Is Waugh’s Hooper, Neitzsche’s last man?
Yes, there are strong parallels between Evelyn Waugh’s Hooper in Brideshead Revisited (1945) and Nietzsche’s Last Man, making Hooper a compelling literary embodiment of this philosophical concept.
1. Who is Nietzsche’s Last Man?
In Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883–1885), Friedrich Nietzsche introduces the Last Man as the ultimate symbol of cultural and spiritual decline. The Last Man:
- Avoids Risk and Passion: He seeks only comfort, safety, and mediocrity.
- Lacks Ambition: He has no aspiration for greatness, transcendence, or meaning beyond material satisfaction.
- Embraces Conformity: He prioritizes stability and predictability over adventure or creativity.
- Rejects Higher Values: With the “death of God”, the Last Man fills the void not with new values, but with banal contentment.
2. Who is Hooper?
In Brideshead Revisited, Hooper is a young officer during World War II, a stark contrast to the novel’s other characters, especially the Flyte family and Charles Ryder:
- Materialistic and Unimaginative: Hooper is characterized by his modernity, with a focus on efficiency, bureaucracy, and utility.
- Spiritually Numb: He shows no connection to the beauty, tradition, or spiritual depth represented by Brideshead Castle.
- Emblem of Modernity: He represents the post-war England that Waugh saw as increasingly gray, soulless, and disenchanted.
- Lack of Wonder: While Charles is initially drawn to the mystique and grandeur of the Flytes’ world, Hooper only sees inconvenience and waste.
3. Thematic Connections
- Mediocrity vs. Nobility: Just as Nietzsche’s Last Man stands in opposition to the Übermensch, Hooper is a foil to characters who strive for meaning and grace, like Sebastian Flyte and Julia Flyte.
- Spiritual Void: Hooper embodies the secularization and banality that Nietzsche feared. His life lacks tragedy, but also beauty and aspiration.
- End of an Era: As the Flyte family represents a dying aristocratic and Catholic tradition, Hooper’s utilitarian worldview signifies the emergence of a new, diminished England.
4. Key Moments
- Arrival at Brideshead: Hooper’s inability to appreciate the grandeur of the estate is symbolic of the Last Man’s blindness to higher values.
- Practicality over Transcendence: While Charles Ryder undergoes a spiritual journey, Hooper remains stagnant, highlighting his philosophical shallowness.
5. Why It Matters
- Waugh critiques the modern world through Hooper, showing a society that has abandoned tradition, faith, and aesthetic sensibility, aligning with Nietzsche’s fears of a civilization content with small pleasures over great aspirations.
- In both cases, the Last Man and Hooper serve as warnings, urging readers to resist complacency and pursue deeper meaning.
Would you like to explore how this reading of Hooper might alter the broader interpretation of Brideshead Revisited, or how Waugh’s own Catholicism might shape this parallel with Nietzsche?