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A review by paul_cornelius
Random Harvest by James Hilton
4.0
James Hilton deals in sentimentality and nostalgia, all presented through a middlebrow medium. That sounds harsh. And so it was meant when Hilton began his career in the interwar years, especially among the modernist highbrow set. But during the 1950s, middlebrow literature gained a slight degree of respectability--although it was still used by aspiring highbrows to harpoon great literary whales represented by such institutions as the Book-of-the-Month Club and the Modern Library. The sense of ennui after World War II sent a generation on a search for meaning. And books such as Random Harvest and Hilton's other two earlier major works, Lost Horizon and Goodbye Mr. Chips fit the bill perfectly, even if they had already gained widespread popularity during their initial publication in the 1930s and early 1940s and in subsequent film versions. For the post World War II 1950s, material comfort and well being were not enough. Albeit set against the backdrop of possible annihilation through atomic war, life needed a certain frisson. And so a flurry of successful middlebrow works in literature addressed to this concern began to flourish. And Hilton's work also gained a foothold as a sort of classic for the medium.
Random Harvest, in particular, sounded a sympathetic chord both when it first appeared (1941) and later on. World War II was in its second year and a successful outcome was far from assured. In that atmosphere, the story of Charles Ranier, a wealthy business tycoon and veteran of World War I who had for some months during and following the Great War lost his memory, presented itself as a paean to earlier and better times of old English values. These included a sort of feudal fantasy of intermingling social classes, unspoiled village life, and idyllic scenes of the countryside.
The twist in the story is that Ranier regains his memory lost due to shellshock (aka combat fatigue/PTSD) in 1917 but in so doing then loses his memory of the time he became hospitalized during the war until just around Christmas in 1920. Recovering those three years and merging them into Ranier's postwar life becomes the task of the novel.
Along the way, Hilton engages in some visionary preaching. These are the moments of greatest weakness in Random Harvest. Delivered by an old parson, these harangues cover everything from the League of Nations to the Common Law rights of villagers to restore their access to the commons being swallowed up by arrogant and distant members of the elite. There are also allusions to the rights and values of the working man in a reformed system of capitalism. (Did Hilton recognize the similarity between his social solutions and the corporatism of Mussolini?) In the end, he sort of espouses a Fabian socialist worldview without accompanying rules of parliamentary procedure. The only thing missing is an avowal of fruit juices and veganism.
So, yes, it's easy to punch holes in Hilton's literary world. But taken on its own terms, it nevertheless maintains its appeal. Is it a literary crime, after all, to write accessibly for the wider public? Should an author reject giving voice to a sense of unease in society simply because it is too common a feeling? And so what if he provides a satisfying answer that lifts people out of those moments of despair about their lack of being connected both to earlier generations and coming generations. Must everything end in modernist cynicism? And Hilton may have dealt in feelings primarily. But without them what do you have?
Finally, an interesting point of view for contemporary readers. While Hilton employed nostalgia for an England he saw disappearing into the abyss of World War II, readers today, of course, have an added level of nostalgia to encounter. There is not only that of the world before and right after World War I but the milieu of World War II in which Random Harvest first appeared. The two greatest political calamities of the twentieth century. And we are drawn back to them. Constantly.
Random Harvest, in particular, sounded a sympathetic chord both when it first appeared (1941) and later on. World War II was in its second year and a successful outcome was far from assured. In that atmosphere, the story of Charles Ranier, a wealthy business tycoon and veteran of World War I who had for some months during and following the Great War lost his memory, presented itself as a paean to earlier and better times of old English values. These included a sort of feudal fantasy of intermingling social classes, unspoiled village life, and idyllic scenes of the countryside.
The twist in the story is that Ranier regains his memory lost due to shellshock (aka combat fatigue/PTSD) in 1917 but in so doing then loses his memory of the time he became hospitalized during the war until just around Christmas in 1920. Recovering those three years and merging them into Ranier's postwar life becomes the task of the novel.
Along the way, Hilton engages in some visionary preaching. These are the moments of greatest weakness in Random Harvest. Delivered by an old parson, these harangues cover everything from the League of Nations to the Common Law rights of villagers to restore their access to the commons being swallowed up by arrogant and distant members of the elite. There are also allusions to the rights and values of the working man in a reformed system of capitalism. (Did Hilton recognize the similarity between his social solutions and the corporatism of Mussolini?) In the end, he sort of espouses a Fabian socialist worldview without accompanying rules of parliamentary procedure. The only thing missing is an avowal of fruit juices and veganism.
So, yes, it's easy to punch holes in Hilton's literary world. But taken on its own terms, it nevertheless maintains its appeal. Is it a literary crime, after all, to write accessibly for the wider public? Should an author reject giving voice to a sense of unease in society simply because it is too common a feeling? And so what if he provides a satisfying answer that lifts people out of those moments of despair about their lack of being connected both to earlier generations and coming generations. Must everything end in modernist cynicism? And Hilton may have dealt in feelings primarily. But without them what do you have?
Finally, an interesting point of view for contemporary readers. While Hilton employed nostalgia for an England he saw disappearing into the abyss of World War II, readers today, of course, have an added level of nostalgia to encounter. There is not only that of the world before and right after World War I but the milieu of World War II in which Random Harvest first appeared. The two greatest political calamities of the twentieth century. And we are drawn back to them. Constantly.