The early 1920s were fruitful years for Arthur Machen. Fuelled
by a heightened interest in the United States his work was in demand, with
publishers scrambling to bring out new books and reprint old ones. Machen provided
introductions and prefaces for these editions, some of which were limited and signed,
aimed at collectors and priced accordingly. An American edition of The
Shining Pyramid appeared in 1923; the British version (Martin Secker), with
greatly altered contents, was published one hundred years ago in February 1925.
The new edition reprinted eight pieces. The mixture was as
before, fiction and articles originally published in various magazines and
newspapers over some thirty years. It was a varied assortment – but came with underlying
connections too. Machen wants to show the ‘pattern in the carpet’: that there
is a distinction to be made between seeing and perceiving; between mere sight
and the perception of meaning and significance. In the essay “The Mystic
Speech” Machen particularly amplifies his thesis that ‘great things can be and
are before the eyes of men for countless ages, and yet are not perceived’ with
lively and vivid examples. For example: ‘From 1620 to 1820, one may say, nobody
had seen Gothic at all. It is interesting to look at eighteenth century prints
of cathedrals…you might almost say that the artist had been gazing not at
Peterboro’ or Lincoln Cathedral, but at a clever model made by a boy with
wooden bricks and bits of wire’ (130, 134).
In the stories, things and events, although seen, may not be
truly perceived except after thought and study, and through insight and
understanding apparently not given to all. In “The Shining Pyramid” Vaughan
invites his friend Dyson to visit him at his peaceful home in Wales. At first
Dyson resists: “London in September is hard to leave. Doré could not have
designed anything more wonderful than Oxford Street as I saw it the other
evening; the sunset flaming, the blue haze transmuting the plain street into a
road ‘far in the spiritual city’” (14). But an account of a young woman
vanishing and some mysterious signs found on a wall convince Dyson to go after
all. Vaughan’s quiet district proves to mask a dreadful reality as Dyson
uncovers the meaning of the symbols and so the reason for the disappearance.
“Out of the Earth” (1915) is thematically connected to The
Terror (1917) and the Great War pieces collected in The Bowmen (1915).
Machen – enjoying himself – begins with a recitation of what we might now call the
misinformation concerning the ‘Angels of Mons’ and his original authorship of
“The Bowmen”. Machen explains that what many regarded as fact was really fiction,
while revisiting his journalistic voice in a further fiction presenting as fact
something else that humanity was not able to see for what it truly is, and thus
perceive. “In Convertendo” (1908) is straightforward. An episode in the life of
Ambrose Meyrink, it chronicles his ecstatic liberation from public school and
journey to the West. As Meyrink glimpses a certain house from the train he
‘felt as though a voice cried to him from that place; the Cup seemed to summon
him to kneel once more and to behold new visions’ (161). The piece was one of
several incorporated in The Secret Glory (1922).
In his introduction Machen did not simply discuss The
Shining Pyramid and explain that its contents differed from those of the
American edition – even though some overlap was acknowledged by reuse of the
title. He also revealed something of the reason for the changes: hinting at the
tangled international saga of misunderstanding that had led to the appearance
of the new work. And as was so often characteristic of Machen, still more lay behind
the account he gave: something to be sensed but which had been left unsaid. Our
view seems a partial one. We see but cannot perceive.
Machen stated that The Shining Pyramid was the result
of a collaboration with an ‘American Gentleman’ who he did not identify. This
was journalist and bibliophile Vincent Starrett (1886-1974) who had ‘full of
industry, rummaged in old papers, magazines and manuscripts’ which had resulted
in the publication of two books by Covici-McGee in the US: The Shining
Pyramid and The Glorious Mystery (1924). Machen continues: ‘At
length I thought I ought to take a hand in the business. […] I went through the
two volumes, and reflecting a good deal, have made them into one’ (7).
Alfred A. Knopf, who had published several books by Machen
and considered himself to be his main American publisher, wrote an open letter
to the Trade complaining that the two books published by Covici-McGee had been
pirated. Machen went along with this interpretation, disowning Starrett and
claiming that he had not known about the books or given permission for them
(Gawsworth, The Life of Arthur Machen 309-10). However, Starrett
defended himself in a pamphlet and showed that in a letter from 1918 Machen had
given him permission to ‘lift whatever you like from the “Academy” and “T.P.’s
Weekly”’.
The two were reconciled when Starrett visited London
in the autumn of 1924. Machen admitted that he had been foolish to give
permission and wrong to have forgotten doing so. It had been wrong of Starrett
to have gone ahead and arranged publication without first submitting a table of
contents to Machen (Arthur Machen: Selected Letters 231-32). Machen’s
new version of The Shining Pyramid became the ‘authorised’ one, not only
appearing from his main publisher in the UK, Martin Secker, but also in the US through
Knopf. Transatlantic and other harmonies had been restored.
(John Howard)
