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The Art of Being Ruled
Wyndham Lewis' scathing critique of modern democracy and mass society, now back in print. "The working of the 'democratic' electoral system is of course as follows. A person is trained up stringently to certain opinions; then he is given a vote, called a 'free' and fully enfranchised person; then he votes (subject, of course, to new and stringent orders from the press, where occasionally his mentor commands him to vote contrary to what he has been taught) strictly in accordance with his training. His support for everything that he has been taught to support can be practically guaranteed. Hence, of course, the vote of the free citizen is a education and suggestion, the imposition of the will of the ruler through the press and other publicity channels, cancelling it. So 'democratic' government is far more effective than subjugation by physical conquest." - Part IV, Chapter 2: The Democratic Educationalist State "a genuinely extraordinary book, because he predicted many things which were from so far off the agenda then that very few people had thought of them, and indeed this book was regarded as slightly madcap even in its era. It looks at theories through Georges Sorel, it looks at theories through Charles Maurras, but in the end it’s Lewis’ thesis that ultimately in the West—if we don’t watch it ...—we will have Left-wing capitalism. This was a heterodox and absurdist thesis in the 1920s, which partly sophisticated Marxian critics and so on laughed to scorn! But we have all around us a global, itemized, Left-leaning capitalist order." - Jonathan Bowden
448 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1926
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About the author
Wyndham Lewis
117 books161 followers(Percy) Wyndham Lewis (1882-1957) was a novelist, painter, essayist, polemicist and one of the truly dynamic forces of the early 20th century and a central figure in the history of modernism. He was the founder of Vorticism, the only original movement in 20th century English painting. His Vorticist paintings from 1913 are the first abstract works produced in England, and influenced the development of Suprematism in Russia. Tarr (published in 1918), initiated his career as a satirical novelist, earning the praise of his contemporaries: "the most distinguished living novelist" (T.S. Eliot), "the only English writer who can be compared to Dostoevsky" (Ezra Pound).
After serving as an artillery officer and official war artist during the First World War, Lewis was unable to revive the avant-garde spirit of Vorticism, though he attempted to do so in a pamphlet advocating the modernisation of London architecture in 1919: The Caliph's Design Architects! Where is your Vortex? Exhibitions of his incisive figurative drawings, cutting-edge abstractions and satirical paintings were not an economic success, and in the early 1920s he devoted himself to study of political theory, anthropology, philosophy and aesthetics, becoming a regular reader in the British Museum Reading Room. The resulting books, such as The Art of Being Ruled (1926), Time and Western Man (1927), The Lion and the Fox: The Role of the Hero in the Plays of Shakespeare (1927) and Paleface: The Philosophy of the Melting-Pot (1929) created a reputation for him as one of the most important - if wayward - of contemporary thinkers.
The satirical The Apes of God (1930) damaged his standing by its attacks on Bloomsbury and other prominent figures in the arts, and the 1931 Hitler, which argued that in contemporary 'emergency conditions' Hitler might provide the best way forward in Germany damaged it yet further. Isolated and largely ignored, and persisting in advocacy of "appeasement," Lewis continued to produce some of his greatest masterpieces of painting and fiction during the remainder of the 1930s, culminating in the great portraits of his wife (1937), T. S. Eliot (1938) and Ezra Pound (1939), and the 1937 novel The Revenge for Love. After visiting Berlin in 1937 he produced books attacking Hitler and anti-semitism but decided to leave England for North America on the outbreak of war, hoping to support himself with portrait-painting. The difficult years he spent there before his return in 1945 are reflected in the 1954 novel, Self Condemned. Lewis went blind in 1951, from the effects of a pituitary tumor. He continued writing fiction and criticism, to renewed acclaim, until his death. He lived to see his visual work honored by a retrospective exhibition at London's Tate Gallery in 1956, and to hear the BBC broadcast dramatisations of his earlier novels and his fantastic trilogy of novels up-dating Dante's Inferno, The Human Age.
After serving as an artillery officer and official war artist during the First World War, Lewis was unable to revive the avant-garde spirit of Vorticism, though he attempted to do so in a pamphlet advocating the modernisation of London architecture in 1919: The Caliph's Design Architects! Where is your Vortex? Exhibitions of his incisive figurative drawings, cutting-edge abstractions and satirical paintings were not an economic success, and in the early 1920s he devoted himself to study of political theory, anthropology, philosophy and aesthetics, becoming a regular reader in the British Museum Reading Room. The resulting books, such as The Art of Being Ruled (1926), Time and Western Man (1927), The Lion and the Fox: The Role of the Hero in the Plays of Shakespeare (1927) and Paleface: The Philosophy of the Melting-Pot (1929) created a reputation for him as one of the most important - if wayward - of contemporary thinkers.
The satirical The Apes of God (1930) damaged his standing by its attacks on Bloomsbury and other prominent figures in the arts, and the 1931 Hitler, which argued that in contemporary 'emergency conditions' Hitler might provide the best way forward in Germany damaged it yet further. Isolated and largely ignored, and persisting in advocacy of "appeasement," Lewis continued to produce some of his greatest masterpieces of painting and fiction during the remainder of the 1930s, culminating in the great portraits of his wife (1937), T. S. Eliot (1938) and Ezra Pound (1939), and the 1937 novel The Revenge for Love. After visiting Berlin in 1937 he produced books attacking Hitler and anti-semitism but decided to leave England for North America on the outbreak of war, hoping to support himself with portrait-painting. The difficult years he spent there before his return in 1945 are reflected in the 1954 novel, Self Condemned. Lewis went blind in 1951, from the effects of a pituitary tumor. He continued writing fiction and criticism, to renewed acclaim, until his death. He lived to see his visual work honored by a retrospective exhibition at London's Tate Gallery in 1956, and to hear the BBC broadcast dramatisations of his earlier novels and his fantastic trilogy of novels up-dating Dante's Inferno, The Human Age.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 24, 2020
Art of ruling is no treatise upon statesmanship, nor is it an affirmative hoorah of our (European) current state of affairs.
The book acts as a whip, a whip cracked upon Wyndham Lewis's enemies. Who are these enemies? Well, everyone.
A book of screaming jabs, of many jabs that still ring true to this day.
What and who is Lewis? You won't be able to tell. You will be arguing with his work the whole way through. Is it satire? Is it sincere? Who knows, probably both though...
Lewis is no futurist and he'll make sure you know. The love of fast FAST machines Lewis did not share. Nor those of a robot man. But he liked their style and those asethetic turbines.
He also appears as Nietzschian in his maunevers and force. But he's not. I think.
For now I will hit upon a few salient points made throughout the book. They will be made briefly so as to represent the quick manner of Lewis's 3 page chapters.
Warning !!! Spoilers below !!!
1.
Art is the context of a life oriented upwards. Of a narration one feels within ones society. A man within a larger epic. This meaning and contextualization of man need only come about by the plastic arts, novels, music, imagery, religion. Lewis loathed the relegation of the arts to mere consumption. In this way so did Ezra pound, who believed that a minority of the artists deserved to be more then mere culture bearers relegated to a dark and lonely corner begging the rushing and working crowds for not just a coin, but rather for a moment of storytelling, a moment of art. To often they pass by to work, awaiting the night after work of hypnotic drooling amongst alcohol and digital screens.
2.
Freedom. Freedom was too Lewis a virile quality that required man to suffer greatly for a goal he had to fight for. The freedom of our age was a lie, a joke, a stinking inversion to Lewis. To be free in our age means to be greatly dependent and too have ones freedom propped up by others. In other words: freedom is the addiction not to self-reliance but an addiction to reliance upon others. The most slackened and decaying freedom, where you want man seperated from all responsibility so that he can enjoy his crumbs and cushions handed to him by charity. Yet, Who is this charity? Who is suffering so that man can have this dependent "freedom"?
3.
Lewis especially loathed the feminised and deracinated creatures of Europe. Sulking around in a fuming cloud of self-hatred. Begging a congo warlord to let him join in their drumming group and allow him to have some wild and foreign girls. A rimbaud of pity.
To take Wyndhams loathsome spectacle even further: the European man has begun to emulate woman, as unto a modern tranny. A tranny being a man trying his hardest to emulate a superficial image of woman, a corrupted and fallen simulacrum. A man timid and tamed, fetishising what a women only is in the movies (only the old movies) and in his desperate mind. Emulating what he himself can't find. Lewis does not blame women for feminism, but rather blames the effeminate man trannies.
Lewis also prophetically announced that feminism and the liberation of women would be just another nail in the coffin of the family unit. That the entrance and pushing of women into the workforce would only make women generally more miserable, another misery of our times labeled"liberation". Though his view on the family unit is too complicated for me too understand, or perhaps I did understand it...
4.
And what does Lewis say of democrazy? Well, what a jolly good hoot that whole show is.
Lewis didn't chalk up the corruption of art, standards, morals, and general culture of Europeans on the flux and time of Bergsonian Herr Spengler. Lewis believed our problems were crafted by the hands of a minority. A minority that hid behind such ideas as representing the masses. The voting of democrazy was too Lewis a way of blaming the people for their supposed mistakes, when in reality the mistakes were planned and in schedule and the votes had nearly no part too play upon the schedule.
Those four bursts were but a taste of Lewis.
Take the chance and spend the pretty penny on Wyndham Lewis's work of weaponry: "The Art Of Being Ruled" .
For in summary this book is flippant and fast, a bitting book of notes slipped sharply into your back.
The book acts as a whip, a whip cracked upon Wyndham Lewis's enemies. Who are these enemies? Well, everyone.
A book of screaming jabs, of many jabs that still ring true to this day.
What and who is Lewis? You won't be able to tell. You will be arguing with his work the whole way through. Is it satire? Is it sincere? Who knows, probably both though...
Lewis is no futurist and he'll make sure you know. The love of fast FAST machines Lewis did not share. Nor those of a robot man. But he liked their style and those asethetic turbines.
He also appears as Nietzschian in his maunevers and force. But he's not. I think.
For now I will hit upon a few salient points made throughout the book. They will be made briefly so as to represent the quick manner of Lewis's 3 page chapters.
Warning !!! Spoilers below !!!
1.
Art is the context of a life oriented upwards. Of a narration one feels within ones society. A man within a larger epic. This meaning and contextualization of man need only come about by the plastic arts, novels, music, imagery, religion. Lewis loathed the relegation of the arts to mere consumption. In this way so did Ezra pound, who believed that a minority of the artists deserved to be more then mere culture bearers relegated to a dark and lonely corner begging the rushing and working crowds for not just a coin, but rather for a moment of storytelling, a moment of art. To often they pass by to work, awaiting the night after work of hypnotic drooling amongst alcohol and digital screens.
2.
Freedom. Freedom was too Lewis a virile quality that required man to suffer greatly for a goal he had to fight for. The freedom of our age was a lie, a joke, a stinking inversion to Lewis. To be free in our age means to be greatly dependent and too have ones freedom propped up by others. In other words: freedom is the addiction not to self-reliance but an addiction to reliance upon others. The most slackened and decaying freedom, where you want man seperated from all responsibility so that he can enjoy his crumbs and cushions handed to him by charity. Yet, Who is this charity? Who is suffering so that man can have this dependent "freedom"?
3.
Lewis especially loathed the feminised and deracinated creatures of Europe. Sulking around in a fuming cloud of self-hatred. Begging a congo warlord to let him join in their drumming group and allow him to have some wild and foreign girls. A rimbaud of pity.
To take Wyndhams loathsome spectacle even further: the European man has begun to emulate woman, as unto a modern tranny. A tranny being a man trying his hardest to emulate a superficial image of woman, a corrupted and fallen simulacrum. A man timid and tamed, fetishising what a women only is in the movies (only the old movies) and in his desperate mind. Emulating what he himself can't find. Lewis does not blame women for feminism, but rather blames the effeminate man trannies.
Lewis also prophetically announced that feminism and the liberation of women would be just another nail in the coffin of the family unit. That the entrance and pushing of women into the workforce would only make women generally more miserable, another misery of our times labeled"liberation". Though his view on the family unit is too complicated for me too understand, or perhaps I did understand it...
4.
And what does Lewis say of democrazy? Well, what a jolly good hoot that whole show is.
Lewis didn't chalk up the corruption of art, standards, morals, and general culture of Europeans on the flux and time of Bergsonian Herr Spengler. Lewis believed our problems were crafted by the hands of a minority. A minority that hid behind such ideas as representing the masses. The voting of democrazy was too Lewis a way of blaming the people for their supposed mistakes, when in reality the mistakes were planned and in schedule and the votes had nearly no part too play upon the schedule.
Those four bursts were but a taste of Lewis.
Take the chance and spend the pretty penny on Wyndham Lewis's work of weaponry: "The Art Of Being Ruled" .
For in summary this book is flippant and fast, a bitting book of notes slipped sharply into your back.
June 26, 2019
One of the best books I've ever read.
October 4, 2023
The Art of Being Ruled is a brilliant book cooked up by the mind of Wyndham Lewis, an interesting, dynamic, and provoking artist. The book itself delves into many subjects, from discussing the various arguments and beliefs of socialist thought, to discussing the psychology of the masses. Lewis makes some great predictions, 100 years ago, that have come true and gone beyond what he could've imagined.
Lewis injects his personality into the entire book, adding that flair of British eccentricity to subjects that would be otherwise very "dull" to read about. He also gives us his thoughts on how things should be, such as his opinion on the relationship of men and women, feminism, class association, the potential dynamic governance of Europe, and much much more, which are refreshing to read and match his unique personality.
The structure of the book itself is broken up very nicely, which I definitely appreciate, so that it can be easily picked up, put down, and managed; with sections only being a handful of pages at a time.
I definitely recommend this book if you're interested in Lewis or the more interesting and unique political and philosophical thinkers of the 1920s.
Lewis injects his personality into the entire book, adding that flair of British eccentricity to subjects that would be otherwise very "dull" to read about. He also gives us his thoughts on how things should be, such as his opinion on the relationship of men and women, feminism, class association, the potential dynamic governance of Europe, and much much more, which are refreshing to read and match his unique personality.
The structure of the book itself is broken up very nicely, which I definitely appreciate, so that it can be easily picked up, put down, and managed; with sections only being a handful of pages at a time.
I definitely recommend this book if you're interested in Lewis or the more interesting and unique political and philosophical thinkers of the 1920s.
August 20, 2023
A brilliant read! This book was written and published back in 1926, but while reading it you will think it was only written and published yesterday as Lewis perfectly predicted the times we're currently living under as he delves into politics, sociology, art, revolutions, and more. I recommend to read
May 8, 2021
Lewis analyzes mass society and the loss of identity necessary to thrive therein.
December 1, 2021
Remarkable. Well worth reading
June 13, 2007
I'm not kidding, Lewis thinks that the world would be a much more peaceful place under fascist rule.
September 24, 2014
Wyndham Lewis has never not disappointed me, and this idiosyncratic, meandering apology for fascism (if that is indeed what he was trying to say) rarely gets above 'not that interesting.'
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews