GOOD PROSE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 37, 13 February 1932, Page 1 (Supplement)

GOOD PROSE.

GLORIOUS AND HUMBLE.

A WIDE COLLECTION. (By CYRANO.) There "would be much more good'prose in the world —men and women would write better books, brighter letters among themselves, and clearer communications to newspaper editors—if people would get rid of the idea that such writing is reserved for special occasions, and that to achieve it the mind must be elevated to a special atmosphere. So many people appear to think that good prose walks only in costume, and in trying to obtain this effect they often present the absurd. This error, I think, is responsible for much of the inflated writing among the young. When they think of good prose, they remember the purple passages of literature, and forget the simplicities. Too often, one suspects, they are encouraged in this by their teachers. It is perhaps the chief merit of "The London Book of English Prose"* that it makes a particularly wide choice of selection, and goes for examples into all sorts of odd corners of the plain as well as on to the peaks of style. Indeed, to some readers the author's choice here and there may bo almost shocking. What is an extract from the "Field Service Regulations" for the British soldier doing between the same covers as the immortal cadences of the Bible and the Prayer Book and the lovely music of Landor? "There are no fields of amaranth on this side of the grave; there are no voices, O Rhodope, that are not soon mute, however tuneful; there is no name, with whatever emphasis of passionate love repeated, of which the echo is not faint at last."

Different Purposes. The answer to this is that there are many purposes of prose, and that writing should he judged by its fitness for the particular end in view. It Is true, the authors admit, that in the scale of values which governs ethics, the lyrical utterance of Jeremy Taylor, the impassioned eloquence.of Edmund Burke, - • or the tense narrative of Edgar Allan Poe, is not to be compared with the humdrum "Instructions for the Boatswain," which the Admiralty issued in 1863, and -"-Inch are printed here. But instructions issued to boatswains in the periods of Buike and Taylor would be absurdly inappropriate. "Yet the boatswain must have his instructions, and these instructions must achieve their purpose. The statesman who sways his audience by his oratory, and the authorities who instruct their boatswains, are using this same instrument, prose; the success of both' is.' measured, not by the gravity of their charge, but by the effectiveness of their communication. Style, it cannot be too often repeated, is not an ornament; it is not an exercise, nor a caper, nor a complication of any sort. It is the sense of one's self, the knowledge of what one wants to say, and the saying of it in the most fitting manner."

O, words of wisdom, meet to be hunp in every school and university! (Yes, ;f you like, I will add newspaper pflices!) "Stand up, speak up, sliut up"—runs the

admonition of the Navy to public speakers. I doubt if advice to writers can be expressed so tersely; they may, however, be counselled to think out what they wish to say, and to say it as directly and briefly as possible. This anthology teaches by advice and example the duty of writing good prose on a!i occasions. None of us passes through life without having laid upon him, at some time or other, the task of saying something important on paper, and much may depend upon whether we say it well or ill. It may be a private letter or a public report. It may carry our own fate or the fate of a nation. When the civil engineer comes to write a long report on a great project he may wisii that he had been trained to write more clearly

and persuasively. An officer may muddle an attack through lack of clarity. It is important to notice that there aie included in this collection Wellington's instructions for the passage of tie Bidasoa in 1817, and the operation order for Allenby's great break-through in Palestine in 1918.

Clarity on the Bench. A judge who lacks the faculty of clear expression may befog a jury or set forth a hazy interpretation of the law. There has been at least one such judge on the New Zealand Bench. Like "The Oxford Book of English Prose" this collection takes notice of the courts. When the time comes to make a New Zealand prose anthology the editors should not overlook the judgments of Sir Joshua Williams, and Mr. Justice Alpers. A place may be found for the latter's remarks in a case in which lie had reluctantly to find for the Crown. His Majesty, he said, was the first gentleman in the land, but in this case something had been done In his name which no gentleman would do. The editors divide their collection into three main branches; the desire to tell a story (narrative prose); the desire to describe a thing (scientific prose); the desire to produce an emotional effect in the reader (emotive prose); and each class has many subdivisions. A wide variety for the reader is thus provided. He will find all moods and subjects represented, from artificial comedy to tragedy, from hunting to the speculations of Sir James Jeans and Sir Arthur Eddington on the nature of the universe. To many a connection between science and literature is not apparent, but the number of extracts here printed from famous scientists in various periods shows how necessary is a good style in scientific exposition. Huxley was one of the great prose writers of his age, and to-day Sir James Jeans would not be a best seller in his field if he were not a master of words.

Within Every Man's Power. Tlie average reader will be struck by tlie number of authors of whom he has not heard, and he may be surprised to learn that good prose can exist outside the sacred ranks of the immortals. The truth is that good prose can exist anywhere and everywhere. It is given only to the very few to reach the heights of really great prose, to combine arresting thought with the requisite choice of words and balance that make perfect music, but thousands of men and women write sound and even striking proee. "Poets are born, not made, but it is given to every man with a clear mind to become a good prose writer." A vast amount of good writing lives but for the day, and it is by no means all to

be found in books. Some books are badly written; some newspaper articles are very well written. Yet a scornful distinction between literature and journalism persists. It is interesting to note the number of writers of our time who are included in this survey. Lord Asquith, Lord Acton, James Bryce, Joseph Conrad, Sir James Frazer of "The Golden Bough," Lord Haldane, A. E. Housman (more famous as the author of "A Shropshire Lad"), W. H. Hudson, Henry James, T. S. Eliot, James Joyce, D. H. Lawrence, C. K. Munro, George Moore, Bertrand Russell, Edith Somerville and Martin Ross, George Santayana, Captain Scott, R. H. Tawney, . Virginia Woolf, and the authors of the Simon Report, are among them. That there is nothing of Wells and Shaw is probably due to difficulty about copyright. And I miss Mr. Neville Cardus in the section on sports. It is curious, indeed, that in this there should be nothing about cricket.

Let me end this notice of a very welcome book by quoting the last words of the introduction: "Prose is as various as mankind itself; it only ceases to be of interest when it expresses, not the man himself, but a convention, or a confusion, in an unresolved impression. There is something immoral about bad prose."

*"The London Book of English Prose" selected and ordered by Herbert Read and Bonamy Dobree (Eyre and Spottiswoode).