The Browning Version

by Terence Rattigan

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The Browning Version Themes

The three main themes in The Browning Version are success and failure, generosity, and apathy and passivity.

  • Success and failure: The experiences of the characters call into question the meaning of success and failure.
  • Generosity: The play emphasizes the power of generosity and the changes it can engender.
  • Apathy and passivity: The play is a portrait of apathy and passivity, conditions often framed in terms of death.

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Success and Failure

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In The Browning Version, the concepts of success and failure are central to character development. Andrew Crocker-Harris is perceived as a failure by everyone, including himself. Despite his undeniable intelligence as a classics scholar, his unpopularity, rigid teaching style, and lack of humor lead others to view him as unsuccessful.

His marriage is also unsuccessful. Andrew has consistently failed to meet Millie’s expectations. This failure is underscored by her open affairs with various men, including her current lover, Frank Hunter. As a result, Andrew’s inadequacies have also affected his wife.

In The Browning Version, success is equated with popularity and sports. Frank Hunter is seen as a successful teacher because he relates better to the students and teaches a less challenging subject than the classics. He allows John Taplow to ridicule Andrew without repercussions and even gives Taplow tips on playing golf.

One of Andrew’s most significant humiliations happens when the school’s headmaster asks him to speak first at an upcoming event, rather than last. The headmaster reserves the final speaking slot for another teacher who is leaving after just a few years but has gained popularity and led the school’s cricket team to a major victory, making him more successful.

Generosity

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A few acts of kindness have a profound effect on Andrew's life. The most significant moment occurs when his student, John Taplow, presents him with a copy of Browning’s verse translation of Agamemnon, complete with a personal inscription. Taplow is studying Agamemnon to learn Greek. This thoughtful gesture deeply moves Andrew and serves as a catalyst for change.

Frank Hunter also demonstrates generosity towards Crocker-Harris. Initially, he shares Millie’s contempt for Andrew, but his attitude shifts when he witnesses Andrew's emotional reaction to Taplow’s gift. Millie’s spiteful comments lead Hunter to end his relationship with her. Hunter’s most sincere act of friendship is his insistence on obtaining Andrew’s new school address so he can visit. He evolves from being Millie's insincere lover to becoming a genuine friend to Andrew.

Apathy and Passivity/Death and Life

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In The Browning Version, Andrew often describes himself as lifeless, a sentiment shared by Millie. This depiction is further emphasized by his extreme passivity, such as when he accepts Dr. Frobisher's denial of a pension without objection. Moreover, Andrew barely reacts when his final honor at the school—delivering the closing speech at a significant ceremony—is revoked.

This passivity also characterizes his relationship with Millie. Despite her numerous affairs that have repeatedly humiliated him, Andrew remains unresponsive. Their marriage resembles a battleground, yet Andrew refuses to engage in conflict.

Throughout The Browning Version, Andrew's attitude undergoes several changes. When Mr. Gilbert, who is set to replace Andrew both in his apartment and at the school, mentions that Andrew is known as the "Himmler of the lower fifth," Andrew is deeply disturbed. He confides in Gilbert about his feelings, which helps him gain a deeper understanding of his emotions and shortcomings. This moment of realization marks a step toward a new beginning for Andrew.

Andrew's reaction to Taplow’s gift reveals that he still possesses emotions and does not need to resign himself to a passive life. These crucial moments inspire Andrew to take action. He contacts Dr. Frobisher and insists on being the final speaker at the ceremony. He also follows Hunter's advice to stay for the summer. Furthermore, he tells his wife that he no longer holds any expectations for even a superficial marriage. By the end of the play, Andrew goes through a personal transformation.

Personal Background and Influence

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Drawing on his own background and experiences, Terence Rattigan wrote about...

(This entire section contains 104 words.)

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people and themes he knew. His father was a diplomat whose glamorous life included many affairs, and his beautiful mother came from generations of barristers. The worlds of diplomacy and law are the sources of the characters and situations of many of his plays, as is Rattigan’s own public-school background. As the son of parents who traveled and lived abroad, Rattigan writes often of child-parent relationships. For Crocker-Harris, the playwright drew on his memories of a former classics master who, like his fictional counterpart, taught the classics as an exercise in translation.

Emotional Repression and Relationships

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From his first successful play, French Without Tears (pr. 1936), until his last play, Cause Celebre (pr. 1977), Rattigan continued to write about sons and parents and about the devastating effects of emotional repression, the “vice-Anglais,” as he once described this peculiarly English social illness.

The father-son relationship, however, is only one of various emotional conflicts Rattigan explores in his dramas. His characters’ marital situations involve more complex emotional dilemmas. When Crocker-Harris surprises Hunter with his confession of having known of Millie’s infidelities, he confronts twenty years of marital frustration, admitting that the sexual love Millie required he was unable to give and that its absence had driven out the caring that he considered “by far the greater part of love.” His repressed frustrations, personal and professional, have made a corpse of him, and he describes his emotional releases in the play as the mere twitchings of a corpse. Such living deaths, caused by the English inability to deal with direct expression of emotion, are the basis for the failed lives Rattigan dramatizes in his plays. In later plays, such as In Praise of Love: Before Dawn and After Lydia (pb. 1973), the means of dealing with this failure are games of various sorts that characters play with one another, especially language games.

Confrontation and Self-Respect

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In the tradition of Anton Chekhov’s definition of Trigorin’s art in Chayka (pr. 1896; The Seagull, 1909)—as the moon shining on bits of broken glass—Rattigan illuminates the failures of average middle-class people, such as schoolteachers, isolated from their own emotions and from their fellow humans. Out of a confrontation with their failures, the characters inevitably make choices, the consequences of which are new self-respect and the understanding of others. Crocker-Harris confronts his corpselike condition and exhibits dignity in choosing to leave Millie, to accept Hunter’s offer of friendship, and, finally, to follow rather than precede the popular master in the term-closing ceremony. His reentry into human relationships with a student and a colleague is a cathartic ending not unlike those found in the Greek tragedies that have been the subjects of his lectures for eighteen years.

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