Books So Bad They're Good: Winston Churchill Goes to Laurania

My grandmother was...how do I put this politely? — problematic.I did not know this when she was alive. She was well into her 70s when I was born and lived two hours north of Pittsburgh on a small farm, and when she died in 1970 I can truthfully say I barely knew her. I knew about her — there were definitely family stories, including one about how she basically saved herself and her sister from an oncoming train when their pony trap balked halfway across the tracks — but Grandma was not the cuddly, bosomy granny of song and story who bakes cookies, squeezes fresh lemons into refreshing summer drinks, and spoils her grandbabies rotten. She was bosomy enough (having eight kids will do that to you) but the cook/baker in my family was my mother, period, and that included holiday meals that took place at Grandma’s table.As for spoiling her grandbabies...if she indulged either me or my cousin, I sure don’t remember it. I was mostly left to my own devices whenever we’d visit, which meant I’d hang out in the living room or the old parlor/TV room while Mum, Betty, and Grandma talked about adult things in the kitchen and my uncles either did farm chores or read the newspaper. She didn’t knit, she didn’t sew, she didn’t quilt, and I had no idea that she was supposed to pass on recipes, give me lessons in handicrafts, or tell me stories about The Good Old Days until I was tell into my teens and encountered other people’s grannies who did just that. Honestly, as far as I could tell Grandma didn’t do much of anything except sit around and give the rest of the family orders about what to cook, when to set the huge dinner table, and what TV shows to watch on Friday nights. It wasn’t until I was well into my teens and Grandma was safely dead that I began to realize that my grandmother was far more complex than I had ever imagined.Oh, she was conventional enough in some ways. She had those eight kids, the first born within a year of her marriage, and stayed married to the husband of her youth despite his struggles with poor health and disability as he aged. She was close enough to her only sister that she named her first child after her brother-in-law when her sister learned she couldn’t have children of her own. She never went to college or held a paying job, and may not have even graduated from high school. All very normal for a woman of her time...but not the whole picture. Oh no no no. Little did I know that my grandmother, child of immigrants, had literally been the backbone of her family. Her husband, whom she loved enough that she had those eight children on a regular basis from 1910-1928, was a smart man but much too fond of his beer to amount to much. That meant Grandma, who had saved herself and her sister from a very early, very melodramatic death (see above), was in charge of family finances, education, and purchases for most of her marriage. So it was Grandma who bought land in what proved to be a prime commercial area. Grandma who bought one farm and leased another. Grandma who raised those eight children, at least until the older ones were out of high school and had found work. Grandma who spearheaded the move from south of Pittsburgh to just outside Knox, best known for horse thieves and a box factory, where her younger sons could farm and the family could get through the rigors of World War II. Grandma who made sure her daughters went to college to earn the degrees she couldn’t.My grandfather, crippled by arthritis and still way too fond of beer, basically ceded whatever power he’d had in the family to his wife by the time his youngest children were in high school. He figured so little in family life that I was surprised to learn he’d lived until 1953, since there were literally no stories or anecdotes about him, no photographs with the rest the of the family, nothing. He seemed to have existed to father Grandma’s children, fix the occasional clock or bit or farm machinery, and negotiate with whatever bootlegger kept him supplied until Repeal.Not that anyone ever mentioned that, of course.Now, none of this in and of itself is especially problematic. Being the backbone of a large family, especially if one’s partner is ill and/or alcoholic, is admirable in many ways, especially given that Grandma did at least some of this before women could even vote. One of her sons took out a patent, another became a pillar of the business community, and both her daughters had long, successful careers. In many ways Grandma could have stepped straight out of one of those sprawling family sagas centered around strong women who run department stores/become midwives/write books/become stockbrokers/own ranches/sail the Seven Seas/found entire towns/become movie stars/etc. etc. etc., and God love her for it.What is problematic is that Grandma may have been a colorful, tough-minded, determined woman, but she was not precisely a great mother. Six of her seven children never married, including all but one of the boys, and her elder daughter (my aunt Betty) was so outrageously spoiled that she’d fill up an entire r/Entitled People sub-Reddit all by herself. My long-suffering mother was the family cook by the time she was twelve, including feeding harvest teams for weeks on end during the summer and early fall. And her oldest son, named for her sister’s husband, moved to another state and spent most of his adult life there until business reversals forced him back home...and that went so poorly that he took his own life soon after.And then there was her admiration for a certain German political leader with a very big mouth and a very small mustache.Yes. Really.Whether Grandma actually joined the notorious German-American Bund, the Nazi front that staged the infamous Madison Square Garden rally of 1939, is not clear; I’ve always assumed that she didn’t, but at this point I’ll never know. She had a lot on her plate in the 30s but there was a thriving Bund chapter in Pittsburgh prior to the war, along with a couple of Italian fascist groups and a chapter of the ultra-radical Silver Legion. Grandma was the daughter of Germany immigrants, had cousins in the spa region around Baden-Baden, and belonged to a conservative Lutheran church, so it’s entirely possible. What I do know is that Grandma was thrilled by what she saw as the resurgence of German life and culture starting in 1933. Her cousins were suffering thanks to the Great Depression, and now they had jobs, money, and all the perks that came with National Socialism like infrastructure improvements and cheap vacations. Her ancestral home was the envy of the world, and anyone who doubted this only needed to check out the newsreels from the glorious 1936 Olympic Games. “Hitler would have gone down as one of the greatest Germans in history if he hadn’t invaded Poland,” she told my mother, and please note that this was after two of her sons had been drafted and one had helped liberate Dachau.So...yeah. Grandma was definitely problematic, even if her life would make a novel.The subject of tonight’s diary was far, far more problematic than my grandmother, for a variety of reasons. One of the towering figures of the twentieth century, he would also make the subject of a terrific novel, and I’m actually surprised that most of the vast literature devoted to him is non-fiction. The same holds for his man’s many, many, many appearances in films and television, the overwhelming majority of which concern his middle years. Even his own writings, which were extensive and extremely popular, were almost all memoirs, biographies, or straight journalism. Note that I said “almost all.” For it seems that one book by this great man was the exception. A slim novel, only 70,000 words, it was published when he was in desperate need of money. It’s quite readable and offers some interesting insights into his character, but as a book, well....Savrola: A Tale of the Revolution in Laurania, by Winston Spencer Churchill — Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, the future wartime leader of the Great Britain, member of Parliament, knight, artist, biographer, historian, and Nobel laureate, was a truly great man. Born to spendthrift politician Lord Randolph Churchill and his American wife Jennie Jerome, Churchill kept his country in World War II by a combination of brilliant oratory, inspirational writings, and a political alliance with Franklin Roosevelt that has become the stuff of legends. It’s fair to say that he was a major reason why Len Deighton’s novel SS-GB is an exciting thriller instead of historical fiction, and why his wartime bunker is a tourist attraction to this day.He was also an exceptionally problematic man.I do not mean his imperialism (extreme), his finances (dicey), or his love of good alcohol (hoo boy). Nor do I mean his support of Edward VIII during the Abdication Crisis, which is probably best characterized as “seemed like a good idea at the time.” None of these was exceptional for a man of his time; plenty of other upper crust Britons believed in Empire, spent money like water, or enjoyed enough aged port, Napoleon brandy, fine wine, and good whisky to kill a draft horse during the course of a single day. Even supporting Edward VIII’s wish to marry a highly unsuitable American was popular among ordinary citizens, if not Churchill’s social class.No, what I’m talking about are some of Churchill’s lesser-known accomplishments, which range from the tragic to the ridiculous:The Siege of Sidney Street — a series of robberies by an anarchist gang in 1910-1911 killedWinston Churchill, police wannabe (Wikipedia)several police officers, caused a huge backlash against immigrants, and culminated when the Metropolitan police cornered several anarchists in a building in Sidney Street. Churchill, then Home Secretary, not only ordered in a detachment of the Scots Guards to support the badly outgunned bobbies, he decided to join in the fun himself and hurried over to Sidney Street, top hat, Astrakhan coat, and all. He’s visible in several photographs and surviving film footage of the Siege, which ended only when the building caught on fire and took out everything (and everyone) inside. Gallipoli — the British attempt at taking the Dardanelles in 1915 has become a defining moment for the ANZAC countries (Australia and New Zealand). Churchill, who was gung-ho for glory, was First Lord of the Admiralty and a major force behind one of the truly great military disasters of the twentieth century. He was blamed, largely correctly, for the failure of the entire campaign, and Prime Minister Herbert Asquith was able to form a new government only on the condition that Churchill not be allowed anywhere near the Cabinet. The Bengal Famine of 1943 — this was not entirely Churchill's fault; drought, pressure from the Japanese campaign in the Burmese theater, and local corruption were major factors in this little-known catastrophe. At the same time, Churchill’s insistence that India continue to send staple foods back to Britain to prevent starvation at home did not help, and it’s a major blot on Churchill’s wartime career.Sunday painter — Churchill first took up painting after Asquith sacked him and found that it raised his spirits and helped his lifelong battle with depression. He enjoyed himself so much that he took his art supplies everywhere (including the Western Front during a brief and not especially distinguished stint in the Army from 1915-1916), and spent the rest of his life at the easel whenever he could. He wasn’t particularly good — he never took art lessons and it showed — but some of the landscapes he did en plein air aren’t bad. On the other hand, an early self-portrait makes him look way, way too much like he’s auditioning for a Slenderman movie, which is highly disturbing and likely not what he intended.And then there’s Savrola, Churchill’s first (and only) novel, which is...Well. Before we go any further, it’s not that Churchill was a bad writer. Far from it. He loved English literature, loved to read, and had a stunning ability to memorize pretty much anything he ever read. His acquaintance with almost the entire corpus of pre-twentieth century British literature is a major reason why his speeches were so effective and have themselves entered the canon, and his facility with language eventually led to him being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. His very first book, 1898’s The History of the Malakand Field Force, was an instant hit, and he produced a steady stream of finely written histories, memoirs, speeches, and biographies for the next sixty years. Modern scholars believe he produced around 8-10 million published words during his career, and at his height he was making around $100,000 per annum as a journalist and historian (most of which he promptly spent in the best aristocratic fashion).Obviously some of this was written with the help of others to a greater or lesser extent — one of his secretaries was an unofficial ghostwriter during the war years — but Churchill’s major works, such as his magisterial biography of his ancestor John Churchill, first Duke of Marlborough, were his and his alone. He may not been the best choice for the 1953 Nobel Prize for literature, which seems to have been given as much for his brilliant wartime oratory as his actual writing, but he was far from the worst laureate *cough*selmalagerlof*.So yes, Churchill could write, and write very well indeed. The problem is that Churchill was not particularly good at writing fiction, which is not the same thing as researching and writing a biography, penning a memoir, or dashing off a magazine article. Fiction requires more than simply stringing words together or assimilating primary/secondary sources and then synthesizing them into a fresh take on an old subject. You need pesky things like a believable plot, plausible dialogue, convincing worldbuilding, and characters who speak, act, and think in recognizably human ways.This is not nearly as easy as one might think. It’s all too easy to fall into cliche and stereotype, especially when one is a new writer whose previous work is basically journalism. Writing a decent boy/girl love story is particularly tricky when one not yet had a serious romantic relationship or much acquaintance on any level with the opposite sex. Such it is with Savrola, and it’s actually something of a shame. The book is an interesting variation on the Ruritanian romance, or tale of derring-do in a small fictional country somewhere in Europe. Most of these are set in Eastern or Central Europe, most involve royalty of one type or another, and they were immensely popular back when there were indeed dozens and dozens of colorful, fractious, romantic princedoms, dukedoms, queendoms, counties, and microstates scattered about the Balkans, Austria-Hungary, and similar areas. The Prisoner of Zenda is the first and best of this genre, but there are still examples being written today (including a fairly recent modern sequel to Anthony Hope’s masterpiece).Savrola breaks the mold by setting its action not in a kingdom, but in a republic, Laurania, five years after an Evil Dictator, Antonio Molara, has seized power. Laurania, which bears a startling resemblance to Victorian England despite being located somewhere in the vicinity of Italy, is about to hold an election to decide whether to restore the constitution, and Molara is preparing to suppress about half the votes to ensure victory (as one does). Opposing him is the noble young Savrola, leader of the opposition. Savrola (not to be confused with the Italian religious fanatic Savonarola, who was a real person and very dead), intelligent, politically gifted, and suspiciously similar in belief and action to the young author, suddenly finds himself coping not just with Molara’s Evil Dictatorish Ways, but a foreign invasion. As the book progresses Savrola goes to diplomatic balls and similar events that are all but identical to the Season in London, falls in love with Molara’s non-Evil wife (who bears a startling resemblance to Churchill’s beautiful, mercurial mother, and no, I am not mentioning this again) after she’s ordered to seduce him, is doubled crossed a couple of times, has to cope with the machinations of the Judean People’s Front and the People’s Front of Judea the Republican Guard and the imaginatively named Popular Party, and ultimately escapes the capital just before Molara’s troops begin bombarding the city. The Evil Dictator eventually dies on the steps of the Presidential Palace, Molara’s wife falls in love with Savrola, and someone named “Miguel” changes sides at least twice.And oh yeah, there’s an epilogue where Savrola and the Evil Dictator’s widow return from exile, Churchill throws in a completely extraneous quote from Edmund Gibbon, and “after many troubles, peace and prosperity came back to the Republic of Laurania.”*pause for wild cheers and acclamation from the crowd*Savrola, which was written a) for money and b) because Churchill was bored, was initially serialized, then published as book. He showed the manuscript to his grandmother, who liked it well enough but pointed out that Lucile, Molara’s non-Evil wife and the romantic lead, was, well, not particularly well written. Churchill, who’d engaged in the typical Victorian flirtations with suitable women but had not yet actually fallen in love, agreed, but by then he’d already sold the book and had to deliver the manuscript as it stood.And so Savrola went to press, where it proved a modest success. Reviewers, well aware that Churchill had political ambitions, compared it to Benjamin Disraeli’s earlier (and far, far better novels) but were less than enthused by the plot holes and cliched characters (especially Lucile). One dismissed the book as full of "stock puppets of brisk romance” but admitted that the battle scenes were better than average. Another referred to Churchill’s "desperate efforts after intellectuality," which is harsh but fair; Churchill was only 23 when he wrote the book, after all, and most 23 year olds are lucky if they can write a decent short st​​​​​​ory, let alone a 70,000 word novel.Despite the tepid response, Savrola stayed in print until at least the 1990s and was adapted for both radio and television. It was even translated into French in the late 1940s, which is more than one can say for most turn of the last century adventure novels. Churchill himself came to like the book less and less as he aged, even though he admitted that it had some merit as a thriller. He was a journalist and historian at heart, not a novelist, and had the wisdom to know it. "I have consistently urged my friends to abstain from reading it,” he wrote in a 1930 memoir, and though I wouldn’t go quite that far, he was capable of much, much better.%%%%%Have you ever read a book by Winston Churchill? Heard of Savrola? Thought it was a biography of Savonarola? Known that Churchill wore a top hat to the Siege of Sidney Street? Watched the episode of Fake or Fortune? about what turned out to be one of his paintings? 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