Reviews. Oscar Wilde

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СКАЧАТЬ to point out neither their defect nor their merit, but their quality merely. And though Mr. Raffalovich is not a wonderful poet, still he is a subtle artist in poetry. Indeed, in his way he is a boyish master of curious music and of fantastic rhyme, and can strike on the lute of language so many lovely chords that it seems a pity he does not know how to pronounce the title of his book and the theme of his songs. For he insists on making ‘tuberose’ a trisyllable always, as if it were a potato blossom and not a flower shaped like a tiny trumpet of ivory. However, for the sake of his meadowsweet and his spring-green binding this must be forgiven him. And though he cannot pronounce ‘tuberose’ aright, at least he can sing of it exquisitely.

      Finally we come to Sturm und Drang, the work of an anonymous writer. Opening the volume at hazard we come across these graceful lines:

      How sweet to spend in this blue bay

       The close of life’s disastrous day,

       To watch the morn break faintly free

       Across the greyness of the sea,

       What time Memnonian music fills

       The shadows of the dewy hills.

      Well, here is the touch of a poet, and we pluck up heart and read on. The book is a curious but not inartistic combination of the mental attitude of Mr. Matthew Arnold with the style of Lord Tennyson. Sometimes, as in The Sicilian Hermit, we get merely the metre of Locksley Hall without its music, merely its fine madness and not its fine magic. Still, elsewhere there is good work, and Caliban in East London has a great deal of power in it, though we do not like the adjective ‘knockery’ even in a poem on Whitechapel.

      On the whole, to those who watch the culture of the age, the most interesting thing in young poets is not so much what they invent as what masters they follow. A few years ago it was all Mr. Swinburne. That era has happily passed away. The mimicry of passion is the most intolerable of all poses. Now, it is all Lord Tennyson, and that is better. For a young writer can gain more from the study of a literary poet than from the study of a lyrist. He may become the pupil of the one, but he can never be anything but the slave of the other. And so we are glad to see in this volume direct and noble praise of him

      * * * * *

      Who plucked in English meadows flowers fair

       As any that in unforgotten stave

       Vied with the orient gold of Venus’ hair

       Or fringed the murmur of the Ægean wave,

      which are the fine words in which this anonymous poet pays his tribute to the Laureate.

      (1) Echoes of Memory. By Atherton Furlong. (Field and Tuer.)

      (2) Sagittulæ. By E. W. Bowling. (Longmans, Green and Co.)

      (3) Tuberose and Meadowsweet. By Mark André Raffalovich. (David Bogue.)

      (4) Sturm und Drang. (Elliot Stock.)

      In reply to the review A Bevy of Poets the following letter was published in the Pall Mall Gazette on March 30, 1885, under the title of

      THE ROOT OF THE MATTER

      SIR—I am sorry not to be able to accept the graceful etymology of your reviewer who calls me to task for not knowing how to pronounce the title of my book Tuberose and Meadowsweet. I insist, he fancifully says, ‘on making “tuberose” a trisyllable always, as if it were a potato blossom and not a flower shaped like a tiny trumpet of ivory.’ Alas! tuberose is a trisyllable if properly derived from the Latin tuberosus, the lumpy flower, having nothing to do with roses or with trumpets of ivory in name any more than in nature. I am reminded by a great living poet that another correctly wrote:

      Or as the moonlight fills the open sky

       Struggling with darkness—as a tuberose

       Peoples some Indian dell with scents which lie

      Like clouds above the flower from which they rose.

      In justice to Shelley, whose lines I quote, your readers will admit that I have good authority for making a trisyllable of tuberose.—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

      ANDRÉ RAFFALOVICH.

       March 28.

PARNASSUS VERSUS PHILOLOGY

       Table of Contents

      (Pall Mall Gazette, April 1, 1885.)

      To the Editor of the Pall Mall Gazette.

      SIR—I am deeply distressed to hear that tuberose is so called from its being a ‘lumpy flower.’ It is not at all lumpy, and, even if it were, no poet should be heartless enough to say so. Henceforth, there really must be two derivations for every word, one for the poet and one for the scientist. And in the present case the poet will dwell on the tiny trumpets of ivory into which the white flower breaks, and leave to the man of science horrid allusions to its supposed lumpiness and indiscreet revelations of its private life below ground. In fact, ‘tuber’ as a derivation is disgraceful. On the roots of verbs Philology may be allowed to speak, but on the roots of flowers she must keep silence. We cannot allow her to dig up Parnassus. And, as regards the word being a trisyllable, I am reminded by a great living poet that another correctly wrote:

      And the jessamine faint, and the sweet tuberose,

       The sweetest flower for scent that blows;

       And all rare blossoms from every clime

       Grew in that garden in perfect prime.

      In justice to Shelley, whose lines I quote, your readers will admit that I have good authority for making a dissyllable of tuberose.—I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

      THE CRITIC,

       WHO HAD TO READ FOUR VOLUMES OF MODERN POETRY.

       March 30.

HAMLET AT THE LYCEUM

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      (Dramatic Review, May 9, 1885.)

      It sometimes happens that at a première in London the least enjoyable part of the performance is the play. I have seen many audiences more interesting than the actors, and have often heard better dialogue in the foyer than I have on the stage. At the Lyceum, however, this is rarely the case, and when the play is a play of Shakespeare’s, and among its exponents are Mr. Irving and Miss Ellen Terry, we turn from the gods in the gallery and from the goddesses in the stalls, to enjoy the charm of the production, and to take delight in the art. The lions are behind the footlights and not in front of them when we have a noble tragedy nobly acted. And I have rarely witnessed such enthusiasm as that which greeted on last Saturday night the two artists I have mentioned. I would like, in fact, to use the word ovation, but a pedantic professor has recently informed us, with the Batavian buoyancy of misapplied learning, СКАЧАТЬ