. Poetry Parade
By MARGHANITA LASKI (To beread with cultured boyishness.)
GOOD evening. Now our title for this evening's poetry- reading is "The Urban Influence in Eighteenth-Century Verse," but, of course, the implications of this title are limitless. It is, perhaps, in its contrast to rural verse that the urban can be most fully appreciated, while we can never come to a really complete understanding if we entirely ignore the marine. I think too that it would be only proper if we remembered that the eighteenth century had its roots in the seventeenth and even before that, while many of its effects were felt much—indced, very much— later on. I think, then, that the best approach is for me wholly to ignore our original title and give you one or two of my own special favourites.
Satire first. What is it, I wonder, in the English temperament that makes it respond so fully to a brand of satire so mild that it is barely possible to recognise it as such ? I found this little tradi- tional poem the other day in one of my early notebooks. Perhaps the mood that originally prompted me to copy it out has in some measure passed. But because I once had a great measure of affec- tion for it, and because I feel, too, that some of you may well share my affection, I am now going to ask Spencer Dyer to read it to us: (To be read with a North Country accent and heavy stress.) No more Latin, no more French, No more sitting on the old school bench ; No more beetles in my tea Making googly eyes at me . . . &c.
(With a little confiding laugh.) That was rather lovely, wasn't it ?
(More briskly.) And now for a change of mood. One of the most striking characteristics of our English poets has always been their deep response to Nature in all her varying moods. We find this in Chaucer ; we find it in Shafcespeare. But—though perhaps this is purely personal—I always feel that we find it most deeply in the English mid-Victorian poets, in whom a deep religious feeling is coupled with awakening doubt to produce something occasionally almost embarrassing in its intensity of feeling and certainly not to be found in any other period. Here, then, is a verse of almost unbear- able poignancy from a work by that all too frequently overlooked poet Thomas Ashe: (To be read in a very cultured female voice.) .
Came on a Sabbath noon my sweet, In white to find her lover ; The grass grew proud beneath her feet, The green elm-leaves above her:_ Meet we no angels, Pansie ?
That was rather lovely, wasn't it ? Our time is nearly up, but I think we can just manage to fit in a new poem by one of the boys. This broadcast will be its first appearance anywhere and as it is, perhaps, a little difficult to take in at a first hearing, I'm going to ask Mr. Dyer to read it twice. Here it is—Dyffed Machynlleth's "Tenements in May."
(North Country accent for this little gem, but as I don't want to .2y copyright fees, we'll leave it out.) There. That was rather lovely, wasn't it ? And now, if you don't mind, Mr. Dyer, we'll have it again, this time putting in the expression :
(Even heavier accent while fee for second broadcast performance is earned.)
Our time is up now. I will leave the thought of this lovely poem with you until our net Poetry Parade. Its title will be "Poems of Religious Schism."
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