MINOR AND MAJOR

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19972, 5 July 1930, Page 15

MINOR AND MAJOR

(SMCJiLLT TOUTS* W* THS FBSS3B^ [Bt OTIUNO.3

Asked if he was a minor poet, a New Zealand writer of verse said: "Well, rather say brevet major," and HO doubt for quite a time the recollection of this reply gave him a glow of satisfaction. Relative to the great body of English poetry, all New Zealand poets are minor, but that does not mean that they do no good work or that thoy should not be encouraged. It is undeniable, however, that the term "minor poet" is often used in a derogatory sense, and that it is roost inconveniently vague. So, also, indeed, are the terms "poet'" and "poetry." The word "prose" stands firm on its own single, broad base, but "poetry" has, as it were, two feet, "poetry" and "verse," and it sometimes rests on one and sometimes on the other. Both terms cover everything that is not prosQ, but "poetry" is, bo to speak, crowned. Wo talk about the poetry of life, not the verse of life, and we say that a tree is a poem, not a collection of verses. Yet poetcy may be good, bad, or indifferent: it is a word soiled by ignoble use. The New Zealander who wrote

And then came on the night as dark Hades, Down into the cabin went tha ladies, probably called himself a poet, and may have induced some of his friendß to do 60. For to many people everything is poetry that rhymes. But when a critic says "this is not poetry, ho probably menus that it is merely verse, or when he says, "X is a poet" he moans that ho writes real poetry. On the other hand, Mr Philistine may sayt "What else can you expect! He is a poet," meaning that to the poor creature, like the friend of tho narrator in "Tho Brook," "luckv rhymes" are "scrip and share," "and m«llow metres more than cent, per cent."—though perhaps the metres are not at all mellow. There is much confusion in the classification of poets, and injustice Is often done. Tho paradoxioal English produce great poetry, and dosplse the poet, especially the "irtindr poet." All poets are regarded more or less as feckless men, who wear long hair, walk about absont«niindedly, and neglect their business and their wives—if they do not run off with other people's. The minor poet Is particularly so; he is, indeed, rather less than a man. The classification, though acourate enough, is unfortunate. A good deal of contempt has clusterod round it. A minor poet is often associated with request verses in albums, gentle melancholy in magazines, and goneral mediocrity, Horace's reference to "middling poets" is crushingly quoted against tho minor poot. But tho critical faculty should enter here and prevent us from swallowing Horase's words unthinkingly. What is a "middling" poet Y Not necossarily tho same as a minor poot. Horace's words are true of an enormous body of verse that is not groat; but by no means of all. They apply to the dull poet, who has a certain amount of talent, but whose work lacks distinction. Lewis Mortis and Alfred Austin are typical English e*» amples, Martin Tupper and Ella Wheeler Wilcox are not middling; they are low. Kvorv editor knows tho true "middling" type, the writer who has a little imagination, a good deal of sentiment, a little music, and »ome facility, but whose sum total of quality does not lift him above mediocrity. Now and again, however, verse comes along that has the true ring. There is in it an Indefinable something that makes it live. It may not bo groat poetry, but it IS poetry; there is a nreatn In It not to bo found in whole volumes of certain dull writers who once were read by thousands. The minor poet, then, may bo ft roal poet. Mr John Drlnkwater says he may be "charmingly gifted, but he has no originality. 7 ' Surely this is a hard saying. Does the author of "A Bhropshiro Lad" lack originality* Do Mr W. H. Davies, or Mr Walter de la Mare, or Mr Siegfried Bassoon P If Mr Drlnkwater retorts that he does not consider these minor poets, ho may be asked what he does call them. To say they are great poets would be misleading; it would bring them into comparison with Tennyson and Browning, and even greater than these. Perhaps he would say "major" poets; but that would also bo unsatisfactory. The Cambridge History of English Literature refers to "lesser" poets, which is much more satisfactory, but the word is not likely to oust "minor." Tho truth is that there are many grades of real poetry, and the welltrained taste will see merit in all. Think of the grades in the lawn tennis world. Tho chamnion of the Whangamomona Club probably will not win a set from the champion of Wellington. The champion of Wellington may go down to the champion of Now Zealand, and the champion of New Zealand may not be able to live in the company of French and American Davis Cup players, yet, quite oonoeivably, we might see interesting play on the Whangamomona courts —play with a touch oi distinction. "We needs must love tW highest when we see it"; yes, but wo don't always see it, and in some cases it is very difficult and oven impossible to live indefinitely in its atmosphere. The world gets an enormous amount of genuine and legitimate ploasuro from "minor" or "lesser" poets, jus* as it does from oricket and football that are below first-class Tx»ngfollow was a "lesser" if not a minor poet: think of what he has meant to millions. Lesser men than Longfouow have touched the hearts of nations and won immortality with a , tew verses. Wherever the authentic voice is. though it be but a whisper and perhaps never beard again, there is poetry. , , There is a similar vagueness about the term "great." What is a great poet? We may say that not only must ho have high quality but must have produced a certain _ quantity of gooa work. Despite bis translation or Omar, FitzGerald is hardly a great poet. But when we say a writer isi a great ooet, do we mean equality witn Byron, Shelley, Keats, Browning, Wordsworth, and Tennyson, or companionship with the higher immortals, the Btars that are the possession of the world? Before it ekn be placed "m the glorious claps of the best," says Matthew Arnold, poetry must have "high seriousness." The great poets shows thjs virtue in their criticism or life, and they sustain it. Homer, Dante, and Shakespeare are among Arnold's great poets. If you seek an example of the influence exercised by the really greatest, read what Dante meant to Gladstone. In Dante, says Morley, Gladstone found the unity of wholeness, goodness, beauty, and strenuous living—this unity of thought and coherence of life, not only illuminated by a sublime imagination, but directly associated with theology, philosophy, politics, history, sentiment, duty. Here are a}} tho elements and interests that lie about the roots of the U*e of a man, and of the general civilisation of the worlij I think of this and then of the gloomy young New Zealand poet I know to whom A. E. Hous* man seems to bo the last word w philosophy. A. world away indeed, yet Housman Is a poet. Many a young Englishman took "A Shropshire jpith Mm to tho was, aad it ia cortai*

that in some "kits" the little volume rubbed backs with Dante. "There Is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars," Intimate little songs touch hearts that are out of range of the organ music of Milton. A Greek epigrammatist writes a few lines on a dead friend and they drift down the ages, as sure of immortality, one supposes, as "the surge and thunder of the Odyssey." Brightness is all.