Essay Questions

What is meant by the phrase "temporary gentleman" and how does it apply to Billy Prior?

The phrase "temporary gentlemen" applies to a working class person who, because of the war, has been promoted to "officer class" and is therefore rubbing shoulders with the upper classes that he would normally not. It is temporary because it is a status conferred entirely because of the war, and once the war is over, normal class status will apply. Billy Prior is a temporary gentleman because he is given social access to the fraternity of military officers when from a class perspective he belongs more with the grunt soldiers and corporals under him. He is aware of this but not entirely uncomfortable as he has the ability to see things from the officer perspective, is a good leader and soldier, and very articulate and intelligent, so he is not socially out of water, even though his background might suggest otherwise. He is also smart enough to only say what is appropriate and is a "watcher" rather than a talker.

Do you think Beattie Roper is guilty of trying to assassinate Lloyd George?

Beattie Roper is a street-smart kind of woman and it is hard to imagine that she could be duped into participating in a plot to assassinate Lloyd George by someone like Sprague, as she gives the impression she would be suspicious enough of anyone who was not her immediate family to be more wary than she implies that she was when dealing with him. She is outspoken in her opposition of conscription and of her opposition to punishing those who were conscientious objectors, going as far as to hid those who have deserted. She makes no secret of this and it is therefore easy to see that she would be somebody the authorities would like to remove from the community to avoid her influencing others, so it would also be easy to believe that she was framed. Both possibilities are believable. The most likely scenario is that she knew what Sprague was suggesting - assassinating the Prime Minister - and did not try to stop him, so she was likely involved in the plot, but not the instigator that the authorities suggested.

What did Captain Manning find more frightening - the war, or being revealed to be homosexual?

In the novel, it can sometimes seem that the Government of the day saw homosexuals to be almost as much of an enemy as the Germans they were fighting in World War One. They seemed to spend a disproportionate amount of time and resources trying to discover the identity of homosexuals and to deal with them in a way they considered "appropriate". It could be argued that this time and these resources would have been better utilized on the enemy in Europe. Captain Manning was not particularly afraid of fighting in the war, and to have reached the rank of Captain, would have had to have been a military man by intent, not by reason of war, as well as a good leader and a man of courage in the face of danger. He would have returned to the front line in France quite happily had his injured leg not prevented this. He also seemed to have little fear of the actual bombing campaigns on London, his concern mostly for the practicalities of owning a home that could at any moment be bombed and destroyed. His fear regarding being discovered to be a homosexual, on the other hand, was haunting him continuously and he developed quite a paranoia about it. He worried that he was on the list of high profile gay men that could at any moment become public. He was being blackmailed by an anonymous letter writer whose identity is never revealed but whose intent to destroy his career and reputation because of his sexuality was blatant. He was also very concerned that attending a play by Oscar Wilde would make it obvious that he was secretly gay. His fear of this being revealed, and therefore destroying his family, was far greater than his fear of fighting in France, or of being injured in a raid in London, primarily because there was no shame in being killed in action, but plenty of shame for his family if he was "outed".