Norman Douglas
SIR,—In the few obituary and other notices I managed to see on Norman DtSuglas I was struck, as I was too in Mr. Harold Nicolson's reflections in the Spectator, by what seemed a blind spot, surprising in itself and depressing in its implication. It suggests that the writing of English prose as a great art is no longer much esteemed. I would say that Norman Douglas was the first popse stylist of his time and one of the major masters of the language. What English writer of recent times has found language so pithy, limpid, stony and honeyed, as occasion dictates, to express a powerful and rich mind, and to express it with such urbanity ? It is done as modestly and without gesture as one passes the salt; and indeed it is like the best talk. But it is not talk; it is sweated ink, tonic always, at times tender.
When have we had such another artist as could have written Alone, to mention one book only, and left us, years after, with so haunting a perfume ? Surely not in the time of Norman Douglas.—Yours
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