The Napoleon of Notting Hill

G. K. Chesterton

Language: English

Humour Library - Science Fiction and Fantasy Librivox Literature Novel Politics Project Gutenberg _isfdb

Publisher: John Lane

Published: Jan 2, 1904

Page Count: 328

Description:

415. THE NAPOLEON OF NOTTING HILL. John Lane; London and New York, 1904. 111. William Graham Robertson
Allegory told as a fantasy of history. Chesterton has dissociated two human characteristics, humor and drive (otherwise expressed as satire and respect, humor and fanaticism, etc.), and set them at odds in two individuals, Auberon Quin and Adam Wayne. Both men, however, are striving for the same end, civilization. 
*  Chesterton sets his fantasy in England from 1984 to 2014, although the futurity is only a literary device; everything is much the same as in 1904, with the exception of governmental affairs. The smaller nations of the world have been absorbed by the larger, and Britain is now a selective despotism, with a king chosen by rote, like jury duty. The rationale is that an average man can do only average harm. 
*  Auberon Quin, a gnomish young man who might be taken as satire incarnate (and is one of Chesterton's odd blends of utter cynicism and quixotism) is walking with two friends when they encounter the recently deposed president of Nicaragua. Nicaragua has just been conquered by the United States, and it would seem that something colorful, if irrational, has gone out of the world. Meeting the president sets off the eccentric Quin. 
*  At about this time the office of kingship devolves on Quin, who begins a regime of utmost whimsy and irresponsibility. His most significant act, from our point of view, is an edict restoring colorful aspects of medievalism, with trade guilds, costumes, ceremonials, etc. He also breaks up Great Britain into semi-independent city states. London, divided into its ancient districts, each governed by a provost, becomes redolent with pomp and ceremony. 
*  Most of the burghers consider the new system a silly, pointless nuisance; the halbadier bodyguards, for example, often cannot find room to follow their provosts onto horse-cars. For Quin, however, it is a perpetual unmatchable joke to see the multicolored costumes, the heraldic devices, and the inconvenience. 
*  The opposite force is evoked by Quin's nonsense when someone takes it all seriously. Not long after Quin became king, he encouraged a boy who was playing at swording and fighting. The boy then grows up convinced by Quin' s encouragement that neomedievalism is the only proper mode of human existence. This is Adam Wayne. 
*  An incident arises. Several of the other cities of London want to put a road through Notting Hill; for this they need permission from the provost of Notting Hill, who is Wayne. An athletic and single-minded young man, Wayne refuses to yield part of his territory for the road. There is a falling out among the districts. King Auberon, whose impish nature is indicated by his name, at first tries to settle the dispute, but when it becomes clear that Wayne takes the king's joke seriously, Auberon refuses to act, for it is now an even larger joke. 
*  The result is civil war. Wayne organizes Notting Hill into a military force, and the other cities of London invade. Although greatly outnumbered, the citizens of Notting Hill win a decisive victory because of the superior strategy and tactics developed by a toy merchant who practices with lead soldiers. Notting Hill's enemies are shattered, and Notting Hill becomes preeminent among the cities of London. 
*  Thirty years pass. Wayne is still provost, and his old foes are still active. By now the land is tired of the moral tyranny of Notting Hill, and hordes from much of England gather for an attack. Notting Hill falls, and its army is slaughtered. Wayne, in his last heroic defense under an oak tree, topples the tree upon himself, King Auberon (who has gone through the motion of resigning), and his enemies. 
*  Two forms then converse from the branches of the fallen tree, Auberon and Wayne. Presumably ghosts, for the first time they understand each other and what they have done, Quin with his huge private practical joke, and Wayne with his humorless enthusiasm. The result (although the reader may not agree) is improvement. 
*  A strange book, written with typical brilliance of style, whimsical ideas, curious humor, and paradox. The subject matter, however, seems too weak to bear the load of rhetoric and fancy. The whimsy, which is realistically presented, is too outrageous and too persistently belabored.