chapter reflects on his view of morals, his feelings about women and his attitude towards the future of humanity and takes a dark turn on occasion. The narrator exalts, for example, in the fact that he has not brought children into the world and predicts a dystopian future caused by overpopulation:

in fifty years there will be less to eat, but certainly some millions more mouths. I laugh, I rub my hands! I shall be dead before the red time comes. I laugh at the religionists who say that God provides for those He brings into the world. The French Revolution will compare with the revolution that is to come, that must come, that is inevitable, as a puddle on the roadside compares with the sea. Men will hang like pears on every lamp-post, in every great quarter of London, there will be an electric guillotine that will decapitate the rich like hogs in Chicago. Christ, who with his white feet trod out the blood of the ancient world, and promised Universal Peace, shall go out in a cataclysm of blood. The neck of mankind shall be opened, and blood shall cover the face of the earth.

It is hard to know how to respond to such statements and how seriously we should take them as a reflection of Moore (or the narrator's own views). This passage is closely influenced by the readings in Schopenhauer's pessimism that I discussed in a previous post. It rejects conventional Christian morals for a bloody vision of humanity's self-interest and violent tendencies.

Arthur Schopenhauer
The positions adopted in this passage are so extreme and vivid ('men will hang like pears on every lamp-post'), that we may be intended to understand them as an exaggeration and parody of such pessimism. Likewise, his relish for a bloody version of Christianity may be intended to shock more than it is intended to convince. Other passages of the chapter repeat back words or phrases that Moore has used earlier in the book. As a result, this sequence becomes intensely reflexive. It becomes possible that he is mocking or parodying himself as part of this dialogue between the narrator and his conscience. 

This is, perhaps, what is most Decadent about Confessions. As a movement, Decadence is sometimes understood as the espousal of art for its own sake and a rejection of conventional morals. But at its furthest extreme Decadence extends its rejection of values to its very own position: its knowing skepticism can call everything into question. This is a powerful tool - one that connects Decadence to Modernism and Post-Modernism. But it is also profoundly disorientating. Is Moore (or his narrator) genuinely troubled by his conscience? Is genuinely sanguine about humanity's chances for the future? Or is he playing an elaborate game?

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