W.E.A.

Southland Times, Issue 19345, 10 September 1924, Page 7

W.E.A.

BUTLER’S ‘THE WAY OF ALL FLESH.” SUCCESSFUL SESSION CONCLUDED. The tenth winter session of the W.E.A. Literature Class was brought to a successful conclusion last evening when there was a representative attendance of members. The chair was occupied by Mr W. M. Shardlow, who said the class had covered wide literary ground, and had done good work in popularising the intellectual side of modern letters. Discussion had been Splendid, and the class had made a distinct advance. There was every reason to thank the tutor for his enthusiasm and untiring energy.

The lecturer (Mr S. G. August) said that ‘The Way of All Flesh” would mean a continuation of the study of Samuel Butler (author of “Erewhon”). The novel was remarkable in many ways, not the least being that it took over thirty years or so to write, and that it was published posthumously. The book was a vigorous indictment of Victorianism, and of all that that so-called golden age of literary’ and scientific progress in England stood for. Butler traces the Pontifex family through several generations, and while not strictly a realist in the Zolaesque sense he is willing to spare neither fault nor foible. George Pontifex, who represents the successful man wishing to found a family at all costs, proves on what an unsound foundation many apparently successful houses have been built. It does not matter to George that his son has no call to the Church, it is important that the dignity of the family should be upheld by holy orders, and that is the end of it. The atmosphere created is one of cold brutality, a forcing of the human plants in social and national hothouses to bring about desired results. Butler is deadly in his aim, and as he does not care what he hits, the social fabric seems to rock under a steady broadside of satire, humour, and contempt. He does not, like Dickens, for instance, exaggerate bis characters into clowns and stage-drilled comedians, nor does he introduce the sentimentally pathetic.. He is certainly an advance on that form of Victorianism, and is willing to lead a person cr character on to a logically reasonable end. You will, therefore, continued the lecturer, find no startling surprises in Butler, but you will find a great deal of hard, powerful, and effective comment on life and manners. The ideals of Victorianism are smashed to bits by this mighty iconoclast, and one at once realises hew this book has blazed the track for men like H. G. Wells, G. B. Shaw, and numerous others. The lecturer read extracts from “The Way of All Flesh,” which were well qualified to bear out his statements regarding one of the greatest novels of the last two decades. The lecturer said he would like to shortly review the work of the session, and stated that the first three studies were to do with John Masefield. “Ballads and Lyrics,” “Dauber.” and ‘The Everlasting Mercy” were taken separately, and the time was, he considered, well spent. Masefield was the man who probably out-Kiplinged Kipling, but he was a professional sailor before the mast, and wrote of the sea frem the inside. If the sea was England’s glory—and undoubtedly it was—then Masefield must be accounted the true laureate of Empire, because there was real sincerity in all of his sea-poetry. Masefield was a romantic realist, and was not afraid to “call a spade a spade.” He might even go further and call it a special kind of spade, but he would never call it an agricultural implement. He apparently set out to prove George Mocre’s dictum that literature is never literary, and has succeeded, paradoxically, in presenting England with a mass of poetry rare in any age. The next man was Joseph Conrad, and the class treatment of him has some historic significance, as Conrad died during the session. This enlivened public interest, and the busy journalists began to write laudatory obituaries. Conrad, also a sailor, gained the ear of the British public by his intimate treatment of the sea. Strange to say, he was a Pole, who had gone to sea in a French ship, and knew nothing of English until he joined the British Mercantile Marine as an able-bodied seaman when over twenty years of age. That Conrad became the one living master of the English novel is about as near to a miracle as can be expected. Surely the age of romance is not done, and wonders have not ceased on the earth. Stories like “Youth,” “Falk,” ‘Typhoon,” ‘The Nigger of the Narcissus,” “The Rover,” “Heart of Darkness,” “Chance” and “Almayer’s Folly” dincover a philosophic view of life, an uncompromising attitude, and a cold artistic desire to present a temperament which is unique in contemporary literature. Katherine Mansfield was a most interesting subject, and being a New Zealander, it was likely a patriotic affair to treat of her book. As a matter of fact, the great outside world of London and New York were singing her praises before we entered the field, and the good name of K.M. was not “boosted by us. Katherine Mansfield is the only successful prose writer this country has produced, and although her childhood was spent in Wellington, as many of her stories go to show, it was in London and under metropolitan and European influences that her genius was permitted to develop. New Zealand, artistically, is little more than a tideless backwater, where freshwater sprats are convinced that they are whales in the boundless ocean. Katherine had no such delusion, and a reading of her books should be considered a necessity in the culture of this country—they prove how far it was possible for a New Zealander to go given a real environment. Macaulay’s New Zealander may some day sketch a broken arch of London Bridge, but Katherine Mansfield has added a noble arch to the bridge of English letters in the way of several perfect short stories. This surely is more worthy than the mere listing of ruins, it is building in the truest sense.

Writers who caused interest were Anatole France, “Thais” being accounted a picturesque novel, with a solid basis in philosophy. This book shows the Paris sage in his most ironic vein, and if voluptuous and colourful, he was nevertheless good company and exhibited consummate literature. The evening with Rupert Brooke brought the fact of Brooke’s undoubted popularity to light. Some members objected that the author of “1914 and Other Poems” was slight, and had little to say, but the lecturer strongly opposed this view and said he considered Brooke to be the one significant poet of the War. He was sure that his Sonnets in “1914” and a few other poems were marked for immortality. Edward Fitzgerald’s “Omar Khayyam” has proved to be a work of continued appeal, and the lecturer said he considered Fitzgeral to be one of the great Victorians, to take his place beside Tennyson, Carlyle, Dickens, Thackeray, Darwin, Huxley, and others. If his output was small, it was distinguished by the highest quality and was unique in English literature. Although Tennyson and the Brownings published volume after volume, leaving to posterity a huge mass of poetic print, they would not claim a higher place on the artistic side than the translator (or should we not say author) of the English Omar. Both Lord Tennyson and Robert Browning were treated at length, each a worthy contributor to the “spacious days” cf England’s great modern queen. Dramatists were noticed in the work of G. B. Shaw and John Galsworthy. It appeared that the class did not, as a whole, greatly admire Galsworthy’s matter and method of treatment. Shaw was accepted on account of his downrigfitneas and hard-hitting, but some exception was taken to the author of “The Doctor’s Dilemma” also. To go back to the genuine classics, a profitable evening was spent in the company of John Keats, his odes being analysed and commented upon. Of other poets, Francis Thompson was represented by a study of his famous pcem “The Hound of Heaven,” and the minor poets of to-day had a study all to themselves. These included A. E. Housman, Katherine Tynan, C. Fox Smith, Edward Thomas, Stella Benson, Rose MacW. H. Davies Ratoh Hodgson, and.

others. It was shown that English minor poets found most cf their inspiration in locality and tradition, a thing which was practically unknown here. The mere mention of a thing English with age in a poem would often make the poem a success. To mention, say, Queenstown, in a New Zealand poem would not improve it, although it suggested the most beautiful mountain scenery in the world. The fault, no doubt, is in ourselves, and not in our country, that we have no literature. In treating of contemporary essayists the lecturer said he had run into a brick wall. The three chosen were E. V. Lucas and G. K. Chesterten (English), and H. L. Mencken (American), and it was with the last that he experienced a great deal of trouble. The class rose and objected to Mencken, and said he was a vulgarly outspoken American whose jeers at things in general were cheap and unconvincing. In spite of all the speaker’s enthusiasm for the sage of Baltimore, the class would have none of it. Still as variety is the spice of life, the little interlude added to the gaiety of the meetings. He (the lecturer) would like to thank those who had attended during the session, and also Messrs J. J. W. Pollard of the Southland Times and T. R. Fleming, of Dunedin. Their assistance was much appreciated, both by himself and class-members. The class had held together splendidly.

At the conclusion of the lecture Mrs H. Sutton referred to the excellent work of the year, and the enthusiastic manner which it was carried on. She would like to personally thank the lecturer. This was followed by speeches in a similar strain from Miss Murdoch, Mrs Watt, and Messrs W. Denhim, H. McFeely, A. L. Whelham, W. Shardtow, I. L. Petrie, and others. Mr August, in reply, thanked the speakers for their kindness. A programme was then presented, the following giving items:— Miss Erskine (piano solo), Misses Murdoch and Kirkpatrick (recitations), Messrs H. P. Campbell, W. J. Miller, W. Shardlow, I. L. Petrie (tecitaticns), Mesdames Doyle, Sutton, Crofts and Farrant (songs). Mrs H. Sutton and Miss Erskine were accompanists. Mr Roy Robertson introduced some modern phonograph records. After refreshments provided by the ladies the evening was concluded with the singing of “Auld Lang Syne.”