The Go-Between

by

L. P. Hartley

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Ted is a working-class tenant farmer on the Brandham estate. He is physically imposing and has a reputation through the Hall and village as a ladies’ man. He also displays a tender side, taking care of Leo’s knee after he finds him injured on his farm, and appears deeply devoted to Marian despite knowing he can’t be with her officially. Ted commands the respect of the lower classes, who love his heroic display in the cricket match and his rough singing in the village hall afterwards. Though Ted generally behaves respectably and defers to his social superiors, he also has an air of violent threat about him, more felt than witnessed. In one encounter, for example, Leo visits Ted just as he is cleaning his shotgun—literally looking down the barrel of the gun that he will later use to kill himself upon the discovery of his affair with Marian. Leo sees Ted as an authority on those things he doesn’t understand, especially “spooning” (a euphemism for making love). Ted, ultimately, has ideas about love and marriage that are quite radical for the time—he thinks it perfectly plausible for two people to “spoon” before marriage, and doesn’t think marrying before “spooning” would be very “lover-like.” He represents, then, a kind of commitment to love that is less concerned with what’s practical or legitimate than what makes people feel something—a view quite outside of the norm in 1900.

Ted Burgess Quotes in The Go-Between

The The Go-Between quotes below are all either spoken by Ted Burgess or refer to Ted Burgess. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Social Class and Hierarchy Theme Icon
).
Chapter 9  Quotes

I gave him the envelope which at once he tore open; and then I knew he must have killed something before I came, for, to my horror, a long smear of blood appeared on the envelope and again on the letter as he held it in his hands.

I cried out: “Oh, don’t do that!” but he did not answer me, he was so engrossed in reading.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 94
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10  Quotes

My world of high intense emotions collapsing around me, released not only the mental strain but the very high physical pressure under which I had been living. My only defence was, I could not have expected it of Marian. Marian who had done so much for me, Marian who knew how a boy felt, Marian the Virgin of the Zodiac—how could she have sunk so low?

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Related Symbols: The Zodiac
Page Number: 102
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

I could not tell whether the next ball was on the wicket or not, but it was pitched much further up and suddenly I saw Ted’s face and body swinging round, and the ball, travelling towards me on a rising straight line like a cable stretched between us. Ted started to run and then stopped and stood watching me, wonder in his eyes and a wild disbelief.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 127
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13 Quotes

“Phew! Three times I nearly had to cat…And you looked so pi, Leo, really dreadfully pi. So did everybody, while you were singing that church thing about the angels taking care of you. They all looked as if they were thinking about their dear dead ones, and Burgess looked as if he might be going to blub. Of course it’s difficult to know how Trimingham feels because of his face, but he didn’t half crack you up to Mama. He’ll eat out of your hand now.

Related Characters: Marcus Maudsley (speaker), Leo Colston, Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 140-141
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14 Quotes

I liked Ted burgess in a reluctant, half-admiring, half-hating way. When I was away from him I could think of him objectively as a working farmer whom no one at the Hall thought much of. But when I was with him his mere physical presence cast a spell on me, it established an ascendancy which I could not break. He was, I felt, what a man ought to be, what I should like to be when I grow up.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 142
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 18 Quotes

Lady-killer: what did that mean? I didn’t like to ask too many questions. I did not think, however, Ted would kill Marian: Man-killer, that was what I had been afraid of. Now the fear had passed away, lost its reality with the rest of my life at Brandham Hall. I could scarcely believe that I had once felt I ought to warn Lord Trimingham of his peril. The ninth Viscount would never know that I had saved him from the fate of the fifth. By removing myself I had removed the danger: it was my master-stroke.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 188
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 20 Quotes

“Marian, why don’t you marry Ted?”

It was only for a moment, but in that moment her face reflected all the misery she had been going through; it was a heart’s history in a look. ‘I couldn’t, I couldn’t!” She wailed. “Can’t you see why?”

I thought I did and since so many barriers between us were being overturned I added—it seemed only logical:

“But why are you going to marry Hugh if you don’t want to?”

“Because I must marry him,” she said. “You wouldn’t understand. I must. I’ve got to!” Her lips trembled and she burst into tears.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley (speaker), Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 211-212
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 21 Quotes

But what spell could I employ to break the spell that Ted had cast on Marian?

I had no knowledge of Black Magic and relied on the inspiration of the moment. If while concocting the spell I could excite myself and frighten myself, I felt it had a better chance of success. If also I had the sense of something giving way, inside me and outside, that was still better…but those were spells whose operation was confined to the world of my experience, the schoolboy world. I had never launched a spell against a grown-up person. My present victims were not only grown-ups, they belonged to the world from which my spells derived their power; I should be trying to turn their own weapons against them.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Page Number: 218
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 23 Quotes

“No, you shall come,” she said, and seized my hand, and it was then we saw them, together on the ground, the Virgin and the Water-Carrier, two bodies moving like one. I think I was more mystified than horrified; it was Mrs. Maudsley’s repeated screams that frightened me, and a shadow on the wall that opened and closed like an umbrella.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Mrs. Maudsley (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Related Symbols: The Zodiac
Page Number: 244
Explanation and Analysis:
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Ted Burgess Quotes in The Go-Between

The The Go-Between quotes below are all either spoken by Ted Burgess or refer to Ted Burgess. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Social Class and Hierarchy Theme Icon
).
Chapter 9  Quotes

I gave him the envelope which at once he tore open; and then I knew he must have killed something before I came, for, to my horror, a long smear of blood appeared on the envelope and again on the letter as he held it in his hands.

I cried out: “Oh, don’t do that!” but he did not answer me, he was so engrossed in reading.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 94
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10  Quotes

My world of high intense emotions collapsing around me, released not only the mental strain but the very high physical pressure under which I had been living. My only defence was, I could not have expected it of Marian. Marian who had done so much for me, Marian who knew how a boy felt, Marian the Virgin of the Zodiac—how could she have sunk so low?

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Related Symbols: The Zodiac
Page Number: 102
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

I could not tell whether the next ball was on the wicket or not, but it was pitched much further up and suddenly I saw Ted’s face and body swinging round, and the ball, travelling towards me on a rising straight line like a cable stretched between us. Ted started to run and then stopped and stood watching me, wonder in his eyes and a wild disbelief.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 127
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13 Quotes

“Phew! Three times I nearly had to cat…And you looked so pi, Leo, really dreadfully pi. So did everybody, while you were singing that church thing about the angels taking care of you. They all looked as if they were thinking about their dear dead ones, and Burgess looked as if he might be going to blub. Of course it’s difficult to know how Trimingham feels because of his face, but he didn’t half crack you up to Mama. He’ll eat out of your hand now.

Related Characters: Marcus Maudsley (speaker), Leo Colston, Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 140-141
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14 Quotes

I liked Ted burgess in a reluctant, half-admiring, half-hating way. When I was away from him I could think of him objectively as a working farmer whom no one at the Hall thought much of. But when I was with him his mere physical presence cast a spell on me, it established an ascendancy which I could not break. He was, I felt, what a man ought to be, what I should like to be when I grow up.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Ted Burgess
Page Number: 142
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 18 Quotes

Lady-killer: what did that mean? I didn’t like to ask too many questions. I did not think, however, Ted would kill Marian: Man-killer, that was what I had been afraid of. Now the fear had passed away, lost its reality with the rest of my life at Brandham Hall. I could scarcely believe that I had once felt I ought to warn Lord Trimingham of his peril. The ninth Viscount would never know that I had saved him from the fate of the fifth. By removing myself I had removed the danger: it was my master-stroke.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 188
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 20 Quotes

“Marian, why don’t you marry Ted?”

It was only for a moment, but in that moment her face reflected all the misery she had been going through; it was a heart’s history in a look. ‘I couldn’t, I couldn’t!” She wailed. “Can’t you see why?”

I thought I did and since so many barriers between us were being overturned I added—it seemed only logical:

“But why are you going to marry Hugh if you don’t want to?”

“Because I must marry him,” she said. “You wouldn’t understand. I must. I’ve got to!” Her lips trembled and she burst into tears.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley (speaker), Ted Burgess, Lord Trimingham the Ninth Viscount / Hugh
Page Number: 211-212
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 21 Quotes

But what spell could I employ to break the spell that Ted had cast on Marian?

I had no knowledge of Black Magic and relied on the inspiration of the moment. If while concocting the spell I could excite myself and frighten myself, I felt it had a better chance of success. If also I had the sense of something giving way, inside me and outside, that was still better…but those were spells whose operation was confined to the world of my experience, the schoolboy world. I had never launched a spell against a grown-up person. My present victims were not only grown-ups, they belonged to the world from which my spells derived their power; I should be trying to turn their own weapons against them.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Page Number: 218
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 23 Quotes

“No, you shall come,” she said, and seized my hand, and it was then we saw them, together on the ground, the Virgin and the Water-Carrier, two bodies moving like one. I think I was more mystified than horrified; it was Mrs. Maudsley’s repeated screams that frightened me, and a shadow on the wall that opened and closed like an umbrella.

Related Characters: Leo Colston (speaker), Mrs. Maudsley (speaker), Marian Maudsley, Ted Burgess
Related Symbols: The Zodiac
Page Number: 244
Explanation and Analysis: