Quasi-Professional Culture, Conservative Ideology, and the Narrative Structure of George Gissing's New Grub Street

Abstract

Quasi-Professional Culture, Conservative Ideology, and the Narrative Structure of George Gissing's New Grub Street Stephen E. Severn (bio) Scholars have difficulty taking George Gissing at his word. When assessing the thematic and rhetorical implications of his narrative structures, many argue that the development of and resolution to his major novels should not be read literally to any significant extent. They downplay the importance of the narrated events that the reader encounters and instead look elsewhere for clues as to where the author's rhetorical agenda might lie. For instance, Simon James asserts that "it cannot be . . . the plot that creates and establishes the values the author wishes to promote. Gissing's model of Bildung always contains a structural gap between potential and fulfillment, the former suggested by the discourse and in the characters' own aspirations, the latter denied by the plot" (13). Adrian Poole echoes that stance in his analysis of the conclusion to New Grub Street, Gissing's masterful examination of the London literary world of the 1880's. He argues that the novel's conclusion should be understood as a discontinuity that is out of step with the essential narrative: "This final scene, so neat, so glib, is not the one demanded by the novel's internal logic. Gissing's deep, humane identification with those who are left outside requires that the final scene should belong to Marian, and her lonely, loveless vigil in the provincial library" (Poole 155). [End Page 156] The individual that Poole refers to is Marian Yule,1 perhaps the only completely admirable character in the novel. Born into a literary family, she toils in selfless obscurity for years as a researcher and ghostwriter for her father, Alfred Yule, a longtime editor and writer of limited abilities who has achieved relatively little success because he remains doggedly steadfast to the literary practices of an earlier time. Midway through the text, Marian encounters the first in a relentless series of personal disappointments when she learns that a long-anticipated inheritance from a wealthy uncle has been lost thanks to the failure of one of his creditors. Next, her engagement to an aspiring writer named Jasper Milvain collapses. Driven to succeed, Jasper has no qualms about producing sensationalist prose that is specifically designed to appeal to the vulgar reading tastes of the mass market. He shamelessly casts Marian off when he determines that she will hinder the progress of his literary career. To make matters worse, her father goes blind. His handicap deprives the family of its primary source of income, and Marian's subsequent efforts to earn extra money result in her suffering a series of nervous breakdowns. Finally, the Yules are forced to relocate from London to a "provincial town" where Marian ekes out a meager existence as a librarian and Alfred eventually dies. Although, as Poole's comments suggest, the reader learns Marian's ultimate fate in the last chapter of New Grub Street, the final scene does not belong to her. Instead, Gissing closes with Jasper, whose fortunes have taken a dramatically different turn from those of his former fiancé. Having finally achieved a modest level of success as a writer, he has married Amy Yule, a recent widow and cousin to Marian. Unlike Marian, the Milvains now live in relative comfort because Amy has received a ?10,000 inheritance from the same estate that failed to produce revenue for her cousin. The novel's last sentence shows Jasper drifting into a state of "dreamy bliss" as Amy sings and plays a song for him on their piano (551). Thus, like many nineteenth-century novels, the text closes on a note of supreme domestic tranquility. Yet here the resolution appears decidedly incongruous—even shocking—for it marks the complete triumph of the text's most self-centered character. Whereas the denouement of a Victorian novel would normally punish Jasper's behavior, New Grub Street seems to reward it. That apparent discontinuity produces the sense of consternation that is [End Page 157] palpable in the analyses of both Poole and James. Although such frustration is understandable, their arguments ultimately ring hollow. If, as James suggests, the plot "cannot" be said to...