JUDGE ON ROLE OF THE NOVEL

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27470, 2 October 1954, Page 9

JUDGE ON ROLE OF THE NOVEL

Obscenity Charges Fail In London

LIBERTY AND LICENCE Summing up in a case at the Central I Itimiral Court, London, recently, in ■ rhich a book was alleged by the [rosecution to be qbscene, Mr Justice | liable said that there were two thools of thought on sex which were •/ [poles apart” “I suppose somewhere i etween those two poles, the average, d ©cent, well-meaning man or woman .< axes his or her stand.” he said. The jury of nine men and three j ramen were sent home by the j Mge to read the book, Stanley i pfflffinan’s “The Philanderer.” Martin 3 >ecker and Warburg, Ltd., publishers, i John street W.C., The Camelot | Tess, Ltd., of Shirley road, Southand Fredric John Warburg, a j ? sector of the publishing company, of ?>t Edmund’s Court, St. Edmund’s errace. Regent’s Park, were found not of publishing an obscene libel H were discharged. They had pleaded ot guilty. Mr Mervyn Griffith-Jones, 1 had said that Martin ? and Warburg were publishers ‘ highest repute, as also was Mr I Camelot Press carried on a S j re P a table business. None of . ,? efe ndants was in toe I [ what was normally under- ' wod to ne pornographic literature. Vast Importance , Times” summarised as follows » ge .’ s summing up:— Mr Justice Stable said that the jury’s ’' was a matter of the utmost J It was of importance to ’ who created imaginary 1 » ♦ ’ for our edification, amusej and sometimes, too, for our 1 was a matter of vast im- , Js® the community in general • J/* tile adolescent, perhaps, m parSS r - K was great importance in toe future of the novel in * civilised world and to the future who could only derive their pledge of how we lived, thought, uf from the contemporary -?J at - ure the age in which they interested. x °ur verdict will have great bearJL2 a -,ytoere the lifie is drawn beeen liberty and licence.” he said. not here as judges of We are not here to say whether .n*e a book of that kind. We are to sa y whether we think it ■ j-ld be a good thing if books like au never written.” The test

nou’n in 1868 of whether a book obscene was whether the was to deprave those into afl sands5 ands publication might and whose minds were open to ohL^ ru ? or3l influence. The book had 06 Judged on today’s standards. Schools of Thought * the ages, sex had been interest to man and 'here were two schools of poles apart. "In between the D»niS? rernes was found a variety of ; and thought. In one extreme ~ought that sex was sin, that Mift thing was dirty, and that aH sa , id about the whole distasteth® better. At the other exwas found the line of thought Z 3 nothing but mischief reWffS M Om toe policy of covering up jUnicb* e w^ole thing was just as G °h’s universe as anymsH6 ’ an< * toe proper approach to |KLwas one of 1 rankness, plain sKn xTf? aiK * the avoidance of any pretence. We going to say in England Conte mporary literature is to w *«easured by what is suitable for a

14-year-old schoolgirl to read? I do not suppose there is a decent man or woman in this Court who does not believe wholeheartedly that the pornographic. filthy books ought to be stamped out. But in our desire for a healthy society, if we drive criminal law too far—farther than it ought to go—is there not a risk that there will be a revolt and a demand for a change in the law? Might not th<j pendulum swing too far the other and allow to creep in things we can at the moment keep out?” This book purported to be a picture of contemporary life in New York. The book’s theme was the story of a rather attractive young man absolutely obsessed with his desire for women. It was not presented as an admirable thing nor a thing to be copied. It was not presented as a thing which brought him happiness or permanent satisfaction, and throughout was heard the note of impending disaster. The prosecution had said the book was “sheer filth.” “Is it?” his ’ Lordship asked. “Is the act of sexual passion sheer filth. It may be an error of taste to write about it, but is it sheer literature of the world from the earnest days when people could write, represented, so far as we had it today, the sum total of thought of the human mind—literature sacred and literature profane. Were we to be reduced to the sort of books that were read to children in the nursery? The answer to that was ‘‘Of course not. A mass of great literature was wholly unsuitable for reading by the adolescent, but that did not mean the publishers were guilty of a criminal offence for making those works available to the general public. . “Those of us who enjoy the great Victorian novelists get such understanding as we have of that great age from Trollope, Thackeray, Dickens, and many others. In the world in which we live today it is important that we should have an understanding of how life is lived and how the human mind is working in those Parts of the world, which are not separated from us by time but bywace. "At a time like today when ideas, creeds and processes of thought see™ to some extent to be in the meltingpot and people are bewildered to know in what direction humanity is heading, into what column we propose to marcn; if we are to understand how Ute is lived in the United States, for example, in France, Germany, or elsewhere, the contemporary novel of those nations may afford us some guide: it may ne the only guide to many.”