Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man

Siegfried Sassoon’s prose is quite dull, which is surprising in such a good poet. He’s writing here about pre-war England, which is probably what I think of when I think of England – villages, farms, and rich people going hunting. I think hunting was banned last year in England, and I have to say I can’t see why not, after this account – it seems a meaningless activity, limited to a small group of wealthy people.

Of course the sting in this tale of a boy (“George Sherston”, but it’s really autobiographical) is our knowledge of what is to come. His life seems the absolute antithesis of what is to come. Easy, pleasant, undisciplined, and apolitical. He fears socialists because they don’t like hunting. It’s almost like a conversion story, with the worldly man being eventually shocked into Christianity.

On the other hand, whether you think his life meaningless or not, there is a wistfulness about it all simply because he doesn’t worry about anything but the moment. Especially right now that seems like an unbelievable thing – to just exist for the weekly hunt, for sport. Does anyone live like that now? He has his 600 pounds a year, he need not work, he lives with his aunt and worries only that the weather be all right.

Sassoon’s prose is so calm that it doesn’t really bring anything to life, and in some places it’s dated by a certain floweriness in the prose which isn’t particularly effective. It’s not nearly so powerful as Grave’s fabulous Goodbye To All That, but I think Grave is a prose writer through and through, while Sassoon is a poet. As a social-historical piece it’s fascinating, especially as an insight into Sassoon, but as literature it’s not fantastic.