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Parade's End #2
No More Parades
English novelist, Ford's eccentric personality and varied output has been attributed to the obscurity of his achievements. No More Parades is the second book of his four-volume work titled Parade's End. The subject was the world as it culminated in the war; the story centers on Christopher Tietjens, an officer and gentleman, the last English Tory, and follows him from the secure, orderly world of Edwardian England into the chaotic madness of the First World War. Against the backdrop of a world at war, Ford recounts the complex sexual warfare between Tietjens and his faithless wife Sylvia.
242 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1925
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About the author
Ford Madox Ford
474 books374 followersFord Madox Ford was an English novelist, poet, critic and editor whose journals The English Review and The Transatlantic Review were important in the development of early 20th-century English and American literature.
Ford is now remembered for his novels The Good Soldier (1915), the Parade's End tetralogy (1924–1928) and The Fifth Queen trilogy (1906–1908). The Good Soldier is frequently included among the great literature of the 20th century, including the Modern Library 100 Best Novels, The Observer′s "100 Greatest Novels of All Time", and The Guardian′s "1000 novels everyone must read".
Ford is now remembered for his novels The Good Soldier (1915), the Parade's End tetralogy (1924–1928) and The Fifth Queen trilogy (1906–1908). The Good Soldier is frequently included among the great literature of the 20th century, including the Modern Library 100 Best Novels, The Observer′s "100 Greatest Novels of All Time", and The Guardian′s "1000 novels everyone must read".
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March 17, 2014
That is something Ford Madox Ford is quite emphatic about; this war is the end of life as it used to be, and there will be no more parades of any kind—not military, not marital.
In ‘Some Do Not’ we saw Tietjens as he prepared to leave England for his assignment in the war. Now we see him at that job, but not at the front. Instead, his task is to prepare the requisitioned troops to be sent up the line, and his thankless job is to try to outfit the incoming soldiers from the dominions who the English military stores keepers don’t want to help. Once again everyone’s perceptions are the product of prejudice and ill will and it’s impossible to set right a rumor once started; the store keepers are convinced the provincials are reluctant draftees rather than the volunteers they really are.
The book is about evenly divided between Tietjens military and marital trials. FMF is still furious, as he writes several years after the armistice, about the consequences of civilian meddling in military affairs during the war. The meddling runs from the annoying and time wasting—lectures on the causes of the war—to really dangerous, the cutback in rifle training—to the insanely murderous: contemplation back in London of abandoning France, which would have led to mass slaughter of the English troops in a country angry with them for leaving and thus indifferent to whether the Germans wiped them out, especially as the English troops were untrained in how to retreat.
There is repeated reference to a unit being starved of reinforcements at the front so that the general in charge of it will suffer resounding defeat when the weather gets good enough for a German attack. This set up is ‘required’ so that he can be returned to England without causing the politicians there any trouble. This truly devastating indifference to human life is hard to comprehend. FMF’s deft means of bringing it home is to show just one casualty in the whole book: a single soldier serving under Tietjens, who dies in his arms and haunts his thoughts for the next 250 pages. There is a backstory to the event, which keeps the elements of chance and English civilian interference bubbling under everything.
And of course there is Sylvia, also haunting Tietjens. Of course she does evil things, but I think Ford mostly wants you to feel her mad frustration. What does Ford think about her? Is it her character, that needs drama and conflict more than she needs food and water to survive? Her Catholic upbringing and girl’s school culture? Lack of anything productive to do? All of the above? Does she love Tietjens or just lust for him?
There are several really wonderful characters here, from Tietjens’s lunatic Scottish tent mate to his wise old seargeant-major to the delightful Colonel Levin, who develops from a seeming wimp to a true friend. And Sylvia’s slimy Perowne reappears. The French characters, in a brief scence, are very French--in the way you would expect an Englishman of FMF’s class to portray them.
We are bordering on Tietjens becoming a bit too Christlike, but FMF steers it more explicitly toward the schoolboy who still believes in schoolboy codes. Also, there is more suggestion that his forbearance in his marriage, although very much due to his abhorrence of exposing his private life to public view, is also due to protecting his son from a scandalous story. A few slant references raise questions about whether there is something in Tietjens own family background that will explain some of this.
Of Valentine, we hear nothing.
In ‘Some Do Not’ we saw Tietjens as he prepared to leave England for his assignment in the war. Now we see him at that job, but not at the front. Instead, his task is to prepare the requisitioned troops to be sent up the line, and his thankless job is to try to outfit the incoming soldiers from the dominions who the English military stores keepers don’t want to help. Once again everyone’s perceptions are the product of prejudice and ill will and it’s impossible to set right a rumor once started; the store keepers are convinced the provincials are reluctant draftees rather than the volunteers they really are.
The book is about evenly divided between Tietjens military and marital trials. FMF is still furious, as he writes several years after the armistice, about the consequences of civilian meddling in military affairs during the war. The meddling runs from the annoying and time wasting—lectures on the causes of the war—to really dangerous, the cutback in rifle training—to the insanely murderous: contemplation back in London of abandoning France, which would have led to mass slaughter of the English troops in a country angry with them for leaving and thus indifferent to whether the Germans wiped them out, especially as the English troops were untrained in how to retreat.
There is repeated reference to a unit being starved of reinforcements at the front so that the general in charge of it will suffer resounding defeat when the weather gets good enough for a German attack. This set up is ‘required’ so that he can be returned to England without causing the politicians there any trouble. This truly devastating indifference to human life is hard to comprehend. FMF’s deft means of bringing it home is to show just one casualty in the whole book: a single soldier serving under Tietjens, who dies in his arms and haunts his thoughts for the next 250 pages. There is a backstory to the event, which keeps the elements of chance and English civilian interference bubbling under everything.
And of course there is Sylvia, also haunting Tietjens. Of course she does evil things, but I think Ford mostly wants you to feel her mad frustration. What does Ford think about her? Is it her character, that needs drama and conflict more than she needs food and water to survive? Her Catholic upbringing and girl’s school culture? Lack of anything productive to do? All of the above? Does she love Tietjens or just lust for him?
There are several really wonderful characters here, from Tietjens’s lunatic Scottish tent mate to his wise old seargeant-major to the delightful Colonel Levin, who develops from a seeming wimp to a true friend. And Sylvia’s slimy Perowne reappears. The French characters, in a brief scence, are very French--in the way you would expect an Englishman of FMF’s class to portray them.
We are bordering on Tietjens becoming a bit too Christlike, but FMF steers it more explicitly toward the schoolboy who still believes in schoolboy codes. Also, there is more suggestion that his forbearance in his marriage, although very much due to his abhorrence of exposing his private life to public view, is also due to protecting his son from a scandalous story. A few slant references raise questions about whether there is something in Tietjens own family background that will explain some of this.
Of Valentine, we hear nothing.
December 21, 2024
Second time with Parade’s end for me, first with these editions. They are to be recommended above all others. The most obvious reason being they retain FMF’s original swearing by this solders which become dashes or blanks in all other versions, completely neutering the realism.
More generally, this tetralogy is not just one of the greatest novels of WW1, but one of the great books of the first half of the 20thc full stop.
More generally, this tetralogy is not just one of the greatest novels of WW1, but one of the great books of the first half of the 20thc full stop.
March 31, 2016
I wonder if these books actually work better read aloud than reading them on the page. It can be quite hard working out sometimes whether an individual is speaking aloud to others, or thinking to himself, and I found myself needing to reread passages to clarify this.
The book covers the period of a couple of days of Christopher's life in the midst of the Great War and gives some idea of how maddening the whole experience must have been, both in terms of horror and also in the constant changing of orders about the movement of troops. It is a wonder that anyone involved survived with any sanity left.
Sylvia's viciousness is given free rein, as she manages to turn up in France and cause even greater turmoil in Christopher's life than the Germans or the British commanders, which is quite a feat.
I shall continue reading the tetralogy, but need a break from it!
The book covers the period of a couple of days of Christopher's life in the midst of the Great War and gives some idea of how maddening the whole experience must have been, both in terms of horror and also in the constant changing of orders about the movement of troops. It is a wonder that anyone involved survived with any sanity left.
Sylvia's viciousness is given free rein, as she manages to turn up in France and cause even greater turmoil in Christopher's life than the Germans or the British commanders, which is quite a feat.
I shall continue reading the tetralogy, but need a break from it!
July 18, 2019
The series started slow for me but now I am all in. This covers the same time period as "Downton Abbey". There is WWI foxhole description from the Allied point of view and an unconsummated love affair.
October 23, 2018
Disappointed; but perhaps that’s just me. One hundred years of literary activity have created an expectation of what a WWI novel should be: although written in the shadow of that war by an ex-combatant this does not conform to those expectations.
The first book of the series seemed to set up a corrupt and decadent civilisation on the brink of disaster: Book two (this one) to me should therefore cover that disaster. However, Ford just repeats the drawing-room melodrama of Book one but now against the backdrop of the thundering guns on the Western front. The result seems ultimately to trivialise the war - or maybe this effect was part of Ford’s objective?
I’m annoyed with Tietjens, annoyed with Sylvia - cannot be annoyed with Valentine as she does not appear in this book. However, I know from my experience of The Good Soldier Ford requires huge amounts of patience and super-aware reading, so no doubt my responses will develop throughout books three and four.
He writes astonishingly, and with such control. He carefully, indirectly, builds up a devastating picture of British incompetence and chaos, but not one which is foregrounded.
The first book of the series seemed to set up a corrupt and decadent civilisation on the brink of disaster: Book two (this one) to me should therefore cover that disaster. However, Ford just repeats the drawing-room melodrama of Book one but now against the backdrop of the thundering guns on the Western front. The result seems ultimately to trivialise the war - or maybe this effect was part of Ford’s objective?
I’m annoyed with Tietjens, annoyed with Sylvia - cannot be annoyed with Valentine as she does not appear in this book. However, I know from my experience of The Good Soldier Ford requires huge amounts of patience and super-aware reading, so no doubt my responses will develop throughout books three and four.
He writes astonishingly, and with such control. He carefully, indirectly, builds up a devastating picture of British incompetence and chaos, but not one which is foregrounded.
March 14, 2022
Free download available at Project Gutenberg
I made the proofing of this book for Free Literature and Project Gutenberg will publish it.
I made the proofing of this book for Free Literature and Project Gutenberg will publish it.
July 11, 2014
Free download available at eBooks@Adelaide.
Opening lines:
When you came in the space was desultory, rectangular, warm after the drip of the winter night, and transfused with a brown-orange dust that was light.
It is becoming better and better....
The sequel of this book is A Man Could Stand UP.
Opening lines:
When you came in the space was desultory, rectangular, warm after the drip of the winter night, and transfused with a brown-orange dust that was light.
It is becoming better and better....
The sequel of this book is A Man Could Stand UP.
August 26, 2012
It is clear that the second part of Ford's four novel sequence Parade's End is of pivotal important to the quartet even before starting to read it, because it provides the title for the series as a whole. It covers only a short period, a few days in the middle of the First World War; their importance is that they are a high water mark in Sylvia Tietjens' bad treatment of her husband.
The events of the novel illuminate Sylvia's character more than Christopher's, and show the reader the reasons behind her actions much more sympathetically and fully than in Some Do Not.... What she actually does her it to travel to the war zone in France without papers and attempt to cause a fight between Christopher and one of her ex-lovers, while continuing to spread the baseless rumour that Christopher has a hidden child by another woman. This all takes place at Christopher's unit, behind the Western Front.
The basic motivation behind her actions is to force a reaction from her husband, whose determination to maintain "normal" relations with Sylvia will not even permit him to have a row with her. She obviously causes him a great deal of difficulty and distress, but never has the satisfaction of causing him to break down in public.
If Christopher Tietjens is meant to represent the idea of the English gentleman, an obvious question to raise is what does Sylvia symbolise? It seems to be something like Britain itself, a country which exploited the best of its upper class with the First World War being the final betrayal of any true decency that still existed. (And, despite all the hypocrisy of the Victorian age, there was much to admire.) The title itself could be seen as a reference to this idea. The only way in which the government were prepared for the war, so far as Tietjens knew, was to come up with a ritual to use in demobilisation: after a band played, an adjutant would say, "There will be no more parades". This utterly fatuous way to plan for four years of grisly death, the decimation of the male youth and the overturning of the foundations of society has a deeper meaning that Ford skilfully brings out: things will be changed by the war; pomp and circumstance (the music the band plays is Land of Hope and Glory) will no longer be important as the old order is overthrown. This is a double sided coin, of course, for it does not just mean the destruction of the cruelty and fickleness of Sylvia but also of the virtue and decency of Christopher.
December 17, 2022
No More Parades is a part of a tetralogy of novels about the First World War by the English writer Ford Madox Ford. His reputation might be less significant now than fifty years ago, possibly because, like others of his generation, he bore the assumptions of supremacy and empire that are currently - and deservedly - out of fashion. There remains in such writers as Ford Madox Ford, John Galsworthy, George Meredith, however, much that is both interesting and engaging for the modern reader, and not merely because their work offers a window into the psyche of its particular time.
No More Parades was published in 1925, the better part of a decade after the end of the war. The author, therefore, had several years to reflect on the experience. Time, it seemed, had not reduced the horror that was still embedded in the collective and personal memories of the participants. The author, clearly, was not alone in expressing them. An act of violence might be completed in seconds, but the scars last a lifetime.
In summary, No More Parades concentrates on the life and experience of Christopher Tietjens, who is an English officer with Belgian heritage. He is constantly having to justify his identity against assumptions that he might be more French than English, despite his name actually being more Flemish.
In part one of the book, we are at work with Tietjens, who is going about the business of war, managing resources with limited supplies. His frustration with the British establishment, of which he is in fact part, is obvious and explicit, but equally, his status as an officer and a gentleman, a member of the propertied classes, is never in question. Tietjens’s day changes when a Welshman by his side, 09 Morgan, is hit in the face and dies, bleeding profusely in his arms. There was no threat here, nothing to justify this individual soldier being singled out by a lethal projectile, just a collective identity that had to be collectively opposed.
Part two of the book moves the focus to examine the personal life of Christopher Tietjens, and especially that of his wife, Sylvia. Modern readers might not identify easily with Ford’s depiction of this woman, who seems totally bound up with her own needs and desires, to the extent that she almost seems to deny that the rest of the world is at war. Let’s call her selfish. She is, however, by the common consent of every eligible male, quite stunningly beautiful, attractive to the point of distraction. She has been estranged, if that’s the right word, from her husband since 1912 and has conducted an open affair with one Perowne, an officer known to her husband. Christopher Tietjens has had his own liaison with a woman called Valentine Wannop, though he seems unable to pin down even himself when it comes to describing the nature of their relationship. Complications abound, not least in that there’s a property to inherit and professional relationships to be maintained. Mistaken identity, perhaps, leads Tietjens eventually to strike Perowne.
Then, in part three, it all turn rather putrid because Tietjen’s position has to be reviewed in the light of complex relationships that span private and professional life. An interested superior has to decide his new posting. Personal history, professional status and more mean that Christopher Tietjents must choose between a rock and a hard place, the potential disgrace of a court martial or a posting to the front on active service. Faces, if not lives, are saved.
Reading around the book and its author, it becomes patently clear that No More Parades relies heavily on autobiographical elements. Ford Madox Ford grew up with the family name of his father, which was the German “Heuffer”. He suffered, he tells us, from the same complexity of identity that Christopher Tietjens experiences. The author changed his name. Tietjens has marital complications. So did the author. Tietjens served in the war. So did the author. Christopher Tietjens criticises the British establishment, characterising it as often incompetent, driven by social class and unable even to recognise its own weaknesses. So did the author, albeit from his own privilege, as so often is the case.
And thus, No More Parades is transformed from a wartime exploration of class, privilege and identity to a more personal statement than its surface and setting might suggest.
No More Parades was published in 1925, the better part of a decade after the end of the war. The author, therefore, had several years to reflect on the experience. Time, it seemed, had not reduced the horror that was still embedded in the collective and personal memories of the participants. The author, clearly, was not alone in expressing them. An act of violence might be completed in seconds, but the scars last a lifetime.
In summary, No More Parades concentrates on the life and experience of Christopher Tietjens, who is an English officer with Belgian heritage. He is constantly having to justify his identity against assumptions that he might be more French than English, despite his name actually being more Flemish.
In part one of the book, we are at work with Tietjens, who is going about the business of war, managing resources with limited supplies. His frustration with the British establishment, of which he is in fact part, is obvious and explicit, but equally, his status as an officer and a gentleman, a member of the propertied classes, is never in question. Tietjens’s day changes when a Welshman by his side, 09 Morgan, is hit in the face and dies, bleeding profusely in his arms. There was no threat here, nothing to justify this individual soldier being singled out by a lethal projectile, just a collective identity that had to be collectively opposed.
Part two of the book moves the focus to examine the personal life of Christopher Tietjens, and especially that of his wife, Sylvia. Modern readers might not identify easily with Ford’s depiction of this woman, who seems totally bound up with her own needs and desires, to the extent that she almost seems to deny that the rest of the world is at war. Let’s call her selfish. She is, however, by the common consent of every eligible male, quite stunningly beautiful, attractive to the point of distraction. She has been estranged, if that’s the right word, from her husband since 1912 and has conducted an open affair with one Perowne, an officer known to her husband. Christopher Tietjens has had his own liaison with a woman called Valentine Wannop, though he seems unable to pin down even himself when it comes to describing the nature of their relationship. Complications abound, not least in that there’s a property to inherit and professional relationships to be maintained. Mistaken identity, perhaps, leads Tietjens eventually to strike Perowne.
Then, in part three, it all turn rather putrid because Tietjen’s position has to be reviewed in the light of complex relationships that span private and professional life. An interested superior has to decide his new posting. Personal history, professional status and more mean that Christopher Tietjents must choose between a rock and a hard place, the potential disgrace of a court martial or a posting to the front on active service. Faces, if not lives, are saved.
Reading around the book and its author, it becomes patently clear that No More Parades relies heavily on autobiographical elements. Ford Madox Ford grew up with the family name of his father, which was the German “Heuffer”. He suffered, he tells us, from the same complexity of identity that Christopher Tietjens experiences. The author changed his name. Tietjens has marital complications. So did the author. Tietjens served in the war. So did the author. Christopher Tietjens criticises the British establishment, characterising it as often incompetent, driven by social class and unable even to recognise its own weaknesses. So did the author, albeit from his own privilege, as so often is the case.
And thus, No More Parades is transformed from a wartime exploration of class, privilege and identity to a more personal statement than its surface and setting might suggest.
April 25, 2014
*REVIEW FOR PARADE'S END TETROLOGY.
Parade’s End, by Ford Madox Ford. First published as a series of books, Some Do Not…, No More Parades, A Man Could Stand Up–, and The Last Post, in the 1920s. I read the Vintage edition of all four stories together, published in 1950/1978.
All authors have their overused words. For Rowling in the Potter series, it was “pant.” For Rowling later on, it was all about “thick legs.” For me, it seems to be “face” or “gaze.” For Tolstoy, it was “superfluous” (at least in translation). And for Ford, well, he has a number of them, which at times he is doing on purpose. The worst one, by far, is “lachrymose.” If I have to read “lachrymose” one more time…
This book is a tetralogy. Ford, in fact, never saw it as the omnibus Parade’s End, even though he suggested the title. However, when Graham Greene did a release of it many years ago, he left off the last book, saying that Ford himself wrote The Last Post superfluously (tee hee) and that he later regretted its inclusion. I was, therefore, torn between reading it as a trilogy or in its entirety. It helped that I had a terrible time getting through it at all. I left it at the trilogy. Many Parade fans would be appalled, for even though the last book is supposedly very different, it does have its proponents. Okay, I’ll admit, I skimmed it, and nothing called out to me.
This is another one of those books listed without fail in the top one hundred best books, wherever you might find that list. It has been called the greatest war novel(s) of all time, as well as the best of the 20th century. It does not have the large base of obsessive followers as many of the other chart-toppers (Anna Karenina, The Great Gatsby, Don Quixote, etc.), and it is clear why. It is a difficult read. Or, in the words of some article I read months ago and can not now find, it is a dying novel. Sure, it has themes and stories that could transcend, but its language and literary devices are wearing thin.
The writing style is somewhere between stream-of-consciousness and chunky time jumps (backwards and forwards). Ford’s writing is replete with repeated words and phrases, amazingly sustained run-on sentences, and ellipses. (If ellipses vex you, I beg you not to pick up this book.) Particular moments in time are relived again and again, the whole 730 dense pages adding up to maybe a total of ten actual scenes. Points are driven into the reader’s head until it’s simply buzzing. I believe all of this comes from the stream-of-consciousness thing, and it’s a style I have a very hard time enjoying. Perhaps it’s because I don’t think in meandering tirades of words. I think in pictures. Meandering, messy, repetitive tirades of words are tiresome to me.
And yet I can appreciate many things about this novel(s). You are really able to get in to a couple of the character’s heads. The characters, in general, are extremely finely drawn. So is leftover Victorian England. So is war, or at least WWI. You’ve got this great love triangle, and an exploration of fresh topics, like one’s upbringing and theories versus their passion and circumstances. And Sylivia? She’s just one big train wreck of a personality disorder, and I heartily enjoyed reading her on tenterhooks.
But I found myself wishing, very frequently, that Ford’s writing style had been very, very different. I appreciate his care and perspective; I can’t tolerate his voice. I want to play editor, and demand that he cut the whole thing by at least half, re-order it into sequential events, and flesh out a few of the supporting characters and subplots. Plus, give us more action! Then, I’m afraid, the whole thing would be dead, a mangled, lifeless thing, the harrowing tension gone. Which is what the book is, really: a very tight winding in the distinct voice of the times.
Not a re-read for me. Can’t say I regret having read it. It took me forever. If I was forced to choose one to re-read, it would definitely be A Man Could Stand Up–, which has some achingly beautiful language and moments.
__________
I had decided to move this book up on my queue when I saw that the new British TV series was written by Tom Stoppard. (For Stoppard reviews, see here and here.) Of course, Cumberbatch fever helped.
I ended up watching the whole five-part series while I was on a break from reading the novel, which has confused me considerably. From what I can recall, the series is a great representation of the novel(s). It has that sort of fractured, in-his-head, finely-drawn characters feel, and it covers just about all the scenes, at least in the middle two books. There were some plot changes that I am not sure about. It could have been that I misunderstood something. It could have been that not reading the last book put me at a disadvantage. It could have been Stoppard added things for translation into movie. Plus, for a book which gathers most of its sexual steam by being definitively demure, the series was a bit too overtly sexy for itself.
Otherwise, fans of British TV and/or Cumberbatch will be happy with this series. It is true, as has been widely said, that he does a great job acting, as does Rebecca Hall. I can imagine these were two of the most difficult characters to play, of all time, which may be why Parade’s End doesn’t seem to have hit the big or small screen until now. Beautiful cinematography, fun costumes. Enjoyable, at the very least, for anyone who tolerates period films.
__________
“…the oddnesses of friendships are a frequent guarantee of their lasting texture” (p5).
“Such calamities are the will of God. A gentleman accepts them” (p12).
“Disasters come to men through drink, gambling, and women” (p14).
“…you live beside a man and notice his changes very little” (p17).
“Damn it. What’s the sense of all these attempts to justify fornication?” (p18).
“It’s the tradition, so it’s right” (p18).
(About England:) “We’re always, as it were, committing adultery–like your fellow–with the name of Heaven on our lips” (p21).
“The gods to each ascribe a differing lot: / Some enter at the portal. Some do not!” (p24).
“But Sister Mary of the Cross at the convent had a maxim: ‘Wear velvet gloves in family life.’ We seem to be going at it with the gloves off” (p41).
“‘What’s to stop it?’ the priest asked. “‘What in the world but the grace of our blessed Lord, which he hasn’t got and doesn’t ask for?’” (p45).
“Cats and monkeys. Monkeys and cats. All humanity is there” (p85).
“‘It’s the person who does the thing he’s afraid of who’s the real hero, isn’t it?” (p88).
“I could harangue the whole crowd when I got them together. But speak to one man in cold blood I couldn’t’” (p89).
“In every man there are two minds that work side by side, the one checking the other; thus emotion stands against reason, intellect corrects passion…” (p93).
“Who knows what sins of his own are heavily punishable in the eyes of God, for God is just?” (p129).
“I shall write in my bedroom on my knee. I’m a woman and can. You’re a man and have to have a padded chair and sanctuary…” (p132).
“It was as if for a moment destiny, which usually let him creep past somehow, had looked at him” (p147).
“Obviously he might survive; but after that tremendous physical drilling what survived would not be himself, but a man with cleaned, sand-dried bones” (p200).
“If you hunch your shoulders too long against a storm your shoulders will grow bowed…” (p201).
“He considered that, with a third of his brain in action, he was over a match for Mark, but he was tired of discussions” (p216).
“This civilization had contrived a state of things in which leaves rotted by August. Well, it was doomed!” (p232).
“No! ‘Pasteurized’ was the word! Like dead milk. Robbed of their vitamins…” (p294).
“An enormous crashing sound said things of an intolerable intimacy to each of those men, and to all of them as a body” (p315).
“The distrust of the home Cabinet, felt by then by the greater part of that army, became like physical pain” (p320).
“‘If you let yourself go,’ Tietjens said, ‘you may let yourself go a tidy sight father than you want to’” (p325).
“He used the world hell as if he had first wrapped it in eau-de-Cologned cotton-wadding” (p348).
“‘Don’t think I’m insulting you. You appear to be a very decent fellow. But very decent fellows have gone absent’” (p364).
“The man looked you straight in the eyes. But a strong passion, like that for escape–or a girl–will give you control over the muscles” (p364).
“English people of good passion consider that the basis of all marital unions or disunions, is the maxim: No scenes” (p368).
“He would, literally, rather be dead than an open book” (p368).
“…she had seemed a mere white phosphorescence…” (p370).
“You cannot force your mind to a deliberate, consecutive recollection” (p371).
“My wife must have been more aware of my feelings for Miss Wannop than was I myself” (p373).
“Obviously he was not immune from the seven deadly sins” (p377).
“One reserved the right so to do and to take the consequences” (p377).
“That whole land was to be annihilated as a sacrifice to one vanity” (p386).
“The world was foundering” (p387).
“But it’s better to go to heaven with your skin shining and master of your limbs” (p390).
“…he might be just in time for the last train to the old heaven…” (p394).
“The French were as a rule more gloomy than men and women are expected to be” (p437).
“You cannot keep up fits of emotion by the hour” (p436).
“They wanted the war won by men who would at the end be either humiliated or dead. Or both. Except, naturally, their own cousins or fiancee’s relatives” (p533).
“…the telephone began, for Valentine, to assume an aspect that, years ago it had used to have–of being part of the supernatural paraphernalia of inscrutable Destiny” (p543).
“…flee away and eat pomegranates beside an infinite washtub of Reckitt’s blue” (p546).
“You had to keep them–the Girls, the Populace, everybody!–in hand now, for once you let go there was no knowing where They, like waters parted from the seas, mightn’t carry You” (p551).
“To save three thousand, two hundred pounds, not to mention interest–which was what Vincent owed him!–Edith Ethel with the sweetest possible smile would beg the pillows off a whole hospital ward full of dying …. She was quite right. She had to save her man. You go to any depths of ignominy to save your man” (p570).
“‘I didn’t consciously want to bother you but a spirit in my feel has made me who knows how …. That’s Shelley, isn’t it?” (p571).
“Then… What should keep them apart? …. Middle Class Morality? A pretty gory carnival that had been for the last four years!” (p576).
“If people wanted your to appreciate items of sledge-hammering news they should not use long sentences” (p578).
“Thoughts menaced him as clouds threaten the heads of mountains” (p588).
“Probably because they–the painters–drew from living models or had ideas as to the human form …. But these were not limbs, muscles, torsi. Collections of tubular shapes in field-grey or mud-colour they were. Chucked about by Almighty God? As if He had dropped them from on high to make them flatten into the earth” (p594).
“How the devil had that fellow managed to get smashed into that shape? It was improbable” (p597).
“In the trench you could see nothing and noise rushed like black angels gone mad; solid noise that swept you off your feet …. Swept your brain off its feet” (p602).
“You imagined that the heavenly powers in decency suspended their activities at such moments. But there was positively lightning. They didn’t!” (p603).
“It appeared to him queer that they should be behaving like that when you could hear… oh, say, the winds of the angel of death ….” (p622).
“But Great General Staff likes to exchange these witticisms in iron. And a little blood!” (p655).
*REVIEW WRITTEN FOR THE STARVING ARTIST BLOG
Parade’s End, by Ford Madox Ford. First published as a series of books, Some Do Not…, No More Parades, A Man Could Stand Up–, and The Last Post, in the 1920s. I read the Vintage edition of all four stories together, published in 1950/1978.
All authors have their overused words. For Rowling in the Potter series, it was “pant.” For Rowling later on, it was all about “thick legs.” For me, it seems to be “face” or “gaze.” For Tolstoy, it was “superfluous” (at least in translation). And for Ford, well, he has a number of them, which at times he is doing on purpose. The worst one, by far, is “lachrymose.” If I have to read “lachrymose” one more time…
This book is a tetralogy. Ford, in fact, never saw it as the omnibus Parade’s End, even though he suggested the title. However, when Graham Greene did a release of it many years ago, he left off the last book, saying that Ford himself wrote The Last Post superfluously (tee hee) and that he later regretted its inclusion. I was, therefore, torn between reading it as a trilogy or in its entirety. It helped that I had a terrible time getting through it at all. I left it at the trilogy. Many Parade fans would be appalled, for even though the last book is supposedly very different, it does have its proponents. Okay, I’ll admit, I skimmed it, and nothing called out to me.
This is another one of those books listed without fail in the top one hundred best books, wherever you might find that list. It has been called the greatest war novel(s) of all time, as well as the best of the 20th century. It does not have the large base of obsessive followers as many of the other chart-toppers (Anna Karenina, The Great Gatsby, Don Quixote, etc.), and it is clear why. It is a difficult read. Or, in the words of some article I read months ago and can not now find, it is a dying novel. Sure, it has themes and stories that could transcend, but its language and literary devices are wearing thin.
The writing style is somewhere between stream-of-consciousness and chunky time jumps (backwards and forwards). Ford’s writing is replete with repeated words and phrases, amazingly sustained run-on sentences, and ellipses. (If ellipses vex you, I beg you not to pick up this book.) Particular moments in time are relived again and again, the whole 730 dense pages adding up to maybe a total of ten actual scenes. Points are driven into the reader’s head until it’s simply buzzing. I believe all of this comes from the stream-of-consciousness thing, and it’s a style I have a very hard time enjoying. Perhaps it’s because I don’t think in meandering tirades of words. I think in pictures. Meandering, messy, repetitive tirades of words are tiresome to me.
And yet I can appreciate many things about this novel(s). You are really able to get in to a couple of the character’s heads. The characters, in general, are extremely finely drawn. So is leftover Victorian England. So is war, or at least WWI. You’ve got this great love triangle, and an exploration of fresh topics, like one’s upbringing and theories versus their passion and circumstances. And Sylivia? She’s just one big train wreck of a personality disorder, and I heartily enjoyed reading her on tenterhooks.
But I found myself wishing, very frequently, that Ford’s writing style had been very, very different. I appreciate his care and perspective; I can’t tolerate his voice. I want to play editor, and demand that he cut the whole thing by at least half, re-order it into sequential events, and flesh out a few of the supporting characters and subplots. Plus, give us more action! Then, I’m afraid, the whole thing would be dead, a mangled, lifeless thing, the harrowing tension gone. Which is what the book is, really: a very tight winding in the distinct voice of the times.
Not a re-read for me. Can’t say I regret having read it. It took me forever. If I was forced to choose one to re-read, it would definitely be A Man Could Stand Up–, which has some achingly beautiful language and moments.
__________
I had decided to move this book up on my queue when I saw that the new British TV series was written by Tom Stoppard. (For Stoppard reviews, see here and here.) Of course, Cumberbatch fever helped.
I ended up watching the whole five-part series while I was on a break from reading the novel, which has confused me considerably. From what I can recall, the series is a great representation of the novel(s). It has that sort of fractured, in-his-head, finely-drawn characters feel, and it covers just about all the scenes, at least in the middle two books. There were some plot changes that I am not sure about. It could have been that I misunderstood something. It could have been that not reading the last book put me at a disadvantage. It could have been Stoppard added things for translation into movie. Plus, for a book which gathers most of its sexual steam by being definitively demure, the series was a bit too overtly sexy for itself.
Otherwise, fans of British TV and/or Cumberbatch will be happy with this series. It is true, as has been widely said, that he does a great job acting, as does Rebecca Hall. I can imagine these were two of the most difficult characters to play, of all time, which may be why Parade’s End doesn’t seem to have hit the big or small screen until now. Beautiful cinematography, fun costumes. Enjoyable, at the very least, for anyone who tolerates period films.
__________
“…the oddnesses of friendships are a frequent guarantee of their lasting texture” (p5).
“Such calamities are the will of God. A gentleman accepts them” (p12).
“Disasters come to men through drink, gambling, and women” (p14).
“…you live beside a man and notice his changes very little” (p17).
“Damn it. What’s the sense of all these attempts to justify fornication?” (p18).
“It’s the tradition, so it’s right” (p18).
(About England:) “We’re always, as it were, committing adultery–like your fellow–with the name of Heaven on our lips” (p21).
“The gods to each ascribe a differing lot: / Some enter at the portal. Some do not!” (p24).
“But Sister Mary of the Cross at the convent had a maxim: ‘Wear velvet gloves in family life.’ We seem to be going at it with the gloves off” (p41).
“‘What’s to stop it?’ the priest asked. “‘What in the world but the grace of our blessed Lord, which he hasn’t got and doesn’t ask for?’” (p45).
“Cats and monkeys. Monkeys and cats. All humanity is there” (p85).
“‘It’s the person who does the thing he’s afraid of who’s the real hero, isn’t it?” (p88).
“I could harangue the whole crowd when I got them together. But speak to one man in cold blood I couldn’t’” (p89).
“In every man there are two minds that work side by side, the one checking the other; thus emotion stands against reason, intellect corrects passion…” (p93).
“Who knows what sins of his own are heavily punishable in the eyes of God, for God is just?” (p129).
“I shall write in my bedroom on my knee. I’m a woman and can. You’re a man and have to have a padded chair and sanctuary…” (p132).
“It was as if for a moment destiny, which usually let him creep past somehow, had looked at him” (p147).
“Obviously he might survive; but after that tremendous physical drilling what survived would not be himself, but a man with cleaned, sand-dried bones” (p200).
“If you hunch your shoulders too long against a storm your shoulders will grow bowed…” (p201).
“He considered that, with a third of his brain in action, he was over a match for Mark, but he was tired of discussions” (p216).
“This civilization had contrived a state of things in which leaves rotted by August. Well, it was doomed!” (p232).
“No! ‘Pasteurized’ was the word! Like dead milk. Robbed of their vitamins…” (p294).
“An enormous crashing sound said things of an intolerable intimacy to each of those men, and to all of them as a body” (p315).
“The distrust of the home Cabinet, felt by then by the greater part of that army, became like physical pain” (p320).
“‘If you let yourself go,’ Tietjens said, ‘you may let yourself go a tidy sight father than you want to’” (p325).
“He used the world hell as if he had first wrapped it in eau-de-Cologned cotton-wadding” (p348).
“‘Don’t think I’m insulting you. You appear to be a very decent fellow. But very decent fellows have gone absent’” (p364).
“The man looked you straight in the eyes. But a strong passion, like that for escape–or a girl–will give you control over the muscles” (p364).
“English people of good passion consider that the basis of all marital unions or disunions, is the maxim: No scenes” (p368).
“He would, literally, rather be dead than an open book” (p368).
“…she had seemed a mere white phosphorescence…” (p370).
“You cannot force your mind to a deliberate, consecutive recollection” (p371).
“My wife must have been more aware of my feelings for Miss Wannop than was I myself” (p373).
“Obviously he was not immune from the seven deadly sins” (p377).
“One reserved the right so to do and to take the consequences” (p377).
“That whole land was to be annihilated as a sacrifice to one vanity” (p386).
“The world was foundering” (p387).
“But it’s better to go to heaven with your skin shining and master of your limbs” (p390).
“…he might be just in time for the last train to the old heaven…” (p394).
“The French were as a rule more gloomy than men and women are expected to be” (p437).
“You cannot keep up fits of emotion by the hour” (p436).
“They wanted the war won by men who would at the end be either humiliated or dead. Or both. Except, naturally, their own cousins or fiancee’s relatives” (p533).
“…the telephone began, for Valentine, to assume an aspect that, years ago it had used to have–of being part of the supernatural paraphernalia of inscrutable Destiny” (p543).
“…flee away and eat pomegranates beside an infinite washtub of Reckitt’s blue” (p546).
“You had to keep them–the Girls, the Populace, everybody!–in hand now, for once you let go there was no knowing where They, like waters parted from the seas, mightn’t carry You” (p551).
“To save three thousand, two hundred pounds, not to mention interest–which was what Vincent owed him!–Edith Ethel with the sweetest possible smile would beg the pillows off a whole hospital ward full of dying …. She was quite right. She had to save her man. You go to any depths of ignominy to save your man” (p570).
“‘I didn’t consciously want to bother you but a spirit in my feel has made me who knows how …. That’s Shelley, isn’t it?” (p571).
“Then… What should keep them apart? …. Middle Class Morality? A pretty gory carnival that had been for the last four years!” (p576).
“If people wanted your to appreciate items of sledge-hammering news they should not use long sentences” (p578).
“Thoughts menaced him as clouds threaten the heads of mountains” (p588).
“Probably because they–the painters–drew from living models or had ideas as to the human form …. But these were not limbs, muscles, torsi. Collections of tubular shapes in field-grey or mud-colour they were. Chucked about by Almighty God? As if He had dropped them from on high to make them flatten into the earth” (p594).
“How the devil had that fellow managed to get smashed into that shape? It was improbable” (p597).
“In the trench you could see nothing and noise rushed like black angels gone mad; solid noise that swept you off your feet …. Swept your brain off its feet” (p602).
“You imagined that the heavenly powers in decency suspended their activities at such moments. But there was positively lightning. They didn’t!” (p603).
“It appeared to him queer that they should be behaving like that when you could hear… oh, say, the winds of the angel of death ….” (p622).
“But Great General Staff likes to exchange these witticisms in iron. And a little blood!” (p655).
*REVIEW WRITTEN FOR THE STARVING ARTIST BLOG
July 30, 2025
No More Parades by Ford Madox Ford
Another version of this note and thoughts on other books are available at:
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list...
Christopher Tietjens is the Übermensch.
This is the lasting impression I have after reading the second tome of Parade’s End by the stupendous Ford Madox Ford…
For this reader, Christopher Tietjens is a complex character.
Like the Übermensch in the propositions advanced by Nietzsche, which had many flaws, the protagonist of No More Parades is a complex Superman that only qualifies him as a superhero for a limited fan club.
The hero is a genius, with a brilliant mind.
He is the only one capable to understand, use and fix the numbers in the statistics department of his Majesty’s Government.
In war, he acts with exemplary discipline, dedication, sense of duty and honor, taken to some extremes.
There is a moment when he is training or supervising soldiers under his command and his attitude appears farfetched.
Yet, like always with this Superhero, there is a good sensible reason for his insistence on an overbearing exercise
If they reach the gates of Paradise- and a good number in this heinous conflict will- the Supreme Deity will see clean and organized men.
His attitude towards his wife has an Angelique, otherworldly quality about it, although he can be as cold as ice.
Indeed, Sylvia played for me the role of the dark angel, a villain that is cheating on the hero and tormenting him.
Until I realized I might be very wrong.
The wife of the protagonist might be in love with an insensitive man that she tries desperately to entice and seduce.
Having to do with an exceptional character, who is extraordinary in his abilities to work with numbers, understand so many aspects of life, prove bravery, honesty, generosity and an indifference to worldly possessions, Sylvia Tietjens must play an extreme game.
Her philandering is a manifestation of yet another complicated, hard for me to understand personage, but one which seems to try and get her husband back…
So to say.
It is true that I have been overwhelmed and annoyed often by the idiosyncrasies of a woman that takes lovers, if only to tease and torment them in turn, then dispatches a supposed lover of her spouse- and I thought why not let him be, unless she is really head over heels…but here we may have a situation wherein one allows oneself acts that one does not accept for others.
But Sylvia tells general Campion that her husband is a…socialist.
The general is not amused and in fact takes this statement so seriously as to consider excluding Christian from his will.
When told about this, the hero is first inclined, in jesting, to accept this preposterous accusation to avoid an inheritance that he does not want- after all, he refused to take advantage of his rights as heir after his father died- and then he goes as far as to protect and explain the position of his wife in a baffling manner.
I hate communism and left wing systems and I would have been mad.
In another instance, when his wife is in a restaurant room with his lover, instead of showing any dissatisfaction or aggression, this Superman tries to be as cavalier as to defy ordinary people’s feelings and pretends not to see them, so as to avoid embarrassment for her.
He is as composed and unaffected as possible.
Or so it seems.
To end with another positive aspect… what a name the author has:
- Ford Madox Ford!
- I love it
I’d name a child Madox and since there would be no more but I have children with fur and feathers and their number increases, the next one might be called Madox
Or maybe Tietjens, albeit that is rather difficult and unusual.
Another version of this note and thoughts on other books are available at:
- https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list...
Christopher Tietjens is the Übermensch.
This is the lasting impression I have after reading the second tome of Parade’s End by the stupendous Ford Madox Ford…
For this reader, Christopher Tietjens is a complex character.
Like the Übermensch in the propositions advanced by Nietzsche, which had many flaws, the protagonist of No More Parades is a complex Superman that only qualifies him as a superhero for a limited fan club.
The hero is a genius, with a brilliant mind.
He is the only one capable to understand, use and fix the numbers in the statistics department of his Majesty’s Government.
In war, he acts with exemplary discipline, dedication, sense of duty and honor, taken to some extremes.
There is a moment when he is training or supervising soldiers under his command and his attitude appears farfetched.
Yet, like always with this Superhero, there is a good sensible reason for his insistence on an overbearing exercise
If they reach the gates of Paradise- and a good number in this heinous conflict will- the Supreme Deity will see clean and organized men.
His attitude towards his wife has an Angelique, otherworldly quality about it, although he can be as cold as ice.
Indeed, Sylvia played for me the role of the dark angel, a villain that is cheating on the hero and tormenting him.
Until I realized I might be very wrong.
The wife of the protagonist might be in love with an insensitive man that she tries desperately to entice and seduce.
Having to do with an exceptional character, who is extraordinary in his abilities to work with numbers, understand so many aspects of life, prove bravery, honesty, generosity and an indifference to worldly possessions, Sylvia Tietjens must play an extreme game.
Her philandering is a manifestation of yet another complicated, hard for me to understand personage, but one which seems to try and get her husband back…
So to say.
It is true that I have been overwhelmed and annoyed often by the idiosyncrasies of a woman that takes lovers, if only to tease and torment them in turn, then dispatches a supposed lover of her spouse- and I thought why not let him be, unless she is really head over heels…but here we may have a situation wherein one allows oneself acts that one does not accept for others.
But Sylvia tells general Campion that her husband is a…socialist.
The general is not amused and in fact takes this statement so seriously as to consider excluding Christian from his will.
When told about this, the hero is first inclined, in jesting, to accept this preposterous accusation to avoid an inheritance that he does not want- after all, he refused to take advantage of his rights as heir after his father died- and then he goes as far as to protect and explain the position of his wife in a baffling manner.
I hate communism and left wing systems and I would have been mad.
In another instance, when his wife is in a restaurant room with his lover, instead of showing any dissatisfaction or aggression, this Superman tries to be as cavalier as to defy ordinary people’s feelings and pretends not to see them, so as to avoid embarrassment for her.
He is as composed and unaffected as possible.
Or so it seems.
To end with another positive aspect… what a name the author has:
- Ford Madox Ford!
- I love it
I’d name a child Madox and since there would be no more but I have children with fur and feathers and their number increases, the next one might be called Madox
Or maybe Tietjens, albeit that is rather difficult and unusual.
October 6, 2019
I didn't enjoy this as much as I did the first book, but it did provide a very vivid portrait of what it was like to be serving as an officer in World War One. Two things are happening in this book: Christopher Tietjens, after being sent home from the front with shell shock (PTSD in today's parlance) returns to France to serve behind the front lines as some kind of logistics officer, equipping and forwarding troops from "the colonies" (mostly Canada, I think). At the same time his wife, Sylvia, having realized that he's in love with Valentine Wannop, makes a serious play to get him back (turning up at the hotel where he's stationed) while alternately fending off and encouraging the advances of a former flame.
It's a volume that moves very oddly around in time, stopping occasionally to record a traumatic event in real time but mostly moving backward and forward as Christopher and Sylvia flicker in and out of the present and their memories of the recent past. It's hampered by an over-use of ellipses; I can see that Ford is trying to record how people think (which is practically never in complete sentences) but he overdoes it.
The overall effect is that of an interweaving dance of two minds with entirely different purposes. Sylvia's aim is to get Christopher to have sex with her, to satisfy both her renewed physical interest in him and her pride. Christopher's aims are more diffuse, being about how to survive the war with his mind and psyche intact, how to preserve his basic sense of self and honor while following his heart, and how to do his job properly (a job that of course he'd rather not do) in the midst of chaos. It's an odd, slow passage through the middle of a love story that's interrupted by no less than a world war, and at the same time it marks the transition that will make the next part of the story possible. I'm looking forward to the next installment.
It's a volume that moves very oddly around in time, stopping occasionally to record a traumatic event in real time but mostly moving backward and forward as Christopher and Sylvia flicker in and out of the present and their memories of the recent past. It's hampered by an over-use of ellipses; I can see that Ford is trying to record how people think (which is practically never in complete sentences) but he overdoes it.
The overall effect is that of an interweaving dance of two minds with entirely different purposes. Sylvia's aim is to get Christopher to have sex with her, to satisfy both her renewed physical interest in him and her pride. Christopher's aims are more diffuse, being about how to survive the war with his mind and psyche intact, how to preserve his basic sense of self and honor while following his heart, and how to do his job properly (a job that of course he'd rather not do) in the midst of chaos. It's an odd, slow passage through the middle of a love story that's interrupted by no less than a world war, and at the same time it marks the transition that will make the next part of the story possible. I'm looking forward to the next installment.
September 27, 2024
A character based novel about protagonist Christopher Tietjens and his experience in World War One, in France. Tietjens is an intelligent, wealthy man who lives a complicated life due to his personality, and his rich, beautiful, flirtatious and manipulative wife, Sylvia. Tietjens gets into awkward situations with the scandalous rumors spread about him. The novel describes the ways the wealthy gossip about one another, are jealous of one another and have no scruples in ruining each other’s reputations. There are vivid descriptions of life in the trenches and the administrative and personal difficulties of commanding a group of soldiers.
I find Tietjens a very interesting character and will read with interest about what happens to him in books three and four of the ‘Parade’s End’ series.
This book is the second novel in the ‘Parade’s End’ series.
This book was first published in 1925.
I find Tietjens a very interesting character and will read with interest about what happens to him in books three and four of the ‘Parade’s End’ series.
This book is the second novel in the ‘Parade’s End’ series.
This book was first published in 1925.
August 9, 2025
This second book in the Parade’s End series takes place behind the frontlines during the First World War. Again the pace is languorous and I enjoyed being back in the company of Christopher Tietjens, who is an efficient army officer, processing men for the “draft” on their way to the front. The opening scene of the book is the most memorable: the weirdly cosy scene in Tietjens’s hut. It’s an interesting insight into the workings of the army, the politicking, maneuverings, resentments, and petty squabbles between the officer class. It was also surprising that Mrs Tietjens appears at the camp and then meets Christopher in a fancy hotel. Didn’t they know there’s a war on? (It was the hotel scene where I slightly lost interest and momentum.) Again, I was able to follow most of the subtle drama in this audiobook form, but I did find myself listening to other things instead of this - partly because of Bill Nighy’s soft-voiced narration, which my ears can’t pick out over the sound of a shower or boiling kettle. It feels like what I imagine a Henry James novel to be: almost as if it’s in slow motion, but it is exquisite and masterly, like an oil painting described in minute detail. I love learning how fucking clever Tietjens is. On to A Man Could Stand Up - a title that I can never remember.
February 28, 2023
“No more Hope, no more Glory, no more parades for you and me any more.”
I can tell why this book is titled no more parades as this sentiment is written many times. In this book we see Sylvia’s true colors. I thought it very strange that everyone was so concerned with Tietjens’ personal life. So far this is my least favorite of the books.
“For, your wife to throw you over for an attractive man is naturally humiliating, but that she should leave you publicly for a man of hardly any intelligence at all, you priding yourself on your brains, must be nearly as mortifying a thing as can happen to you.”
“Women do say things against their husbands when they are not on good terms with them…”
“I do what I want and that’s good enough for any one.”
“If I am vulgar I’m vulgar with a purpose.”
“But if you commit a mortal sin with your eyes open it’s not vulgarity…”
I can tell why this book is titled no more parades as this sentiment is written many times. In this book we see Sylvia’s true colors. I thought it very strange that everyone was so concerned with Tietjens’ personal life. So far this is my least favorite of the books.
“For, your wife to throw you over for an attractive man is naturally humiliating, but that she should leave you publicly for a man of hardly any intelligence at all, you priding yourself on your brains, must be nearly as mortifying a thing as can happen to you.”
“Women do say things against their husbands when they are not on good terms with them…”
“I do what I want and that’s good enough for any one.”
“If I am vulgar I’m vulgar with a purpose.”
“But if you commit a mortal sin with your eyes open it’s not vulgarity…”
July 5, 2019
This starts really slowly. You could skim read part one. But, parts two and three are compelling. Extended conversations with Sylvia and General Campion, the next day. His wife is an awful character. She manipulates everything for her own amusement. She makes Lady Macbeth & Lydia Gywilt look like saints. (The only character that is as remotely awful, as I can think of is Tamora, in Titus Andronicus.
Christopher ought to be completely mad (PTSD?) but continues to uphold his proper, if twisted moral code. Even in the face of the truth about his wife being known!
I love the language, the extended internal monologues, that last pages and occupy no time at all. (Am I mad too, as I live my life with these self-contained thoughts, that I observe the world in?)
Part of me wants to not like these books! Modernism and its techniques are not my preferred genre. I have studiously avoided Joyce for many years. But, I do like them, and really am revelling in my own iniquity and the compelling language.
Onward immediately to vol 3…
Christopher ought to be completely mad (PTSD?) but continues to uphold his proper, if twisted moral code. Even in the face of the truth about his wife being known!
I love the language, the extended internal monologues, that last pages and occupy no time at all. (Am I mad too, as I live my life with these self-contained thoughts, that I observe the world in?)
Part of me wants to not like these books! Modernism and its techniques are not my preferred genre. I have studiously avoided Joyce for many years. But, I do like them, and really am revelling in my own iniquity and the compelling language.
Onward immediately to vol 3…
June 3, 2013
Deservedly acknowledged as one the major British novels of the inter war years. As a reader you are engrossed in the subtlety and refinement of the psychological portraits of the likable/unsufferable Tietjens, his deadly beautiful psychopath wife Sylvia and the supporting cast of characters. With the ominous backdrop of the WW1 Western Front drawing closing in you witness high drama and fate on a Greek tragedy scale.
January 10, 2016
Not an easy read, because the style is dated. I wouldn't recommend it to the average reader who merely wanted entertaining. But I did love it. The novel has a sense of history, a different way of looking at the First World War and how that war was changing society.
September 12, 2021
The slow slog towards war
In "No More Parades", the second volume in the "Parade's End" tetralogy, Royal Army Officer Captain Christopher Tietjens, the landed heir to a noble family in a terrible marriage with the beautiful, bored, destructive and "excruciatingly unfaithful" wife, Sylvia, returns to the war to escape his terrible marriage and the chaos and pain Sylvia seems to intentionally inflict on her husband.
Having previously been wounded in the war and returning to France to take command of a draft brigade of convalesced wounded soldiers, draftees from the English colonies and volunteers from Canada, Christopher can't escape the reach of his wife who, despite her philandering, is obsessed with the belief that her husband is maintaining a mistress in France. Using her connections and charms she convinces his commanding officer that he is carrying on a disgraceful tryst and conducting other functions unbecoming of a British officer.
This volume, while still packed full of drawing room drama, does delve into the traditions and tedium of soldierly life during The Great War.
On to Volume Three, A Man Could Stand Up.
#nomoreparades #paradesend #fordmadoxford #readtheworld #readtheworldchallenge #globalreadingchallenge #britishliterature #worldwarone
In "No More Parades", the second volume in the "Parade's End" tetralogy, Royal Army Officer Captain Christopher Tietjens, the landed heir to a noble family in a terrible marriage with the beautiful, bored, destructive and "excruciatingly unfaithful" wife, Sylvia, returns to the war to escape his terrible marriage and the chaos and pain Sylvia seems to intentionally inflict on her husband.
Having previously been wounded in the war and returning to France to take command of a draft brigade of convalesced wounded soldiers, draftees from the English colonies and volunteers from Canada, Christopher can't escape the reach of his wife who, despite her philandering, is obsessed with the belief that her husband is maintaining a mistress in France. Using her connections and charms she convinces his commanding officer that he is carrying on a disgraceful tryst and conducting other functions unbecoming of a British officer.
This volume, while still packed full of drawing room drama, does delve into the traditions and tedium of soldierly life during The Great War.
On to Volume Three, A Man Could Stand Up.
#nomoreparades #paradesend #fordmadoxford #readtheworld #readtheworldchallenge #globalreadingchallenge #britishliterature #worldwarone
April 29, 2024
So inexplicably invested. It takes time to adjust to the non-linearness of the story. I'm learning that I should notice and remember the things that don't seem to make sense, as they will in time, even stretching through the books.
It's very disconcerting how much I feel along with Sylvia when I think I ought to just be hating her.
"Men, at any rate, never fulfilled expectations. They might, upon acquaintance, turn out more entertaining than they appeared; but almost always taking up with a man was like reading a book you had read when you had forgotten that you had read it. You had not been for ten minutes in any sort of intimacy with any man before you said: 'But I've read all this before . . .' You know the opening, you were already bored by the middle, and, especially, you knew the end. . ."
It's very disconcerting how much I feel along with Sylvia when I think I ought to just be hating her.
"Men, at any rate, never fulfilled expectations. They might, upon acquaintance, turn out more entertaining than they appeared; but almost always taking up with a man was like reading a book you had read when you had forgotten that you had read it. You had not been for ten minutes in any sort of intimacy with any man before you said: 'But I've read all this before . . .' You know the opening, you were already bored by the middle, and, especially, you knew the end. . ."
August 29, 2024
I enjoyed Part 2 of this series more than Part 1. I think it's because Ford showed some of the same events from different points of view and the storyline became both more subtle and more complex. As the action moves to Northern France, Tietjens is shown to have real worth and ability. He is able to deal with bureaucratic regulations and administrative difficulties to send new recruits up to the front properly equipped. Yes, his Christlike status is becoming ever more evident but he still wishes for General Campion's cup to pass from him. New depths are also revealed in Sylvia's character and she remains the biggest enigma of all.
August 24, 2017
I am getting more into this set of 4 books and found this second one more easily read and understood. The writing is still very scattered but that seems more purposeful in indicating the very scattered thought patterns of the characters. I still don't understand the motivation of the main character's seemingly appalling wife. Why does she want him with no money, why does she want to denigrate him in the eyes of his brother, social contacts and family friends? Perhaps that becomes more clear in the later books. (Purchased Ca Foscarina bookshop, Venice)
May 21, 2020
Christopher has returned to the war, in relative safety outfitting Canadian volunteers who head to the front. This comes to an end when Sylvia, who has done her utmost to make Christopher as uncomfortable as possible (stopping his letters and writing to his commander/uncle, General Campion) actually comes for a visit. Things come to a head when husband Christopher, former lover Perowne and another officer converge on Sylvia's hotel room. Will Campion have to send Christopher to the front because of the scandal?
Reading as part of the 907-page Parade's End.
Reading as part of the 907-page Parade's End.
May 29, 2020
I would give this 6 out of 5 if I could. I am gradually chugging through this whole superb sequence of novels, and it is one of the greatest reading experiences of my life. I will probably do a longer review when I have finished the entire Parade’s End sequence (if anyone cares). I feel so grateful that I decided to give it a shot.
July 26, 2023
The plot thickens. Novel #2 of the tetralogy, and I just keep feeling more and more interested in every character in a way that makes me want to go back and take a closer look at them. I love the dialogue - and the inner dialogue. I don’t even know why I love this as much as I do but now I can’t stop reading.
February 13, 2025
Book 2 in the quartet of books that comprise Parade's End. Tietjens is stationed in France in a relatively safe position within the British army during WWII. Even far away from home he cannot escape his amazingly awful wife and her machinations.
October 20, 2017
Really couldn't get into it. Whilst I can appreciate the literary talent that Ford has employed, I couldn't enjoy reading it.
January 24, 2019
Audiobook edition narrated by Stephen Crossley, very good job.
This second book in the Parade's End series gives more insight into the character of Sylvia Tiejens.
This second book in the Parade's End series gives more insight into the character of Sylvia Tiejens.
July 23, 2020
The absurd, damaging behavior of human beings in peace and war continues in the excellent second novel of Ford's tetralogy Parade's End.
July 27, 2021
Interesting moral dilemma, window to long gone society.
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