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Chapter 7
CUSTOMER-DRIVEN MARKETING STRATEGY:
CREATING VALUE FOR TARGET CUSTOMERS
Discussion Objective
A focused discussion of the opening Henkel story will illustrate the basics of segmentation, targeting,
differentiation, and positioning. Henkel has segmented its market carefully and concentrated on serving men and
women’s needs separately. The discussion should emphasize that Henkel not only knows which customers it wants
but also knows what those customers want.
Discussion Questions
1. How would you describe Henkel’s approach to market segmentation? (As with most marketers, Henkel
uses a combination of different segmentation variables. Discuss how the company might draw upon
geographic, demographic, psychographic, and behavioral variables in determining its market structure. Ask
students to provide examples of each type. As a class, try to determine which variables appear to be most
important to Henkel in targeting its customers. Look at its expansion plan. What variables will play into its
expansion?
2. Look at the range of Henkel’s detergent brands. How does this range compare to popular brands in your
country or region? Are there any downsides to having a more limited range of offerings? Speculate on the
reasoning behind the range.
3. How does the chapter-opening story relate to the segmentation and positioning concepts that follow in
Chapter 7? (Henkel knows that it can’t serve every kind of customer, or every customer in the same way. It
doesn’t even want to try to appeal to all possible customers. It succeeds by segmenting its market, targeting
the best segments for it, and differentiating and positioning itself to best serve the needs of target
consumers. That’s pretty much what this chapter is all about.)
CHAPTER OVERVIEW
Use Power Point Slide 7-1 Here
This chapter looks further into key customer-driven marketing strategy decisions—how to divide
CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
Use Power Point Slide 7-2 here
CHAPTER OUTLINE
INTRODUCTION
p. 210 Henkel has made great strides in the Middle Eastern market.
It knows who its customers are and what they want from
their detergents.
P. 211
It requires careful market segmentation and positioning to Photo: Henkel
succeed with this strategy and to offer something valuable
to consumers in each group.
PPT 7-3 Define the major steps in designing a customer value- Learning Objective
driven marketing strategy: market segmentation, 1
PPT 7-5 List and discuss the major bases for segmenting Learning Objective
consumer and business markets. 2
PPT 7-8 Table 7.1 outlines the major variables that might be used in p. 213
segmenting consumer markets. Key Term:
Geographic
Geographic Segmentation segmentation
MARKET TARGETING
p. 224 Micromarketing
PPT 7-27 p. 224
Micromarketing is the practice of tailoring products and Key Terms:
marketing programs to suit the tastes of specific individuals Micromarketing,
and locations. Local marketing
PPT 7-32 A product position is the way the product is defined by p. 229
consumers on important attributes. Ad: IKEA
Positioning Maps
p. 229 p. 229
PPT 7-33 Perceptual positioning maps show consumer perceptions Figure 7.3:
7-1 How would you describe the key differences between differentiation and positioning? Do
businesses use both techniques? (AACSB: Communication)
Answer: Differentiation involves making the product or service noticeably different from the
competition so consumers can recognize its distinctive properties or features more easily.
Positioning is about establishing the product or service in the minds of the target consumers
at a point in the continuum of factors, such as quality, price, or convenience. A business
would use both approaches: differentiation, to create a recognizable and separate product or
service, and positioning, to enable consumers to make an informed comparison.
7-2 How is demographic segmentation used in consumer markets? Provide an example where
marketers have used demographic segmentation. (AACSB: Communication; Reflective
Thinking)
Answer:
Demographic segmentation divides the market into segments based on variables such as age,
life-cycle stage, gender, income, occupation, education, religion, ethnicity, and generation.
Demographic factors are the most popular bases for segmenting customer groups. One reason
is that consumer needs, wants, and usage rates often vary closely with demographic
variables. Another is that demographic variables are easier to measure than most other types
of variables. Even when marketers first define segments using other bases, such as benefits
sought or behavior, they must know a segment’s demographic characteristics to assess the
size of the target market and reach it efficiently.
Students' examples will vary. Examples may include Dove developing a line for men. Dove’s
7-3 What is the value of intermarket segmentation for global businesses? (AACSB:
Communication)
Answer:
Intermarket segmentation allows a business to create and identify target market segments of
consumers that share similarities even though the members of those target markets live in
different countries. Intermarket segmentation allows the business to fulfil the needs of these
recognized groups and develop strategies to serve them.
7-4 There are many ways to segment a market, but not all segmentations are effective. Explain
the five requirements for effective market segmentation. (AACSB: Communication)
Answer: Student answers will vary based on their personal response. Refer to the MyLab for
an opportunity to assign this question, and all starred MyLab questions, to a student
discussion board.
7-5 Explain the differences between differentiated and undifferentiated marketing. Can a
business effectively use both strategies? (AACSB: Communication; Reflective Thinking)
Answer:
Differentiated marketing is often used when a business aims to create variants of products or
services that individually aim to cater for specific markets. In essence, the whole (or most) of
the market is catered for, but each distinctive target market has a variant designed to appeal
to them in a specific way. Undifferentiated marketing involves having a single product or
service and selling it to the whole market. This is also known as mass marketing. However, a
product or service can be differentiated simply even if it is undifferentiated. For example, a
bulk version of the product may appeal to business customers whereas a more manageable
standard version may appeal to individual consumers.
7-6 How can a company gain competitive advantage through differentiation? Describe an
example of a company that illustrates each type of differentiation discussed in the chapter.
(AACSB: Communication)
Answer: Student answers will vary based on their personal response. Refer to the MyLab for
an opportunity to assign this question, and all starred MyLab questions, to a student
discussion board.
Answer:
Market niches are often developed by start-ups. They are turned into mass-market products
or services by merchandisers or much larger established businesses. They have the scale,
distribution, and sales to commercialize the product that the start-ups do not. However,
sometimes the transition can be made by the start-up. Steve Jobs at Apple and Bill Gates at
Microsoft are examples of individuals with the foresight and intelligence to do it themselves.
A visionary leader at an early stage can make a real difference.
Students are likely to approach this in different ways. Strategies that may work include
seeking investment and expertise to assist in the transformation, partnering with a bigger
business with experience, selling the idea to some other business that will commercialize it,
or using word of mouth to gradually make the transition rather than trying to achieve it
quickly.
7-8 Manfluencers is a terms that describes a new marketing trend. To what does this term refer?
Describe two examples of how marketers have responded to the manfluencers trend.
(AACSB: Communication; Reflective Thinking)
Answer:
Students’ examples will vary. The term refers to males who shop and prepare meals at least
half of the time. (Source: https://www.consumeraffairs.com/news/marketing-to-men-by-
appealing-to-manfluencers-102513.html; http://midanmarketing.com/beta/wp-
content/uploads/2014/12/Manfluence-infographic-081413.pdf;
http://midanmarketing.com/consumers-case/man-fluence/)
Manfluencers is a term that describes the almost 50 percent of men who now do most of the
grocery shopping and cooking at home. See John Johnson, “New Marketing Trend: Meet the
‘Manfluencers’” USAToday, October 27, 2013, at
www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/27/newser-marketing-men/3280773/.
Another article describes several examples – see Anne Marie Chaker, “Groceries Become a
Guy Thing,” Wall Street Journal, (October 17, 2013), p. D1. Food giants Kraft and General
Mills are going after manfluencers. Some changes are merely cosmetic, such as larger
portions and darker color schemes on packages. Powerful Yogurt focuses on protein content,
and frozen yogurt, Pro Yo, is geared specifically for men and is marketed as tasting like
premium ice cream and high in protein and nicknamed “brogurt.” General Mills sponsored a
Real Men Cook event for fathers in Chicago, and representatives in a red truck gave samples
of Crunchy Taco and Ultimate Three Cheese Marinara. They gave samples at NASCAR
races, too. “Ultimate” is a male-friendly buzzword. For an interesting infographic, see
www.theshelbyreport.com/2013/08/21/study-examines-how-manfluencers-shop-for-prepare-
consume-meat-products/.
7-9 In a small group, create an idea for a new business. Using the steps described in the chapter,
develop a customer value–driven marketing strategy. Describe your strategy and conclude
with a positioning statement for this business. (AACSB: Communication; Reflective
Thinking)
Answer:
The four major steps in designing a customer value-driven marketing strategy are market
segmentation, market targeting (or targeting), differentiation, and positioning. Students
should identify the target market for their business and identify the competitive advantage.
That is, what does their business offer that others do not? A difference is worth establishing
and promoting to the extent that it is important, distinctive, superior, communicable,
preemptive, affordable, and profitable. Once value differences and competitive advantages
are identified, the positioning statement should follow the form: To (target segment and
need) our (brand—business in this case) is (concept) that (point of difference).
Local marketing is an effective tool used by marketers to reach intended market segments.
Groupon has capitalized on this concept by tailoring brands and marketing to the needs and
wants of local customer segments—cities, neighborhoods, and even specific stores. According to
its website, Groupon “offers a vast mobile and online marketplace where people discover and
save on amazing things to do, see, eat, and buy. By enabling real-time commerce across local
businesses, travel destinations, consumer products, and live events, shoppers can find the best a
city has to offer. Groupon is redefining how small businesses attract and retain customers by
providing them with customizable and scalable marketing tools and services to profitably grow
their businesses.” This concept lies at the heart of Groupon’s mission: “to connect local
commerce, increasing consumer buying power while driving more business to local merchants
through price and discovery.” To help consumers make those connections, Groupon offers a
mobile app, online marketplace, and social media touchpoints where customers can readily
access information on its daily deals.
7-10 How does Groupon use target marketing? Provide examples. Discuss the ways in which
small businesses can utilize local social media marketing in your community. (AACSB:
Communication; Use of IT; Reflective Thinking)
Answer:
7-11 Do you use Groupon? Is it effective in helping local businesses to meet the challenges of
local marketing? Why or why not? (AACSB: Communication; Reflective Thinking)
Answer:
Students’ answers will vary but many students will be familiar with Groupon. Groupon may
or may not be effective. Local marketing efforts such as Groupon allow businesses to
potentially reach new customers. But are those new customers going to continue to support
the business? This is the challenge. The cost of promoting a business using Groupon is
significant to a small business. This cost may or may not be recouped. And existing
customers who would visit the business without using the Groupon deal will be able to take
advantage of it as well. This may be a wonderful way to reward the loyal customer.
Beverage Giant Coca-Cola faces several challenges as a result of an increase of consumer health
awareness, the reduction of carbonated drinks in schools in many regions, and newer, healthier
drinks. The brand is having an especially difficult time getting through to teens. To increase
sales, Coca-Cola attempted to make a personal connection with teens through a campaign called
“Share a Coke.” The campaign was first launched in Australia in 2011, then introduced in the
United States, and then spread across 70 countries until 2015.
The soda maker also knows very well that it needs to target teens through social media and
mobile phones. Through the #sharecoke hashtag, Coca-Cola achieved a phenomenal result, with
25 million extra Facebook followers and an increase of consumption by young consumers by 7
percent in 2015.
However, the campaign was criticized by many; health experts, for instance, expressed their
concern that Coca-Cola uses the Internet and technology to push sugary drinks on teens that
might lead to long-term consequences with regard to their diet and lifestyle.
7-12 Discuss how Coca-Cola expanded its teen customer base again.
Answer:
7-13 How will Coca-Cola prove that they are catering to teens responsibly?
Answer:
Coca-Cola should improve its brand health score by promoting healthy diets and physical
activities. Peer influence on teens should be taken into account while setting the marketing
strategy. The brand should be honest when engaging with social networks to build trust and
relationships with customers. In some territories, engaging with parents will also help
promote healthier diets.
USAA is a financial services company formed in 1922 by 25 Army officers who came together
to insure each other’s automobiles because they were deemed too high-risk to insure. USAA now
has almost 25,000 employees and more than 9 million member customers. It consistently ranks
in the top 10 automobile insurance companies and offers other types of insurance as well as
banking, investment, retirement, and financial planning services. USAA practices a niche
marketing strategy—it targets only active and former military personnel and their immediate
families. Members earn the right to be customers by serving in the military and can pass that on
to their spouses and children. The company was originally even more restrictive, targeting only
military officers. However, in 1996, eligibility was extended to enlisted personnel and is now
extended to anyone who served and was honorably discharged from the military and his or her
immediate family members.
7-14 Discuss the factors used to evaluate the usefulness of the military segment. (AACSB:
Communication; Reflective Thinking)
Answer:
7-15 Using the chain ratio method described in Appendix 2: Marketing by the Numbers, estimate
the market potential in the military (active duty and veterans) market. Be sure to state any
assumptions you make. (AACSB: Communication; Use of IT; Analytical Reasoning)
Answer:
Students’ assumptions and estimates will vary, and instructors can use this exercise as an
illustration that estimating market potential is not an exact science. The aim of this exercise
is not to come up with the “correct answer” per se—there is no single correct answer. There
are several acceptable answers. Students will have to research and justify the numbers they
use.
The chain-ratio method described in Appendix 2 for estimating total market demand uses
three variables:
a) number of prospective buyers
b) quantity purchased by an average buyer per year
c) price of an average unit
Q=nqp
where
Q = total market demand
n = number of buyers in the market
q = quantity purchased by an average buyer per year
p = price of an average unit
For example, the U.S. Census Bureau reports there are 19,300,000 veterans in the United
States as of 2014. Additionally, the number of active duty personnel as of May 2016 is
1,330,356 (http://www.governing.com/gov-data/military-civilian-active-duty-employee-
workforce-numbers-by-state.html, accessed October 16, 2016). However, this number must
be discounted because some military personnel and veterans already have life insurance
(focusing on that specific service for this example). One way to discount this number is to
To determine the other elements of the chain ratio method, students will have to state their
assumptions. For example, if using the cost of a policy as the “average price per unit,” then
the “quantity purchased” would be 1 because most veterans and active duty personnel will
likely purchase only one life insurance policy, for example. However, if the “average price
per unit” is the cost for a policy for more than one family member, then the “quantity
purchased” will be the number of policies. To determine costs, students should research the
USAA Web site (https://www.usaa.com/inet/ent_logon/Logon?redirectjsp=true).
Synopsis
There are far more failures among airline startups than there are successes. In the past few
decades, the most notable successes have pursued a low-cost/low-fare model (Southwest,
Allegiant, Spirit, Frontier, etc.). This case shows there is room in the market for an airline that
doesn’t try to beat the competition by offering the lowest price, but by offering the best service
and the most appealing amenities. Virgin America is succeeding by doing these things and by
targeting the right customer.
Teaching Objectives
1. Provide a practical application for possible ways that companies can segment markets.
2. Underscore the difference between segmentation and targeting.
3. Show the importance of establishing a positioning for a brand that is consistent with a
targeting strategy.
UP AND DOWN
His vagueness, apparently, is only on the surface of his mind; down at the
centre the pulses of life throb with unusual vigour and decision. And I think
the explanation of his puzzled expression and dazed manner—to say
nothing of his idiotic replies—when addressed upon ordinary topics is due
to the fact that he prefers to live in that hot and very active centre. He
dislikes being called out of it.
Down there his creative imagination is for ever at work: he sees clearly,
thinks hard, acts even splendidly. But the moment you speak to him about
trivial things the mists gather about his eyes, his voice hesitates, his hands
make futile gestures, and he screws up his face into an expression of
puzzled alarm. Up he comes to the best of his ability, but it is clear he is
vexed at being disturbed.
“Oh yes, I think so—very,” he replied the other day as we met on our
way to the Club and I asked if he had enjoyed his holiday.
“Awful amount of rain, though, wasn’t there?”
“Was there, now? Yes, there must have been, of course. It was a wet
summer.”
He looked at me as though I were a comparative stranger, although our
intimacy is of years’ standing, and our talks on life, literature, and all the
rest are a chief pleasure to each of us. We had not met for some months. I
wanted to pierce through to that hot centre where the real man lived, and to
find out what the real man had been doing during the interval. He came up
but slowly, however.
“You went to the mountains as usual, I suppose?” he asked, with his
mind obviously elsewhere. He hopped along the pavement with his quick,
bird-like motion.
“Mountains, yes. And you?”
He made no reply. From his face I could tell he had come about half-way
up, but was already on the way down again. Once he got back to that centre
of his I should get nothing out of him at all.
“And you?” I repeated louder. “Abroad, I suppose, somewhere?”
“Well—er—not exactly,” he mumbled. “That is to say—I—er—went to
Switzerland somewhere—Austria, I mean—down there on the way towards
Italy beyond Bozen, you know.” He ended the sentence very loud indeed,
with quite absurd emphasis, as his way is when he knows he hasn’t been
listening. “I found a quiet inn out of the tourist track and did a rare lot of
work there too.” His face cleared and the brown eyes began to glow a little.
It was like seeing the sun through opening mists. “Come in, and I’ll tell you
about it,” he added, in an eager whisper, as we reached the Club doors.
At the same moment, however, the porter came down the steps and
touched his hat, and my vague friend, recognising a face he felt he ought to
know, stopped to ask him how he was, and whether So-and-so was back
yet; and while the porter replied briefly and respectfully I saw to my dismay
the mists settle down again upon the other’s face. A moment later the porter
touched his hat again and moved off down the street. My friend looked
round at me as though I had but just arrived upon the scene.
“Here we are,” he observed gently, “at the Club. I think I shall go in.
What are you going to do?”
“I’m coming in too,” I said.
“Good,” he murmured; “let’s go in together, then,” his thoughts working
away busily at something deep within him.
On our way to the hat-racks, and all up the winding stairs, he mumbled
away about the wet summer, and tourists, and his little mountain inn, but
never a word of the work I was so anxious to hear about, and he so anxious
really to tell. In the reading-room I manœuvred to get two arm-chairs side
by side before he could seize the heap of papers he smothered his lap with,
but never read.
“And where have you been all the summer?” he asked, crossing his little
legs and speaking in a voice loud enough to have been heard in the street.
“Somewhere in the mountains, I suppose, as usual?”
“You were going to tell me about the work you got through up in your
lonely inn,” I insisted sharply. “Was it a play, or a novel, or criticism, or
what?” He looked so small and lost in the big arm-chair that I felt quite
ashamed of myself for speaking so violently. He turned round on the
slippery leather and offered me a cigarette. The glow came back to his face.
“Well,” he said, “as a matter of fact it was both. That is, I was preparing
a stage version of my new novel.” All the mist had gone now; he was alive
at the centre, and thoroughly awake. He snapped his case to and put it away
before I had taken my cigarette. But, of course, he did not notice that, and
held out a lighted match to my lips as though there was something there to
light.
“No, thanks,” I said quickly, fearful that if I asked again for the cigarette
the mists would instantly gather once more and the real man disappear.
“Won’t you really, though?” he said, blowing the match out and
forgetting to light his own cigarette at the same time. “I did the whole
scenario, and most of the first act. There was nothing else to do. It rained all
the time, and the place was quiet as the grave——”
A waiter brought him several letters on a tray. He took them
automatically. The face clouded a bit.
“What’ll you have?” he asked absent-mindedly, acting automatically
upon the presence of the waiter.
“Nothing, thanks.”
“Nor will I, then. Oh yes, I will, though—I’ll have some dry ginger ale.
Here, waiter! Bring me a small dry ginger ale.”
The waiter, with the force of habit, bent his head questioningly for my
order too.
“You said——?” asked my exasperating friend. He was right down in the
mists now, and I knew I should never get him up again this side of lunch.
“I said nothing, thanks.”
“Nothing, then, for this gentleman,” he continued, gazing up at the
waiter as though he were some monster seen for the first time, “and for me
—a dry ginger ale, please.”
“Yes, sir,” said the man, moving off.
“Small,” the other called after him.
“Yessir—small.”
“And a slice of lemon in it.”
The waiter inclined his head respectfully from the door. The other turned
to me, searching in his perturbed mind—I could tell it by the way his eyes
worked—for the trail of his vanished conversation. Before he got it,
however, he slithered round again on the leather seat towards the door.
“A bit of ice too, don’t forget!”
The waiter’s head peeped round the corner, and from the movement of
his lips I gathered he repeated the remark about the bit of ice.
“I did say ‘dry’?” my friend asked, looking anxiously at me; “didn’t I?”
“You did.”
“And a bit of lemon?”
“And a slice of lemon.”
“And what are you going to have, then? Upon my word, old man, I
forgot to ask you.” He looked so distressed that it was impossible to show
impatience.
“Nothing, thanks. You asked me, you know.”
A pause fell between us. I gave it up. He would talk when he wanted to,
but there was no forcing him. It struck me suddenly that he had a rather
fagged and weary look for a man who had been spending several weeks at a
mountain inn with work he loved. The pity and affection his presence
always wakes in me ran a neck-and-neck race. At that “centre” of his, I
knew full well, he was ever devising plans for the helping of others, quite as
much as creating those remarkable things that issued periodically,
illunderstood by a sensation-loving public, from the press. A sharp
telepathic suspicion flashed through my mind, but before there was time to
give it expression in words, up came the waiter with a long glass of ginger
ale fizzing on a tray.
He handed it to my vague friend, and my vague friend took it and
handed it to me.
“But it’s yours, my dear chap,” I suggested.
He looked puzzled for a second, and then his face cleared. “I forget what
you ordered,” he observed softly, looking interrogatively at the waiter and at
me. We informed him simultaneously, “Nothing,” and the waiter
respectfully mentioned the price of the drink. My friend’s left hand plunged
into his trousers pocket, while his right carried the glass to his lips. Perhaps
his left hand did not know what his right was about, or perhaps his mind
was too far away to direct the motions of either with safety. Anyhow, the
result was deplorable. He swallowed an uncomfortable gulp of air-bubbles
and ginger—and choked—over me, over the waiter and tray, over his beard
and clothes. The floating lump of ice bobbed up and hit his nose. I never
saw a man look so surprised and distressed in my life. I took the glass from
him, and when his left hand finally emerged with money he handed it first
vaguely to me as though I were the waiter—for which there was no real
excuse, since we were not in evening dress.
When, at length, order was restored and he was sipping quietly at the
remains of the fizzing liquid, he looked up at me over the brim of his glass
and remarked, with more concentration on the actual present than he had
yet shown:
“By the way, you know, I’m going away to-morrow—going abroad for
my holiday. Taking a lot of work with me, too——”
“But you’ve only just come back!” I expostulated, with a feeling very
like anger in my heart.
He shook his head with decision. Evidently that choking had choked him
into the living present. He was really “up” this time, and not likely to go
down again.
“No, no,” he replied; “I’ve been here all the summer in town looking
after old Podger——”
“Old Podger!” I remembered a dirty, down-at-heel old man I once met at
my friend’s rooms—a poet who had “smothered his splendid talent” in
drink, and who was always at starvation’s door. “What in the world was the
matter with Podger?”
“D.T. I’ve been nursing him through it. The poor devil nearly went under
this time. I’ve got him into a home down in the country at last, but all
August he was—well, we thought he was gone.”
All August! So that was how my friend’s summer had been spent. With
never a word of thanks probably at that!
“But your mountain inn beyond Bozen! You said——”
“Did I? I must be wool-gathering,” he laughed, with that beautifully
tender smile that comes sometimes to his delicate, dreamy face. “That was
last year. I spent my holidays last year up there. How stupid of me to get so
absurdly muddled!” He plunged his nose into the empty glass, waiting for
the last drop to trickle out, with his neck at an angle that betrayed the collar
to be undone and the tie sadly frayed at the edges.
“But—all the work you said you did up there—the scenario and the first
act and—and——”
He turned upon me with such sudden energy that I fairly jumped. Then,
in a voice that mumbled the first half of his sentence, but shouted the end
like a German officer giving instructions involving life or death, I heard:
“But, my dear good fellow, you don’t half listen to what I say! All that
work, as I told you just now, is what I expect and mean to do when I get up
there. Now—have you got it clear at last?”
He looked me up and down with great energy. By biting the inner side of
my lip I kept my face grave. Later we went down to lunch together, and I
heard details of the weeks of unselfish devotion he had lavished upon “old
Podger.” I would give a great deal to possess some of the driving power for
good that throbs and thrills at the real centre of my old friend with the
vague manner and the absent-minded surface. But he is a singular
contradiction, and almost always misunderstood. I should like to know, too,
what Podger thinks.
VIII
IMAGINATION
Having dined upon a beefsteak and a pint of bitter, Jones went home to
work. The trouble with Jones—his first name William—was that he
possessed creative imagination: that luggage upon which excess charges
have to be paid all through life—to the critic, the stupid, the orthodox, the
slower minds without the “flash.” He was alone in his brother’s flat. It was
after nine o’clock. He was half-way into a story, and had—stuck! Sad to
relate, the machinery that carries on the details of an original inspiration had
blocked. And to invent he knew not how. Unless the imagination
“produced” he would not allow his brain to devise mere episodes—dull and
lifeless substitutes. Jones, poor fool, was also artist.
And the reason he had “stuck” was not surprising, for his story was of a
kind that might well tax the imagination of any sane man. He was writing at
the moment about a being who had survived his age—a study of one of
those rare and primitive souls who walk the earth to-day in a man’s
twentieth-century body, while yet the spirit belongs to the Golden Age of
the world’s history. You may come across them sometimes, rare, ingenuous,
delightful beings, the primal dews still upon their eyelids, the rush and glow
of earth’s pristine fires pulsing in their veins, careless of gain, indifferent to
success, lost, homeless, exiled—dépaysés.... The idea had seized him. He
had met such folk. He burned to describe their exile, the pathos of their
loneliness, their yearnings and their wanderings—rejected by a world they
had outlived. And for his type, thus representing some power of
unexpended mythological values strayed back into modern life to find itself
denied and ridiculed—he had chosen a Centaur! For he wished it to
symbolise what he believed was to be the next stage in human evolution:
Intuition no longer neglected, but developed equally with Reason. His
Centaur was to stand for instinct (the animal body close to Nature)
combined with, yet not dominated by, the upright stature moving towards
deity. The conception was true and pregnant.
And—he had stuck. The detail that blocked him was the man’s
appearance. How would such a being look? In what details would he betray
that, though outwardly a man, he was inwardly this survival of the Golden
Age, escaped from some fair Eden, splendid, immense, simple, and
beneficent, yet—a Centaur?
Perhaps it was just as well he had “stuck,” for his brother would shortly
be in, and his brother was a successful business man with the money-sense
and commercial instincts strongly developed. He dealt in rice and sugar.
With his brother in the flat no Centaur could possibly survive for a single
moment. “It’ll come to me when I’m not thinking about it,” he sighed,
knowing well the waywardness of his particular genius. He threw the reins
upon the subconscious self and moved into an arm-chair to read in the
evening paper the things the public loved—that public who refused to buy
his books, pleading they were “queer.” He waded down the list of
immoralities, murders and assaults with a dreamy eye, and had just reached
the witness’s description of finding the bloody head in the faithless wife’s
bedroom, when there came a hurried, pelting knock at the door, and
William Jones, glad of the relief, went to open it. There, facing him, stood
the bore from the flat below. Horrors!
It was not, however, a visit after all. “Jones,” he faltered, “there’s an odd
sort of chap here asking for you or your brother. Rang my bell by mistake.”
Jones murmured some reply or other, and as the bore vanished with a
hurry unusual to him, there passed into the flat a queer shape, born surely of
the night and stars and desolate places. He seemed in some undefinable way
bent, humpbacked, very large. With him came a touch of open spaces,
winds, forests, long clean hills and dew-drenched fields.
“Come in, please....” said Jones, instantly aware that the man was not for
his brother. “You have something to—er——” he was going to use the word
“ask,” then changed it instinctively—“say to me, haven’t you?”
The man was ragged, poor, outcast. Clearly it was a begging episode;
and yet he trembled violently, while in his veins ran fire. The caller refused
a seat, but moved over to the curtains by the window, drawing them slightly
aside so that he could see out. And the window was high above old smoky
London—open. It felt cold. Jones bent down, always keeping his caller in
view, and lit the gas-stove. “You wish to see me,” he said, rising again to an
upright position. Then he added more hurriedly, stepping back a little
towards the rack where the walking-sticks were, “Please let me know what I
can do for you!”