David’s review of Different Speeds, Same Furies: Powell, Proust and other Literary Forms > Likes and Comments
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look forward to your thoughts on this one
I've read the Powell series twice & find it monumentally compelling, thanks for your review here of the Anderson work
Given your and Anderson's endorsements, it's now harder for me to sit out 'the dance'. Thanks for your responses in any case.
Nice review. I have read both Proust and Powell, and I did not find his arguments unreasonable.
I am not sure I agree with you about Powell and his attitudes to patriotism and communism. There are many characters in the Dance who have communist sympathies, and I thought Powell treated them in a sensitive and nuanced way. Some of them are depicted as repellant or foolish, but by no means all.
It’s gratifying to read your positive remark about my review. Thanks!
I was intrigued by your further comment on Powell’s political views toward leftwingers, in which you detect more sensitivity and nuance than suggested in my (perhaps too sweeping) statement about Powell’s anti-communism. You may be on to something that others have overlooked.
For major parts of an AI-generated response to the question “In 'Dance to the Music of Time' how did Anthony Powell portray leftwing or communist characters?” read as follows:
“Anthony Powell presents left wing and communist figures in A Dance to the Music of Time as often self regarding, opportunistic, or crankish, with their politics folded into a wider scepticism about ideological enthusiasm of any kind.
…
“Powell’s narrator Nick Jenkins repeatedly treats “Left Wing thought” as one more early 20th century craze, not far removed from spiritualism or other faddish beliefs. Characters drawn to communism or advanced left politics are usually shown as driven by ego, social ambition, or guilt rather than coherent conviction. The books never become a simple anti communist tract, but they consistently align communism with philistinism and will to power rather than with generosity or justice.
…
“In sum, Powell’s left wing and communist characters are woven into a larger pattern in which ideological commitment, especially to communism, signals a flawed “method of conducting life”: ambitious, humorless, and ultimately self regarding rather than humane.”
…
“Taken as a whole, the twelve novels track a curve from 1930s “progressive” enthusiasm, through wartime and early Cold War recognition of communist totalitarianism, to a later sense that communism has become both discredited and yet spiritually continuous with other extremist credos. Powell’s own anti communist convictions, visible outside the novels in his association with Robert Conquest and Kingsley Amis, sharpen over time and feed into the increasingly caustic depiction of fellow travellers, spies, and party line intellectuals as the historical record of Stalinism and its aftermath accumulates.”
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Carol
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Dec 02, 2022 01:16PM
look forward to your thoughts on this one
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I've read the Powell series twice & find it monumentally compelling, thanks for your review here of the Anderson work
Given your and Anderson's endorsements, it's now harder for me to sit out 'the dance'. Thanks for your responses in any case.
Nice review. I have read both Proust and Powell, and I did not find his arguments unreasonable. I am not sure I agree with you about Powell and his attitudes to patriotism and communism. There are many characters in the Dance who have communist sympathies, and I thought Powell treated them in a sensitive and nuanced way. Some of them are depicted as repellant or foolish, but by no means all.
It’s gratifying to read your positive remark about my review. Thanks!I was intrigued by your further comment on Powell’s political views toward leftwingers, in which you detect more sensitivity and nuance than suggested in my (perhaps too sweeping) statement about Powell’s anti-communism. You may be on to something that others have overlooked.
For major parts of an AI-generated response to the question “In 'Dance to the Music of Time' how did Anthony Powell portray leftwing or communist characters?” read as follows:
“Anthony Powell presents left wing and communist figures in A Dance to the Music of Time as often self regarding, opportunistic, or crankish, with their politics folded into a wider scepticism about ideological enthusiasm of any kind.
…
“Powell’s narrator Nick Jenkins repeatedly treats “Left Wing thought” as one more early 20th century craze, not far removed from spiritualism or other faddish beliefs. Characters drawn to communism or advanced left politics are usually shown as driven by ego, social ambition, or guilt rather than coherent conviction. The books never become a simple anti communist tract, but they consistently align communism with philistinism and will to power rather than with generosity or justice.
…
“In sum, Powell’s left wing and communist characters are woven into a larger pattern in which ideological commitment, especially to communism, signals a flawed “method of conducting life”: ambitious, humorless, and ultimately self regarding rather than humane.”
…
“Taken as a whole, the twelve novels track a curve from 1930s “progressive” enthusiasm, through wartime and early Cold War recognition of communist totalitarianism, to a later sense that communism has become both discredited and yet spiritually continuous with other extremist credos. Powell’s own anti communist convictions, visible outside the novels in his association with Robert Conquest and Kingsley Amis, sharpen over time and feed into the increasingly caustic depiction of fellow travellers, spies, and party line intellectuals as the historical record of Stalinism and its aftermath accumulates.”
