The New Age, August 14 1913

This issue of The New Age contains the first protest against anti-Semitism that I have come across in my explorations, "The Folly of Anti-Semitism" by one of the editors (Orage, presumably?), starting on page 449.  It's very disturbing, and very revealing, how much the author has to hedge their position.  The main thrust of the piece is to discredit the Jewish international finance conspiracy theory, and further to discredit the idea that Jews have more money than is proportionate to their population.  So far, so good.  The author also defends Jewish intellectual culture, particularly their left-wing, to which The New Age is (at the moment) claiming alliance. 

But then the bad: there's a lot of very-vintage backpedaling about "intermixture" and "purity of blood and spirit."  This isn't shocking.  I almost wrote about it in my piece on Rebecca West's "At Valladolid," (The New Freewoman, August 1)--but there's a throw-away aside in that story that has the narrator casually say, "We hate the Jews because of their habit of evaluation," going on to explain that Englishfolks are just as bad (67).  Stuck in my craw.  West has the fictioneer's excuse that she's writing characters and not her own views, but it says something about the audience.  I remember  a professor of mine during my undergraduate schooling telling the class that Pound was somewhat of a scapegoat--he was attacked by people who felt guilty for his public airing of their private thoughts.  That seems likely, definitely possible, if not grounds for excuse. 

At any rate, I'm glad The New Age has at least taken steps to combat the more-obviously-bullshit conspiracy theories then current. 


Other moments:

I love it when the journals I read give me a shout-out.  This time, Orage published the financials of The New Age "published, not as an appeal, but as a record for posterity, how soon to arrive I do not know" (458).  They're losing one thousand pounds a year, pretty tough. 

They also review John Gould Fletcher's Fool's Gold.  Remember last New Age, when I was surprised to see him outright panned?  They're just as surprised to really like his second book, going so far as to accuse the publisher of delaying the first one too long.  So he's redeemed.  

Satirical poet P. Selver makes fun of the vogue for villanelles, by writing a crappy one about villanelles.  Ha. 

There's a great surrealist urban short story by Arthur Thorne, "A Modern Metamorphosis," on page 466.  I won't give away what the "organism" is--maybe I should have figured it out sooner, but I was happy when the moment of recognition came. 

Beatrice Hastings, alas, continues "Feminism and Common Sense."  This week's concern: how the decay of English hospitality has made it difficult to marry off daughters.  Complete with totally square anger over dance parties.