## Holiday.

Though southern materials make up the body of this novel, the primary approach to it should not be sectional. Rather, one should come to it through the artistic personality of Waldo Frank. This attitude is natural to those who have experienced the author's Rahab and City Block. For these works frankly eschew geographical and naturalistic fidelity in favor of a reality, more individual and more essentialized. In like manner, Holiday is first of all a subjective; it has utilized certain elements of the South because these seemed most suited to its purposes. Hence whatever local or racial truth (or untruth) the work may contain, must be considered as a purely secondary factor.

The design is stark and clear enough. It is concerned with repression and release, with repression and expression, as consequent and contrast-ing realities of human life. But the design, as achieved in novelistic form, is dynamic. Therefore it manipulates the effects and frictions of these realities to create its movement and its climaxes.

Frank is too subtle for an arbitrary portinning of repression, in a block, to the whites of the South. For a rigid symbolizing of the blacks as expression. He sees the Negro as free within a very strict oppression. He sees the white, half, respectably restricted, half, frankly-hypocrit-ically loose, compressed with an equally strict freedom. Each race then, within itself, contains the contrasting elements. And he knows that the Negro often serves as outlet for the pent energies of the dominant race. In contrast with each other, however, it may be said that in this novel the blacks generally represent a full life; while the whites stand for a denial of it. The black church; the white church, niggertown; whitetown, are similarly opposed. This opposition egts its state ent in the open-ing passage "Sunset at Mazareth. Niggers go home through the copperglow of pines. Niggers sing home. White man stand lean in the doors of paint-less houses. White men stand still." And by means of swift chapter juxta-positions, and the Frankian crystallizations of unspoken consciousness,

2

Holiday.

it is sustained throughout the book.

For the purpose of a novel, and likewise in order that Frank's intentions be completely realized, it was necessary that two bodies: a white and a black, be set in movement, through the contrasting states, towards each other. Virginia Hade and John Cloud, vehicles for a KAMIKAZE need conscious beyond the local taboos placed upon sex and race, move towards each other. Away from Nazareth, where nature is still innocent of the divisions that spring to life with exploitation, they meet. For the first moments their contact is as clean as nature is. And then the inevitable discords differences and DIXIIS assert themselves. Having exchanged knives with her, the black man suddenly recalls, "I am John Cloud. Nigger." Whereupon the straightway leaves her. She, pressing the knife into her waist, cuts herself. The wound is a mere body-outlet. Deeper release has been denied. Conscious that her own world is the real cause of her frustration, she neverhtless fastens upon John as the immediate instrument of it. And, impelled by a force which is clearly greater than volition, with John's knife still in her hand, and blood upon her, she marches into the town square. White Nazareth is just coming from a revival which has whipped it within an inch of release. Full release, not quite. It sees Virginia, John Cloud's knife, and it immediately knows that a lynching will fulfill what the revival failed in. "-Upon the black branch of the black tree let there be Fruit! Let there be seed, let there be fruit for my passion!" It forthwith gets John Cloud and Hangs him. "Nazareth beneath him peers with grimed eyes through the murk of its spent lust." Virginia, comfortable in bed, makes no effort to avert the tragedy which she senses taking place, for, "-Who made this wound? My hand. Yet it is your wound, John." Here, then, the design and motor-plot of Holiday.

They are executed with a precision, an economy, a swiftness, and a sense of form that spell artistic mastery. Generally, the esthetic employed is that so accurately analyzed by Gorham B Munson in his Waldo Frank: a Study. The Frankian esthetic of mobility: "...accomplished first

3

Holiday!

of all by the abundant use of very active verbs...generated by his shrewd
calculation of overstatements, by his thrusting and expanding figures of
speech...worked up by lyrical crystallizations, by swift dramatic present-
ation, by the alternating structure of the Whole." - adapted to the given
materials. In this review I shall concentrate upon Frank's use of the
unspoken consciousness, for in Holiday it is the major element of his
esthetic.

Considered as a structural mechanism, it provides the condensation,
swiftness, and dramatic contrasts essential to such a design as Holiday.
The psychology of a repressed people, seeking release in a revival tent,
is given in seven lines, the last of which reads, "Come, preacher, lash
us! Make us leap!" Virginia Hadeass consciousness is unfolded in seven
lyric pages. And whitetown and niggertown, taken as entities, are vividly
opposed in the same number. I quote from this passage:

-How can I rest in you when you stand and shout? I am
weary with whiteness To rule, to be civilized and chaste; you
do not know what weariness it is My woman yearns towards me in
hunger, I am spent All the world waves in darkling circles
about my white uprightness, I am spent I must lean down on you,
earth, lie in you O you are warmth and power, I am spent. Your
pools draw my blood: your red soils blanch me dry. I must lie
in you! But you who are my earth stand up and shout! How can I
rest in you? how can I shut my eyes?

-Leave me alone..  
Don' you see we is lovin'?  
Leave me alone..  
Don' tell me nothin'.  
How kin I listen to you  
When mah love's lips  
When mah love's arms  
When de soft breast ob mah love  
Closes roun' me like de earth  
.. all laughin' flowers  
Comes roun' me like de air  
.. all smilin' breeze.

As functions of

the larger organism, these crystallizations are effective and admirable.

Considered in relation to specific characters, they operate fanwise.
By their means, the figures expand to an awareness which otherwise would
be impossible to them. Because this extra-awareness raises the conscious

4

Holiday.

level of the book, because it contributes to Frank's general intention,
it is justified. It nevertheless forces one to accept the characters as
essentially Frankian in origin. There is no artistic reason why an author
should not fashion his own characters. In fact there is a very definite
artistic reason why he should. For this is the method of great creation.
But he should be fully determined in this position. In Holiday, here and
there, are to be found breaks in texture: of the dialog, of the dialog
compared to the unspoken consciousness (as, for example; in these *through*
lines attributed to John: "Ol' woman- yo' gettin' lazy, yo' gettin' fat!
Yo' cookin' too good. Mammy, soon I'll have to h'ist you." "*It is your
skin*.
-Your love's a white sun shinin' on a sea.

Summer blue sea

Summer blue sky

... Da's your love!

*It is your skin!*"

"-I love you, mother, But it is your fault. You made me." "-An' I care
fo' you. An' in my love fo' you, why is there blame?" I do not of course
refer to any superficial difference in the use of dialect. I refer to a
psychological break, to a textural break which is more readily felt than
defined.) that make one question Frank's clarity on this point. They do
not, however, impair the larger organization of this novel. Technically,
it is solid and tight. And as an art form Holiday is superb.

In content, by intention it is less profound than either Rahab or Cāty
Block. But artistically it sustains Frank's high achievement as a novelist.
For as an art form, Holiday is superb.

The Irony of Holiday.

Holiday, by Waldo Frank. New York. Boni and Liveright. $2.00.

The disparity between precepts and actions, between the probable
desires and the actual achievements of those who call themselves Christ-
ians is a choice theme for the ironist. Many have availed themselves of
it, but for its compelling execution one must possess, in addition to the
motor-emotion, a vivid sense of contrast, and a talent to present this
contrast dramatically. Among the Americans, no equipment is so adequate
for the artistic issue of this theme as that of Waldo Frank.

Both Rahab and City Block furnish evidence of this fact. Even those
who are most hostile to his work have granted the power, finish, and vivid
dramatic realization of Fanny Luve's crucial scene with her husband in
Rahab. And though the intense and bitter irony of this passage is some-
what absorbed by the essentially religious nature of her ensuing torment,
it nevertheless sets the entire sub-tone of the book, and it is the deter-
mining emotion of those passages where the Church and legal justice are
ridiculed. Likewise, in six of the fourteen designs of City Block, the
ironic use of Christian symbolism creates a pervasive mordant note. But
in these two novels the irony is largely diffused in, or subordinate to
values that transcend them.
In Holiday, however, Frank has fashioned
a design which shunts his theme into stark relief. Hence in this work
one may more clearly follow it, more readily weigh the power and precis-
ion of its execution.

The materials of Holiday are few and simple. A southern town for
background, divided into the typical sections: white- and niggertown.
A white church, a black church. A white girl, and a black man. A mob of
lynchers. And incidental characters. Having created his larger contrasts,
having generally symbolized the whites as repression; the blacks,
expression, Frank, then brings the white girl and the black man together.
Whereupon, the rasped repression of the whites swiftly rises to the
passion of a lynching. The curve of this passion contains the novel's
irony.

2

Walbro Frank as Trust
The Irony of Holiday.

From a dreab and emotionally lean world, Frank leads white Nazareth into a revival tent. There, hymns and a series of Thou Shalt Hots, delivered by a wooden voice, simply serve to irritate the congregation's need for some sort of expression, without satisfying it. It is evident that this need has no relation to the religious function of the church; that, on the contrary, it springs from a vicious secular repression. It is equally clear that the church has no kinship with any deep religious mission whatsoever. Hence preacher and congregation join in an act which violates the accepted intentions... In contrast to this dry, hot puppetry, Frank creates a black church of beef and song and drama, wherein Negroes are satisfied in the measure of their yearning. The contrasts and disparities then, (not implied) are dramatically realized in this novel. But to follow the curve of the central passion...

The white congregation has been lashed by its preacher. The lashing, however, is ineffectual in achieving a complete release. (Even on this plane the white church of Holiday is impotent.) Rasped, unsatisfied, it comes out of the revival tent. Seeking release. It moves to the town's main street, and there, quite as if sent them by Providence, stands the white girl, who has evidently had violence done her. Her hand upholds a tell-tale knife. And immediately from the congregation a body of lynchers form. They know that a lynching will fulfill what the church failed in. "The Tent flaps debile. It is empty. Nazareth is empty. The crowd has drawn unto itself all of the Tent, all of Nazareth. But the men are apart. They are an organ thrust forth from the crowd. They are blank and dark. They do not glow and exclaim like the crowd itself. They are silent, muttering low. They are a promise: a larval joy. The crowd ... women, children, old men, sick men ... look on the knot of men with their ropes and guns, and love its darkling ugliness. It is an instrument for them of joy and flame. From the Tent's flapping mouth a little man appears. He is black-frocked. He stands a moment in the droop of canvas which he ... small with the word of Christ: his eyes vince as he

first
The literary movement in America which found its solid statement in
The Seven Arts, the movement, I mean, that directed attention to immediate
urged and
materials, that championed a literature expressing them, has ended by
placing the most powerful literary artist amongst us in a curious dilemma.
Waldo Frank, conscious and intense beyond any materials available for
literary use which he is likely to encounter, and hence, temperamentally
qualified for a sheer subjective (creative) handling of these materials,
has nevertheless been forced by the implications of this movement into a
position, divided between the desires to express himself and the urge
to express America. This division is brilliantly manifest in Our America.
For here, splendid temperamental statements alternate with passages that
or social
are clearly scientific in derivation. The materials of Rabab and City
Block are more fused into an inward vision. But here too, the division,
though subtle, is no less evident. Fanny Luve, for instance, in her south-
ern setting, has a local and objective validity. But it is soon clear
that Frank's consciousness and intesity will not be satisfied with so
moderate a girl. And in fact, beginning with her experience with Leon,
she becomes essentially Frankian. In Holiday there has been no resolution
of the dilemma. Here again Frank is divided between the desire to express
himself and the urge to express the given materials.

These materials are southern. A whitetown, a niggertown. A white
church, a nigger church. A white girl and a black man. That Frank has an
artist's love for Negro peasant life, for the repressed or violently expressed
life of the whites, for the tragedy of the "un-
ending racial crisis", and that he has the requisite artistic power to
memorably fashion these, is obvious when one examines individual passages
and scenes, when one grips the superb organization of the whole.
But that Frank was not satisfied with sheer objective expression is
equally manifest when one centers upon the central characters: Virginia
Hade, and John Cloud. For the first few sections these figures have a
reality which may be called local. But, as in the case of Fanny Luve,

their thoughts, problems, and consciousness soon become essentially those
of Waldo Frank. The mother complex of John Cloud is in no real way diff-
erent from the mother complex of Quincy Burt. Virginia's MARGE to life,
though less deep, intense, and religious, is nevertheless analagous to
the urge that drove Fanny Luve through her stark torment. And the conscious
ness which saturates these characters is one. Paul Rosenfeld in The Dial,
January, 1921. in criticising Frank's novels, makes a statement that may
seem similar to what has been said here. But, whereas Rosenfeld, using
a psychological hypothesis, concluded that Frank should effect a release
himself
from into objective creation, I, basing my case on the available literary
data, calim an interest in, and a value for Frank's personality above
that any character he is likely to encounter. I think the expression of
this personality in literature to be important. And my criticism is: that
Frank should drive for a pure organic art, untouched by literary methods
that are alien to it. In a word, that he should solve his dilemma by
promptly.

In Holiday then, one finds the South, and one finds Waldo Frank.
The point is, that in this novel there is a break between these two
realities. A break that leaves one suspended between the desire to accept
the book as an expression of the South, and the desire to accept it as an
artistic projection of an essentially Frankian world.

The church is a creative social unit when the emotions and aspira-
tions that are peculiar to it function through its forms. Waldo Frank
a
sees the church of the southern Negro as such a unit. From their world
of suffering, oppression, hatred, of song and love, Negroes fill their
church. The preacher, dramatizing the conversion of Saul, pleading for the
Church against the Devil, vividly and with an elemental power presents
passion
the conflict between good and evil. With his own emotionalism as a pivot,
he soon generates a vortical emotionalism about him."O you," cried the
black prophet. His round thick body was erect. Sweat flowed from his bull
head and neck. His broadcloth suit wrinkled as his muscles worked. He
prayed: "O you, does you hear? O you, does you hear de Lo'd? He's sayin':
Brother, Brother. He's sayin': Sister, Sister." Feet beat time. "How long
yo'll all gwine fo' to cheat me?" Feet beating time lifted his voice to
song. "How long yo'-all gwine fo' to leave me out in de col'?" .. "Nevah!
Come in! Lo'd take me!"'The thick moebement roils to crescendo. "A girl
rose clear. Her head and arms spiked out into the lampglow. Angular arms
thrust, legs beat a dull reiterant tatto .. stiff, catatonic .. while her
head lurched forth, lurched back, lurched sidewise and her arms spun like
the arms of a mad marionnette. ""O Lo'd...O Jesus...M reay on me, Lo'd."
the
Her voice, her arms, her head, her rigid legs held black ecstasy of the
crowd, held up her splintering frenzy. From her brown dress it came: body
gleaming black, prayer burning black: body and prayer came one. She dancee
Her feet struck the floor. Her arms pierced the round chant of the church.
...She crumpled. She fell to silence. Song rolled released." And the church
having satisfied the desires that came to it, gladly yeilds its ocngrega-
tion to the outside world.

But the church is essentially negative or vicious, when, incapable of
channeling and stimulating sentiments appropriate to it, it serves as a
vehicle for a vicarious emotional release. In Holiday, the white church
is seen as such a vehicle. Further, in this novel the church is impotent
to effect even a substitute fulfillment; but is forced to turn this
function over to a lynching party. From a lean, drawn world, whites fill

The church is a creative social unit when the emotions and aspirations which are peculiar to it may function through its forms. Waldo Frank sees the church of the southern Negro as such a unit. But the church is essentially negative or vicious when, incapable of channeling and stimulating religious sentiment, it serves as an instrument for a vicarious emotional fulfillment. In Holiday, the white church is seen as such an instrument. Further, in this novel it is impotent to effect even a substitute release, but is forced to turn this function over to a lynching party. Here then the contrasts and the disparities, not implied but created, from which the irony of Holiday has its source.

a revival tent. It is evident that their mission is not religious. It is
equally clear that they are seeking a color and life denied them in their
customary existence. But hymns, and a series of Thou Shalt Nots, delivered
by a wooden voice, are إِنَّمَا لِلَّهِ شَرَكَةُ الْمُحْسِنِينَ

" However, in the eventual course of evolution the necessity for expressing the characteristics of the country will have become so strong that the idiom of expression will be formed subconsciously."

""Any man who cannot master his own personal equation but who is mastered by it, must produce a harassed and stilted art."

Ornstein.

"Aesethetic rhythm is poise in three dimensions, wherein all the extremes of movement are related to a center of gravity, giving us the sense of complete satisfaction"

Willard Huntington Wright

4

Holiday.

be impossible to them. Because this extra-awareness raises the conscious
level of the book, because it contributes to Frank's general intention,
it is justified. It nevertheless forces one to accept the characters as
essentially Frankian in origin. There is no valid artistic reason why an
author should not fashion his own characters. In fact there is a very
definite artistic reason why he should. For this is the method of great
creation. But he should be fully determined in this position. And no
an
trace of an alien mode should be allowed to mar his work. In
Holiday, here and there, are to be found breaks in texture: of the dialog,
of the dialog compared to the unspoken consciousness (as, for example,
in these lines attributed to John: "Ol' woman- yo' gettin' lazy, yo'
gettin' fat! Yo' cookin's too good. Mammy, soon I'll have to h'ist you."
"It is your skin!"

-Your love's a hite sun shinin' on a sea.
Summer blue sky sea
Summer blue sky
Da's your love!

"It is your skin!"

"-I love you, mother. But it is your fault, You made me." "-An' I care
fo' you. An' in my love fo' you, why is there blame?" I do not of course
refer to any superficial difference in the use of dialect. I refer to
a psychological break perhaps, to an underlying textural break which is
more readily felt than defined.) that make one question Frank's
clarity on this point. They do not, however, impair the larger organiza-
tion of this novel. Technically, it is solid and tight. In content, by
intention it is less profound than either Rahab or City Block. But
esthetically
it sustains Waldo Frank's high achievement as a novelist.
For as an art form Holiday is clean, superb.

Jean Toomer.

4

Holiddy.

be impossible to them. Because this extra-awareness raises the conscious
level of the book, because it contributes to Frank's general intention,
it is justified. It nevertheless forces one to accept the characters as
essentially Frankian in origin. There is no valid artistic reason why an
author should not fashion his own characters. In fact there is a very
definite artistic reason why he should. For this is the method of great
creation. But he should be fully determined in this position. And no
an
trace of alien mode should be allowed to mar his work. In
Holiday, here and there, are to be found breaks in texture: of the dialog,
of the dialog compared to the unspoken consciousness (as, for example,
in these lines attributed to John: "Ol' woman- yo' gettin' lazy, yo'
gettin' fat! Yo' cookin's too good. Mammy, soon I'll have to h'ist you."
"It is your skin!"

-Your love's a hite sun shinin' on a sea.
Summer blue xxx sea
Summer-blue sky

.. Da's your love!

"-It is your skin!"

"-I love you, mother. But it is your fault, You made me." "-An' I care
fo' you. An' in my love fo' you, why is there blame?" I do not of course
refer to any superficial difference in the use of dialect. I refer to
a psychological break perhaps, to an underlying textural break which is
more readily xxx felt than defined.) that make one question Frank's
clarity on this point. They do not, however, impair the larger organiza-
tion of this novel. Technically, it is solid and tight. In content, by
intention it is less profound than either Rahab or City Block. But
esthetically
xxx it sustains Waldo Frank's high achievement as a novelist.
For as an art form Holiday is clean, superb.

Jean Toomer.

4

Holiday.

be impossible to them. Because this extra-awareness raises the conscious
level of the book, because it contributes to Frank's general intention,
it is justified. It nevertheless forces one to accept the characters as
essentially Frankian in origin. There is no valid artistic reason
why an author should not project portions of himself into his charact-
ers. In fact there is a very definite artistic reason why he should. For
this is the method of great creation. But he should be fully determined
in this position. And no trace of an incongruent mode should be allowed
The figures, of whatever origin, should stand, consonant and fused.
to infringe it. In Holiday, here and there are to be found breaks in
texture: of the dialog, of the dialog compared to the unspoken conscious-
ness that make one question Frank's clarity on this point. For example,
take these lines attributed to John Cloud: "Ol' woman- yo' gettin' lazy,
yo' gettin' fat! Yo' cookin's too good. Mammy, soon I'll have to h'ist
you."

"*It is your skin!*

-Your love's a white sun shinin' on a sea.
Summer blue sea
Summer blue sky
.. Da's your love!

*It is your skin!*

"-I love you, mother. But it is your fault. You made me." "-An' I care
fo' you. An' in my love fo' you, why is there blame?" I do not of course
refer to any superficial difference in the language used, in the use of
dialect. I refer to a psychological break in a too obvious duality
of origin which suspends one between the desire to accept Cloud as a
southern Negro, and the desire to accept him as a character created by
Frank for the specific purposes of his design. This break is the one
serious interior defect that I find in Holiday. It does not, however,
impair the structural finish of this novel. Technically, it is solid and
tight. And as an art form it is clean, superb. Holiday therefore sustains
Waldo Frank's high achievement as a literary artist.

Jean Toomer.

4

Holiday.

be impossible to them. Because this extra-awareness raises the conscious
level of the book, because it contributes to Frank's general intention,
it is justified. It nevertheless forces one to accept the characters as
essentially Frankian in argi origin. There is no valid artistic reason
why an author should not project portions of himself into his charact-
ers. In fact there is a very definite artistic reason why he should. For
this is the method of great creation. But he should be fully determined
in this position. And no trace of an incongruent mode should be allowed
to infringe it. In Holiday, here and there are to be found breaks in
texture: of the dialog, of the dialog compared to the unspoken conscious-
ness that make one question Frank's clarity on this point. For example,
take these lines attributed to John Cloud: "Ol' woman- yo' gettin' lazy,
yo' gettin' fat! Yo' cookin's too good. Mammy, soon I'll have to h'ist
you."

"*It is your skin!*

*It is your skin!*

"-I love you, mother. But it is your fault. You made me." "-An' I care
fo' you. An' in my love fo' you, why is there blame?" I do not of course
refer to any superficial difference in the language used, in the use of
dialect. I refer to a psychological break perhaps, a too obvious duality
of origin which suspends one between the desire to accept Cloud as a
southern Negro, and the desire to accept him as a character created by
Frank for the specific purposes of his design. This break is the one
serious interior defect that I find in Holiday. It does not, however,
impair the structural finish of this novel. Technically, it is solid and
tight. And as an art form it is clean, superb. Holiday therefore sustains
Waldo Frank's high achievement as a literary artist.

Jean Toomer.

Just what materials the South will eventually yield to literary expression, and what general cultural significance this expression will achieve, are still largely speculative. For beyond those aspects of southern life which were focused by the abolitionists and the Civil War, there remain rich extra-political areas, yet to be explored. No cultural major mind has attempted the preliminary survey. And no creator has fashioned a representative work of art. But however undefined the materials themselves may be, the mode of their expression is already fairly well certain. One can hardly hope that this mode will be unique-and indigenous. Rather, the literary forms which have served New England, New York, Chicago, and the Middle-West will also serve the South. Realism, naturalism, subjective-naturalism, mystical-or subjective-realism. This statement, and the implications conatained in it, open a clear approach to the literature which the South will now increasingly yield us. Waldo Frank's Holiday must be approached in this way. I mean that Holiday should be approached primarily through Waldo Frank and his unique form of literary art, rather than primarily through the South.

It-is-evident-that this work is a subjective design fleshed by use of southern materials. It is concerned with repression and expression as contrasted realities in human life.