The Good Soldier

The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford

I’m proud to introduce a new tag — “loveless Victorian marriage.” I’m also going to be tagging “suicide,” because I happen to read so many books concluding with one. Soon I’ll go back and update previous stories.

I. Summary

The Good Soldier is a book with an unreliable narrator, John. His wife is a cheat and having an affair with his best friend, and his best friend’s wife is a cunning woman who takes control of the finances once her husband sends them into debt. Leonora and Edward (the other couple) lead a loveless marriage mostly driven by Edward’s numerous affairs, while John’s wife Florence fakes a heart condition so that she can have an affair of her own. John is the most faithful and miserable as he watches his “good friends” break each other’s hearts and descend into melancholia. Both Florence and Edward commit suicide and John is left to pick up the pieces, carrying for Edward’s obsession Nancy after she becomes stricken with catatonia. Leonora remarries a stiff, boring person and no one is happy in the end.

II. Quotations

“Is there any terrestrial paradise where, amidst the whispering of the olive-leaves, people can be with whom they like and have what they like and take their ease in shadows and in coolness? — Page 185

III. Impressions

As with many books featuring unreliable narrators, I stared out this novel very confused. My confusion finally cleared by the time we reached Part IV, where John basically starts over and says yes, this was not what it seemed. I will admit that my frustration did kind of put a damp cloud on this book that probably won’t be lifted unless I take the time to reread it.

By far, my favorite plotline in this book was Leonora’s triumphant control over her adulterous (is that still a word?) husband, Edward. Edward is a cheat and a gambler, and money flows through his fingers like water through a faucet. Leonora seizes his lack of ability to control his finances and starts pensioning him with essentially a teenager’s allowance, with a built-in sum to spend on his mistresses. When Edward runs off with La Dolciquita Leonora finally admits that she’s lost him and resolves to instead hold the money. She knows what she wants and since she can’t have it, she takes something else instead.

John comes off as an idiot throughout the book. He steals Florence away in a grand romantic gesture even though she says she doesn’t love him and doesn’t even notice that his best friend and she are having an affair. So it goes. It’s interesting how he is tasked with observing everything else when he can’t even observe his own marriage.

Overall, I have a mixed opinion of this novel. It’s probably best if I reread it before making a final claim, especially since it’s one of the best books of the English language, apparently.

IV. Why I Read This Book

Found it on the shelves of the Kips Bay library!

CEL