Introduction: Adventure and its Contexts
Lost Horizon is an adventure novel by James Hilton and the origin of “Shangri-La”, the mythic lamasery in the Himalayas. But as is the case with many of the best examples of this genre, though in Lost Horizon adventure means an escape from the everyday world it certainly doesn’t mean an escape from its concerns; instead, we find that it is only when we’re far away from the world that we can truly understand it, and indeed ourselves and where our place in it should be – in it, or out. For this isa book concerned at its heart with how far we can escape the world we all live in, and whether or not we should.
The book was published in 1933 – the year that Hitler came to power in Germany – and the bulk of its action takes place in 1931, a year no more confident in itself. Wars between China and Japan, and the beginnings of the end of the British Empire, are also key points of context. But perhaps the most significant is the First World War and the experience there of grinding slaughter, which in large part contributed to a great feeling of decline, both cultural and spiritual, which permeate Lost Horizon. Our main character, an Englishman named Conway, suffers acutely from his time in the trenches. But more on him shortly.
Plot and Structure
Lost Horizon begins with a frame narrative, detailing an after-dinner discussion between old school friends that leads, as these things often do, to questions about mutual friends and what has become of them. Rutherford, a novelist friend of the narrator’s, enquires about a plane hijacking that took place in Baskul in Persia, and learns that – as he suspected – their mutual friend from Oxford, “Glory” Conway, was on board. But nobody knows where the plane was taken to after it was commandeered – the passengers mysteriously disappeared. However, once they are alone the novelist confides to his friend that he does know what happened to Conway, and provides him with a manuscript recording what Conway told him when they met afterwards. This manuscript makes up the rest of the story.
Four people are on board the hijacked plane – there is a woman, a Christian missionary; Conway, a soldier who had taught at Oxford after the war and now aimlessly works in the Consular Service; an American businessman; and a young and impetuous soldier, Mallinson. Though they try to get into the cockpit, their pilot is armed and is able to defend himself, and eventually they leave off and enjoy the journey. They are flown high into the Himalayas, where eventually their pilot crashes in the middle of a high and alien plateau. Without food or water, and with the hijacker dying from his wounds, they await their own deaths.
But instead rescue comes in the form of a mysterious Chinese man, who introduces himself as Chang, and his servants who bear him on a chair. He offers to lead these helpless people to the lamasery of Shangri-La, where they have everything that the others could possibly want. With no other choice, all of the outsiders agree, and they undertake the arduous journey up to the lamasery with the group.
Shangri-La
What is the new world like to which the characters of Lost Horizon are brought? The first thing they notice is that the lamasery has central heating, which is quite extraordinary given its geographical isolation. But it offers much more than that. The central tenant, Change explains, of the lamas is “moderation”. They work, but not too hard; they obey the rules, but not all the time. They live in a world of ultimate relaxation, because their demands upon themselves are only “moderate” too. It is, from a mental point of view, already sounding like paradise. But things get better still – the lamas, who are all hidden within the lamasery, Chang not yet being fully admitted, are also gifted with extraordinarily long lives, further reducing the pressure upon them. They can take their time with their goals.
Each of the characters reacts to this little utopia in their own way. The missionary decides to learn Tibetan so as to convert the locals who live in the valley by the lamasery; the American decides to make use of the gold reserves of the valley, and its women – who are only “moderately” chaste; Mallinson spends his time planning his escape; and Conway seems to spend his time relaxing and thinking. In Shangri-La, hidden away, he has time for thought. He says that the whole place reminds him of Oxford, it doesn’t seem so far away from an ideal version of my own time at Cambridge either. I was in fact given Lost Horizon by a friend from uni as a parting gift, since both of us enjoy our studying too much, perhaps dangerously so.
Against the outside world, whose continuous decline towards coming cataclysmic war is evident to all the characters, Shangri-La offers a world without connections, without obligations. Nothing here has any effect anywhere else – nobody leaves, and the system by which the lamasery receives books and other objects from the outside world remains shrouded in mystery – but all this is its great weakness, just as it is its great source of strength. The characters learn that they will have to decide for themselves whether to stay, or to make the hazardous journey back to the rest of the civilized world. And it is not an easy decision to make.
“Glory” Conway and the legacy of the First World War
Conway’s nickname comes from his schooldays, when he was one of those talented, lovable people in private education who seem to be able to do absolutely everything that they set their mind to. But the war breaks him, leaving him mature before his time, and he hides among the ivory towers of Oxford afterwards. Then, when his stint in the Consular Service comes, there is still a sense of dislocation very much apparent. He floats between far flung territories without ever reconnecting with the world – he has no ambition to drive him in his work, and his relationships just fizzle out. Whether he is satisfied or not is hard to say, but it is clear that his glory days from school and before the War are behind him.
In Shangri-La he has a place where he can work to his heart’s content. He can study and learn and play music and make idle chit chat. He can do all of those things that he would do in the outside world, but in a protected environment where his actions would no longer be challengeable for being derelictions of his duty. If he stays in Shangri-La there is no duty, except to yourself and your own whimsy. And the world that such an attitude has created is wonderful – it is a place of bliss and peace. But we know from the frame narrative that Conway doesn’t stay, and the question then becomes “Why did he go?”
Values in a World of Decline
O Public School. I have good memories of Winchester, where in the toilets an oversized phallus could be scrawled next to the words “Sic transit gloria Monday” (a pun on “sic transit gloria mundi” – thus passes the glory of the world). The education I received went far beyond learning how to do well in exams – it also encompassed things like having an appreciation and understanding for culture in general. Though it is unfair that I received what others did not, I am certainly glad that I had the chance. I would not be the person I am otherwise.
Public school has not changed much since Conway was there, though the people who go there have. I mention all of this because in the battle to find something worthwhile in this world where everything is falling apart, Lost Horizon seems to hit upon public school and something akin to “British public school” values as the answer. Conway represents something of an enlightened representative of this group of old boys, able to indicate what is good and what is not good. He regularly comes down against racism and notions of racial superiority, and he is also critical of the attitude that the “bally Empire [be] the Fifth Form at St Dominics”.
But at the same time, it is notions of honour and duty that finally spur him out of his self-confessed idleness into action. All of us who have been to private school have the choice between hiding from the world and acting self-interestedly, or acting in service of the world out of respect for the gifts we have been given by our fortunate position. Shangri-La offers the best chance of achieving the former, but it cannot come without a sense of guilt, however small, for the duty we are failing to fulfil. The world may be approaching the greatest conflict it has yet known, but Conway is not going to avoid it by siting around in the mountains, pretending it is not going on. Such are the views and the values he choses to set his store by. I like to think he is right.
Conclusion
The other characters react in different ways, and Lost Horizon contains many more mysteries than those I have described here. It is also a surprisingly funny book, with lots of jokes about British attitudes and ways of thinking that made me laugh. It has its serious message about the dangers of turning our backs on the world, but if you just want to enjoy a story about a magical lamasery hidden in the Himalayas, then it absolutely works on that level too. It’s good fun.
My friend James, who recommended Lost Horizon to me, has a blog here. He’s very talented and has been doing this for much longer than I have