Tanya Palmer
English 775.2: Literature and Society: Modernism & Material Culture
Professor J. Drouin
August 18, 2008
Final Project: A Survey of English Imperialism as Treated in Dana and The New Age

The Paradox of the Thing: British Society and the Making of a British Empire

“The unvarnished truth is that no nation interferes from motives of philanthropy in the affairs of other nations, and the ideal of world-rule is itself fundamentally vicious, since the rule of communities by themselves is infinitely better in the long run than the most wise and benevolent outside despotism.”
~Frederick Ryan

In constructing an argument for the notion that individuals and whole societies alike engage in acknowledging, even honoring, a mythical force or essence that positively links them with specific groups, Slavoj Zizek, in “Eastern Europe’s Republics of Gilead,” uses the fall of Communism in the Soviet Union and Western reaction to it to identify a bilateral nature to the aforementioned unifying source: it is also a powerful hindrance to amicability between groups. Further, “Republics of Gilead” maintains that this entity, this Thing, is essentially inconspicuous; it gives and is cause for national, regional, racial, ethnic, etc. pride, yet remains elusive in that its celebrants cannot pinpoint it with specificity. Its effects are thereby taken as proof of its presence. Zizek’s piece accuses Western nations of taking an immense interest in the demise of the Soviet Union insomuch as the latter occurrence doubly paves the way: for the prevalence of democracy where Communism once reigned, and the opportunity for the West to both model and defend the liberties, the Things, that democratic rule affords and has been affording them. It is not the nature of that modeling that interests this paper; rather, it is the aforementioned defense that will be examined, specifically in relation to the imperialist objectives of Great Britain at the turn of the 20th century. What is argued here is that in her endeavor to expand her influence and gain by means of conquering and colonizing as near as Ireland and as far as Australia, England engaged in actions that were strategically aimed at maintaining the English Thing. This paper is also in concurrence with the viewpoint maintained by its opening quote and attempts to demonstrate the lack of true humanism that spurred the British Empire in its alleged philanthropy and illogical defense of an entity that arguably did not exist even on its main soil. Modernist periodicals The New Age and Dana are heavily referenced here for theoretical and practical material that evidence the paradox of the British Thing and its profound impact on the nation’s imperialist policies.
Not surprisingly, it takes little reading of politically centered, independent modernist magazines to note the absence of philanthropy that Frederick Ryan, contributor to Dana, a modernist magazine dedicated to the publication of issues pertaining to the state of Ireland, maintains is a fundamental aspect of the imperialist agenda. What teems with irony is the plethora of articles, letters, notes-to-editors that laments conditions within England herself. “The Outlook,” the editorial section that ushered in each issue of The New Age, concerned itself much with exposing the deplorable conditions under which British citizens were compelled to survive at the turn of the 20th century. In Volume 1 No.1 of the periodical, “The Outlook” declares the editors’ support for England, even for a British Empire (a Socialist rather than an imperialist one), but doubted whether the latter could come into and remain in existence. Their reason: English society was much too fragmented island-wide to allow for a worldwide unity. In support of their notions, Orage and Holbrook cite such instances as the creation of legislature that taxed the poor without discretion and provided increased economic relief for the wealthy whose puppets were those avaricious members of Parliament. The editors compare such procedures with the taxation of regions colonized by Britain; taxation from which ensued no Parliamentary representation for those who paid. Such details furiously eat away at any image of a desirable English Thing and ridicule any notion of that entity being advantageous for England or any other nation.
Issue No. 2 of the same Volume continues to make salient many aspects of turn-of-the-century England that challenge the notion of an actual unifying force within British society, one that worked to more than centralize the people of England under a common brand of nationality. The article, “The Difficulties of Temperance,” which treats the problem of alcoholism in England, disregards scientific theories that hold heredity at least partially responsible for the promulgation of the disease, blatantly stating that “…men become drunkards because their whole social surroundings are unhealthy.” Slums, overcrowding, urban congestion, and lack of access to proper food and reasonable hours of work and play are named as evidence of the imperial nation’s regrettable state. Additionally, there is published within the same issue of The New Age a review of Ramsay McDonald’s Labour and the Empire, which, based upon the contents of the text, characterizes British imperialism as an effort that “sacrifices indiscriminately for material gain; rejoices in domination; is indifferent to liberty (of the colonized); and is resentful of racial equality.” It is with little difficulty that the aforementioned can be made applicable to the state of affairs on the English isle itself; one merely needs substitute “social” for “racial” and the stark similarity between the plights of the Britons and those colonized by the British becomes highly pronounced. Upon becoming cognizant of such possible (and logical) juxtapositions, one might wonder whether England truly believed she possessed with what to positively effect change on behalf of her allegedly inept colonies. Indeed, it appears that the Thing was absent from turn-of-the-century England in all forms: as physically intangible as Zizek maintains, and as unfelt as the overt disregard for the welfare of the English laborer by the English middle class demonstrates. Nevertheless, English imperialism entailed much defending, and an attempt at understanding the nature of this defense of the seemingly worthless is at least worthwhile.
From its stance on the psychological presence of the Thing and the entity’s ability to determine social interactions, “Eastern Europe’s Republic of Gilead” explains the defense of the Thing as an almost desperate attempt to both validate those who ascribe to what the Thing subjectively (as they perceive it) and objectively (how they think others with whom they hope to identify perceive it) represents. This cosa nostra, as Zizek characterizes it, is not only portrayed as something to be desired locally and internationally, but is also at the pinnacle of the desire of the Other, any and all who are situated without the boundaries of the cosa nostra. Consequently, because it is supposed that the Other relentlessly pursues the Thing to which he/she is not entitled, there needs exist strategies that ensure the safeguarding of that Thing. At this juncture, the present paper proposes that England’s defense of her cosa nostra was manifested in the form of her imperialist agenda and that the nation’s motivations and methods for realizing a world empire were heavily determined by the real absence of a British Thing and a subsequent desire to create/establish one.
As previously noted, specific parallels can be drawn between the social circumstances of native Britons (certainly of the lower classes) and those of peoples colonized by England at the turn of the 20th century. It has likewise been noted that many of those circumstances were not celebratory in nature. What will now be considered is the fact that almost all those unhappy situations were consequences either of direct English Parliamentary legislature or British interference in the governmental matters of the peoples England colonized. For instance, while it is certain that Britain’s influence and rule was not integral to the survival of any of the groups she dominated (indeed, they had gotten along for centuries without the faintest awareness of a Europe), once she had usurped [their] control over their affairs, England labeled her colonies inept and void of the ability to take care of themselves. Indeed, she self-identified as the “Motherland” for a reason.
Volume 1 Issue 4 of The New Age, in an entry entitled “India and the Imperialists,” clearly conveys the aforementioned strategy so obsequiously employed and exploited by imperial Britain as it sought to justify its invasion and subjugation of other nations and peoples. It tells of England’s Lord Curzon destroying the municipality that had already been established by the Indians and of the British-inspired division of the Hindus and the Muslims in order to facilitate the dominance of British rule in India (divide and conquer in a most literal sense). In logical anticipation of reprisals from the abused Indians, British officials in India offensively stripped the natives of that country of militaristic power whilst vowing: never to relinquish “any weapon which the law places in our hands.” To further compact the deplorable nature of English imperialism in India, the colonizer ensured, according to The New Age, that the power of economic boycott was wrenched from the colony’s hands. When the justifiably angry yet unarmed Indian natives, by means of public discussion assemblies and peaceful protest, attempted to assert themselves for redress of their ills, “sudden arrests of malcontent and imprisonment without trial” ensued. Furthermore, British officials in both India and England, when reporting happenings to the “Motherland,” tried to ensure that a certain portrayal of events was made available. Cries of treason and shouts for martial law against the Indian natives reverberated in the popular press; the “hell,” to quote The New Age, that the colonized peoples suffered under British rule was rendered much less salient.
Additionally, The Outlook of Issue 2 of The New Age, assuming the subtext Socialist Foreign Policy, sarcastically lauds “…the secrecy with which the government has thought it necessary to observe in regard to all proceedings of the Colonial Conference except speeches of their own representatives.” Those political voices that even moderately dissented with the nation’s imperialist methodology ran the risk of being labeled disloyal to England. What such propaganda did was paint a specifically negative picture of India and being Indian, and shed all positive light imaginable (and imaginative one had to be) on the British imperialist business: namely, that India and its inhabitants were savage; that both had the potential to leave their primitiveness behind, but could not do so if left to their own devices; and that England’s dominating presence (and subsequently, the infusion of her Thing into India and the Indian…gracious England!) was the Balm in Gilead tumultuous India needed and even unbeknownst to her, desired. The reader has only to recall the atrocities suffered by the masses of tax-paying Englishmen and women to recognize the paradox of and absurdity in this notion of the English cosa nostra working for the benefit of the Indians.
The truth of the matter is that the alleged English Thing, like all nation Things, did not exist even within the England it should have primarily served. Rather than colonization being a means by which she could share the blessings inherent in her being with those who lacked and needed/desired it, England relied on her brutal colonial practices to establish and intensify belief in the farcical Thing. Her actions as recorded by the aforementioned modernist magazines do not reflect an altruistic England; indeed, she consented to the suffering of many of her own people. Says a correspondent of The New Age, Vol. 1 Issue 3 in reference to the British government’s awareness of the unpleasant circumstances faced by non-wealthy Britons: “Nothing will happen of any importance, except speeches and promises and unsubstantial little changes which have done service many a time before.” Surely an England in possession of the English Thing did not seek to grant the Other what she denied her own. Philanthropy out of the question and the argument laid down by Zizek in “Eastern Europe’s Republics of Gilead” borne in mind, it is logical to assert that England was ruthless in her dealings with her colonies’ affairs and pointed to the disastrous effects of her actions (with blame attributed to the natives, of course) as evidence of the need for her presence within the colonies. Attention drawn to the unpleasant conditions in India (by means of tirades from British officials that defame and criminalize the Indians), for example, any improvement in those situations could and would be portrayed as the result of British influence upon the native peoples she subdued.
Though never officially categorized as a colony, the experience of the Irish under the British teems with circumstances that mirror those of more distant conquered lands. Furthermore, the aforementioned claim that England (in her quest to establish a cosa nostra that should have been born on her own soil and enjoyed existence amongst the people of England but did neither of the two) gave little or no consideration to the already-established governmental rules and regulations that she encountered upon initial contact with those she proceeded to dominate is clearly conveyed by the editors, contributors, and correspondents of Dana, the aforementioned modernist magazine that dedicated itself to giving a voice to Ireland in her struggle against British imperialism. Volume 1 Issue 1 of the periodical evidences this claim in an article simply entitled “Imperialism.”
Submitting correspondence under the pseudonym “Ossirian,” the author of “Imperialism” evaluates the British occupation of Ireland from angles both sympathetic to the concept of Irish independence of England and loyal to the British crown, yet in tone and choice of empirical reference, leans towards the former. In his decidedly pro-Irish review, Ossirian calls into memory (for his coevals who were undoubtedly familiar with it)) the popular imperialist view that “while England has power to prevent it, she will never, it is said, tolerate the existence of an independent and possibly hostile Ireland upon her flank [emphasis mine].” Such a notion emphatically defends the claim that it is not Ireland’s physical closeness to England that was troublesome to the latter; the nation was at no logical risk as a by-product of her neighbor’s proximity. In invading and occupying Ireland, England is thereby unjustified, specifically in light of the universally recognized right of a nation to defend her people and territory. The English Thing was in no need of defense; Ireland had demonstrated no desire for it in her possible hostility. The viewpoint therefore further supports the stance this paper has taken from its onset: that England’s imperial invasions and conquests were not truly defensive, but instead, were endeavors to create that which she claimed to protect, maintain, and disseminate with superior discretion.
Having forced her way into Ireland and Irish affairs, (indeed, according to the article, even overriding established local legislature with newly-enacted British law) England at the turn of the 20th century busied herself with proving the so-called advantages of British imperialism in Ireland. Ossirian’s piece, teeming with irony even then in the face of pervasive poverty and political turmoil in Ireland, derides the notion of any such benefits. According to England, career opportunities and Irish prosperity from British harvesting and development of Irish natural resources would ensue from her endeavors in Ireland. Put clearly, Ireland would come to benefit from the British presence. Like the natives in India, she innately possessed with what to improve herself yet could not do so on her own for a certain lacking. It is here that England stood to play a role. By violent and intrusive means if necessary, she would infuse the British Thing into Ireland, supplying her what she lacked. The inherent falsity of the notion was clearly spelled out in Ireland at the beginning of the 20th century and the realization (for some, as patriotic Irishmen and women had known it from the beginning) that any if any good ensued from British occupation of Ireland, the latter was infrequently if ever made aware of it.
Even in instances when England appeared to hold Ireland’s welfare in regard via such means as verbally supporting the idea of local Irish legislation, a pervasively strong case for poor “parenting” is noted. The “Motherland’s” solipsism even in apparent philanthropy is evident in, for example, the opinion of prominent imperialist, Edmund Burke, who advised Parliament to assume the following stance in reaction to Irish outcry against the injustices they suffered at the hands of the British: “Let them always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government; they will cling and grapple to you and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance” (Dana, Vol. 1 No. 2). Not only does such a strategy strip English promotion of Irish independence of all altruism, it also strengthens the argument that England looked to her colonies for the same Thing she claimed only she could supply. Burke’s advice underlines a fundamental motivation for worldwide British expansion: that of doing away with the practices of the people England colonized and replacing them with British policies that both disadvantaged the colonized and caused them to rely on England for remedy. The English Thing would come into being when these destitute persons clung and grappled to Britain; such actions on their part created within England the feeling of being a necessity, thereby reassuring the nation’s governing body that in spite of its dire failure to function in the interests of those who elected it to service, it was still worthwhile. Members of the civilian community who supported their nation’s imperialist ventures were likewise strengthened in their confidence in England. They themselves may not have been able to see the English Thing through the dirt and smog of the British slums, the misogyny and class bias that ravaged their society, but saw it in England’s tireless efforts to save the Irish and other colonized persons they were taught to believe were in far worse condition than the most wretched Englishman (pitiful if only in that those of the colonies were not blessed with inherent Englishness).
In the interest of strengthening and maintaining the English Thing, the merchandise that the purchaser is coerced into both building and buying, British imperialists in Ireland utilized tactics similar to those employed by their counterparts in India. In “Empire and Liberty,” set forth in Volume 1 Number 4 of Dana, Frederick Ryan notes the prevalence of speeches by English officials that address the “innate turbulence and discontent of Ireland,” and likewise marks the pitiful presence or blatant absence of mention of the “perpetual Coercion Acts, over-taxation, and imprisonment of Irish political representatives” at the hands of the British. Ryan further asserts: “Any people who do not delightedly welcome the political slavery (when the brand is English) are in the view of this type morally inferior beings, with a double dose of original sin. But if the slavery be other than English…then the people who resist it are patriots and heroes.” Ryan’s observation points to Britain’s lack of true regard for those it colonized. Rather than aspire to render assistance if and when necessary to foreign lands, the imperial nation sought to legitimize itself and its Thing at their expense, not caring whether they were abused as long as England was allowed to deliver the merciful blow.
The arbitrarily selective publication of data of which Ryan accuses the turn-of-the-century mainstream press in Modernist England proved to be one of a number of means by which England used colonization to validate herself. Whilst propaganda surrounding the ineptitude of the colonized and the necessity of the British Thing contributed to the establishment of that Thing via its biased portrayal of the paradoxical British strategy of ruining (the colonies) for construction (of the same), the very nature of the colonized peoples became target for alteration by British forces. Successful invasion and an aggressive occupation (the true nature of which many Britons were never cognizant) would not suffice; such measures were sufficient for establishing the Thing, but required reinforcement to ensure its survival. To this end, England sought to convince the Irish of her superiority by persuading them of their innate inferiority. Knowing that the deplorable state of Ireland under British rule could hardly be offered as proof of the advantages of being connected to England, the latter ventured to persuade Ireland that their true disadvantage had origins predating the arrival of the English onto Irish soil.
One of the strategies employed by England in her quest to deny Irish worth is her staunch discouragement of the use of the Gaelic language and the usurpation of its place by the English tongue, a symbolic representation of the Irish loss of voice to English authority. Volume 1 Number 5 of Dana includes an article entitled “The Gaelic League and Politics” in which Alfred Webb laments this presumptuous move on England’s part and the dire consequences it spelled for Irish peoples on levels that traversed the political into the psychological. Though the piece neither extensively expounds upon the mental condition of the Irish during the attempted eradication of their native language nor makes a nationalist call for the exclusion of English and other non-Gaelic studies, it does note that an early twentieth-century attempt on the part of such notables as James Joyce, Father O’ Growney, the Gaelic League and others to restore Irish cognizance of the nation’s natural tongue “struck chords that answered yearnings in the hearts of our people. It has fostered self-respect. It has opened up sources of pure and elevated enjoyment, and it has brought fresh interest and wider views of life to the humblest of our dwellers in town and country.” If the even miniscule knowledge of their own language that the majority of the people of Ireland were able to acquire at the time (indeed, Webb admitted that he “commenced too late to acquire but the rudiments of the old tongue”) did so much for their sense of self-worth and manifested itself in such a pronouncedly positive manner in the everyday lives of the people, the opposite effects of the imposition of English upon them, the intensity of self-loathsome that imperialist strategy might have cultivated within the Irish people can but be imagined by one who did/does not live it.
At the opening of “The Gaelic League and Politics,” Alfred Webb comments on the integral role of active involvement of each individual in politics. Still a promulgator of representative democracy, Webb explains that though he does not expect every man to run for an office, the careful election of individuals to public service should be the concern of everyone as the decisions the elected official makes after assuming his post resultantly affects the lives of all. As arguably practical a notion as Webb’s might seem, “The Gaelic League and Politics” elsewhere mentions that the minds of the Irish people were “disinclined for sustained political effort.” As Irish resistance to English occupation of Ireland was a well-known fact in the early 1900s, Webb’s note may initially come as a surprise. When one considers how improbable it is that an individual who despises himself will expend significant energy to defend what he neither loves nor values, the reluctance of those Webb observed is both anticipated and understood.
As the dominating political force in Ireland, England only stood to gain from the Irish lack of confidence in the ballot. If the Irish willingly relinquished their suffrage, England was not only able to effect more legislature that went to determine the state of affairs in Ireland, but the Irish stance could also easily be marketed as further proof of the nation to the north’s need for the English presence, the English Thing. The endeavor to replace Gaelic with English as the dominant tongue of Ireland is thereby found to have motivations on the part of British imperialists and profoundly negative effects on the Irish that traverse linguistic boundaries. Though it is difficult to imagine what the Irish might have stood to gain from the forced eradication of their native language, the far-reaching consequences of this imperialist strategy on the Irish psyche is astounding. An even more unexpected result of the English/Gaelic matter is the fact that from a change that appeared to have nothing to do with anything but language came opportunities for England to both gain more extensive control of Ireland and maintain the deception that is her Thing.
In the Correspondence section of Volume 1 Number 4 of The New Age, an anonymous contributor to the magazine proposes the following with regards to Indian unrest under British tyranny: “As long as the officials cannot see that the people are suffering severely, even in the best of times, so long there will be trouble - and the agitator. Is it not the same in England? Just as we should feel, the Indian feels. Should we like to be treated as he is? Would we stand it?” The present paper in turn proposes an affirmative response to that century-old question. It is not whether England would stand it but why, for indeed this paper has shown in what ways the British people have tolerated treatment at the hands of their leaders and policymakers that mirror that which the latter inflicted on those it opted to make part of its Empire. That England at the turn of the twentieth century valued the notion (and that is all it was) of a nation Thing as outlined by Slavoj Zizek’s “Eastern Europe’s Republic of Gilead” and utilized colonization to both secure and maintain what could be regarded as a British nation Thing has likewise been shown.
Prior to its attempts at worldwide expansion, and contrary to imperial propaganda (that portrayed British occupation of foreign lands as a means by which England could impart its cosa nostra to those who lacked and needed), the nation had no discernable Thing. The destitution of the English masses as referenced by this paper does not support the imperialist claim. The state of the countries colonized by England, which India and Ireland have here been called on to exemplify, likewise counteract the idea of the English Thing and the advantages of identification with it. Rather, it has been shown that nullification of local legislations and usurpation of local authorities by British rule in addition to other strategies led to the devastation of those colonized regions and negatively affected those peoples on levels political and psychological. Knee deep in the mire of the ruins she instigated, the colonizer then called attention to her efforts at rectifying the unhappy circumstances the native peoples had allegedly brought onto themselves. It is this perceived altruism that satiated the desire for a conspicuous British Thing, giving both political leaders and civilians a reason to believe in the England whose own society was riddled with discontent. In closing, this paper returns to staunchly defend its opening quote and hopes its contents go towards proving that it was solipsism, not philanthropy, that motivated British imperialism centuries prior to and during the moments when Modernist periodicals such as The New Age and Dana came into existence to record.