Virtue Alarmed [2]

Sir: Something more needs to be said on the issue of Miss Rice-Davies, but I think it has to be expressed in allegory. It is not wise even for saints to make war on the goddess Venus, or on one or other of her minor representatives. She is seldom reputable. She does not explain herself. One knows that her other face is a skull. Yet without her, the crops fail, beauty goes into mourning and the arts decay. I know nothing of Miss Rice-Davies. But in the popular mind she has become a minor representative of the goddess. I felt that those who wish to keep her out of the country have acted unwisely – symbolically they exile that part of themselves which she represents, and this, with many other things, is needed if our culture is to be a whole one, and not the mere barren shadow of life which it so unfortunately and so often is. I felt a moment of anger about it; but now, as usual, I feel grief. And I apologise if I have hurt the feelings of well-meaning people who, in my opinion, lack wholeness in their thinking.

1965 (357)