Carry On Breathing
°R. DAVIE has sought and won a reputation as a kind of iron-lung poet, interested in, and devot- ing an admirable intelligence to, the techniques of carrying on breathing, the exploration and definition of handicaps and limits. But in this b03k he emerges, looking very fit, and demon- strates a wide range of remedial exercises. We observe a musculature not merely unimpaired but exemplary; powerful, delicate movement and dreeP, steady breathing. The Forests of Lithuania is not a translation, but a set of imitations of the Pan Tadeusz of Mickiewicz. It starts with a 'Fore- word' (unsuccessful Poundian pastiche) and then ,there are six sections of narrative verse, con- ILicted briskly in a shifting three-stress line diversified by all manner of elegancies of rhythm and diction. This occurs in the middle of a roll- call of Polish mushrooms :
Some As poor relations scorned
For ill effect or taste, Yet deem not useless if They shade flies, nourish beasts, Enamel groves.
The syntax and diction are vaguely eighteenth- century Miltonic, but the fourth line is lifted from Wordsworth. There is a remarkable range of effects rather like this, from Marvellian coneeits and outbursts of precious rhyming to such calcu- lated grandeur as: Kosciusko sworn and sworded To drive three powers from Poland Or fall upon that sword.
It would be easy to multiply examples of pure diction and articulate energy. The sixth section is in terza rim° (three defective stanzas) and there is a splendidly heroic epilogue. This is a very rich poem; the bear-hunt has genuine vigour, the characters, though somewhat dimly seen, are all 'good for some singable idiom.' The work might have been called Homage to Mickiewiez; though the range of effects is entirely different from Pound's, one sees that what Dr. Davie reads turns into Dr. Davie. He has produced a very idiosyn- cratic book, but its queerness is of the authorita- tiv% kind that founds a new normality.
Mr. Goodsir Smith's collection ('some of thir poems hae been prentit afore') needs a glossary, and a 'word leet' is provided, but on a perishable separate sheet that Sassenachs will need to look after. One of the great virtues of these poems is that their language exempts them from the Eng- lish ban on talking big. The maker is frankly en- slaved to a muse, enjoying the divine furor but also suffering the pains of its withdrawal, and magniloquent about everything.
There are some lovely and skilful poems like 'Cokkils,' some first-rate rowdyism, some vivid translations (Blok and Corbiere). The language supports and dignifies bardic attitudes, and there are passages which deviate little from Southern English and yet sound very grand : this would not count for much in an Englishman's poem : I heard the far fell cry o Aphrodite's horn
And snuff't the rank bouquet o love's approach.
Time and again one stirs with pleasure at some full-mouthed audacity. Mr. Goodsir Smith is worth the trouble of the word leet.
Mr. Kavanagh's poem 'Intimations of Un- reality' has for some time been a certain choice for any good anthology of the Fifties, but there are half a dozen others just as good in his book. There are witty songs with a seventeenth-century flavour, Auden cadences and MacNeice wit, but the voice is, of an individual valued because his conversation is made up of mutually consistent affirmations and ironies.
assumed the critical faculty like an inheritance which it is not, 11 guess, watching the phalanx of ambiguous treasons advancing, whose per-
sonal history is identical to mine. . . .
Mr. Kavanagh is unfussily certain that being a poet is precisely as difficult and tragic as Mr. Goodsir Smith cries that it is. There are three very good poems on this, 'Love Poem,' The Words of Mercury to a Muse,' and 'Nothing is Easy,' which should also go into the anthology.
Opus Posthumous, which 1 reviewed here about a year ago, contains early poems omitted from the collected edition, as well as a small but important group belonging to Stevens's last years. There are also two short plays, some uncollected prose and a brilliant collection of `Adagia.' The book is essential to the reader of Stevens and it is incon- ceivable that the year has seen any other volume of poetry of comparable value.
FRANK KERMODE
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