Herbert Read and the Surrealists; Art and Rebellion, Gregory Motton

2
The Flood Gates
Herbert Read and the Surrealists — art and rebellion
against the status quo
The trend in British politics described in the last chapter is within the context of the
Europe-wide, or (with exceptions) worldwide, growth to ascendancy of the middle
classes, and the parallel growth of capitalism, liberalism and socialism, and the
extension of their influence over the formation of opinion. Between them, these three
ideas – partly compatible, partly not – were more or less to dominate the world over
the 20th century. In a pluralist society such as Britain, the three could exist and thrive
alongside each other and, to a large extent, merge. It is also the era of totalitarianism,
and of the expansion of the state.
Part of the transition from the old order to the modern world has been the resolution of
the dichotomy between classicism and romanticism, in favour of the latter. This
dichotomy had a political manifestation in the French Revolution and the conservative
reaction against it. Throughout the early 19th century when reaction and liberalism
struggled for ascendancy, one major victory for romanticism was the rise of
nationalism which later reshaped Europe’s political barriers. This marked the beginning
of the end of the era of the great empires and the aristocratic domination of Europe
constructed by Metternich at the Congress of Vienna.
The classical ideas, which were largely pan-European and which spoke of a natural
order, of reason and harmony, and which tended to argue for hierarchical regulation of
society, gave way to the passionate and romantic nationalist mythologies of
romanticism.
The pan-European aspect of liberalism in the days of the French Revolution and
Napoleon’s continental system, and the exporting, by military force, of revolutionary
ideas across the Europe, was more or less gone, surviving only in the socialist writers.
Liberalism was anti-aristocratic and led to the populism of nationalistic enthusiasm:
classicism was associated with the ruling aristocracies; it was their art and their
architecture, and their system of conservatism, based on harmony and stasis, and, in
Europe, secret police.
Romanticism combined the liberal ideas of the French Revolution – which also claimed
to be based on Reason – with the ideals of individual heroism, of Byron’s Manfred, and
Goethe’s Young Werther (both these combined their romanticism with aristocratic
spirit and a love of classicism too). Along with this went the notions of mythical and
spiritual and political rebellion, of Shelley’s Prometheus, and the brutal philosophies of
Nietzsche.
The struggle between the two outlooks was never conclusive, and the alignments never
clear-cut. The two sides shared some of their origins and attributes, and had ideas in
common, even to the extent of being two sides of the same coin, or process. They
survived each other’s onslaughts and by the late 19th century you certainly wouldn’t be
able to conclude that one idea had finally triumphed over the other. In England at that
time it would be noticeable, though, that classicism informed many of the attitudes of
the aristocracy, while romanticism was associated with rebellion, against authority, and
even sometimes against God. One represented a view of nature and harmony; the other
the troubled human spirit. The English public schools, for example, were reformed by
the inspiration of Dr Arnold, from the ideal of the aristocratic gentleman, educated
solely in the classics, to the more romantic ideal of the Christian gentleman, and the
beginnings of what might be called a liberal education. In art and architecture the
socialism and mythological romanticism was united in the work of William Morris and
the pre-Raphaelites, as well as the gothic revival of Ruskin, Pugin and others.
When the great cataclysm came, and the Great War sent millions to their unnecessary
deaths, it is perhaps not surprising that on the face of it, of the two outlooks to come
out most discredited, it would be the one most readily associated with the old order,
classicism. And such indeed was the case. The upper class generals ‘led’ from the rear
without taking the field, and sat drinking champagne in châteaux while giving orders for