AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND VERSE.

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 155, 28 December 1918, Page 11

AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND VERSE.

"Digger Smith." By. C. •J. Dennis.. Angus-and Robertson, Sydney (Fer- ' guson and Osborn, Wellington); The rapid output of books from the pen of C. J. Dennis ("The Sentimental Bloke") has been phenomenal, and all the more so since the whole of his series to date has been published during the period of tlie war. Doubtless their unbounded success has been due largely to the appeal these books make to Australians in'the trenches far away from "Sunny New South Wales" and the other States of the Commonwealth. Like its predecessors, "Digger Smith" reflects a certain atmosphere of. Australia in a marked degree. It is perhaps more a mood than an atmosphere, for it is not a reflection of . everyday affairs but an exaltation of moods which are met with in everyday life. It is here that the art of the writer is evident; a thousand writei-6 might, seize upon the same incidents and. write them, down, yet Would miss the mark because their work would be too literally true. Mr. Dennis does not make that mistake. He writes more of people as the people wonld like to be than as they are, and thereby achieves success as a literary , artist. In "The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke" ■ he achieved moi'e thaii that. His later work is not so hearfcstirring. Yet it is good and. very readable and pleasant to remember, and read again. And occasionally there is a gleam of living humour as in the verses "Before the War." Speakj'of her absent son to the Bloke ail old mother said: " . . . yeli mustn't mind Me talkin* so of Jim, but when I see Your face it brings it back; c's just your kind, Not quite so handsome 'praps nor co .'": refined." and the Bloke tells how after bidding her. goodbye he —"Just waved back; then goes inside to .find : A lookin'-glass, and iakes a reel good look. „»'. ■ ' Not quite so 'an'some, praps, nor so refined! ' Gawd help yeh, Jim, I thinks ych must be crook.'" Tlie book is issued in the publisher's neat well-bound edition with coloured and cover,design and coloured frontispieces by Hal Gye. Tile same artist supplies black and white illustrations which are perhn-pB, not so convincing as his colour work.

'Iwelve Sonnets." By Birtlett Adamson. Whitcoffibe and Tombs, Ltd., Wellington. , • ■ The steadily-increasing library of New Zealand verse, which all booklovers possess,' will be enriched by'the addition of this little volurhd. The author, Mr. Bartlett Adamson, has been a writer of verse, chiefly in sonnet form in Australasian _ periodicals, for' some years past, and is accounted one of the most promising of New Zealand's writers; in the matters of form, style, and imagery, probably the most promising of the newel 4 School. - It is paradoxical, perhap6, that a young ; writer of his power has not yet exhibited the spontaneity which makes for true lyric but that mayi-como with-the daring-of the greater adventures in Ji.fo. The twelve sonnets cover a wide range of subjects, and the writer's treatment, too,, has a pleasant variety. , The first one in the book, called "Adventurej" shows the poet's strength and restraint and. originality, of thought:— '■■ '■ ■ : •■ The world is charted out from Pole to Pole, - Measured and docketed and filed away, And old Adventure, portly grown and grey, ' Sits in his office. But his fiery soul Yearns for 'the magic seas that. used to • roll, The dragon terrorsvthat were once to ■slay, \ Tile perilous journeys, past the tim of day, In joytitis quest of some forbidden goal. In the sextet, the impujse swings from the forbidden and lost things to the one vision which yet remains, and there is power in the last line : — One vision.yet to stir his roVer-blood, The panorama from the peaks of Death. A lighter touch is given to other sonnets, and often a remarkable power of imagery is shown. .Yet these qualities . are almost fretting, tb tile reader because ■ of the feeling that the writer's pen | should move with abandon and a thunder of words, a clashing of music and the swing of stormy measure in such glad ballads as all. men's-souls long for.- Mr.Adamson, it is true, has written in other thiiri the. soniiet form, and perhaps soon: he.will bUi'st the b6nds that hold him., To ■ quote in full would Hot be fair,' though the majority of the sonnets are: wcitth quoting. ..But that one called "Grlory". must be taken iufull:-^- ■ Sef dreamed of glory through his boy-: hood's years; ' ' 1 Thousands of laiicers in the morninglight, •; ■ . ■■• " Charging behind him with tumultuous' might, . A thundering cataract of cavaliers. He dreamed of glory. Silver swords and spears; | Banners of gold and purple, and the .1 bright Meadows of waving hats to left and right; His tall plumes tossing in a gale of cheers. He dreamed of glory |. but he dreams no moi'e. l ■ i. : Glory has made him her ambassador. And there, erect amoiig the 'rotten-ripe Corpses that ehuggle in their beds of: blood, He stands unconquerable, knee-deep in mud, • And fumbles for a' match to light his 1 pipe. : So much. for glory ! Theife, is none in war; and Mr. Adamson has clearly proved it in his vivid word-pictures, which show the numbing awful matter-of-factness of it all. Yet one might wish that this young writer in his work had. not such a sombre regard for Death.