PRIVATE BATES
By C. S. LEWIS
THE habit of takilig dramatic characters out of their setting and writing their biographies as if they were real people is not one which, as a critic, I can commend. But I have at the moment a special reason—not a literary one—for thus extracting a character from Henry V. He will be Private Bates.
In one respect Private Bates shared with the modern serviceman the good fortune of serving under a national leader of heroic mould and dazzling eloquence. Shakespeare's Henry was as rousing a chief as our present Prime Minister. His "pep talks" were about as good as Shakespeare could make them, which means they were about as good as that kind of thing can be. It will not be generally thought that the modern serviceman hears anything better. - What effect this splendid propaganda had on John Bates, Shake- speare reveals very clearly. He had been told, on the eve of Agin- court, that the King would not wish himself anywhere but where he was. This cut no ice at all wi,th Bates. He replied that, though it was a blank cold night, he didn't mind betting, that the blank King would rather be up to the neck in the Thames than mucking about in the lines at Agincourt, and he added a rider to the effect . that if the King did really like mucking about in the said lines, he, John Bates, heartily wished the King could be left to get on 'with it by himself and let sensible chaps go home. He had also been told that the King's "cause was just and his quarrel honourable ": in modern language, that we .were fighting for civilisation against barbarism and to make the world safe for democracy.
It was at this point that another private, one Williams, who had hitherto been just stamping his feet and staring, too "browned off" to say anything at all, chipped in with what I take to be the Elizabethan equivalent of " Sez you" or "Oh. yeah." His actual words were, "That's more than we know." "That's right," growled Bates, and anyway, he added, it was no blank busihess of theirs. They had to obey their blank orders ; the rights and wrongs of the war were the King's funeral. "And enough for him to be going on with, too," said Private Williams. Then the conversation drifted on to something like Post-War Policy and the "implementing" of promises made to the fighting man. The King had promised that he would never be ransomed. "Yes, promised," said Williams with withering emphasis. "And if he does go and get ransomed after you've had your throat cut, a blank lot you'll know about it. Promised! " This infuriated the only person present who took the Government's pep talks seriously, and a quarrel developed. But Bates wouldn't stand for that. "Shin up, shut up! "he said wearily. "Pair of bally fools. Ain't ye got Frenchies enough to fight without fighting one another? Silly, I call it."
It would be a pity to leave the scene without noticing that there was another soldier present, Private Court. He said nothing. He is there for the very purpose of saying nothing. No front line con- versation would be complete without that silent figure. He says nothing. He knows there is no good in saying anything. He stopped saying things years ago when the war was young and when his illusions were shattered : perhaps after the first promise of leave was broken, perhaps when he discovered that the state of the French army was quite different from what he had been led to expect, perhaps when, in the midst of a headlong retreat, he came across a newspaper which said we were advancing.
Now of course Shakespeare knew no more than we do—perhaps kss—about the English soldier in the time of Henry V. But he knew the Elizabethan soldier. This scene gives -his answer to the question which has recently been agitating a number of people, die question of "what the soldier thinks." And the answer, in the supposedly " spacious " days of Elizabeth after the defeat of the Armada, Was that the soldier thought everything his leaders said was "eye-wash." Whatever has been recently said in these columns about the scepticism or " cynicism " of the 'modern soldier was, according to Shakespeare, at least equally true of the Elizabethan soldier And Shakespeare does not seem to be specially disquieted by it ; the scene occurs not in a satire, but in a heroic and patriotic ptay about a "famous victory."
The Shakespearian evidence suggests that our present disquiet about ".what the soldier thinks" is due not to any temporary deterioration in the soldier's morale, still less to any malice or in- competence in the observers, but to the fact that the upheaval of war is permitting, and indeed forcing, members of the more educated (and credulous) classes to see close up what the great mass of the people in this country are, and always have been, like. What they see gives them a shock, because it is so very unlike what they expected. But it is not in itself very dreadful. It might be better: it might be worse.
In the last few years I have spent a great many hours in third- class railway carriages (or corridors) crowded with servicemen. I have shared, to some extent, the shock. I found that nearly 'all these men disbelieved without hesitation everything that the news- papers said about German cruelties in Poland. They did not think the matter worth discussion:. they said the one word " Propaganda " and passed on., This did not shock me: what shocked me was the complete absence of indignation. They believe that their rulers are doing what I take to be the most wicked of all actions—sowing the seeds of future cruelties by telling lies about cruelties that were never committed. But they feel no indignation: it seems to them the- sort of procedure one would expect.
This, I think, is disheartening. But the picture as a whole is not disheartening. It demands a drastic revision of our beliefs. We must get rid of our arrogant assumption that it is the masses who can be led by the nose. As far as I can make out, the shoe is on the other foot. The only people who are really the dupes of their favourite newspapers are the intelligentsia. It is they who read leading articles: the poor read the sporting news, which is mostly true. Whether you like this situation or not depends on your views. It is certainly hard on you if you are a Planner or a man with any panacea that demands a nation of united enthusiasts. Your ship will be wrecked on the immemorial, half kindly, half la* wholly ironi, incredulity of the English people. If you are not a Planner, you may feel that this immovable scepticism, this humour, this dis- illusioned patience (an almost inexhaustible patience—" How differs it from the terrible patience of God! ") is no very bad basis for national life. But I think the true conclusion is that the existence of Private Bates in -his millions should, both, stifle your hopes and allay your fears. It is he who makes it improbable that anything either very bad or very good will ever happen in this island. And when all's said and done, he did beat the French chivalry at Agincourt.
Previous page
