''So Disdained'' is the second published novel by British author,
Nevil Shute
Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 189912 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect h ...
(N.S. Norway). It was first published in 1928 by
Cassell & Co.,
[ reissued in 1951 by ]William Heinemann
William Henry Heinemann (18 May 1863 – 5 October 1920) was an English publisher of Jewish descent and the founder of the Heinemann publishing house in London.
Early life
On 18 May 1863, Heinemann was born in Surbiton, Surrey, England. Heine ...
, and issued in paperback by Pan Books
Pan Books is a publishing imprint that first became active in the 1940s and is now part of the British-based Macmillan Publishers, owned by the Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group of Germany.
Pan Books began as an independent publisher, est ...
in 1966. In the United States it was first published in 1928 by Houghton Mifflin
The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star.
Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...
in Boston, with the title ''The Mysterious Aviator''.[
]
Political and diplomatic background
When the book was written, Germany was disarmed under the Versailles Treaty
The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June ...
, Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...
was still a marginal figure in the politics of the Weimar Republic
The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is al ...
and, as the book makes clear, the major political and military threat was perceived to be from the Soviet Union, then in the first flush of success of the October Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
.
The book describes a state of cold war
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
between Britain and the Soviet Union, though the term did not yet exist. Many elements which later became familiar in the background of 1950s and 1960s thrillers — an accelerated arms race, the development of secret weapons, intensive espionage and counter-espionage around these weapons projects, political and social subversion, and the tendency to promote right-wing dictatorships as allies against Communism — are already present in this book, three decades earlier.
The book was written in the direct aftermath of the 1926 General Strike which seemed to put the spectre of a Socialist Revolution — highly unwelcome to people of Shute's persuasion — on the British agenda.
Title
The text is prefaced by a quotation from Sir Walter Raleigh
Sir Walter Raleigh (; – 29 October 1618) was an English statesman, soldier, writer and explorer. One of the most notable figures of the Elizabethan era, he played a leading part in English colonisation of North America, suppressed rebellion ...
:
Plot summary
Peter Moran, the narrator, is agent to Lord Arner, administering his (fictional) estate of Under Hall in West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...
. Driving home after a dinner in Winchester, he chances to encounter Maurice Lenden, who in 1917 had been a fellow pilot in the Royal Flying Corps
"Through Adversity to the Stars"
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.
It emerges that Lenden, who had suffered repeated financial failure and believes himself to be divorced, has entered Soviet service as a mercenary pilot, thus becoming a traitor to his own country. On a night espionage flight to photograph naval construction in Portsmouth Harbour
Portsmouth Harbour is a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest between Portsmouth and Gosport in Hampshire. It is a Ramsar site and a Special Protection Area.
It is a large natural harbour in Hampshire, England. Geographically it i ...
, he has made a forced landing in his Breguet XIX in a remote part of the Under Hall estate.
Despite having no Communist sympathies, Moran shelters Lenden, hides the aeroplane, and contrives to mislead a Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
investigator. However, he takes the precaution of covertly exposing Lenden's photographic plates so that the images cannot be returned to the Soviets.
Shortly afterwards, two Communist agents steal the photographic plates in order to take them back to their base in an Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
villa. Lenden, who has recovered his wife and his patriotism, sets off in pursuit. Moran in turn sets off to intercept Lenden near the Italian border, taking off in the aeroplane as the only way to catch up with him.
Moran's plan fails because he is injured landing in Italy. Instead, he persuades the local Fascists
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and th ...
to storm the communist hideout. They are too late; most of the Communists have fled and Lenden has been mortally wounded while stealing the photographic plates. Shortly before dying, he redeems himself by smashing the plates; Moran does not tell him that they were exposed even before he sacrificed his life to retrieve them.
Philip Stenning, the first person narrator of ''Marazan
''Marazan'' is the first published novel by the British author Nevil Shute. It was originally published in 1926 by Cassell & Co, then republished in 1951 by William Heinemann. The events of the novel occur, in part, around the Isles of Scilly.
...
'', appears in the final part of this novel as Moran's ally. Once again he is portrayed as a 'rough diamond' with a debatable sense of moral justice.
Portrayal of Italian Fascists
As in ''Marazan
''Marazan'' is the first published novel by the British author Nevil Shute. It was originally published in 1926 by Cassell & Co, then republished in 1951 by William Heinemann. The events of the novel occur, in part, around the Isles of Scilly.
...
'', one of Shute's characters expresses respect for the Italian Fascist movement of the time. In the seventh chapter Moran, wounded from his crash landing in Italy, considers his options and comes to the conclusion that "I had to get allies. I was up against a Bolshevik organization; the most obvious people in Italy to set against the Bolsheviks were the Fascisti."
In the final chapters of the book, Moran meets Captain Fazzini, the local Fascist leader: "I liked the look of him. He was a man of my own age, very tall and straight, and with a tanned, unshaven face. He had a very high forehead, and in some peculiar way he had the look of a leader in spite of his three-days' beard."
When Fazzini has roused his men to raid the secret Communist base, Moran remarks: "His force of Fascisti paraded in the square. It took some time to get them out to parade – they must have all been in bed – but I liked the look of them. They were a fine, straight body of young men, dressed in field-green breeches and black shirts and each armed with a sort of truncheon."
Though equipped with truncheons, the Fascists depicted in the book are not eager to use them on the single Communist captured in the raid. Rather, they interrogate him only verbally and ineffectively, and it is the Englishman Philip Stenning who brutally beats up the prisoner, breaking his arm, to extract information on the fate of Lenden. The Fascist leader Fazzini actually tries to restrain Stenning. Moran remarks that "I don't think that physical violence to a prisoner was much in Fazzini's line".
By the time the book was republished in 1951, the British public's perception of a Fascist militia leader had considerably changed. Shute's foreword to the 1951 edition, in which he remarks that he changed nothing in the book except "half a dozen outmoded pieces of slang", may indicate that he decided not to make any change in the favourable depiction of the Fascists.
Author's note, quoted from the 1951 edition
Shute makes similar comments about rewriting ''So Disdained'' in his autobiography ''Slide Rule
The slide rule is a mechanical analog computer which is used primarily for multiplication and division, and for functions such as exponents, roots, logarithms, and trigonometry. It is not typically designed for addition or subtraction, which is ...
'' (page 78).
References
External links
*
{{Nevil Shute
1928 British novels
British thriller novels
Novels by Nevil Shute
Fascism in the United Kingdom
Cassell (publisher) books
Aviation novels