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Part 4
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in An Englishman’s Home, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Class, Hierarchy, and Selfishness
Hypocrisy and Elitism
Social Mobility
Summary
Analysis
After Hargood-Hood and Hodge’s talk, Hodge proposes a solution to Metcalfe: all of the neighbors can pitch in a bit of money to buy Hargood-Hood’s land and build a new hut for the Boy Scouts upon it. Everyone is amenable to the idea of using the land for the public good. Ultimately, Peabury contributes £250 and Metcalfe £500, and everyone else a negligible amount. When the hut is finished, they name it the Metcalfe-Peabury Hall, and Mr. Metcalfe likes this so much that he convinces the local inn to change its name from “the Brakehurst Arms” to “the Metcalfe Arms.”
This compromise works because it satisfies Metcalfe and Peabury’s pride. By putting the land to public use, this arrangement allows both of them to avoid the awkwardness of contributing to the other’s holdings while helping them appear selfless and altruistic. Ultimately, it is their dislike of one another, their prioritization of themselves, and their desire to come across as generous that brings the neighbors together. Of course, this compromise is expensive, as Metcalfe ends up spending at least twice as much as he ever planned to and developing the very land that he had wanted to keep unspoiled. For him, however, it is worth it to see his name gain significance and authority within Much Malcock. Through a combination of his cotton money, his pettiness, and his arrogance, he is finally able to become the country gentleman he has aspired to be.
Themes
In its final subsection, the story gets its punchline: Mr. Hargood-Hood is no London gentleman, but rather an old-money countryman himself. In order to preserve his own family estate, he and his brother—who masquerades as his lawyer—buy land in “unspoilt, well-loved village[s],” strike fear in the hearts of its residents with their supposed plans to develop industrial monstrosities, and sell the land back for a profit. The brothers congratulate each other on a job well done— although it was a bit of a close call—and start to look for their next target.
Mr. Hargood-Hood is just like the other characters in “An Englishman’s Home”—he is a country gentleman. The fact that he is the opposite of what he pretended to be speaks to a larger pattern of disguise throughout the story. That is, neither the characters nor their motives are ever quite what they claim to be. In the end, their preservation efforts are always selfish, and in that, they are all more alike than they realize.
Themes
