Abstract
In one of Angus Wilson’s short stories, ‘Fresh Air Fiend’, a young graduate student, staying with her professor and his wife in their country home outside Oxford, tries to get her hosts to face up to the reality of their sterile marriage. The girl, Elspeth Eccles, is an example of a type of person who is to appear often in Wilson’s stories and his novels. Almost invariably young, and female, she is the fresh air fiend of the title, eager to dispel the deceit and hypocrisy of those around her. Elspeth knows that Professor Searle has been prevented from continuing with his research by his neurotic and dipsomaniac wife, and she suspects that Miranda Searle’s neurosis has been caused by the death of her only son some years ago. She decides that the best way to alert Mrs Searle to the damage she is doing is to confront her with the memory of her son and force her to understand how she is sacrificing the living to the dead. There is much thought of ‘putting the issue fairly and squarely before Mrs Searle’. When Elspeth puts her plan into practice Miranda creates a terrible scene. Later Professor Searle has a nervous breakdown and has to leave the university.
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© 1984 Patrick Swinden
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Swinden, P. (1984). Angus Wilson. In: The English Novel of History and Society, 1940–80. Studies in 20th Century Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17512-3_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17512-3_5
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-17514-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-17512-3
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