ABSTRACT
Ford Madox Ford often describes himself as a Catholic and a Tory. Ford's remark about the affinities between socialism and Toryism occurs in England and the English. He argues that the Revolution of 1688 consolidated state power at the expense of the monarchy. Political centralisation gradually took hold, and in time this eroded the influence of the landed gentry. Ford also supported women's suffrage. He was appalled that women were denied the vote. It was a disgrace, he maintained, that women should be treated like children, criminals, lunatics', the only other groups who in England were refused the right of citizenship'. Ford held to his radical Tory views consistently. But we can identify phases in his political thinking during which his preoccupations changed. Ford's greatest Impressionist tour-de-force, deals with adultery and repression among the upper classes, but it is also a Condition of England' novel that explores the social and political implications of the events it describes.
