The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1894-10-14
POETRY ANDPROSE
The Essential Principle
of Poetic Art.
REAL AND IDEAL UNITED.
Professor Howison Before the
Charming Auxiliary.
NOVEL WRITING AS A FINE ART.
Mans Great Works of Art Accepted
by Nature as Its Own
Kin.
NOVEL WRITING AS A FINE ART.


lors of the First Unitarian Church.
THE artist" said the professor. rs
seer whose eye pierces to the secret to
which The natural fact is the sign and
prophecy. He is magician whose hand
releases the spirit imprisoned In mat
ter and transforms the brute token Into
the breathing and speaking body.
"What makes a poem poem is the en-
b1dmens In it of some element OF actual
experience set in the light of its own ideal.
an ideal, however, which must fit into the
ideal of human nature. The theory rests up
on the doctrine that the final truth of nature
and of man is one and the same: that the
IDEAL law of nature-the pred estined end
toward which it moves by force of its own
immanent Ideals Identical with that re-
vealed in the human mind as the ideal of
man. Such writings as exhibit this healthy
and truly prophetic imagination that
moves along the lines of eternal law COM
mon to nature and man are genuine
poems; such as lack it are not.
"The doctrine that art is genuine crea-
tion-that the imaginative thought Of man
can and does literally continue the creative
work of God and expand the scale of ma
ture by writs that wortbily continue the
power of nature itself; that are true men,
bers OF nature, nay, are even higher men,
bers, may seem to many OVERLOAD, extrav-
agant or even irreverent. But its advocates
are far from being alone; they are sup
ported in it by some of the greatest human
names. We can cite in its behalf, for in
stance. the voice of Emerson, who has
stated it with impressive splendor in his
imam callad THE Problem.
Earth proudly wears the Partnenon
AS the best gem upon her zone.
And morning opes with haste her lids
To gaze upon the pyramids
Ger England's abbeys bends the sky,
AS on its friends with kindred eye;
For out of Thoughts interior sphere
These wonders rose to upper air:
And Nature gladly gave them place,
Adopted them into her race.
And granted them equal date
With Andes and with Ararat.
sit is profoundly true that 1t is not only
the quality but the test of real poem
that, like every other work of genuine art,
it possesses perpetualiy increasing in ter
est; and this is not only for the individual
reader. but for collective and historic man,
as his culture advances in successive gen.
erati0ns. Therefore poems, as with all
works OF art. not only fail of their full
effect on first view, but fail of it just in
proportion as they are great. Only the
most experienced judges can recognize u
work of the highest order on sight. Even to
them the realization of its true compass and
depth comes only through repeated exam
ination and patient study, while upon the
ordinary observer, even of good taste. the
first effect Of the greatest works Is un-
impressive and even disappointing
THE point of view from which 1 would
reconstruct our theory OF art is the trait of
arts being its own end, taken in connec-
ton with another trait-the trait of literal
creativeness. In virtue of this every true
work of art is not only union of the two
coDtrasted elements-the actual and the
ideal-but an indivisible unit.
What makes poem poem Is ths fact
that there 10 presented in it, in a rounded
whole OF vigorous unity, theme of real
ideality-a theme founded in actual ex-
perience, but TRANSPORTED in the light of
that ideal. borne within ii. which unites it
at once with the reality of nature and
with the Supreme Ideal toward which all
nature moves. This creative embodiment
must be in the genuine medium of thought
and language. avoiding all those mere.
tricious effects. exaggerations and exirava-
gances that come of attempting TO force
thought and speech out of their natural
province and make them ape the fnuc tions
Of music. or painting. or sculpture
avoiding. in short, the fault $50 common)
of the false mimicking of external nature
by that whose proper function is only to
suggest its ideai-the fault of over.melo-
diousness. oyer-description, over-delinea-
tion."
Speaking of the distinction between the
substance of poetry and prose, and
whether prose should be admitted to the
sisterhood OF fine arts, the professor said:
st is plain that since poetry is creation
it cannot be limited to composition in the
form of verse unless we can show that
imaginative creation in the medium of
thought and language demands verse as
its only expression. But to this there are
two fatal objections. In the first place it
is fact that some OF the greatest poems lose
nothing vital to their poetic character by
being translated into an diversified form
witness the book of Job, the translation OF
the Odyssey by Butcher and L ang; and
John Carlyle's version of the Inferno of
Dante. In the second place there are
unversified works of genius that are
unquestionable poems; for instance, Cole
ridges wonderful fragment, The Wan
derings Of CAIN DE Quinc ey's Vision
of Sudden Death and the Dream Fugue'
that follows it. his Flight of Tartar
Khan and Jean Paul Rchter's Dream
''In fact verse aud poetry are quite dis
tinct Verse may sometimes be the form
of poetry, but Il has nothing necessarily
to 90 with its essence; verse of high
order is frequently void of all poetry, and
poetry is often independent of verse. We
must either add to our list of the fine arts
woodworking. pay-writing and writing
such as De Quincey's tieces and these
others, or taks poetry as including them.
Prose in its strict Sc nse as the antithe-
sis of poetry proper, is an art com bining
the mechanical and decorative in one;
and oratory. the highest form OF prose,
illustrates this fact with the greatest of
clearness"