BWBC 38: Panic! At the Villa

This week’s story is an example of a skilled writer writing an unlikable character well. That the character is as unlikable as he is may or may not have been Forster’s intention. After all, my patience for Upper Class British men hectoring adolescent boys to make men out of them so they might continue to shoulder Empire and all that is not really what it once was.

“The Story of a Panic” by EM Forster

Our narrator is a very proper British gentleman on vacation with his family in Italy. They’re staying at a pension alongside some other English tourists: an artist, a doctor, a pair of widowed sisters, and the sisters’ fourteen-year-old nephew Eustace. Our very proper British gentleman takes a quick disliking to the artist and to Eustace. Much of the story’s beginning is mostly our narrator complaining about the sullen teen who isn’t manly enough to shoulder Empire. Honestly, it’s a bit funny.

Then one day while all the tourists are out hiking, Eustace dragged along with the rest, there’s a bit of talk about nature and the worship of Pan. This conversation gets cut short when a sudden storm sweeps down the mountainside and sends everyone running for shelter. Everyone except Eustace. He’s left behind, and it’s only after the storm that the characters realize this, so there’s another expedition up the mountain to search for the odious child.

When Eustace is found, it’s in a swoon with goat tracks all around him. This is curious and the doctor remarks on there being no goats on the mountain, but the narrator finds such talk too disturbing and expects a rational explanation for what happened. Eustace recovers, but has been altered. Where before he showed little interest in nature, he now is overwhelmed and captivated with it, so much so that he refuses to go back to the pension.

Of course, this won’t do, not for proper young English lads, and the boy is dragged inside where the Italian waiter, another teen the narrator dislikes, calms Eustace somewhat since the two boys are friends. This waiter says that it will mean the boy’s death to stay in the house, and once the wind calls to one, they can never be cooped up without risking their life. But the Italian waiter is improper and the narrator gives him a stern talking to, dismissing all talk of anything out of the ordinary happening. It’s all nonsense to our Proper English Fellow.

Eustace then breaks out of his room and runs for the countryside, communing with all the wilderness and nature he can see. As he runs about the Proper English Fellows bribe the Italian waiter to assist them in capturing Eustace. They manage to do so, but not for long. Eustace escapes again, the narrator wants the bribe he paid the Italian back, but the Italian refuses to return it and attempts to run away, but instead he falls and dies. At which point the landlady arrives and screams while Eustace runs through the trees and that’s it: THE END.

Overall, it’s an entertaining enough story and I appreciate how petty the narrator is. Also, as someone who has taught middle school boys, I can say that there is something almost instinctual in the disgust that they can quite unwittingly provoke. It’s like everyone is angry at you for not sitting still, when it’s nearly impossible for you to sit still. Maybe this is a guy thing, and women don’t have the same response upon encountering teen girls. I certainly have memories from my teens of every older male in my family being angry at me for no reason. But no one ever suggested this disgust was anything but an individual teen’s moral failing, and not simply default wiring that can be dealt with.

Next week, I suspect we’ll be talking about hunting humans for sport.

See you then!