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Bookreport about

The Flying Inn

(published in the year 1914)

Gilbert Keith Chesterton, English journalist and author, was born in
Kensington on May 29 in the year 1874. He was educated at St. Paul´s
school, where, at an unusually early age, he gained the Milton prize for
English verse. He left school in 1891 with the idea of studying art. But
though he early developed, and indeed retained, a talent for draftsmanship
of a very distinctive kind, his natural bent was literary, and he went through
the usual apprenticeship of free-lance journalism, occasional reviewing and
work in a publisher´s office.
In 1901 he married France Blogg. In 1900, after having produced a volume
of poems, The Wild Knight, which led good critics to expect great things of
him as a poet, he became a regular contributor of signed articles to The
Speaker and the Daily News. Between 1901 and 1929 he produced a quantity
of works like The Man Who Was Thursday (1908) or The Napoleon of
Notting Hill (1904). During the same period Chesterton wrote a lot of verse,
some good, some bad - none of it indifferent. At its best it is very good
indeed. A well-known English critic once observed of his light verse that,
whereas there had been many in all ages who could write comic verse,
Chesterton was one of the very few who could write comic poetry. The
compliment was deserved. His more serious verse has been held to give him
rank as the last of a great rhetorical poets. Like all rhetorical poets he is
sometimes tinselly, but his best poems show what rhetorical can be at it
best. Of these are Lepanto (1911) and A Song of the Wheels written during
the railway strike of 1911.
If a prediction may be ventured, Chesterton will be remembered longest by
his poems and his work in literary critics. Many will regret that he tried his
hand so little at playwriting and spent so much time on polemical
journalism. Nearly all will deplore the volume of his output. None will
question the reality of his achievement at its highest, or the strength and
purity of his influence. He died in Beaconsfield near London on June 14 in
the year 1936.

Plot synopsis: The grotesque events are released by Lord Philip Ivywood,
who wants to close all inns in England. Patrick Dalroy, an Irishman, and his
friend Humphrey Pump, who has lost his inn, which has been called “The
Flying Inn” are the antagonists of Philip Ivywood. But before the house has
been destroyed by subjects of the Lord, Dalroy and Pump are able to escape
with a keg of rum, a loaf of cheese and with the old sign of the inn, which
is very important because you will be allowed to sell alcohol if you have a
sign. But Lord Ivywood is angry because these two men will destroy his
plans. So Dalroy and Pump wander around and sometimes they sell some
rum . After a short time Dalroy buys a donkey and a cart. In the evening the
two men reach an old tunnel under the land of the Lord. In this night the

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Lord, some of his subjects, the police and the two men go for each other.
Dalroy and Pump can escape and Lord Ivywood is hurt badly by a round of
shot from Pump´s shotgun. Now the Lord is very angry and so he tries to
change the law about alcohol. Meanwhile Pump and Dalroy ”rent” a car
which belongs to Dorian Wimpole and drive to a little town called “Town of
Peace”. This village belongs to a very rich man, whose name is Dr. Wiesen,
also a friend of Lord Ivywood. Although a new law is created it is
impossible to imprison the two men. Now Dalroy finds out the secret of
Krug´s chemist´s shops. Krug is selling alcohol but only for the rich person
like Mr. Levyson, Philip Ivywood´s secretary. So the two men and a lot of
other people from Pebblewick ...... (I can’t betray the end of this story
because the story will lose tension if I do so.)

Main Characters:

Lord Philip Ivywood: He is the dark person of this story. His skin is very

pale and he isn’t really a very good looking man. He is also a very
strange fan of the Islam. The Islam is against alcohol so it isn’t
surprising that the Lord will close all inns in England. He is the most
grotesque figure in this novel. He has a lot of subjects like his secretary
Mr. Levyson, or his adviser Misysra Ammon, who is a very fanatic
Islamist and who delivers a lot of speeches in the name of Lord
Ivywood. Mr. Evyson and the journalist Hibbs Indessen are the right
hand of the Lord, who always needs a lot of person for the confirmation
for something he wants to do. So Ivywood isn’t a man of his own
decisions which don’t make him really to a person on a high social level.
He never shows any kind of feelings, so the lord is a very cold person.

Patrick Dalroy: He is an Irishman and he has been in the army until he was

offended by a general. So Dalroy does not like the English except his
friend Pump and a young lady called Joan Brett. He is the hero of this
story, because he is a very good looking young man. He is very tall and
incredibly strong and hard. He never shows any feelings either, but he
isn’t such a cold and unscrupulous person like Lord Ivywood. He is a
very clever man and he loves animals. Dalroy is the opponent of Lord
Ivywood and so he is also the opposite in appearance and in character.
He has fantastic red hair, which looks like a fire, and strange blue eyes.
He is in love with Lady Joan Brett, but this woman is a member of
Ivywood´s harem. Sometimes he gets very angry and aggressive and then
it is hard for him to keep a cool head.

Humphry Pump: He is the best friend a Dalroy and I think he is the only

person who can really understand Patrick. He is the owner of the inn,
which has been closed by the Lord. So he is a victim, like hundreds
other, of the new laws and of the Islam. He does not really like the Islam
but he doesn’t hate it either. He isn’t such a good looking guy like

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Dalroy and he isn’t an Irishman, but he is a very fine and clever
Englishman. He isn’t in love with somebody, he only loves his inn and
the alcohol. But he isn’t a man who drink too much, so he always has a
cool head. Pump is a very interesting person in this story but it is very
hard to understand the character of him. Although Pump isn’t the hero,
he as a very important figure of this novel.

Jaon Brett: She is the female main character. She has a good looking and she

is the contact between Lord Ivywood and Patrick Dalroy. So you can say
that Lady Brett is a kind of pivot in this novel because the story begin
with her and end with her. She doesn’t really like the Islam, but she has
begun to hate the Islam since she has understood that she is living in a
harem.

Interpretation: Chesterton is well known for his critics so it is not

surprising that this novel is a political satire on the one side and a
burlesque on the other. This story is one of lots fantasy novels, which
express, on an outrély way, Chesterton´s opinion about the political,
social and religious developments in the beginning of the 20

t h

century.

The book has been published in a time, as a very witty discussion
between Chesterton and his friend Hilaire Belloc about the
”Progressives” cause a stir. Like everytime Chesterton use every
opportunity to let out his displeasure about a very restless time, which
destroy and smash the tradition and which pay tribute to a dangerous
individualism. However he does this mainly with a humorous and
optimistic tone. But this novel which was called ”sociological political
allegory” is depressed by Chesterton´s inclinations to overemphasise and
to exaggerate his stories.

The novel ”The Flying Inn” is mainly about the Islam and it is also about
new things like cars. There is Lord called Philip Ivywood who wants to
close all inns because he is a fanatic Islamist. But the story shows that
the Lord is a very weak person and that he is not able to administer his
land. He always need advisers for a confirmation. So I think this is one
of the first problems in this novel. An other, I think this is the most
important theme, is the problem with the right religion. Lord Ivywood is
obsessed by the opinion to convert the whole England to the Islam. He
has a lot of subjects and each of them are obsessed too. Misysra Ammon
is one of the best friends of the Lord, but it is not surprising if you know
that he is a preacher of the Islam and that he is mainly the adviser of
Philip Ivywood. It looks like that Ammon is influencing Lord Ivywood
because Philip is an Englishman and I don not believe that an English
can have such ideas. On the other side there is Patrick Dalroy and his
friend Humphry Pump who fight a battle against the Lord and his laws.
This fight is hardly to win but Dalroy and Pump have won the fight
because Lord Ivywood allows Krug to sell alcohol. Dalroy opens the
secret and so the Lord has lost and has to fear for his life. There is also a

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little love theme between Jaon Brett, the niece of the Lord, and Patrick
Dalroy. It is very hard to describe this theme because you nearly have no
indications for it, except a little passage on the end.

To sum up the story is very interesting and easy to read because the
language of Chesterton is rather modern.

Personal comment: I do not love this book but I think that it is very

interesting although some passage are very boring. For example the first
chapter is not so good that I can say I’m thrilled. This is so because
Misysra Ammon delivers a speech on the beech. He is talking about the
names of the English inns. He has the opinion that all inns, without any
exception, have not an English name, they have only an oriental name.
He says also that inns would not build to sell Christian alcoholic drinks
but to sell the antialcoholic Islamic drinks. This passage is only a listing
of facts and names. You can hardly follow the story and so it is very
boring. But other chapters, e.g. chapter 15 and chapter 16, are so lovely
that I can not stop reading. There is rather more action and there is not
only a simple listing of something. For example in chapter 15: Dalroy
and Pump meet Dorian Wimpole, who is the owner of a very good car.
Dorian is an poet and he has given the order to stop the car because he
believes that Dalroy will do something to the donkey. So Dorian starts a
conversation with the two men and the two men show their interest about
the car. This passage is more humorous than the first chapter because
there are lots of word jokes. I think one of the best passage is that where
Dorian is talking to the donkey while Dalroy and Pump are driving away
with Dorian´s car. One another very good text is where a lot of person
give a report about an anonymous sign, which is from Pump´s inn. Once
you can see it once you can not see it. So there are lots of different
rumours in the daily newsmagazine. The drinking songs, which are
collected in the book of poem which is called ”Wine, Water and Song”
are very famous. I think that are the best passage of the whole novel.
Each drinking song is different and every shows another feeling of
Dalroy or of Pump. E. g. at the end of the novel there are some songs
which sound like a battle cry.

”Oh, be careful, Lord Ivywood, Lord Ivywood

If we get you , it will not be very good for you.”

To sum up I can maintain that the hole story is perfect, with the
exception of some passages. But I think we can expect that from a
scriber with the fame of a very well know poet. Chesterton is know in
the whole world for his ”Father Brown” - stories, which are one of the
best detective story. So you can see that Chesterton can also write
”normal” novel. At the end there is nothing else that I can do, with one
exception. I can only recommend the novel for everybody, who want to
read something other than Thrillers or Action.

Krispin

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Text and written by Krispin Hable