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Abstract:

The article treats two novels, “The War in the Air” by H.G. Wells and “The Good Soldier” by F.M. Ford, as a sort of “invasion literature” described by C. Eby. In these novels “invasion” has a figurative sense of domination, of cultural absorption, the danger of which is imagined as coming from both Germany and the United States. The transposition of “invasion anxiety”, that was caused by the Franco- Prussian War, to anxiety about Americanization may seem metaphorical, but these are different stages of the same national anxiety about the possible loss of the British Empire’s place in the world and the loss of the Empire itself. The motif of “invasion” in Wells’ and Ford’s novels provokes reflection on English and Englishness. Wells’ journalistic style differs sharply from the modernist writing of Ford. The narrative of rural England is presented in the novels from different angles: the peasant world of Wells’ novel does not coincide with the “landlords’ country” described by Ford. And yet, in conceptualizing Englishness under the sign of a possible invasion, both authors make use of cartoon representation, borrowed from caricatures and cartoons, as well as from comic-book and music-hall characters. At the expense of this, Englishness in the novels gets a concentrated quality, which, as the article suggests, contributed at the time to “creating an image of similarity internally” (R. Jenkins) for the nation.