RICHARD LE GALLIENNE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15551, 7 March 1914, Page 4 (Supplement)

RICHARD LE GALLIENNE.

AN APPRECIATION, &

The announcement of a new volume of poems by Richard le Gailienne leads an English critic into the following appreciation of his qualities as a poet. " The new volume has already appeared in America, where Mr. l e Gailienne now lives, and I, being one of the few people on this side of the Atlantic who have teen privileged to see an advance Copy, do not hesitate the opinion that its publication places the author in the front rank of living lyric poets. It is curious that so typical an Old World genius as Richard le Gallienne's should develop strength and power in the New, but such is the fact; and it is to be noted particularly in his poetry. The last \olnme, 'New Poems,' contained better poems than he had ever written, and, although he is not likely to surpass the best of them, the note of the new volume, called ' The Lonely Dancer,' is sustained in a higher key and with a wider range than anything he has yet done. So ' it would seem that England's loss in the poet's departure from her shores has been a decided gain

to English literature. It is not. to be assumed, however, that le Gallienne has not been appreciated 4n his native land; indeed, the contrary 'is proved by* the long list of his books and the multiple editions of many of them. But there is little doubt that he has received, latterly at aU events, a finer quality of appreciation in America than here. One example of that appreciation lies before me in a review of his last volume of poems, from the pen of America's leading man of letters, William Dean Howells:—

'''Something of William Blake, something of Emily Dickinson is here, and the little impalpable loveliness is in many passages of this most beautiful book. But it has a music very distinctly its own, with a haunting charm in its (lying falls, and a delight in its gladder tones which I do not remember to have got from other poets. For lightness and fineness of what must be called critical analysis of his own joy, it seems to me that this poet is at ■his subtlest in "The Nightjar," which he holds dearer than the nightingale. . . . It will not do to say that Keats could not have worded this better, for Keats is dead and there is no way of proving I such a thesis; but with Keats no longer alive, I take leave to be glad of the surpassing felicity of phrasing, the impassioned sense of beauty, the requisite fancy, and. not least, the just and manful spirit whiVh I find in Mr. le Oallienne's poetry.' " Many English critics should be expressing similar views before the present year is over."