Timely Resurrection : WE owe Mr. A.. J. A. Symons a
substantial -debt for the admirable anthology which he has plucked from the poetry of the 'nineties. He has brought out of the dusk and the dust that had fallen on half-forgotten volumes and magazines, such as the Savoy and the Spirit Lamp, some quite indubitable gems. His compilation, derived entirely from authors who were . alive and at work during that decade, will come as _a revelation to those who still, though in dwindling numbers, are disposed to pronounce that the 'nineties heard only the swan-songs of the moribund and the feeble chirrupings of incompetent singers before the dawn, which, if we can trust these contemporary optimists, is now in rosy splendour. But in the 'nineties there was, as Mr. Symons has here demonstrated, a tuneful choir in full song, which held choristers of high distinction. They have music and they have magic, and thus prove their title to be poets and not mere writers of verse. The 'nineties, as those know who are old enough to remember them, were rich in loud-trumpeted discoveries of genius, and some remarkable hoaxes were played on a high- brow public, even as to-day some very husky voices are hailed as the morning-stars singing together. But Mr. Symons's volume very amply shows that among those antique squeals and whistlings there were audible the accents of true song.
We must, however, differ from him when he represents the lyrical utterances of these years as being the chorus of a band of brothers in revolt against the Victorian tyranny under which they suffered and were prepared to bleed, or that they were bound together by a sacrament of rebellion. That is only true of versifiers who say, " if it were not for middle- class conventions with regard to subjects the poet may treat of, we should be among the great singers of the world," and who then generally proceed to show that, though they are perfectly capable of outraging current taste, they are hopelessly incapable of producing poetry. The true poet in all ages is only incidentally a rebel : he does not set out, like the fat boy in Pickwick, to make our flesh creep, nor does he care two straws whether it creeps or not. If he sees beauty in any mood of the human spirit or in any shim or palace of human experience , he turns it into song. He is too much wrapped in the ecstasy of creation to harbour any trivial rebellion against convention : the singer who admits such into his song ceases to sing and merely bawls or sniggers. No doubt Aubrey Beardsley hoped to shock when he wrote " The Three Musicians," which, rather unfortunately, owing to the alphabetical arrangement of these poets, opens this volume, and for that very reassn the piece is a mere schoolboy ribaldry : the gesture of rebellion, which Mr. Symons tells us links his poets together, is its dominant note.
But it is impossible to impute rebellion as a motive force to the three poets who chiefly render this book so welcome.
Lord Alfred Douglas was not thinking of anything but "The Dead Poet " when he wrote of " the voiceless thoughts like murdered singing-birds," or of anything but " The City of the Soul " when he wrote of " the hiddeh things that poets see. Nor did Ernest Dowson care what the Victorian mind might feel about the morals of Cynara's lover " when the feast is finished and the lamps expire." Equally indifferent,• and equally solitary (for every poet when he sings is in some inviolate, melodious hermitage), was Llonel Johnion.. thought only of his " Friend " :
"All that he came to give He gave, and I who _814 His praise, bring all I have to bring."
True poets such as these need not wait for time to put :a patina on their songs, and Mr. Symons's plea that the poetry of the 'nineties " has not yet attained the prestige of antiquity " is unwanted. Plutarch says of the Periclean buildings at Athens that. ".Each of these works was instantly antique, but in the freshness of its vigour it is, even to the present day, recent and newly wrought." Such a test applies to all poetry : very good verse is often the better for the patina the years bring, but poetry is classical, straight from the mint. True song is ageless and unageing.
Time, however, which gives charm to verse, though none to poetry, deals ruthlessly with artificial or pretentious stuff. It rings hollow, it soon begins to crack, and then we perceive that its ornament does not spring from the structure, but is plastered on to it. Such will be the impression given to many modern readers. by the verse of Oscar Wilde. Its jade and amber and pearls, its porphyry and steatite are peppered on to the surface : they are perilously like gimcrack and tinsel. When fresh they blinded the 'nineties by their glitter, but they have not worn well. We wonder, too, at the looseness of his rhymes : " which " is paired with " witch," " road " with " rode," " galiot " with " chariot," " automaton " with " skeleton." When the iron entered into his soul, a poet stirred there, as the " Ballad of Reading Gaol " proved, but the poet had not yet come to birth, Ornament, similarly, rather the worse for wear, is too much in evidence in J. A. Symonds's work : "In the Key of Blue " merely bewilder* the reader with, sapphire and topaz and lapis-lazuli : there are too many rainbows and they spoil the broth. Time, dealing inexorably with such, shows them to be flashy rather than to flash. But it has already bestowed a grace on much very good verse in this volume, and, above all, has proved itself powerless to touch all that is better than good verse. For this demonstration we are most grateful to Mr. Symons : it is as if he had thrown open to the air and the sun some tomb of a period both recent and remote. The ostrich-fans and, the perishable kr1;bk-knacks flake into dust, but on the bronze there gleams a kindly green and the gold and the gems emerge incorruptible.
E. F. BENSON.
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