Secret Europe, by John Howard and Mark Valentine

Immanuel Kant analyzed the experience of an aesthetic object as an act of contemplation that is independent of one’s personal interests and desires and free from reference to the object’s reality, moral effect, or utility.  Writing in 1912, Edward Bullough introduced the term “distance” to the idea of aesthetic experience.  He points, for example, to the difference between our ordinary experiences with a dense fog at sea – the strains, anxiety, and fear of invisible dangers – and an aesthetic experience, in which we attend with delight to the “objective” features and sensuous qualities of the fog itself. Bullough argues that this “distance” is obtained by “separating the object and its appeal from one’s own self, by putting it out of gear with practical needs and ends.” In his essay, ‘The Poetic Principle’ Edgar Poe refers to a “poem written solely for the poem’s sake,” a concept Theophile Gauthier would later embrace with the phrase L’art pour l’art (art for art’s sake).  Gauthier’s words would eventually become a rallying cry for aestheticism – the belief that the end of a work of art is simply to exist in its formal perfection; that is, to be beautiful and to be contemplated as an end in itself.

Secret Europe contains twenty-five such works of art, penned by authors John Howard and Mark Valentine.  It is a masterful collection. One would expect no less from Ex Occidente Press. Highly regarded for the beautiful books they produce, the publishers at Ex Occidente have embraced Gauthier’s creed.  One cannot deny the fact that these twenty-five tales deserve the care and consideration provided by Ex Occidente, but their beauty lies firmly in the aesthetic nature of the written word. These stories are not a pastiche; they are an embodiment of Poe’s poetic principle.  Howard and Valentine do not emulate the decadent work of writers past, they carry the torch forward. Secret Europe should not be considered a tribute to aestheticism, but rather a welcome progression of its artistic ideals.

Given the restrained strength of ‘Baltersan’s Third Edition’ it is easy to understand why this story was chosen to open Secret Europe.  The tale begins with the description of Archibald Lyall’s Languages of Europe. This book, ironically enough, is a “practical, black-bound handbook of sentences, phrases and words from all the tongues of the continent, in one convenient volume.” As an object it would seem far removed from the ideals of aestheticism. A common, utilitarian text meant to serve a specific purpose it becomes something far more fascinating within the mind of Mark Valentine. It becomes a story. It would not be difficult to envision Lyall’s Languages of Europe at home in Valentine’s library, nor would it seem odd to find the imagined third edition of Baltersan’s work beside it on the shelf.  Less subtle than the tales that follow, ‘Baltersan’s Third Edition’ implies that there are things to be learned in the ensuing stories, “no harder to understand than our human tongues…once we discerned the secret of them.”

The delicate brushstrokes with which he paints ‘Secret Byzantium’ reveal the cleverness of Valentine’s controlled brilliance. Valentine is an intellectual writer with a firmly established and well-maintained balance between intelligence and imagination. ‘Secret Byzantium’ is a skilfully understated journey that begs to be read again. There is something almost allegorical about it, hints of a deeper meaning that might be divined by the studiously observant reader. This veiled promise aside it is the text’s aesthetic nature that inspires additional reading.  Perhaps there is no hidden message. Perhaps the only purpose behind the story is the story itself – l’art pour l’art. Regardless, ‘Secret Byzantium’ lingers in the mind long after it has been read.

In John Howard’s ‘The Silver Eagles’ we encounter a vague European setting built around Empires and Grand Duchies. Howard’s story exists somewhere between the Germans and the Bolsheviks, between fact and the fantastic. In it Howard suggests that “that which is real, or comes to be considered real and accepted as such, can take over and drive out all else before it.” ‘The Silver Eagles’ is undoubtedly and deliberately an alternative history piece. It is undoubtedly so because it takes history and skews it. It is deliberately so because Howard utilizes the genre as a tool in the telling of his stories. The genre isn’t the intent, the stories are. It is the literary use of genre as a device that makes his well-crafted tales so intriguing.

Historical fact is an open debate. The truth about the past is rarely etched in stone, most often left to the winner to write, or the witness to decipher. When reading his contributions to Secret Europe it is easy to get swept into John Howard’s history. The reader becomes witness to a past that never happened but perhaps could have, or did happen but never should have.  The beautiful thing about history is its subjectivity. Howard paints this beauty with a master’s stroke. In ‘The White City,’ Howard says, “There is always the possibility that the buildings absent from my sight were never actually built; perhaps that was why the artist had smiled the way he had.” When reading works like ‘The Silver Eagles’ and ‘The White City’ it is easy to envision John Howard smiling.

Secret Europe is precisely that. It is a Europe rife with past possibilities, potential people and places left unrealized by fate until they found life in the minds of John Howard and Mark Valentine. Their stories are told with grace and subtleness, intelligence of style and an aesthetic beauty that both embraces and belies their modernity. The authors are not emulating the decadent literature of the past. They are not paying homage to another era. With Secret Europe they are championing the poetic principle, and in doing so adding their unique voices to the aesthetic chorus.

Publication Date: January 2012
ISBN: N/A
Details about the book: Sewn hardcover, limited to 200 hand numbered copies, 250 pp with end papers.

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