The situation observed by Humphreys in Italy immediately after the war, particularly the conflict between surviving partisans and fascists, clearly suggested to him the feuding Capulets and Montagues. Given the familiarity to most readers of the Romeo and Juliet story, this patterning device achieves the same effect as the chorus which opens that play and the sense of fate which permeates it. Again it would seem the author was intent on making his fiction tragedy. Indeed, in his diary mentioned above Humphreys wrote that ‘it needs an Elizabethan to do justice to Europe to-day, another Webster’,28 presumably referring to the corruption and Machiavellian manipulation he found existing in the administration of the camps, but suggesting too why he felt the situation needed the tragic approach. There are numerous ways in which Guido and Marcella echo Romeo and Juliet: the way they fall in love, the opposition to their marriage, Marcella’s fond father and cold mother, Guido’s friend Riccardo, who combines the Mercutio and Tybalt roles, the mix up of messages, Sorella Crispi as nurse and Morrell as Friar, causing plot complications which result in the tragic death of Marcella. Humphreys adds to the sense of repeated patterns by authorial comment: ‘he [Guido] had an uneasy vision of all the past as a long plain of existence along which an unnamed power had guided them towards each other, and already they had both spoken of the draught of destiny they had felt in the instant of their meeting’.29 On the other hand, Marcella emphasizes their uniqueness: ‘we are come together as only lovers come together, and from our first contact we are the warp and woof of a new pattern weaving’,30 showing how the author is balancing in his text his concept of history not repeating itself against the Welsh condition that does.31
The sexual triangle in this novel is closer to that in Othello than in the myth of Blodeuwedd. Marcella has the innocence of Desdemona, whilst Riccardo combines the role of Iago and Cassio, increasing for the reader both the evilness of Riccardo and the sense of the inescapable conclusion. Marcella’s death, when she is depicted as a sacrificial victim in white, echoes Desdemona’s and simultaneously Guido begins a kind of anagnorisis in his comprehension of his own decreasing morality:
He was an idiot wandering through life with indelible bloodstains disfiguring his hands – a killer dwelling among killers, a crude inaccurate instrument of destruction. The contempt he felt for himself made him press his hands against his face, ready to dig in his nails and gouge out his own eyes.32
This passage is typical of Humphreys’s method of multiple allusion, emphasizing his character’s archetypal qualities. However, it could equally be argued that the text is overloaded, and made significant to an extent not justified by the actual situation.
Humphreys uses many references to classical myth, their numerousness being possibly due to the Italian setting, but they tend to be a momentary connection rather than revealing underlying patterns, as when Williams’s wife is named Helen.33 Fairy-tale references are used similarly, particularly the symbol of the rose, which so often indicates female sexuality or repressed sexuality between father and daughter.34 On occasion, however, myth is used to suggest the basic human dilemma in which a character can be trapped, making the character representational rather than individual. So Marcella’s dream indicates the way in which the female is destined to be a victim; either raped Leda or seductive Eve, she is always to be seen in relation to the male.35 Humphreys also plays with myth, reversing it, as in the use of Daphne when Marcella wants Guido to chase her,36 and using it mock-heroically.37 This novel, in fact, seems to be working as an exploration of different uses of myth simultaneously, or even indiscriminately, as though any myth use is going to enlarge and reinforce the stature of the novel. The Bible is brought in to make reference to archetypal relationships and types of behaviour. For example, David and Jonathan are used to explain the relationship between Guido and Riccardo, ‘bound by bonds of experience more lasting, more mystical than marriage’,38 whilst there are several references to Judas Iscariot,39 which have the function of preparing the reader for Riccardo’s betrayal. The author also uses reference to historical characters which suggests a cyclical view of history as producing situations that repeat, although the human race is unable to learn from past mistakes. Whether the reference is to Julius Caesar, Mussolini, or Aeneas and Dido from literature, the effect is ambiguous. For one reader it might enlarge the character’s stature, for another underline its non-existence. Another way of defending Humphreys’s practice is to suppose that he is showing how the unknown are as significant as the famous; that an ordinary character can be the subject of tragedy.
The title of the third novel, A Change of Heart (1951), is followed by the description ‘A Comedy’, and this marks an obvious difference from the first two novels. On the other hand, it is still reliant on Shakespeare for its plot. The central action bears strong similarity to Hamlet. Simultaneously, the author is using the Oedipus complex as part-explanation of the psychology of the protagonist, and for the first time Humphreys is drawing a definite link between myth and psychoanalysis. The central Oedipal relationship is the damaging connection between Howell Morris and his mother, but this is emphasized by all of the younger generation being damaged by their relationship with their mothers. Celtic myth is again introduced, this time the story of Geraint and Enid, which is used as a counter-pattern to the romantic relationships, emphasizing the fallibility of Lucy and Gwen and the lack of heroic qualities in Howell and Frank. Both Lucy and Gwen may also be seen as modern versions of Blodeuwedd, dissatisfied with their original choice of partner and becoming unfaithful women. Hamlet is used both by direct quotation in the text, for example, the linking of Sir Goronwy Annwyl with Polonius by ‘nothing he would more willingly part withal’,40 and by the basic plot situation, which also reveals the basic weakness of the novel. Frank’s sister, Lucy, is dead and he blames Howell, his brother-in-law. It is the basic Laertes – Ophelia – Hamlet situation but centred on Frank’s search for the truth about his sister’s death. The language also elevates Frank to the position of tragic protagonist: ‘He was profoundly disturbed by an awareness of the pressure of Fate closing in upon him’.41 The problem is that the novel began by centring on Howell, the Hamlet figure, and it is unbalanced by this switch.
Alongside this use of Hamlet Humphreys portrays Howell as rendered sexually impotent by his domineering, possessive but cold mother. This is not then a Hamlet–Gertrude relationship, but the kind of overpowering domination exerted by Mrs Morel in Sons and Lovers, the Oedipus complex which affects the dominated son’s ability to form successful heterosexual relationships. The puzzle at the heart of the novel is never solved: at the conclusion Howell does not know what really happened with Lucy and the reader remains ignorant about his sexual orientation. The novel does not work as a puzzle because there is no solution; nor does it constitute ‘A Comedy’, as the title claims, simply because the protagonists do not die at the end. The use of the Oedipus complex works against the use of Hamlet to confuse the reader as to whether the novelist is writing a sociological, psychological or detective-style novel. This third novel is extremely problematic in its convoluted patterns and allusions, which appear to have no overall purpose but, rather, are selected on a ‘the more the better’ approach. Neither does the setting in Wales contribute to the idea of Humphreys as a promoter of Wales or as an explorer of Wales’s variety. It is much closer to a portrayal of Wales by an outsider or an exile, which indeed Humphreys was when the novel was written, in its cynical portrayal of a bigoted, narrow-minded society.
The fourth novel, Hear and Forgive (1952), moves back to England for its setting and is less dependent than the previous novels on any prefiguration or structural patterning. However, the result is a novel which is a detailed character study with very little plot; a novel in which nothing much happens. This suggests that Humphreys, as a young novelist, did in fact need a strongly plotted ‘story’, whether from history, myth or literature, in order to aid his own construction of a dynamic plot but had not yet found the right balance, either over- or under-loading each plot. This novel, then, has the least plot action of any of Humphreys’s novels, and in critical