The New Republic (novel)

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The New Republic or Culture, Faith and Philosophy in an English Country House by English author William Hurrell Mallock (1849-1923) is a novel first published by Chatto and Windus of London in 1878. It is a satire consisting almost entirely of dialogue and mocking most of the important figures then at Oxford University.

But the work had its genesis as a serialization. In 1876 and 1877 (after Mallock had secured his Bachelor of Arts degree at Oxford in 1874, the same year as Oscar Wilde) it appeared as a series of sketches in Belgravia magazine. The subsequent novel was a compilation and revision of these individual satiric portraits, with attacks added on aestheticism and Oxford Hellenism. Literary blogger Ray Davis calls the whole effort "the work of a clever and vindictive student," adding that its "deflating and punctured monologues, drawn from close observation of college lectures and sermons, match [Mallock's] gifts perfectly" [1].

The book became a best seller in its time and retains much of its humor and satirical bite today. As author David Daiches wrote in 1951, "If we can read through The New Republic without at one point or another being made to feel a little foolish, we are wise indeed."

The famous people Mallock depicts are as follows, together with the names of the characters that represent them.

Matthew Arnold — Mr. Luke

Thomas Carlyle — Donald Gordon

W. K. Clifford — Mr. Saunders

Violet Fane — Mrs. Sinclair

W. M. Hardinge — Robert Leslie

Thomas Huxley — Mr. Storks

Benjamin Jowett — Dr. Jenkinson

W. H. Mallock — Otho Laurence

Walter Pater — Mr. Rose

John Ruskin — Mr. Herbert

John Tyndall — Mr. Stockton

Walter Pater is of particular interest because Mallock's apparent homophobia against him—expressed first in the more extensive treatment given the Mr. Rose character in the initial serialization—helped ruin Pater's public reputation as well as his career at Oxford. Reading Wilde, Querying Spaces: An Exhibition Commemorating the 100th Anniversary of the Trials of Oscar Wilde notes that, as Linda Dowling has observed, "Mr. Rose" is "the first in a long line of popular depictions of effeminate English aesthetes such as Gilbert's Bunthorne and Du Maurier's Postlewaite and Maudle" [2]. This depiction of Pater appeared during the competition for the Slade Professorship of Poetry and played a role in convincing Pater to remove himself from consideration.

But Mallock's work—as indeed all of his writings—is little known today.