As a man, but not as a writer, T. H. White may be best compared to Ernest Hemingway. They were more than contemporaries and look-alikes; they were also remarkably close in psychological orientation. Both were big, handsome men, each extremely vital in his approach to life. Yet each was haunted by the very talent he possessed—frightened of not only sudden death but the failure of his powers through the onslaught of age. Both were fatalists, not at all sure that the masses of humanity weren't tacitly trying to destroy each other and that God wasn't in on it all behind the scenes. Both were afraid of war, though both (White not as much as Hemingway) felt they had to participate to demonstrate their ability to deal with reality despite its horrifying definition. As substitutes for the conflict and challenges of war and life, both substituted the conflict and challenge of sport—each felt that sport was a miniature battleground in which man had a chance to test himself for the bigger fight ahead. Each had consistent need to prove himself the better of the opposition and the fear that life seemed to mount against him, and each was furious when he failed to meet the test. Each failed to meet the test much more obviously with the coming of his forties and fifties, and both died premature deaths couched in unshakeable despair. (p. 17)
White could not exactly be called misanthropic, but his love and his respect for mankind were closely guarded. This self-protection was due mainly to the constant threat or actuality of war during the second half of his life. He one day discovered that only men and ants make war upon one another, and he was shocked at the way men of the 1930's, 1940's, and 1950's followed blindly into battle because leaders, haranguing on national patriotism, baited them to it. White's masterpiece, The Once and Future King, is, ultimately, an examination of mankind's addiction to warfare and of his moral and physical destruction by it. (p. 18)
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