Ideology Possessed

Children and Others, by James Gould Cozzens. Harcourt, $5.95 It is difficult to talk about James Gould Cozzens without bringing up the savage treatment he has been receiving recently from critics and reviewers. This is a pity. Several of the stories in his current volume I will never forget, and to talk about the reception of his work is in one sense an irrelevancy. Nevertheless, it really ought to be said that the critics’ attacks upon Cozzens have been politically motivated; and, though I am sorry to have to say it, this comes close to pointing out that, as literary critics, they have been operating in bad faith.

Reviewing Children and Others on the front page of the New York Times Book Review, Professor Frederick C. Crews of Berkeley spends about half the space castigating Cozzens for what amount to political heresies. Cozzens, we learn, is a bigot, he is interested in social status, he is illiberal, he doesn’t hate the rich. Crews even compares him to Barry Goldwater. Now this review might be written off as a mere eccentricity. But when one turns to the N.Y. Herald Tribune reviewer, Jean Stafford, whose piece appeared on the same Sunday, one finds that the main objection to Cozzens is that his characters come from the wrong social class. In the bad old genteel days, certain social strata were considered beneath the notice of the respectable writer; but now, under the new dispensation, some are to be regarded, evidently, as above it. Cozzens is thus a sort of transmogrified Dreiser. His excursions into proscribed subject matter violate all the canons of what respectable opinion considers decent and fitting.

About the Author

Jeffrey Hart

Jeffrey Hart is a contributor to National Review.

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Children and Others, by James Gould Cozzens. Harcourt, $5.95 It is difficult to talk about James Gould Cozzens without bringing up the savage treatment he has been receiving recently from critics and reviewers. This is a pity. Several of the stories in his current volume I will never forget, and to talk about the reception of his work is in one sense an irrelevancy. Nevertheless, it really ought to be said that the critics’ attacks upon Cozzens have been politically motivated; and, though I am sorry to have to say it, this comes close to pointing out that, as literary critics, they have been operating in bad faith.

Reviewing Children and Others on the front page of the New York Times Book Review, Professor Frederick C. Crews of Berkeley spends about half the space castigating Cozzens for what amount to political heresies. Cozzens, we learn, is a bigot, he is interested in social status, he is illiberal, he doesn’t hate the rich. Crews even compares him to Barry Goldwater. Now this review might be written off as a mere eccentricity. But when one turns to the N.Y. Herald Tribune reviewer, Jean Stafford, whose piece appeared on the same Sunday, one finds that the main objection to Cozzens is that his characters come from the wrong social class. In the bad old genteel days, certain social strata were considered beneath the notice of the respectable writer; but now, under the new dispensation, some are to be regarded, evidently, as above it. Cozzens is thus a sort of transmogrified Dreiser. His excursions into proscribed subject matter violate all the canons of what respectable opinion considers decent and fitting.