PEOPLE COUNT MOST

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 108, 10 May 1933, Page 13

PEOPLE COUNT MOST

JOURNALIST'S TRAVELS

GLAMOUR OF THE EAST

"I have found in travelling that it is not places that count so much as people," said Mr. Will Lawson, the well-known Australian journalist and writer of verse, in an address to members of the Writers' and Artists' Society at the Lyceum Club last evening. "And it is not necessary to travel much in order to study people," he said, remarking that restlessness in a writer was a bad feature. He contended that if a story Kvcre good its setting did not matter. New Zealand, said Mr. Lawson, was full of mystery and food for the imagination, and although a little small in size, its very smallness gave it a broadened outlook. "People in isolated countries have long thoughts," he said. "In cities like New York the whole place absorbs and narrows the mind. It is not necessary to 'think overseas.' " Mr. Lawson commented on the development of literature in New Zealand. The Katherine Mansfield memorial had aroused a great deal of discussion, ho said, but he thought the erection of the memorial was a wonderful thing for New Zealand. It showed that literature was becoming an important item. Amusing reminiscences of his early newspaper experiences with men whose names are now well known in the literary world, found an appreciative audience. Vivid descriptions of the islands of the Far East, of Japan, and China and of their people, were given with an absorbing human touch, accompanied by bright anecdote. The three most beautiful sights he had seen, Mr. Lawson said, were the Yosemite Valley, the lights on the peaks of Hong Kong, which in many ways resembled Wellington, and sunset on Manila Bay, where the old Spanish custom of firing the sunset gun was still kept. The Far East, he said, was full of glamour and material for stories and novels. Australia, too, was a wonderful place for the novelist. Australians in the cities did not know the true Australia which was as large as Europe. He described the inner country, which he had grown to know during the writing of a series of travel articles. In discussing tho colour question, a merchant of Hong Kong had said regarding Australia. "The Almighty never intended you to keep an empty country like that." The same merchant had also said that no country could be wealthy without a large population —a theory that he had seen in the writings of prominent Englishmen and Americans. A hearty vote of thanks, moved by Miss N. E. Coad (president), was passed to Mr. Lawson for his deeply interesting address. A dainty supper was then served, and members were able to meet and converse with Mr. Lawson.