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If you already know which Ludovici books, essays, short stories and poems you're looking for, skip this section and go straight to TEXTS. But if you're new to Ludovici and want some guidance about the best works to consult, then read on. Perhaps Ludovici's favourite among his many subjects was the relationship between the sexes. He treated it in over a dozen works of fiction and non-fiction, arguing that men differ sharply from women in their psychological make-up. To learn about Ludovici's profound analysis of human psychology, read the complementary books, Woman: A Vindication and Man: An Indictment. (His short story, A modern Delilah, portrays female characters in more graphic terms.) For Ludovici's attack on feminism and his belief that women should concentrate on bearing and raising children, read Enemies of Women and the 10-part essay, Woman's contribution to Britain's national decline. Advocating that healthy women of all social classes should have large families, Ludovici wanted them to abandon contraception, and he said so at length in The Night-Hoers. He explained how to raise children in The Child: An Adult's Problem and in the 14-part essay, Education in modern England. For most of his life Ludovici knew an England populated largely by Anglo-Saxons, and, apart from his 1955 essay, The black invasion of Britain and his 18-part 1958 essay The importance of racial integrity, which offers a brilliant case against miscegenation, he had little to say about modern race relations. But a major theme running through his work is that, for offspring blessed with mental and physical harmony, like should be marrying like — in racial type, physiognomy and personality. Ludovici outlined his ideas in Divorce and the psycho-physical disparity of spouses and chapters 5 to 7 of The Quest of Human Quality, but his masterwork in this field is The Choice of a Mate. (His short story, What the east wind brought, also explores racial alienation.) Although an admirer of Jewish psychologists like Freud and Adler, and a friend of the Nietzschean scholar Oscar Levy and other Jews, Ludovici took an objective look at the Jewish role in Western societies in Jews, and the Jews in England, which he wrote under a pseudonym, and in a tactful essay, Transform society's values. Renowned as a pioneering commentator on Nietzsche, Ludovici examined the German philosopher's dissection of Christian morality in his first two books, Who is to be Master of the World? and Nietzsche: His Life and Works. Over fifty years later, in one of his last but finest books, Religion for Infidels, Ludovici illuminated the course of evolution and deduced the ethics that mankind needs for survival in a harsh universe. Despite calling himself a "Christophobist" in the frank poem, My testament, Ludovici treated the proper relationship between Church and state in chapter 5 of A Defence of Conservatism. By no means a snob, Ludovici nevertheless hated majority rule and, at the risk of his livelihood as a writer, said so in (among other places) a 15-part essay, The false assumptions of democracy. He argued that the West needs hierarchical societies ruled by new elites in A Defence of Aristocracy and The Quest of Human Quality. A Defence of Conservatism is perhaps the best general introduction to Ludovici's political outlook, while his economic opinions are neatly summarised in a booklet, The Sanctity of Private Property. To read about his tour of National Socialist Germany and his reaction to a strongly hierarchical society in practice, see the 3-part essay, Hitler and the Third Reich. The son and grandson of painters, and a talented amateur himself, Ludovici championed representational art stressing human beauty. Nietzsche and Art is an early Ludovici book explaining his views, while other useful sources are the Introductory essay on Van Gogh and his art and Confusion in the arts. After working as Rodin's private secretary, Ludovici recalled the great French sculptor in Personal Reminiscences of Auguste Rodin and Rodin as I knew him. Some of Ludovici's own published and unpublished art work — paintings, sketches and cartoons — may be seen in the GALLERY. |
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