Misanthrope

By R.Z. Sheppard

SCANDAL, OR PRISCILLA'S KINDNESS by A.N. Wilson Viking; 233 pages; $15.95

The world is a wormy place in the seven satiric novels of A.N. Wilson. The deadly sins flourish there, as do those lapses of character and taste that can turn a serious life into a pathetic farce. At 34, this precociously wise and productive British writer has pierced the intimidating exteriors of physicians, clergymen and scholars. Scandal takes on politicians, journalists, prostitutes, thugs, spies, not-so-innocent bystanders and that quaint ideal, the dutiful wife of a public figure.

That would be Priscilla Blore, helpmate of Cabinet Minister Derek Blore, the woman whose doubtful benevolent instincts are commemorated in the book's subtitle. "Kindness," in Author Wilson's mischievous sense, comes to mean an unnatural state of grace. Priscilla is one of those exasperating people who appear poised under all conditions. She can be part of someone's fantasy or grubby pursuit without misplacing a lustrous strand of her hair. Hughie Duncan, an irrevocable romantic and book editor, is allowed to worship her as an untouchable goddess. The physically and morally repugnant newspaperman Henry Feathers is granted bed privileges, partly out of pity and partly, as the author writes of this woman who is at her best in crises, because "like King Midas murmuring his secrets to the earth and stones, Priscilla needed a confidant who would be ultimately unreliable."

Love in this sprightly, misanthropic comedy assumes two basic guises: Priscilla's death grip on her family as a vehicle for social survival and Hughie's foolish infatuation. Mainly it is betrayal that makes Wilson's fictional world go round. Feathers deceives Mrs. Blore by exploiting her pillow talk in a sensational and highly profitable expose of her husband. Derek Blore, the Right Honorable Member for Wheat-bridge East, got the ball rolling with furtive visits to a prostitute named Bernadette for his ritual whipping. Blore enjoyed fancying himself a naughty schoolboy, a harmless diversion were it not for the Soviet agents who recorded his extracurricular activities on film. Blackmail, conspiracy, espionage and scandal ensued.

Wilson, former literary editor of London's weekly Spectator and biographer of the humorist and Roman Catholic apologist Hilaire Belloc, is a lightning plotter. The action, however, is never as arresting as those who initiate it. The smitten Hughie is a striking example of what the author calls "an overdeveloped inner life." Bernadette is a stinging portrait of stupidity (a pimp recruits her with veiled threats, and she mistakes him for a social worker). Blore is an overbearing ass who makes a big production about serving a modest Spanish wine and talks of W. Somerset Maugham's The Moon and Sixpence as if he has discovered the latest bestseller.

The name Evelyn Waugh comes unavoidably to mind. Wilson shares some of the comic master's ability to draw character in swift strokes. There are similar conversational nuances, inventive use of irony and a longing for an older order, especially spiritual. "Where there was light--from the headlamps of cars, from streetlamps and shop windows--it seemed to be a fuzzy, half-hearted sort of light, almost conspiring with the dark to lose itself in blackness. The windows of the Abbey glowed dimly like old jewels. Behind them, the choir, Dean and Chapter had recently acknowledged that they had followed too much the devices and desires of their own hearts."

Waugh's Guy Crouchback or Charles Ryder might have had such plaintive thoughts about their ignoble times. Wilson interjects such commentary to underscore the point that the assemblages of traits and mannerisms that are his characters are too confused or corrupt for weighty contemplation. Wilson is forbearing about the sins of the flesh, while the transgressions against reason are greeted with disdain. Conservative authority is the secret hero of this book; hapless liberalism and its freebooting institutions are the goats. The result is a sharp irony concisely expressed by an envious KGB agent: "How could a man reach Blore's position of eminence without being checked or vetted? Questions like this were put in the public mind by the likes of Feathers. In other words, he worried them, and stirred them up. For this, the capitalist press magnates paid him sums far in excess of any fee he would have received from the Soviets for acting against Western interests."

Scandal is a glittering though chilly performance.

--By R.Z. Sheppard