Fairburn poetry found impressive

The Collected Poems of A. R. D. Fairburn contains a body of poetry which is impressive for its breadth and perceptiveness, for its ranging between humour and deep seriousness which demonstrates a mind critical and yet flexible in its approach to experience and the general issues and institutions of the world surrounding it.

A useful place to start in an appreciation of the way in which these elements organise themselves into poetry is at the simplest of levels, albeit introduced in the grand manner, a poem entitled "A Note on the Depressing Effects of Abdominal Disturbances," which reads:

"People who have the colic Don't, frolic." is in itself a frolicsome piece which indicates at a level of almost complete uninvolvement the sort of humour which comes through strikingly and happily in much of Falrburn's poetry. Of course, in many poems and especially those directed at a particular political or social issue, this humorous perceptiveness is used very tellingly, and it gains much force by the characteristic simplicity and in-cisiveness of its expression.

That the underlying seriousness of the lightly humorous piece is the touchstone of Falrburn's poetic manner and interests is, however, apparent when one moves from "A Note" to "The 105 per cent Loaf" and then to "My Pretty Maid", in which the humour hardens and bites as the seriousness of the issue deepens.

To say this is not to imply that all Falrburn's poetry is humorous in one way or another. Rather, it is out of this fundamental seriousness that his more significant poetry arises, as even a surface comparison of the two groups Poetry Harbinger and He Shall Not Rise indicates.

An indication of those issues central to Fairburn's poetry (which is primarily concerned with the end and value of human activity— not unusual for a poet, but Fair-burn is unusually perceptive. I think) is given in a stanza from "For an Amulet"

"What truly is will have no end Although dented by friends or foe.

And this I tell to foe and friend. As onward to the grave we go." It is in the great variety of ways in which Fairburn looks into "what truly is" and proceeds to tell all persons, regardless of affiliation, what he finds, that his strength and vitality He. The recognition in the last line only serves to give his poetry greater firmness and direction, as this end of human activity is subsumed in the present awareness that

"We know in the instant of joy that our warrant is sure.

Our faith not vain, our being not belied by death."

Strength and vitality, firmness and direction, are substantially ensured by Falrburn's control over his material, both words and matter. Close scrutiny of many poems throughout the collection will demonstrate the sensitivity with which idea and argument are ordered, image, line length, rhyme pattern, and stanza form, are used. For example, even in the early poems there is a sensitivity to the relationships that can be forged between natural images and human activity, shown both in the simplicity of' "Wish" and the greater complexity of "The Old Bridge."

It is however, in the longer poems that the most developed and serious discussion of major issues takes place, and it is in these poems, especially 'To a Friend in the wilderness" and "The Voyage", that we see the most complete expression of Fair-burn's skill. To make this more explicit it would be necessary to quote many pieces which in the first instance would indicate only those qualities already mentioned, and would destroy their real sign-ificance. It may be sufficient for the purposes of this review to say of these poems, and by implication of many in this collection, that they are "major New Zealand poetry", "major" in that they do not need the proective garment of "New Zealand made" to justify them, and yet "New Zealand", in that their qualities of thought and expression possess an individuality which is not solely that of the poet himself, but also of the country to which he belongs.—B. P. Opie.

There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written or badly written -Wilde.

A man of great common sense and good taste: meaning thereby a man without originality or moral courage.—Shaw.

Corporations cannot commit treason, nor be outlawed nor ex-communicated, for they have no souls.—Coke.