Disenchantment · Chapter
XI: Stars in Their Courses explained
The chapter reflects on the disillusionment following the initial romanticism of war, arguing that the scale of modern warfare nullifies individual heroism and enforces the law of cause and effect.
What happens
The chapter reflects on the disillusionment following the initial romanticism of war, arguing that the scale of modern warfare nullifies individual heroism and enforces the law of cause and effect. It critiques the inadequate education and social values of the British ruling classes, which led to tactical failures and massive casualties, and concludes that the universe's immutable laws cannot be escaped or bribed.
Themes in this chapter
Disillusionment and Disenchantment
The chapter details the collapse of romantic illusions about war, replaced by a grim recognition of cause and effect.
Critique of Authority and Institutions
Strong criticism of the British ruling classes, their education system, and the resulting military incompetence.
Class and Social Inequality
Highlights the divide between the 'common people' sacrificed and the privileged classes who failed to prepare adequately.
Simplification vs. Complexity
Contrasts the simplistic hopes of 1914 with the complex, unyielding reality of modern warfare and its statistical inevitability.
Characters to notice
- Unknown Narrator
The narrator reflects on the collective disillusionment and the harsh realities of war, using personal observations and literary allusions.
- Bacon
Quoted at the start regarding the removal of vain opinions and flattering hopes from men's minds.
- Hotspur
Referenced in the context of the cost of illusions, with a quote about the river Trent 'coming me cranking in.'
- Prometheus
Mentioned as having planted blind hopes in mankind, paralleling the illusions of war.
- Lucifer
Alluded to in the phrase 'Like Lucifer when he was confronted with the sky at night, you looked and sank.'
- The British Regular Officer
Criticized for their prewar education and lack of mental nimbleness, contributing to tactical failures.
Key passages
“Doth any man doubt... that if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition and unpleasing to themselves?”
Bacon questions whether removing all illusions and false hopes from people would leave them feeling empty and miserable.
Opens the chapter, setting up the theme of disillusionment.
“More and more, as the armies increase, must the law of averages have it its own dreary way; glorious uncertainties wither; statistical 'curves' of relative national fitness to win, and to stand the strain of winning or losing, overbear everything else.”
In massive modern armies, individual heroism is irrelevant; outcomes are determined by statistical averages and national preparedness.
Key argument about the loss of romance in war.
“So it would go on, week after week, sitting after sitting of the dismal court that liquidated in the Flanders mud our ruling classes' wasted decades, until we either lost the war outright or were saved from utter disaster by clutching at aid from French brains and American numbers.”
The ongoing battles in Flanders were a grim reckoning for decades of neglect by the British elite, only mitigated by French strategy and American reinforcements.
Critique of the ruling class and the war's cost.
“What had we done, when we could, that the stars in their courses should fight for us now? Or left undone, of all that could provoke this methodical universe of swinging and returning forces to shake off such dust from its constant wheels?”
The narrator asks what actions or inactions have led to the universe's indifferent and punishing response.
Reflects on cause and effect and the fear of cosmic order.
