LONDON ADELPHI

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 257, 27 September 1935, Page 4

LONDON ADELPHI

FAMOUS TERRACE TO GO. There are superior persons in London who say that the Adelphi, in the manner of Charles the Second, has been an unconscionable time a-dying. There are others who grieve to think that this picturesque quarter off the Strand should be doomed to suffer the fate of so many other architectural monuments (says a commentator). Though sentenced to extinction several years ago, it contrived to linger on in a sort of living death. The final decision, however, came at last, and the famous terrace is definitely to disappear to make way for a huge and probably very ugly modern block. It will be missed, if not regretted, and one more relic of the brothers Adam will have become a memory. Thousands of visitors doubtless recall those gloomy Adelphi arches and those even more gloomy Adelphi streets. The arches, it is true, have merit—the sort of quality discovered in the etchings of Piranesi—but the houses and roads convey the saddest and mustiest impression of an age that is past. They are tolerable to the eye only because of the names of the men who designed them, and because of their unique personal associations. Mortals, great and small, have lived there. Minor poets, forgotten painters, and figures of genius have dreamed and worked in those depressing shadows. Sir James Barrie is still a local resident, and, until two years ago, when, with typical wisdom, he moved to a more cheerful neighbourhood. Mr Bernard Shaw was also an Adelphian. And, of course, there is the Savage Club, which is most annoyed at being turned out of its historic home m the quarter. Long-haired, beetlebrowed members, and members who are in all respects elegant, equally resent their eviction from premises they have grown to love —premises where romantic Victorianism is at its worst. They cannot help feeling that the club wiil never he quite the same place again. They fear it may be fated to endure a comfortable and efficient future as the result of its translation to a more up-to-date locality. No more will they be able to crouch over their meals and exchange abusive opinions of modern beings and things in an environment tastefully decorated with African fetishes and New' Zealand Maori emblems. No more will they breathe an atmosphere reeking with outmoded Bohemianism. That is their tragedy.

For London, however, the demolition of the Adelphi will not be at all tragic. London has no sentiment one way or another. Nine out of ten of our citizens have lost touch with it, as they have lost touch with stage coaches and sailing ships. To this unimaginative majority the whole affair looms merely as an impending improvement, if it looms at all, which is doubtful.