Directory of Lost Causes (By Quentin S. Crisp)

More Than One Kind of Love

On Monday I finally finished reading Dickens' The Old Curiosity Shop. Of the works of Dickens with which I am familiar, this is far from being my favourite (which distinction probably belongs to Great Expectations). However, it was not without interest, and particular increased in fascination for me when Little Nell and her grandfather eventually arrive at a sanctuary after all the tribulations of their long flight, and Little Nell's mind turns towards the contemplation of Death.



There are also, as always, many incidental points of interest in the novel, and one of these, for me, was a little passage just before the very end, in which Kit and Barbara are shown courting. Kit has been invited to go along with several gentlemen who have previously been concerned with the fate of Little Nell on a mission to rescue her. He has had no idea, for some time, of Nell's whereabouts, and of her fate, and he is very keen to see her again. However, it seems that Barbara is jealous. Nothing is made of the fact that Barbara is, apparently, jealous of a girl in her early teens (I'm not sure of Nell's age at this stage of the novel, but I think she must be about fourteen), thereby conferring on her the status of rival. Well, that is not particularly surprising. It is merely an indication that ideas have changed in the intervening time. It's very hard to judge exactly how the audience of the day would have taken the whole scene and whether there would have been much - or anything - in the way of sexual overtones for the reader. Certainly, Kit does not appear outraged at Barbara's implied accusation, only wishing to defend himself that his affections belong properly to Barbara and not Nell, as he would if the object of jealousy had been any other woman. For the modern reader, I think, ideas of paedophilia raise their heads either distantly or conspicuously when they encounter this passage. And why? Well, my guess is that, in our current age, love itself has become narrowed down to something purely sexual; it is increasingly hard to imagine it as anything else. The passage in question, however, is not intended as controvesial or disturbing, or anything other than cheerful and touching, as far as I can discern:

Now, Barbara, if the truth must be told - as it must and ought to be - Barbara seemed, of all the little household, to take least pleasure in the bustle of the occasion; and when Kit, in the openness of his heart, told her how glad, and overjoyed it made him, Barbara became more downcast still, and seemed to have even less pleasure in it than before!

'You have not been home so long, Christopher,' said Barbara - and it is impossible to tell how carelessly she said it - 'You have not been home so long, that you need be glad to go away again, I should think.'

'But for such a purpose,' returned Kit. 'To bring back Miss Nell! To see her again! Only think of that! I am so pleased too to think that you will see her, Barbara, at last.'

Barbara did not absolutely say that she felt no great gratification on this point, but she expressed the sentiment so plainly by one little toss of her head, that Kit was quite disconcerted, and wondered in his simplicity why she was so cool about it.

'You'll say she has the sweetest and beautifullest face you ever saw, I know,' said Kit, rubbing his hands. 'I'm sure you'll say that!'

Barbara tossed her head again.

'What's the matter, Barbara?' said Kit.

'Nothing,' cried Barbara. And Barbara pouted - not sulkily, or in an ugly manner, but just enough to make her look more cherry-lipped than ever.

There is no school in which a pupil gets on so fast, as that in which Kit became a scholar when he gave Barbara the kiss. He saw what Barbara meant now - he had his lesson by heart all at once - she was the book - there it was before him as plain as print.

'Barbara,' said Kit, 'you're not cross with me?'

Oh dear no! Why should Barbara be cross? And what right had she to be cross? And what did it matter whether she was cross or no? Who minded her!

'Why, I do,' said Kit. 'Of course I do.'

Barbara didn't see why it was of course, at all.

Kit was sure she must. Would she think again?

And so on. I must admit that I laughed at the depiction of Barbara's jealousy here. Some things, I thought, have not changed in the intervening years. When Kit eventually understands what is happening, he defends his affection towards Nell in the following terms:

'...I think I could almost die to do her service... I have been used, you see, to talk and think of her, almost as if she was an angel. ... When I think of myself, it's as her old servant, and one that loved her dearly, as his kind, good, gentle mistress; and who would have gone - yes, and still would go - through any harm to serve her...'

This explanation is apparently satisfying to Barbara. As I read it, I remembered the song by Joan Armatrading, More Than One Kind of Love. It certainly seems as if there were more kinds of love to choose from in Dickens' day. Kit doesn't say, I love her as a brother, or, as a friend, but that he loves her as a servant. I suppose that's one particular kind of attachment that is troubling to the modern sensibility, although it was apparently palatable in fantasy form in the relationship between Frodo and Sam in the recent Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Perhaps these archetypes are still latent within us. Whatever one may think of such an attachment, at least it has the virtue of showing that not all affections must be either of blood or sex if they are not to be entirely tepid.



A typical exploration of the idea of love today, might be, for instance, When Harry Met Sally, a film that famously poses the question of whether men and women can ever be friends without the whole sex issue getting in the way, and seems to answer a resounding NO. The relationship is not valid unless it is in the sexual/romantic mould. Well, this is not surprising coming from Hollywood, for whom the so-called 'happy ending' of the heterosexual pact is the stock-in-trade. However, I have been surprised to find that people in real life hold this view, as if it were self-evident. Not only is sexual love more important than friendship, it is actually All THERE IS. I have always felt something like the opposite. I feel as if we are living in a society where love is increasingly narrowed down to the field of the sexual. It's little wonder that such relationships seem to break down so often, when there is so much pressure for them to provide all the meaning and affection in the lives of the two individuals involved. And in the end, it is even questionable whether this is love at all. After all, of all kinds of love, sexual love is surely the most self-interested. It demands the attentions of the other, and often enough ends in bitterness and disillusion when lies, insecurities, neediness and so on, come to the fore.



I'm not sure how much Dickens is exaggerating the normality of Kit's affections, his strength of loyalty, his innocent love, but it does seem like a very natural and homely way to live to me, even if it's not a way I have actually achieved - to love all those who are a part of one's life.

But then it's very much the mode to doubt that there can be anything 'higher' or unselfish, and perhaps people prefer the grubbiness of disillusionment, if it means they can continue to reap the sexual fruits thereof, to the hard work of sacrifice, even if it meant that one day they might feel, like Sydney Carton standing before the guillotine, "It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done."