{"product_id":"two-cheers-for-democracy","title":"Two Cheers for Democracy","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"wp-caption alignright\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\n\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0278\/7642\/5795\/files\/morganandbookcase.jpg?v=1681472170\u0026amp;width=700\" alt=\"\"\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePREFACE BY HENRY MANCE\u003cbr\u003e232pp\u003cbr\u003eISBN 9781910263365\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eE M Forster, author of PB No. 146 \u003cb class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eTwo Cheers for Democracy: a Selection\u003c\/b\u003e was, in our opinion, the greatest novelist of the twentieth century. He wrote five novels published in his lifetime and a sixth (\u003ci class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eMaurice\u003c\/i\u003e) published posthumously. Naturally, many Persephone readers would rate other novelists, Virginia Woolf perhaps or James Joyce, more highly, and if one included European writers then maybe Proust as well. But for us it’s Forster.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eAs well as novels, Forster wrote two biographies, a libretto, short stories, book reviews, literary criticism - and essays. These pieces were often about writers he admired, but many of them were about moral values, about what he believed. \u003cspan class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eThe originally sixty-nine essays in \u003cb class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eTwo Cheers for Democracy\u003c\/b\u003e – we have cut them down to twenty-five – date from 1925 to 1951 (an earlier volume of essays, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eAbinger Harvest\u003c\/i\u003e, appeared in 1936). Hence the word 'Selection' in the subtitle of our volume: we have made our own selection because we felt that some of the essays are not particularly interesting nowadays. Our intention is to entice Persephone readers to read ‘Culture and Freedom’ or ‘What I Believe’ – and not to get bogged down in essays on William Arnold or Forrest Reid.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"column\"\u003e‘To give an idea of the extraordinary charm of these essays is impossible,' wrote Edwin Muir in the \u003cem data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eObserver\u003c\/em\u003e in 1951. 'It seems to reside in a curious inconstancy or inconsistency. Mr Forster begins his operation upon us by bringing a tolerant and fair judgment to everything he touches, a balance; then the balance overturns, he is seized with a deeper apprehension, and throws everything over, for here is the real truth.’ That is why Forster’s style is so seductive and so unusual: he is thinking aloud and is not afraid to be distracted. And through it all he treats the reader as his equal.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eMany of the 1939 and 1940 pieces were first read on the BBC Home Service and had a great influence. One of Forster's most famous utterances was: ‘If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country’, and what a provocative utterance it was. Yet it is simply an exaggerated echo of Isabella Thorpe’s remark in Jane Austen's \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eNorthanger Abbey\u003c\/i\u003e: ‘There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.’ So when Forster mentions why democracy deserves two cheers instead of three, he adds: ‘Only Love the Beloved Republic deserves that.’\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eIn the preface to \u003cb class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eTwo Cheers\u003c\/b\u003e, Henry Mance of the \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ci class=\"\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eFinancial Times \u003c\/i\u003ewrites: ‘More than seven decades after the essays were written, they chime with me – indeed, they console me.’ He concludes: ‘One of my favourite phrases in \u003cstrong\u003eTwo Cheers\u003c\/strong\u003e is that we “have, in this age of unrest, to ferry much old stuff across the river”. Whatever horrors, whatever mistakes we encounter, we don’t just draw a line and write off the past. We are only here for a short while. We have a cultural responsibility. Forster concluded of Woolf: “It is as a novelist that she will be judged. But the rest of her work must be remembered.” The same is, of course, true of Forster himself. His essays speak to us because they invite us to be ourselves. We must ferry them across the river.’\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eEndpaper\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"endpaper-caption\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e'Coppice', a cotton furnishing fabric designed by Mary White (1930 - 2020) for Heal's in the early 1950s. In a private collection. E M Forster owned a small wood called Piney Copse; he left it to the National Trust. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"endpaper-caption\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePicture Caption\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"endpaper-caption\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"\u003eMorgan and his bookcase at King's College, Cambridge. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"E M Forster","offers":[{"title":"None","offer_id":54098800378163,"sku":"rqa1789694898721","price":28.4,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tissue\/Endpaper","offer_id":54098800410931,"sku":"tui1789694898722","price":31.2,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Cambridge Imprint paper","offer_id":54098800443699,"sku":"vjx1789694898723","price":38.76,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Reusable fabric napkin","offer_id":54098800476467,"sku":"wwl1789694898724","price":45.56,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0989\/0578\/4627\/files\/two-cheers-for-democracy_1.png?v=1789694903","url":"https:\/\/sandstepclad.shop\/products\/two-cheers-for-democracy","provider":"My Store","version":"1.0","type":"link"}