MRS DEANS HONOURED

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21865, 19 August 1936, Page 2

MRS DEANS HONOURED

COMPLIMENTARY LUNCHEON After many years of unremitting devotion to the interests of the Canterbury branch of the Victoria League, Mrs Deans, who had been president for 12 years, declined nomination for that high office at the last annual meeting but at the same time announced her intention of ■ continuing her association with the league. Members were unanimous in expressing appreciation of Mrs Deans’s work, and in thanking her for the hospitality she had frequently extended to the league. As a special mark of gratitude the committee of the branch arranged a luncheon party in honour of Mrs

Deans, and this was held yesterday, -in a private reception room at Ballantynes, where the table s decorated with violets and anemones. Mrs J. Mowbray Tripp, who succeeded Mrs Deans as president, presided, and said the committee could not let Mrs Deans give up office without giving a party for her, who had given so many parties for other folkThe Victoria j_.eague, she said, tried, by personal contact, to establish a practical fellowship amongst members of the British Empire, and such personalities as Mrs 'Deans, with her kindly outlook, were invaluable in turning acquaintances into friends. “You are one that lights fires in cold rooms,” concluded Mrs Tripp, addressing the guest of honour, “and we thank you most sincerely for all you have done for the league, and wish you many years of happiness.” Mrs E. G. Hogg added her good wishes to those of Mrs Tripp, and Mrs Deans feelingly thanked the committee for the honour done her. „ Those present were Mrs Deans, Mrs Tripp, Lady Acland, Mrs J. G. L. Vernon, Mrs E. G. Hogg, Mrs F. L. Scott, Mrs R. H. Hennah, Mrs C. C. Davis, Mrs Endell Wanklyn, Misses C. Gosset, E, Overton, B. Gould; and M. Skoglund. LITERARY CELEBRITIES ADDRESS TO UNIVERSITY , WOMEN . ’• Last evening the monthly meeting of the Canterbury Association of the Federation of University Women _ was held in the club rooms, Montreal street. Mrs C. H. Perkins presided over a good attendance of members. Mr lan Donnelly, the speaker of the evening, described some of the library celebrities he had met m England. Although he had suffered - a certain amount of disillusionment, he had found the greatest m en *° selfeffacing, charming, and charitable. He had spent a very enlivening day with Chesterton, but did not realise until after his death the great affection in which Chesterton was held in England W. W. Jacobs, whom he considered’the greatest living humorist, is himself a sombre man, who talked about the menace of the international Si Walter de la Mare, who refused to discuss literature, had the most agile intelligence of any of the literary men with Whom he had come in contact., Edmund ‘Blunden, the poet and war novelist, has put poetry behind him, and is now a fellow at Oxford. His present interests are nineteenth century literature and cricket. The speaker was particularly interested in the Irish writers, the younger school of which has got well away from romance. Some of the older men are very doubtful of the new tendencies?—especially in poetry. Conflicting , views are held of the contemporary novel. J. B. Priestley considers that the general level was never better, but that though technical perfection is high, there is not enough of the creative spirit. This view_is shared by many, while T. S. Eliot represents the opposing view, that the novel is dead, and has been dead for a long time.