The Last Englishman: The Double Life of Arthur Ransome

This chapter addresses Roland Chambers's biography of Arthur Ransome. It begins by mentioning Ransome's hatred for the Victorian middle class, which his father represented. In 1902, aged eighteen, he cut loose from the hated bourgeoisie, who had so clearly failed to appreciate his true value, and became a fulltime bohemian, devoting himself to literature. He worked hard, and published quantities of vapid Edwardian escapism. Ransome then covered events in Russia for the Daily News and later for the Manchester Guardian. The friends who had welcomed and looked after him in Russia were liberals, who wanted a constitutional monarchy. Ransome sided with them at first, but was increasingly attracted by the Bolsheviks. The feeling that events in Russia were righting his personal wrongs allowed him to downplay their more fearsome aspects.