KATHERINE TYNAN.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume IV, Issue 959, 8 March 1917, Page 4

KATHERINE TYNAN.

Mrs Hinkson, better known to the reading public as Katherine Tynan, lias written fin interesting book of reminiscences "Tlie Middle Years," a sequel to a former volume, ''Twenty-five Years.''

It is for her poems that Katherine Tynan will be remembered, rather than for her novels or her literary criticisms. A passage towards the end of this book doubtless explains why her poetry is of a far higher quality than her prose fiction. "I have lived, to myself, by my poetry; or verse if vou will. My innumerable novels were for boiling the pot. Not that I despise boiling the pot. The business might bear a worthier name, it might even be called a Holy War, the struggle to keep the fire on the hearth for the children, and the securities and sanctities of home about them. But my novels T wrote usually not to please" myself, but to meet the demand; and the demand was diversified. Sometimes I wrote against the grain, as when I must purvey sensations to please the readers of syndicate stories. My poetry, such as it is, I kept un defiled; and "a arood many people from time to time hav« liked to drink at its well."