Parade's End Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Alan Kennedy

Critical Essay by Alan Kennedy

SOURCE: "Tietjens' Travels: Parade's End as Comedy," in Twentieth Century Literature, Vol. 16, No. 2, April, 1970, pp. 85-95.

In the following essay, Kennedy identifies comedic elements in Parade's End.

One can easily see Tietjens as a model of integrity, of morality, of pre-Edwardian honour and Christian long-suffering; as an innocent who is the victim of "an old bitch gone in the teeth." The ease of such a vision may be an indication that it is the best, most correct reaction to Parade's End. One need not, certainly, be always looking for complications. Tietjens' story does appear to have a direct simplicity, and one cannot be too far wrong in saying that Ford approved more of Tietjens' integrity than he did of the "lachrymose polygamy" of such moderns as Rossetti and McMaster.

In contrast, though, to a view which sees Tietjens as a tragic victim of a decaying society, one...
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