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The Thunderer of Otago

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A Critic Criticised.

From the New Zealand Sun.

The town is rather amused with the conduct of the editor of our contemporary, in respect to the Caledonian Society's prize poems, lie and four other gentlemen were appointed a short while back judges of the poems for which prizes were offered. The judges gave in their decision when it appeared that, whilst the other four were unanimous, my lord of the Daily Times, dissented. At the meeting, at which this was announced, our reporter applied for a copy of the prize poem. The rival editor considered all the poems should be left to the tender treatment of the Daily Times but the meeting thought otherwise It was put to the vote, and the decision arrived at that the Sun should have a copy. We duly published it. Days elapsed, when at last the Times came out with an astounding article on the subject. The prize poem was worthless, commonplace, sickly, the majority of the judges incapable, the one minority, the expert editor himself, was the only one who knew anything about poetry. We can only faintly do justice to the egotism displayed. The remarks about poetry were couched in the terms, which many people affect who make Wordsworth their model, but which are wholly alien to the noble truthfulness of thought and feeling which characterised that great poet. However, we need not waste time in describing the spurious Wordsworth school, for it is well known.

The names of the five judges were as follows:—The Rev. D. M. Stuart; Mr Pope, Acting Head Master to the High School; Mr Hislop, Secretary to the Education Board; Mr Bathgate, Manager of the Daily Times company; and Mr Barton, editor of the Daily Times. The last named gentleman was the one minority, but in the Daily Times he in plain terms, gives it to be understood that his four fellow judges were incapable. There is no modest diffidence displayed, no qualified statement that so and so is his opinion, and that he believes he is correct. He places himself on a pedestal of infallibility—"Among the thirty poems sent in, there are only two which can be said to display any poetic power whatever, and of these two one has not even been honorably mentioned by the four judges. We think it our duty to the public, to the Caledonian Society, and to the writers of these poems, to publish them with the successful one. A perusal of the three will leave no doubt in the mind of any competent critic as to the woeful mistake which has been committed in this matter." The italics are our own, the opinion they express of his fellow judges should not be overlooked. It is not for us to palliate the insult they offer to men of recognised educational acquirements.

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But a judge who holds such an exaggerated notion of his powers should at least be impartial. There is evidence to the contrary in the sundry strictures. The judge tries to make out that the prize poem, the Exile's Reverie, is an altogether inferior production to the second piece, which is a Reverie upon sunset. He commences his slashing criticism of the former with the following remarks—"The very subject is common-" place, Exile's Laments, Exile's Returns, and Exile's Reveries "have been written with so much tedious sameness by a herd" of versifiers ever since emigration began that readers of poetry, "have grown sick of the word, and unanimously vote Exile a" nuisance. It would test the most creative intellect of the day" to write originally on such a theme, or to support a single "fragment of reflection with even the appearance of novelty" about it. * * * And later on, had no composition "been sent in of greater merit than that of the Exile's Reverie," the judges would have been justified in declining to make any "award at all. But in making their award, they not only" selected a piece of the most ordinary character, but they "absolutely overlooked the only pieces which were worth con-" sideration. Such a result can only be taken to mean that the "Judges concerned are not competent to offer an opinion on "literary matters. That impression is confirmed by their "Report. They recommend that, in order to enable the Judges "to 'compare' the competition poems on a future occasion, a "subject should be selected for the competitors; and they re-" commend 'The Colonist' as a subject lor the purpose. This "is perfectly absurd. It carries an odious smell of the school-" master's desk about it. The Judges ought to know that the" mere selection of a subject is in itself an index to the writer's "capacity; and they ought also to know that it is not the "business of critics to 'compare' but to analyse. The special "subject which has taken their fancy is a ludicrous illustration "of their taste in poetry. They want heroic verse on a stock "subject, in the fashion prevalent in schools. 'The Colonist' "is only another name for 'The Exile;' the subject is much "the same. It is not one which any poet would choose for "himself, for it is not particularly suggestive of poetry."

Putting on one side the insolence of the allusion to the Rev. Mr Stuart, formerly principal of a school, Mr Pope, and Mr Hislop, contained in the sentence "it carries an odious smell of "the schoolmaster's desk about it," can anything be more unfair than to fasten the stigma of being commonplace, on the subject of an Exile's Reverie, and to omit a like reflection in reference to the other subject. No theme has been more dealt with by versifiers than Sunset. Reveries on Sunset have been written by the thousand. We make no complaint of it on that page iii score, for, in fact, to the true poet it matters little whether a subject is new or old. Nothing but malevolence could have led the critic to such comments; he could not have been unaware that sunsets and clouds and melancholy moonings have been much more versified than exiles It is hard to believe also that he was sincere in supposing that the latter subject "is "not one which any poet would choose for himself." He must have heard of, if he has not read, that exquisite poem concerning an exile—Enoch Arden.

The attempt to bring Wordsworth in was ingenious—pity the ingenuity was not exerted in a better cause. There is no poet whose whole opinions, thoughts, and feelings more belie the notion that he would see anything to complain of in a commonplace subject.

Wordsworth was indeed universal in his notions of the subjects with which poets might properly deal. Neither was it part of his creed that an artificial taste is necessary to the appreciation of poetry. This is the creed our judge wants to maintain, it is a favorite one of the pedantic school. It is to this all the sneers are directed about competent critics, standard of taste, &c. It is a creed which wrongs mankind, for it denies to the majority of men the power of enjoying poetry, it encourages the poetry of priggishness, it would crush out, if it dared, Burns, or even Shakspeare.

We venture with becoming modesty to express our opinion on the side of the four judges. The subject of either an exile or a colonist is a noble one for a true poet to treat. Comparatively little has been done in it; thousands of poems teeming with original ideas might be founded on it. The conquest not by arms but by religion, by art, by science, by indefatigable energy, by toil, by endurance, and by suffering, of the new world by the denizens of the old, comes within the range of the subjects named. In itself, the migration of civilized man, with all the surroundings of transplanted knowledge and civilization, is a poem.

We venture further to endorse the opinion of the four judges as to the merits of the "Exile's Reverie." It is neither common place in itself nor its ideas. Nor is the metre "the most familiar" and the most easily handled." The language is forcible and well chosen, and the imagery correct.

This is more than can be said for the second poem, which our judge is so anxious to uphold. It is unequally written, the metre incorrect in places, the language sometimes involved, and the leading image false. Imagery, especially when it is borrowed from nature, should be rigidly correct. The man who said he "smelled a rat, he saw it floating in the air," was laughed at, and so also the poet opens himself to ridicule who supposes page iv that the clouds shine on the sun. Such an idea is no doubt original, but not so nature's usual operation, the sun shining his farewell to the clouds, and lighting them up with his departing rays We venture to think that the few lines about gold tinged clouds which Walter Scott wrote before he was twelve years of age were true to nature, and incomparably better, for the sentiment is healthy. It is the hysterical school girl who loves melancholy musings; crude poets minister to the want, and as in Sunset, ape Miss Landon, and "weep for the living, not for the dead" The thing is very stale. Its morbid tone is Sunset's worst fault, otherwise it is not without merit. The imagery of the sun summoning back the dispersed clouds, though not original, is well expressed, and in some respects the poem is respectably strung together. The writer is capable of better things, if he or she would condescend to be natural. The fault of young poets, strained affectation is conspicuous.

In respect to the originality of the poem, we incline to believe its ideas, besides the unluckly light dispensing clouds, and the seeping for the living &c., original to a certain extent, but clothed in language not altogether original. In no disrespect to Mr Infallible, we say there is abundant evidence to those accustomed to literary analysis, to prove that he knows something of the author and his intentions. We do not come to the conclusion of the judge's knowledge solely from the violent prejudice he exhibits and the unfair attack he makes upon the other poem. In parts of the article there are evidences of his being familiar with what the author of the poem is familiar. For example, there is no particular reason for intruding the few lines from Tintern Abbey, but the writer evidently knows the lines well and likes to air his knowledge. The author of the poem has also unquestionably read and knows the lines to Tintern Abbey well. Again our judge in a strange manner goes out of his way to quote Wordsworth's lines to a Rainbow. He quotes them apropos of nothing. They are much inferior to Campbell's poem on the same subject. If a rainbow required to be referred to poetically, it would have been better to have selected Campbell's lines. But the judge was evidently well acquainted with Wordsworth's lines, and with some difficulty managed to squeeze them in. There is about those lines evidence that the writer of the poem "Sunset" is well acquainted with them. In them "be" is made to rhyme with "piety" and in Sunset "me" is made to rhyme with "imagery."

However it is not worth while following out this line of evidence further. Whilst acquaintance with the author may, to some extent, explain, if not excuse, the savage onslaught our judge makes upon the innocent prize poem, it rather makes worse than better his insolent treatment of his fellow judges.