Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Salient. An Organ of Student Opinion at Victoria College, Wellington, N.Z. Vol. 2; No. 6 April 26, 1939

A Matter of Principle

A Matter of Principle

The announcement that "The Criterion" has ceased publication brings students at V.U.C. face to face with two problems—what is the immediate future of creative literature, and what are we to have in the library to replace "The Criterion"?

"Last Words."

In "Last Words", the editor, T. S. Eliot, says:

"I have wondered whether it would not have been more profitable, instead of trying to maintain literary standards increasingly repudiated in the modern world, to have endeavoured to rally intellectual effort to affirm those principles of life and policy from the lack of which we are suffering disastrous consequences."

As he makes clear elsewhere in the article, Eliot does not mean that literary standards can be left to take care of themselves. He intends, I think, a change of emphasis. "The Criterion" followed a policy in which the emphasis fell on literary criticism. By its termination, Eliot evidently hopes to leave himself and the "Criterion" circle more time for more important work; i.e., affirming principles, not only of literature, but of "life and policy."

Propaganda?

Since It was the threat of war which two years ago first made him think of suspending publication, and since that threat has not decreased, possibly Eliot intends to devote more intention to politics. Otherwise it is hard to say what form his "affirmations of life and policy" will take.

Eliot is a Rightist, but a Rightist with no sympathy for an order "in many respects inferior to that which threatens to supersede It." He stands for monarchism, Anglo-Catholicism, and other causes we may doubt the virtue of; but he also stands for honesty, culture and intelligence, in government as in Art. The affirmation of these values, in a world ruled by people who deny them, is the more important work, it seems to me, for which he has given up "The Criterion."

Values.

"Literature", said Matthew Arnold. "is at bottom a criticism of life." it isn't; but the statement serves to indicate one of the most important functions of literature. Criticism of life involves the study and affirmation of values. To-day when genuine values are everywhere disregarded, this function must be the foremost, as Eliot has seen. Does this mean taking sides in politics? We may not know the answer; but we should know that the problem arises.

What About Us?

When "Scrutiny"' vanished from the library shelves (why?) "The Criterion" remained the only really first-class literary magazine reaching V.U.C. Accordingly, for those interested in modern English. French and American literature, the loss of "The Criterion" is something of a disaster. The serious students of English cannot afford to neglect modern French and American work because at the top the three cultures meet. For example, two of the foremost figures in literature today, Eliot and Pound, were born in America, write considerably in French, and were greatly influenced by French authors. Therefore to those ignorant of French, the greatest English literature of the century may be not quite a closed book, but certainly a book with many leaves uncut. English criticism cannot, and does not, ignore French. Yet how many of our M.A.'s in languages know more than a line or two of Baudelaire and Verlaine, or have even heard of Rimbaud ("the greatest source of pure lyricism since Villon") or de Nerval, Corblere. Laforgue, Perse, Breton? A paper knife for these uncut leaves was provided by "The Criterion" and "Scrutiny"; we must have the latter bark and find a substitute for the former.

Better still, let us have a complete overhaul of our literary periodicals—we can afford only the best. We could toss out "L'Illustratlon" and "Les Annales." for example, and take the "Mercure do France" and "Etudes Anxlaises" instead, for the same price. The last-named recently had an article on contemporary N.Z. poetry—I wonder whether there is more than one copy of it in this country?

For our library, I suggest:

Transition New Verse
Scrutiny Mercure de France
Twentieth Century Verse
Etudes Anglaises
Life and Letters To-Day.

Why not? Most Honours students in English and French won't notice the difference: but those who, taking literature seriously, treat a degree with the contempt it deserves, will appreciate the change.

—H.W.G.