Anthony M Ludovici - The Confessions of an Anti-Feminist: The Autobiography of Anthony M. Ludovici

T HE C ONFESSIONS OF AN

A NTI- F EMINIST

T HE A UTOBIOGRAPHY OF

A NTHONY M . L UDOVICI

E DITED BY J OHN V . D AY

Counter-Currents Publishing Ltd.

San Francisco

2018

Copyright 2018 by Counter-Currents Publishing

All rights reserved

Cover image by

Antony M. Ludovici

Cover design by

Kevin I. Slaughter

Published in the United States by

C OUNTER- C URRENTS P UBLISHING L TD.

P.O. Box 22638

San Francisco, CA 94122

USA

http://www.counter-currents.com/

Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-940933-32-0

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-940933-33-7

E-book ISBN: 978-1-940933-34-4

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Ludovici, Anthony M. (Anthony Mario), 1882-1971. | Day, John V.
Title: Confessions of an anti-feminist : the autobiography of Anthony M. Ludovici / edited by John V. Day.
Description: San Francisco : Counter-Currents Pub. Ltd., 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2013037560| ISBN 9781935965886 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781935965893 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781935965909 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Ludovici, Anthony M. (Anthony Mario), 1882-1971. |
Essayists--Great Britain--Biography. | Philosophers--Great
Britain--Biography. | Critics--Great Britain--Biography. | Authors,
English--Biography.
Classification: LCC CT788.L7645 A3 2015 | DDC 920.92--dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2013037560

C ONTENTS

E DITORS F OREWORD

Anthony M. Ludovici, the author of this present book, was a British writer who died in 1971, having left a will instructing his Trusteesthe two executors of his will

to pay the cost of publication at the lowest price compatible with the cost of production of a decent and presentable edition of the following works if they have not already been published:THE ENGLISH COUNTRYSIDEMY AUTOBIOGRAPHY (The Confessions of an Antifeminist)and I DIRECT my Trustees to send complimentary sets of the said publications to the Public Libraries of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, Belfast, La Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, and the National Libraries of Berlin, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Rome, New York and Zurich. I leave the details of these publications otherwise to the discretion of my Trustees, but the quality of the editions should not be inferior to that of THE QUEST OF HUMAN QUALITY (published by Riders in 1952). The typescripts of the books will be found among my papers in the study of my house in Ipswich.

After the estate duty was paid on his estate and a few minor bequests were made, Ludovici had left over 36,000. According to Government statistics, such a sum of money would today be worth more than ten times that figure. In short, Ludovici had bequeathed plenty of money for the publication of these two books. But for reasons best known to his executors, both of whom were trained lawyers, neither work was ever put into print and then sent to the designated libraries.

Typescripts of the two works are currently held by the Special Collections Division of Edinburgh University Library in Scotland. According to the library, its Papers of Anthony Mario Ludovici (18821971) are composed of 3 pieces of typescript material, being The confessions of an antifeminist , The English countryside today , and the considerably shorter Juvenile delinquency and sex . These three works, the library says, were acquired from executors, in Diss, Norfolk, January 1997.

One presumes that Ludovicis executors handed over these works to Edinburgh University because Ludovicis will had bequeathed the bulk of his estate to Edinburgh. He wanted Edinburgh University to conduct research into the influence of miscegenation on mans quality and well-being and to award an annual Ludovici Prize for the best thesis on this subject, although, in the event, the university declined Ludovicis bequest and, after discussions with his executors, used most of the money available to study the hereditary disease of Huntingtons chorea.

But the good news is that Ludovicis Confessions have not remained under lock and key in a university library, because a second typescript of this work recently cropped up in the public domain. Apparently with safe-keeping in mind, Ludovici gave a copy of the work to Ron Creasey, a friend and neighbour in Suffolk, and as an old man Creasey passed it on to his friend and neighbour, Nick Griffin, who in turn lent it to people he knew were keen on publishing it.

This typescript must predate the Edinburgh one, because Ludovici declares in the final chapter that I am not sorry to have reached the end of my eightieth year in 1962, whereas the corresponding sentence in the Edinburgh version concludes with my eighty-eighth year in 1970. Nevertheless, Edinburghs 1970 typescript has only three passages that add anything substantial to the 1962 typescriptthe first passage has Ludovici apologizing for his behaviour when younger; the second describes his father in a much better light than before; and the third says a little more about Anthonys own appearance and character. Equally, though, this present book has several passages that the 1970 typescript either omits or tones down.

Now, more than four decades after Ludovicis death, it is thanks to Mr Creasey, Mr Griffin and several of Ludovicis admirers in the United States that the public at large has the chance to read these present Confessions the autobiography of one of the twentieth centurys most perceptive and outspoken thinkers.

John V. Day

P REFACE

I believe that every man who has written anything whatsoever is bound by the most compelling duty to supply material for his biography.Friedrich Hebbel, Diaries and Letters

After translating the above quotation for this preface, I was not certain whether Hebbel meant that an author owes the duty in question to himself or to posterity. I incline to the belief that he owes it chiefly to himself. A man writes to be understood, and the dread of failing here has probably led to many of the autobiographies of literary men.

At all events, when a man has been misunderstood and misrepresented as consistently as I have been, he owes it to himself to try to clear the fog that has settled about him. For in England, and London above all, fog is notoriously the danger. Careful clarity of expression is no protection against it, because long ago, centuries before fighting armies and fleets had thought of the use of artificial fog, literary critics, professional rivals and all those whose advantage was served by obscuring an authors message had discovered the tactical advantage of smoke-screens in the war of ideas and, more especially, in the struggle for power.

Besides, many quite innocent readers carry their own fog about with them and, without malice prepense, allow it to settle on the printed pages before them. This would be more easily forgiven if only they would refrain from subsequently ascribing to the work itself and not to their own private nebulosity the false impressions they have gathered.

Occasionally, even in the densest fog, the Englishman finds his way. But, as a rule, only his own way home. Beware, then, all those who invite him to grope through his murk along unwonted paths!

It has been my fate always to offer him hitherto untrodden, uncharted itineraries. Naturally, he lost his way. What is far more serious, he usually lost his temper. In my sixty years of literary work I have had to put up with an extraordinary amount of bad temper. As most of it was quite undeserved, I owe it to myself, rather than to my readers, to follow Hebbels advice.

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