Hudge and Gudge
Who are Hudge and Gudge, and why are they
important to us?
Chesterton introduced these two in his 1910 book "What’s Wrong with the
World". Both Hudge and Gudge were gentlemen of the governing class.
Gudge was described as a plutocrat, a Tory, an individualist, and perhaps a
slumlord. Hudge was described as a socialist, an idealist, a progressive, and
perhaps a vegetarian.
In short, these are none other than the political antagonists we know as the
Liberal (Hudge) and the Conservative (Gudge). But there was an important third
individual in Chesterton's discourse, and his name was Jones. He was not a
gentleman of the governing class but merely a member of the lower orders of
society, the common family man.
The key to Chesterton's politics is that he refused to take part in the debate
between Hudge and Gudge, but rather judged them both by the test of Jones.
What, he asked had Gudge, the industrial-capitalist, done to strengthen the
family of Jones? What had Hudge, the socialist-idealist, done to strengthen the
family of Jones?
Gudge rules by a coarse and cruel system of sacking
and sweating and bi-sexual toil, which is totally inconsistent with the family
and is bound to destroy it. And Hudge calls a women’s work freedom to live her
own life, and says the family is something we shall soon gloriously outgrow.
Gilbert! measures current issues and political proposals by
the test of Jones. By that standard, the governing classes of Chesterton's day
and our own have failed miserably, as both Hudge and Gudge continue their
separate and ferocious attacks on the family of Jones.
[And for further reading in
Chesterton's works, see "The Homelessness of Man" in What's Wrong
with the World and "The Drift from Domesticity" in The Thing].
The text has been
picked up from Martin Ward's Chesterton page.