Angels and Absences: Child Deaths in the Nineteenth Century (67 page)

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Authors: Laurence Lerner

Tags: #History, #Modern, #19th Century, #Social Science, #Death & Dying, #test

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Page 182
self-indulgence." We need not take seriously his assertion that it would be absurd to take Nell seriously, for he takes her very seriously; hence his stern disapproval. He could be setting out to refute Macready's evident belief that the story of Nell will "make our hearts less selfish," or the strikingly moral terms in which Forster defends it:
I am not acquainted with any story in the language more adapted to strengthen in the heart what most needs help and encouragement, to sustain kindly and innocent impulses, to awaken everywhere the sleeping germs of good.
23
This quotation from the
Life
reaffirms the view Forster had already expressed to Dickens in his letter, that the power of the death of Little Nell gives us something more elevated than "an ordinary experience of literature"; and only after dwelling further on the "benevolent" effect of the episode does he turn to "its effect as a mere piece of art."
Leavis's view of literature is, in an important sense, profoundly unhistorical. Relying on his own response, not simply as a twentieth century reader but as a representative reader at any time, he would consider it condescending to make allowance for the fact that Macready and Forster lived in a different age and were familiar with different literary conventions. The exact opposite to this position is represented by Samuel Pickering and Andrew Sanders. The former declares his approach to be "in flagrante delicto historical," and his method is to compare the work of Dickens with that of now unread tracts by forgotten figures (Andrew Reed, John Cunningham, Leigh Richmond, Hannah More) in order to show "that the great tradition of the early nineteenth century English novel is the moral tradition." Both he and Sanders ask us to put aside our own response and replace it, as far as we can, by that of contemporaries. Sanders finds the "easy jests" of modern critics (including Leavis) "grossly unfair" because they demonstrate ''a disturbing failure both to sympathize with the nature and intent of Dickens' art and to grasp the tradition in which he is working." Dickens "draws from and adapts a popular literary norm": for Pickering and, less crudely, for Sanders, what matters is that he draws from it; forr the Leavisite, what matters is that he adapts itso much so, that Leavis sees no need to mention the popular norm, since all he is interested in is the way a masterpiece differs from it.
24
Carey's more sociological analysis relates Nell and her grandfather to Victorian family structure:
 
Page 183
In an age without Social Security, when the elderly depended upon the strength of the family bond for their survival, Nell's unnatural concern about her grandfather's welfare would particularly endear her to the adult world. For parents with every intention of becoming a burden to their children, she is the ideal heroine.
25
Carey handles ideology with a light touch, but this is an ideological point all the same. As a contrast with the twentieth century, from within which we read, it seems to me brilliant, but it will not serve as a contrast with what preceded. No doubt Victorian parents did have every intention of becoming a burden to their children, but so did those of the eighteenth and the seventeenth centuries, to go back no further: why are there no little Nells then? Carey's explanation tells us, perhaps, why Victorians (or at any rate elderly Victorians) were so besotted with little Nell, but cannot tell us why such a figure arose then and not earlier.
Sentimentality
I have already introduced the term
sentimentality,
and can no longer postpone a discussion of it, since that is what is in question here. To begin with a definition, we cannot do better than quote Jeffrey's reference to the "gentle sobs and delightful tears" that the last number of
Dombey and Son
had cost him, to which we can add the "delighted tears" with which Charles Kingsley's mother read
Uncle Tom's Cabin.
26
The usual definitions of sentimentality speak of displayingor demandingmore emotion than the situation warrants, but this seems to me misleading. It applies better to melodrama, which obviously attempts to arouse unwarranted emotion, and in real life the person who displays excessive emotion is not the sentimentalist but the neurotic. Necessarily, if we are to identify sentimentality accurately, we must consider the nature of the emotion aroused: a sadness that has lost all unpleasantness and become a warm glow. If we unpack the phrasing of Jeffrey and Kingsley, it will yield every important element in sentimentality: its strong association with the pathetic, the frequent prominence of women and children as subject matter (for they weep moreor are supposed to), the avoidance of all physically repulsive details (which would render the sobs and tears less delightful), and even the moral argument: that, on the one hand, sentimentality can be seen as beneficial in its effects because it sensitizes us to the sufferings of others and arouses feelings
 
Page 184
of sympathy and compassion but that, on the other hand, it can be seen as morally bad because it allows us to indulge in sorrow as a luxury, enjoying an experience that ought to distress us. This argument has raged since sentimentality began.
A brief historical survey will be useful here. Whether sentimentality has always existed is too large and fascinating a question to engage us now; what we know is that it dates, as a conscious movement, from the later eighteenth century. It was practiced, and defended, by Sterne, Goldsmith, and Cowper (as well as Greuze and Reynolds), found its philosophic basis in Shaftesbury and Adam Smith, was attacked by Johnson, and was ridiculed by Jane Austen. A contributor to the
London Magazine
in 1776 states the case in favor as follows:
The pleasure which arises from legends of sorrow owes its origin to the certain knowledge, that our hearts are not callous to the finer feelings, but that we have some generous joys, and generous cares beyond ourselves.
27
We need not pay much attention to the difference between the terms "sensibility," which this writer uses, and "sentimentality," since in the eighteenth century they were, in this context, virtually interchangeable, and either could be used to designate the Man of Feeling, that central figure in the sentimental movement, who is easily moved to tears by the sufferings of others, even, in the novel of that name by Henry Mackenzie, by the sufferings of the old dog Trusty:
I called to him; he wagged his tail, but did not stir: I called again; he lay down; I whistled, and cried Trusty; he gave a short howl, and died!I could have lain down and died too; but God gave me strength to live for my children.
28
a reminder of continuity, this: Victorian as it sounds, it was written in 1771.
The case in favor of the moral benefit of such a state of feeling can be found in Adam Smith, whose
Theory of Moral Sentiments
defends a morality based not on rationality but on emotion:
How are the unfortunate relieved when they have found out a person to whom they can communicate the cause of their sorrow? Upon this sympathy they seem to disburthen themselves of a part of their distress: he is not improperly

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