POETS LAUREATE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22172, 27 July 1935, Page 1 (Supplement)

POETS LAUREATE

BY MAT A.N G A

VISIT BY JOHN MASEFIELD

Word has come to Auckland of a visit to New Zealand in the near future by John Masefield, Poet Laureate. Very many will greet the news with the pleasure of anticipation that is not the least of joys. Even without his laurelled dignity, Air. Masefield would have been welcome. He is a stalwart Englishman, loving the things that British folk love. The themes of his poetry reveal a robust mind. He has a rare gift for narrative verse. A stark, even rough realism, is in much that he has written. Yet he has an imaginative genius that often expresses itself with grace and delicacy. And his prose is of excellent quality, ai> " Gallipoli," of interest to all New Zealanders, well proves. As Poet Laureate, Mr. Masefield is in an interesting if not a wholly illustrious succession. Englishmen in this generation have been disinclined to take the Laureatcship seriously—when held by others, that is; some -would take it seriously enough, no doubt, for themselves, if only for the tierce of wine that goes traditionally with it. But that is beside the point. Dr. Bridges, last of the line before Mr. Masefield, had to be taken seriously; there was no option But that was not because he was Poet Laureate: it was because he was Dr. Bridges. Nobody but the Lord Chamberlain's book-keeper regarded him as more important because of the appointment. Dr. Bridges' predecessor was Alfred Austin. His appointment reduced considerably the vitality of the office. After Southey, Wordsworth, Tennyson, came this writer of political articles for the Standard, not unskilled but taking a small size in wreaths, and the office lost its luistre at his touch. A Fictitious List It has ever been exposed to this risk. Indeed the idea of a national poet, presumably gifted with the divine afflatus, being made "an officer of the ; Household of the fourth class," is odd, ! to say the least of the arrangement. In the ISth century he came in ceremonial order immediately before the Royal Pat-Catcher: that was some- | thing, whoever of distinction was on ahead. But even that magnificence has vanished, for the Pat-Catcher has been i abolished. There was a time when any ; poet might have been glad to fall in ! behind the Bat-Catcher, let alone take i precedence of him. Shakespeare did not get even that chance, and Burns I went without it, and Tom Moore —but ! Tom Moore was but the bard of Erin, i Perhaps, though, that was honour enough' In "some nranuals of literature there is given .a lift of Laureates. In Professor Broadus' book it is analysed to. shreds. Most of us thought that list began with dear old Chaucer. It doesn't. He is not even in the list. Our thought of him as father of the Laureates, has arisen, no doubt, from I the vague recollection that he got a | Poval gift ot a pension and a cask of I wine. The tierce of Canary attached to the Laureateship has always struck the imagination: and perhaps it was | the wine that made Dryden, and others j after him, think that Chaucer was their ! first forerunner. | Really, he was something far more ! distinguished. He was a Gentleman of the Household rendering quite admsr--1 able personal services that had nothing ' to do with poetry, and his pension and j the wine were payment for them. In addition, he had a taste for poetry, no ' oreat disqualification for anybody, even a Gentleman of the Household. But there was no Poet Laureate in the Poval Household then. There was one at Oxford, and the memories of poets in official appointments, like C'haucer. and of these laurel-honoured poets of the university, have somehow got mixed. Skelton was such a university laureate. Mingled Traditions In Bernard Andreas, a blind Frenchman attached to the Court of Henry VH., the two traditions were almost inextricabiv mingled. Apparently he was a university laureate; as "versificator regis" he received a royal pension; he was also the Historiographer Royal. But he was not Poet Laureate, ! for' up to that time there was no such office. Spenser got a pension of £SO, but he had no office at all, and Daniel. I also in uhe accepted list, was merely j Licenser of Plays and Groom of the ! Bedchamber. Even Ben Jonson's claim is shaky. He got in 1616 a pension of 100 marks; it was increased in 1630 to £IOO and a tierce of Canary. He wrote many ! masques for the Court. But his penj sions warrant, for all its gratifying I terms, makes no mention of the Laureateship. Yet, after the interregnum of the Commonwealth, there grew a practice of calling Jonson by the title now common. ° It was ascribed to Davenant, too. Unable to recover his pension after the Restoration, Davenant had to find solace in the fact that his title had recognition at Court. Six days after his death the Laureateship had its first offi- ! cial announcement; a warrant was I issued "for a grant to John Dryden | of the Office of Poet Laureate, void ! by the death of Sir William Davenant." The wording of the warrant carries the origin of the office back, then, to Davenant, and possibly Ben Jonson. However, that does not quite solve the mystery. Davenant could not get his pension continued at the Restoration, and Dryden was appointed in 1608 to an office* without emolument. It was not until 1670, when he was made Historiographer Royal, that he re- | ceived his £2OO and his tierce of Canary. The Poet's Wine Dryden got a further increase of £IOO for both offices about 10 years later. Shadwell succeeded in both offices. Bub when, in 1691, Thomas Rymer was appointed Historiographer—there's no certain significance in names —and Nahum Tate, the writer of "While shepherds watched their flocks by night." Poet Laureate, it was necessary to fix the separate salaries, -and the poet's was made £IOO and a pipe of Canary. Pye, Souther's predecessor, demanded the commutation of the wine for its value in money. He got £27. The fate of subsequent pipes is i shrouded in mystery. The name of the poet's wine was ap- i propriate enough, but m many instances the poets stopped singing as soon as they got it. Many of the j Laureates have not become immortal. Dr. Bridges had precedent for his much silence. Under George I. the Laureate had to supply two odes a year—one on the King's Birthday, the other on New Year's Day, both in honour of the King. In the days of the Georges this j -was certainly earning the money and the wine: who else would have w.itten the odea? Cibber, writing to Pope, said: "1 wrote more to be fed than to J be famous." Cowper laughed at "his quit-rent ode, his peppercorn of praise" given by the Laureate to the King. Southey exalted his office, and renny- i son adorned it, but Dr. Bridges' way j was Wordsworth's; he wrote, as it pleased him, with littlo heed of Royal occasion.. Masefield is the sort of man to take that same way.