NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 14204, 18 November 1911, Page 7

NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

SOME AUSTRALIAN POETRY.

To know that a sonnet of his was set as part of the work to be prepared by thu candidates for a Lnircrsiiv degree, might well make a poet feel a classic in his lifetime. Such honour fell to William Gay, who.se noble sonnet on "Federation" met with this high Tribute in Melbourne. William Gγ.v moreover, was not a man of one sonnet. As finely wrought as "i«k>i- ation," and instinct with the same grave- music, are the sonnots |;lfcath,". "Vestigia Nulla liotrortua f ♦Jn £™£ n *J ) > i ? p \' ? y- > "ncUia- Uecction. in Holl," while in poems like

t ' "A .fable," '.Nearm-; c Port," and '"Ine War of the Ghosts, c there was further evidence of what ■>. t be IxMidigo consumptive might have i duno had longer life been granted than ;- his brief thirty-two years. It was only il towards the end that the publication 1 uf two turn volumes of vort.o brought '• him into general notice. That a 0 volume entitled "Tlu. Complete Poeti- . cal Works of Wiiliain Gay" should >- now appear, is a pleasure "only mitir by the discovery thatj tvi^h. 1 one or two inception*, the 11 pooms are those which have nlrendy '' been in print. The preface tells that H over a hundred uioro have been ex- - chicled since their author had not do- - «i..n,d them for publication. Their onI joyment awaits tne demand of a Kss II cfi'iipuious age. .Meantime it is to be " hopi.d that tiie manuscripts aro duly J treasured. Gay was not absolutely ah Australian pcvt. He was born in RenI irewshire, Scotland, in ISCo, came out II to New Zealand in I£&3, after a - youth that in adventure and hardship j reminds one of Do Quineev, ai.d only 1 in IStSS went over to Victoria, where s lie lived (greatly in hospitals) until his - doath in lb\)i. Ne.ther is his work nor 3 Ins mental attitude distinctively Australian. ''His pcety was universal, s not local, and rnignt have been written •' anywhere." The Australian minor ~ poet is usually strenuous, bitterly 1 melancholy, or desperately facetious. J Gay is serene; the right epithet falls - Willi mellow charm into its place; the J high thought nevds no stra:ned temi pvstuous utterance. HLs muse might > stand described in his own "Sea : Maiden." ■ "L:ke white sea-birds bcr thoughts do fly, 1 And fueet and calm and pure is eho i As Apul moons that imaged lie ; Witi.in the unija,icssioned sea." Out of much tribulation, the singer • brought, depth of feeling, un.smiichcd - by sentimentality, and tne early-dying 1 gemus gave a saint's untroubled faro- • well to life. -Aβ whon with g'adness at the hour of Test rhe weary labourer quite the arduous field, : And coon with night his soul to sleep doth yield, To wake at morn with well-recruitod zest; So give, sweet Death, to mc thy slumber blest, With thy cool hand let my hot lids ba scaled, For now tho clock tho vesper hour has pealed, Tho taidy eun has left the fndin? West, And I am worn with hunger and with care, And when, eweet Death, Ivo been for one rhort night A dreamless guest in thy secluded halls, With joy awaking will I greet the light That from no earthy dawn about mc falls, And to my tasks with cheerful haFto repair." From the interesting memoir attached to this volume, we learn the odd fact that William Gay found poetry iard to read, and many "famous poems were known to mm only by reputation. Yet his own first verses were written at fourteen, and in him Australia certainly lost a writer who should have won world-wide fame. (Melbourne: Thomas C. Lothian.) "I blow my ripos, the glnd birds sing; The fat young nymphs about mc spring, The sweaty ccnlaur leaps the trees £nd bites his drynd's ep'endid knoos . . . Anon, tight-beUicd bacchnnals, With ivy from the vinpyard walls, Lfad out and crown with shining glass The wine'e red baby on the gTasa." Those lines are from tho introductory poem in Hugh McCrae's ''Satyrs and Sunlight," a first edition oi wh'ch appeared in 1909. It is now re-appearing in an edition published by T. C. Lo'lran, whoso enterprise has done so ranch for Australian verse. To do Mr MoCrac justic*, we must cay that he writes tar bettor things than this introduction. But lie belongs to that school of poets who, abovo all things, dread to be pretty-pretty; therefore, when choice has to' be made, he takes i the bnteherly rather than the poetic ! i ppthet. "Where . the conventional ; rhymer might montion a pretty ankle, I '"Satyrs nnd Sunlight" attests tho grnco jof a lady's "flnnk." The "spring i poet" risks a couvontiona] association with "all sweot things." So Mr "Australian Spring" begins decisively. "The b'enk-faced Winter with hie braggart winds (Coi.'ed to his scrawny throat in tattered; ' biack) Pofta down the highway of his l&to domain, His spurs like leeches in hie bleeding hack." When he forgets this unfortunate necessity to bo strong, then readois cease to suffer. At its best, Mr MoCrae's verso is a sort of classic pageant, held in Australian wilds. We hear "deep hooting of a Satyr's laugh"; the j "deathless gods" mako their wa.v i through a new world's forests; or a woodland voice wails, in that most conducing and finely-imagined "Lament," ' "My unicorn .... my unicorn is dead." In "Fantasy." "Old Satyr," "Tho South Wind," "Earth Unto Earth." ! "Poetaj et Roges," and other things, this volume justifies its niithoi's > high repute amongst Australian singers. And if there are stanzas grotesquely rugged, he is also occasionally very happy in incidental stanzas, as for instance, in an epitome of bird-song:— "To hear tho Inet wonderful piping That rise-3 to heaven (Six quavers to sum up delight in. And sorrow in seven"). Melbourne: Thomas C. Lothian.