''The History of Mr. Polly'' is a 1910

comic novel A comic novel is a novel-length work of humorous fiction. Many well-known authors have written comic novels, including P. G. Wodehouse, Henry Fielding, Mark Twain, and John Kennedy Toole. Comic novels are often defined by the author's literar ...

H. G. Wells Herbert George Wells"Wells, H. G."
Revised 18 May 2015. ''

antihero An antihero (sometimes spelled as anti-hero) or antiheroine is a main character in a story who may lack conventional heroic qualities and attributes, such as idealism, courage, and morality. Although antiheroes may sometimes perform actions ...

inspired by H. G. Wells's early experiences in the

drapery Drapery is a general word referring to cloths or textiles (Old French , from Late Latin ). It may refer to cloth used for decorative purposes – such as around windows – or to the trade of retailing cloth, originally mostly for clothin ...

trade: Alfred Polly, born circa 1870, a timid and directionless young man living in

Edwardian The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...

England, who despite his own bumbling achieves contented serenity with little help from those around him. Mr. Polly's most striking characteristic is his "innate sense of epithet", which leads him to coin hilarious expressions like "the Shoveacious Cult" for "sunny young men of an abounding and elbowing energy" and "dejected angelosity" for the ornaments of Canterbury Cathedral. Alfred Polly lives in the imaginary town of Fishbourne in Kent (not to be confused with

Fishbourne, West Sussex Fishbourne is a village and civil parish in the Chichester District of West Sussex, England and is situated two miles () west of Chichester. The Anglican parish of Fishbourne, formerly New Fishbourne, is in the Diocese of Chichester. The populat ...

or Fishbourne, Isle of Wight – the town in the story is thought to be based on

Sandgate, Kent Sandgate is a village in the Folkestone and Hythe Urban Area in the Folkestone and Hythe district of Kent, England. It had a population of 4,225 at the 2001 census.in medias res A narrative work beginning ''in medias res'' (, "into the middle of things") opens in the midst of the plot (cf. ''ab ovo'', ''ab initio''). Often, exposition is bypassed and filled in gradually, through dialogue, flashbacks or description of pa ...

'' by presenting a miserable Mr. Polly: "He hated Foxbourne, he hated Foxbourne High Street, he hated his shop and his wife and his neighbours – every blessed neighbour – and with indescribable bitterness he hated himself". Thereafter, ''The History of Mr. Polly'' is divided in three parts. Chapters 1–6 depict his life up to age 20, when he marries his cousin Miriam Larkins and sets up an outfitter's shop in Fishbourne. Chapters 7–8 show Mr. Polly's spectacular suicide attempt, which ironically makes him a local hero, wins him insurance money that saves him from bankruptcy, and yields the insight that "''Fishbourne wasn't the world'', which leads him to abandon his shop and his wife. Chapters 9–10, at the Potwell Inn (apparently located 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 ...

), culminates in Mr. Polly's courageous victory over "Uncle Jim", a malicious relative of the innkeeper's granddaughter. An epilogue then depicts Mr. Polly at ease as assistant-innkeeper, after a brief visit to ascertain Miriam's prosperity.

Themes

The novel's principal conflict is Mr. Polly's struggle with life, told "in the full-blooded

Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian er ...

tradition".. This moral struggle is slow to develop, for Mr. Polly is a stunted, rather than a gifted or self-confident character. He is not without imagination and a flair for language, but his mind is "at once too vivid in its impressions and too easily fatigued". His mother dies when he is seven, and his formal education ends at the age of fourteen, by which "Mr. Polly had lost much of his natural confidence, so far as figures and sciences and languages and the possibilities of learning things were concerned". His unsympathetic father apprentices him to The Port Burdock Drapery Bazaar. Unsatisfied there, he leaves to look for work in London, and is employed for a time in Canterbury, whose cathedral pleases him greatly: "There was a blood affinity between Mr. Polly and the Gothic". Mr. Polly's struggles are chiefly moral: he has no confidence in his intellectual powers (though he is an avid reader), and his emotions are confused and timid. The reader is invited to see things from Mr. Polly's point of view, even when this leads him to commit arson and, perhaps, manslaughter. "This is a history and not a glorification of Mr. Polly, and I tell of things as they were with him." H. G. Wells's moral point of view in the novel is complex and often ironic, as Mr. Polly's musings at the end of the novel suggest: "One seems to start in life expecting something. And it doesn't happen. And it doesn't matter. One starts with ideas that things are good and things are bad – and it hasn't much relation to what ''is'' good and what ''is'' bad. . . . There's something that doesn't mind us. It isn't what we try to get that we get, it isn't the good we think we do is good. What makes us happy isn't our trying, what makes others happy isn't our trying. There's a sort of character people like and stand up for and a sort they won't. You got to work at it and take the consequences". For the most part in ''The History of Mr. Polly'' the author's penchant for social reform is in abeyance; but Wells does cite twice the diagnosis of "a certain high-browed, spectacled gentleman living at Highbury, wearing a gold pince-nez, and writing for the most part in the beautiful library of the Reform Club," who without knowing Mr. Polly diagnoses the situation of "those ill-adjusted units that abound in a society that has failed to develop a collective intelligence and a collective will for order, commensurate with its complexities." A later passage of several hundred words from the same unidentified author critiques "that vast mass of useless, uncomfortable, under-educated, under-trained and altogether pitiable people that we contemplate when we use that inaccurate and misleading term, the

lower middle class In developed nations around the world, the lower middle class is a subdivision of the greater middle class. Universally, the term refers to the group of middle class households or individuals who have not attained the status of the upper middle ...

Criticism

''The History of Mr. Polly'' received mostly enthusiastic reviews. H. L. Mencken published a glowing review in the July 1910 number of ''

The Smart Set ''The Smart Set'' was an American literary magazine, founded by Colonel William d'Alton Mann and published from March 1900 to June 1930. Its headquarters was in New York City. During its Jazz Age heyday under the editorship of H. L. Mencken and ...

''. The novel has been called "a complete comic miracle." Mr. Polly' has been called a "wonderful incarnation of what might have happened to Wells without education, a Wells driven to use the words bubbling in him and getting them all so delightfully muddled." But Wells said his protagonist was based not on himself, but on his elder brother Frank. ''The History of Mr. Polly'' was included by

Robert McCrum John Robert McCrum (born 7 July 1953) is an English writer and editor, holding senior editorial positions at Faber and Faber over seventeen years, followed by a long association with ''The Observer''. Early life The son of Michael William McC ...

in his list of the 100 best novels in English in

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

Screen adaptations

A film version of the same name was made in 1949 by Anthony Pellisier, with

John Mills Sir John Mills (born Lewis Ernest Watts Mills; 22 February 190823 April 2005) was an English actor who appeared in more than 120 films in a career spanning seven decades. He excelled on camera as an appealing British everyman who often portra ...

as Polly. It was adapted by the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

as a six-part television serial shown between 28 August – 10 October 1959, with Emrys Jones as Polly, and again as a five-part adaptation starring

Andrew Sachs Andreas Siegfried Sachs (7 April 1930 – 23 November 2016), known professionally as Andrew Sachs, was a German-born British actor and writer. He made his name on British television and found his greatest fame for his portrayal of the comical Sp ...

, shown between 2 and 30 March 1980. The 1959 version no longer exists. A feature-length version starring Lee Evans was shown on ITV in May 2007.

Notes

References

Bibliography

* * * *

External links

* *
A reading of ''The History of Mr. Polly'' at archive.org
* {{DEFAULTSORT:History of Mr Polly, The Novels by H. G. Wells 1910 British novels British comedy novels Novels set in Kent Novels set in Sussex British novels adapted into films British novels adapted into television shows