NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20274, 27 June 1931, Page 15

NEW BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS.

SWINBURNE. Swinburne. By Samuel C. Cliew. John Murray. (15s net.) Professor Chew is a very judicious and well-equipped American critic, who has pondered his subject for twenty yoars. More or less complete over a decade ago, his study was set aside to await publication of the definitive Bonchurch Edition of Swinburne's works; ans, in the meantime, though Mr Chew's opinions and impressions were "formed independently of all critical studies of later date than Sir Edmund j Gosse's biography" [1917], he was able to "profit by the various estimates that have appeared in recent years." Perhaps the process of maturing has been slightly too long; the wine has lost a ! touch of generosity, of eagerness. Pro- j feasor Chow seems nowhere to feel for I Swinburne, in Wordsworth's phrase, '/us ! a lover or a child"—or to have felt. It would not matter if the critic had recovered himself from the headlong enthusiasm of youth; indeed, he would write very ill if he had not. But an estimate of Swinburne lacks something if it does not reach back to this intoxication and still draw warmth from { it. Swinburne's power was, and is now, very largely the power to produce it. It has to be interpreted, and it js not fully interpreted unless it is in a measure re-felt, an emotion not only recollected in tranquillity, but revived. It is not easy to challenge Professor Chew's final summary, but it is chill and chilling: j He is not of the first order of poets nor.# j perhaps, even of second rank. Nowhere in j his verse will be found a line or a stanza j in which is concentrated the inmost spirit j of poetry. . . . The children of this world stand without the gates of Paradise. With them Swinburne belongs. Nor does his highest praise, discriminating as the best of it is or occasionally ar' in detail excessive, quite obliterate this impression of an intention, a littlo too deliberate, to swerve into saying a word too much. Probably the truth about criticism is that it is impossible to say enough without saying too much. Probably it must, to be excellent, "surprise by a fine excess," just as Keats thought poetry should. But to elaborate this point .against Professor Chew's book is ungrateful and even unfair; at least, it would be unfair if the fact were not emphasised that ho has written an extremely well balanced aud certainly the inost complete estimate of Swinburne's work. One reason for this, is that ho deals more faithfully with Swinburne's prose and with the dramas than any other has done; another, that he very wisely confines his treatment of the poet's life and idiosyncrasies Tb what is essen- v tial,. In reviewing Swinburne's body of work in detail, Mr Chew says many wise things, and some that raise and disappoint expectations of his expanding them or following them up later. For instance, be notes Swinburne's turn, (under Watts-Dunton's unwise direction) to poems of natural description. Now much, of really illuminating value could be Said about the unwisdom of Watts-Dunton's' advice and Swinburne's inaptitude to follow >t, Swinburne would always take his eye off the ob : ject to. write music, and the music suffered from want of resistance. He gave it nothing to obey or to master, but fed its fluency with the diffuse and. teeming images of the landscape behind his eyes. And in such poems we are more uneasily conscious than anywhere else of the automatic movement of Swinburne's verse, a movement which seems to swallow and absorb words rather than to be governed, to be has-- j tened or retarded, by them.- In the Letters of Sir Walter Raleigh there is ' the following flash?, . x

One things-why is any . Swinburnian metre the negation of all that is shy, mysterious, fairy? It, is. Just loud, lewd lyric in the , Phrygian mode, ' If Professor Chew had read it— Raleigh's name is not in the index — it might have prompted him to examine more thoroughly, the relation, in its strength and weakness, between the Quality of Swinburne's invagination and the quality of his music. . MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. Tragic Queen. : A Story of Mary . Queen of Scots. By Andrew Bakers. Hutchinson. FromWfcitcombe and Tombs, Ltd. (188 8d not.) Like so many other modern pleaders, Mr Dakers is ardent in Mary's defence, though the triumph of her. advocates is too late-to avoid the shadow of Patmore 's lines jn ''The Bay": . . . The lie shall rot. Great is the truth, and shall prevail, When none cares -whether it prevail .or not. ■ But triumph is after all only an assumption. Mr Dakers shows, as it. is very easy to show, that "Mary, was beset by traitors, tradveers, bitter and unscrupulous enemies, and that the evidence against her is in many respects suspect and in some respects obviously faked and misused. Be shows again what is abundantly clear, that Mary (innocent or guilty) stood no chance at all. Further, though she fought bravely and even skilfully) she assisted her enemies by a' kind of generous blindness-to the full extent and nature of her danger. But none of this is sufficient to establish her innocence. Mary's enemies may have cooked and misused evidence, * may have resorted to every trick and perversion of justice, making assurance double sure, and yet she may have been guilty. The node of the is the celebrated Casket correspondence. If Mary wrote it, if she wrote only the astounding second letter in the series, then she was guilty. If she did not write it, it must have been a forgery, and a forgery of transcendent skill. It rings abominably true. Mr Dakers thinks it a forgery based on a genuine original. And everyone who is captivated again, on reading his book, by this most romantic of'.figures, will at least hope it was so.

EVERYMAN, A-BRI. Everyman's IJncyclopsEdla, New and BoVised Edition.- Vols. I. and JI„ A-Badg, Bad-Bri. J. M. Dent and Sons, X,td. (6s 6d net each.) The new-and revised Edition of Everyman's Encyclopaedia will be welcomed by many who appreciated the good qualities of the old, and by others who want to possess a comprehensive work of reference in volumes of a handy size. The print is small but clear; there are numerous pictures and diagrams, of which, though a few are not really very useful, none' i? irrelevant; and the arrangement, subdivisions, and cjross-references, so far as we have been able to test them, are admirable. There" are no maps; but the omission is probably wise, as those will agree who have been irritated by having to turn backwards and forwards from map to text and text to map in other encyclopaedias. A separate atlas is more convenient. The new volumes are larger than the old and soberly handsome in appearance. They open easily, without the slightest strain or cracking. When the edition is complete, in twelve volumes—they are to be produced two at a time, at intervals of two months—the purchaser will have furnished himself at a remarkably low cost with a wonderful source of systematised and up-to-date iafomatkm.

THE AUSTRALIAN TARIFF. Tho Delusion of Protection. A Pie* for Tariff Reform. By Gecrgo H. Winder and Cluny MacPherson. Angus and Bobertson. (4s 6d.) This is a timely and useful took, which reviews tlie disastrous history of high tariffs in Australia. The truth could scarcely be better summarised than it is on page 50, at the end of the chapter oil Protection and Wages: Ninety per cent. of Australian industry belongs to a group which enjoys no protection, but must pay for it. Ten per cent belongs to a group -which is protected, but ■which is no better off through beins i>roteeted. The book is a soujid economic lesson and a sharp warning; but the political aspect of protection, not often studied as it should be, is touched on by Senator the lion. Sir Hal Colebatch in a very interesting introduction. Sir Hal says: *lhe other unhappy fact that one would like to ignore is the definitely corrupting influence of bonuses and tariffs and prohibitions upon the public lifo of the country. Professor Marshall stated a truth that all experience tends to confirm -when he said: Tariffs start on tho basis of simplicity. Vested interests press, and tariffs become intricate. Any tariff, taxation, or other matter that becomes intricate becomes corrupt—not perhaps from the cash point of view, but from the corruption of mind of , the politician, caused by the pressure of vested interests. Let anyone who doubts the existence and the influence of this pressure of vested interests visit Canberra about the time that a tariff schedule is being tabled or when a tariff debate is expected and he will come away saddened and disillusioned. To laugh at the racketeers and lobbyists of Washington is easy; those of Canberra are too near home to be funnv.

AMBERGREASE. Pacific Gold. By H. de Vere Stacpoole. W. Collins, Sons, and Co., Ltd. Mr Stacpoole returns to the' Pacific, on an exciting quest, and in excellent company. The party of seekers in- ■ elude Captain Trimming, master of the Sarah Trimmius and a most engaging character, his deplorably respectable nephew, and a suitably charming heroine. They first of all found an equally suitable young man adrift in a little boat, and went on to find the treasure, ambergris according to the dictionary, ambergrease (and much better'so) according to Trimmins; but a gang of determined villains had to be outdared and outwitted before the ambergrease turned to gold in the right pockets. MrStacpoole directs this pleasant entertainment in the most accomplished manner. J BAEDEKER'S RIVIERA. The Biviena, South-Eastern France, and Corsica. The Italian Lakes and lota of Geneva. A handbook for travellers. By Karl Baedeker. With 82 maps Plans. Karl Baedeker: - George Allen and TJnwin, Ltd. (15s net.) This is the latest issue of one of the volumes in the deservedly most famous series of guide-books in the world. It is impossible to think; 'of any respect in which the traveller and tourist could be more precisely and dependably helped. None but experienced' travellers can afford to dispense with Ba«deker; without hinij ejqperience may cost such a price in time and money as only those who are indifferent to both .will knowingly risk. THE POETIC BOXER. Two and Twenty. By C. 9. torfaster. John Lane, The Bodley Head. . ' ' Mr Forester may be writing too much —it is no time since "TT97" and "Plailt Murder'' and their immediate forerunners; but does not flag. "This slight story, yet full of VigO.tlr, witk some, really excellent writing about the ' boxing ring and the lifp of medical students. The hero is a turbulent young man who abandons medicine for poetry - (and his guardians), lives first 1 • on nothing and then on prize-fighting marries secretly, and leaps injfo fame - as a poet. This success is .entirely incredible, like "the success'of innumerable literary heroes 'and heroines,' ftom David Copperfield on; but the story're-'- - fuses to break down, there is such■ go and humour in it. 1

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. > Somebody Must. By Guy Poeock. J.BS. Dent and Sops, JAd. 4- novel which succeeds by reason of. the author's quiet, kind, humorous in- ' timacy with • his characters. They art ■ constantly doing 1 and saying little* things that utter their humanity and individuality, and give the bookthe •subtle flavour of life. .■..» - . . :• Budget Control. An Introduction...to : tfea Financial System of Wew- Sooth Waloa-' By F. A. Bland,-MJL, T.T..8. Align* < - . and Robertson. (356 d.) The author, who is lecturer in public Administration at Sydney University, gives an extremely lucid and) valuable , account of .the working of Australian public finance. It is critical and suggestive, as well as expository, and can ■' be read with great profit in this Dominion. ■ i . ' Beauty and "the Beasts. By Obntf* Woodington. Blldn Hatimre and 'fprrat.' A few of these ten or twd MW stories are slight sketches, others more earsfully worked; all are smooth and neat. Mr "Woodington writes agreeably, bst not compellingly. \ , ■ Candour Coat. . By Kittle . Xalgtt. Bobertsou and Mullens, Ltd. " (55.) Hattie Knight is' a popular and ver- ' satile Australan writer, who r know* • how to be serious without being solemn, ' and humorous without being facetious. The twenty essays in this book ; are pleasant reading. ; ——- ' Bain on the Just. By Mary Vintner. Wright . ■ ■ . and Brown. A wilful, beautiful girl elopes with a Dellish explorer, shares some of bis adventures, and learns from disillusion and new vision how' to face the problems which beset her on his death. Spiritualism In the Light of Occult HMmi*. Kider. From WMtcambe and Tombs. Ltd. (3s 6d net.) The author believes that spiritualism and occultism illuminate eaeh other, and in this light dqals with such subjects aa spirit-teaching and reincarnation, trance phenomena, and astral psyehism.