In Praise of Devil's Tor
Michael Stokes Walton
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I have always been led to believe that David Lindsay's cosmic masterpiece Devil's Tor was, with the exception of the first ninety pages, more or less unreadable. A major criticism levelled at the book is that it is infuriatingly drawn out and that bewildered readers, bogged down by passages of ponderous metaphysics and a turgid, sometime archaic style, seldom get past the first two chapters. Other critics, however, have emitted sounds of cautious enthusiasm. Lindsay's friend, E.H. Visiak, who admitted finding it initially unreadable, worked through the text after an interval of many years and found it "unexpectedly fascinating".
I had considerable difficulty in obtaining a copy of the 1932 version, but recently I was able to read this extraordinary book and confess to being highly moved and uplifted. I recalled Beethoven's Ninth Symphony which Lindsay told us was in his head at the time of writing, and it is this identification with sublime music which confers upon the novel a noble quality, an aloofness and austerity. At the heart of Devil's Tor is a vision of reality which lies within each of us, beyond the field of everyday vision. It seems that Lindsay's mind was opened in some "occult" way while writing it, enabling him to glimpse this other word which interpenetrates with our own. Admittedly, while surveying the stunning landscape of the novel, a mist might occasionally descend obscuring meaning and outline, but the best strategy is to press forward and allow the unique vision to materialise.
There is a similarity between Devil's Tor and that masterpiece of interior exploration Saint Teresa's Interior Castle, for both works notate states of consciousness of a very rare kind, invariably exposing the fallibility and inadequacy of language - at best an imperfect tool when confronted with the numinous. In Devil's Tor, the artist Peter Copping states, "A symbol is the mystic sign of the Creator. An allegory is a wall decoration with a label attached; if you remove the label, it is just as decorative but less illuminating; and that means its special interest is purely literary."
Lindsay himself never wavered in the conviction that Devil's Tor was his crowning achievement. This was no vulgar boast but a measure of his seriousness and commitment to the underlying theme. Behind his "fictions" lie alluring and disturbing realities - many of which hint that everyday life is a shadow of that sublimer reality which we all secretly crave. The symbol for this sublimity in Devil's Tor is the vision of the Great Mother whose conventional aspect is the Virgin Mary. On page 152, Old Magnus Colborne says to Copping, "since you have set your heart upon paintings that shall symbolise the universe, I recommend to you the most vivid, the most passionate, and the most universal - the presentation of the Madonna." And further on, Colborne remarks, "Accordingly, the source of this universe is to be sought in a female archetype - not in an eternal Father, but in an eternal Mother..."
Matriarchy is the central theme of Devil's Tor; the mother standing for the power of the enduring earth and the redemptive visionary capacity locked inside each man and woman. It demonstrates how the irresistible power of fate works through all the characters and finally brings together Ingrid Fleming and Henry Saltfleet; they are destined to produce a child whose ultimate purpose is to produce a race through which cult of the Great Mother will be revived. This can only take place after the joining together of the male and female cosmic flintstones at Devil's Tor.
It is is generally accepted that the novel begins impressively. With the description of an approaching electrical storm over Devil's Tor and the subsequent discovery of the tomb, the opening does achieve an effect of threatening grandeur - but the later developments are equally important if not always so dramatic.
At times the narrative deliberately slows, pauses for breath, before the measured unfolding of yet more enigmas. As for the characters, they have been dismissed as statues of correctitude, formal and stilted, but I would add that their manners and deportment are typical of the period in which the action is set, and today, with the added historical perspective, enhance rather than detract from the value of the story. I would like to conclude by stating this short article is a plea that a reprint of the 1932 edition of the novel should be made available here in Britain, for I am certain that many will respond to a work of such unusual quality and integrity.