Fear of Strangers

Britain's Geoffrey Gorer, critic extraordinary of Africa, Japan, Russia and the U.S., has turned suddenly timid before his own country. In "Some Notes on the British Character" for the final issue of Horizon (TIME, Nov. 28), Gorer first disqualifies himself as an expert ("I cannot make such an analysis; it demands a degree of detachment which I can only achieve spasmodically and for very short periods"), then reaches some tentative conclusions. His most novel notion is that the British are shy:

"Irrational fear of strangers is a characteristic shared by a majority of the English," says Gorer. "In those portions of Asia and Africa . . . governed by England many of the native elites . . . were granted formal equality, but practically never social equality, typified in most areas by . . . social clubs. This exclusion appears to have distressed and humiliated the native elites out of all proportion to a rational assessment of the amenities foregone. [But British exclusiveness was] 'race prejudice' only to the extent that 'race' made the strangeness of" the stranger more evident

... It could be said, without too much exaggeration, that the fear of strangers lost England its Asiatic empire."

Gorer suggests that this and other Brit' ish traits need psychological study. Then, with the eyes of his countrymen upon him, Gorer bows hurriedly out of the room. Says he: "I hope that this work will be undertaken in the not too distant future."

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