The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1899-08-02
The American Sapphos.

That interesting American quarterly, the
!ScTdnee Reriem, reflects the cultivation and
aspirations ofthe University OF the South,
at Sewanee Tenn. This institution, we be.
lievc. is nurtured under the High Church
wing OF the Protestant Episcopal Church
The Rerielr is published under the auspices
of the university faculty, but it bears the
imprint Of a publishing house Of New York
and London, and it's chrome-yellow cover
is seen in the North.
An article in the lSe,rdnee Reriew for July
discusses the claims OF Miss ANN REEVE
ALDRICH, q woman poet OF passion who Is
no longer living, to be considered as the
American SAPPHo. The writer appears to
imagine that in the literary temperament
OF Miss ALDRICH and in the burning verses
which were collected in the volume bearing
her name and entitled THE Rose OF
Flame" he has discovered signs OF new
movement in American poetry in the di-
rection OF frank croticism by women poets;
and. alas! he seems to welcome the same.
OF the present quality of most Of the
poetry produced by female poets he enter
tans very poor opinion. For instance:
THE idea that all poetry must be suited to the
perusa of maidens has led to its being tanned until Il
has almost ceased to interest any one for even the
girl OF to-day is fond OF spice in her reading as in
her food Female authors are generally
tame and inspd TO the last degree. This
may be better az it is. once suggested to an emf
ncnt novelist regret that women did not write as
they felt and reveal their Utmost souls, and he re-
piled that if they did 1t would make our hair stand
on end"
But In Miss ALDRICH the !Sebdnee Rerie,c
thinks it has found prophecies. founder
OF a school of women poets who will refuse,
as the Rcriep expresses it, to suppress the
emotional and animal sides of their nature,
and will burst into bloom. In the pale
Gothic garden, MS n blood-red rose flaming
with all the long buried passions OF the
South and least its Intoxicating perfume
on every breeze that blows" What tho
lSepdnee Rerie,D wants to see Is change in
the American model OF womanly perfection
from "the pale lily of the cloister, with
swan-ike neck and slender. delicate form"
and general Botticcllan and Burnc-JonCsian
attributes, to a woman beautiful, healthy
and shapely, thoroughly well developed
much like Greek statue, but with fuller
roundness OF the contours :" roundncss,
indeed, it proceeds to explain, tending to
the ford luxuriance of DELAROCHE's figure
OF the Renaissance in the great Hemicycle
Of the BeauX-Arts ut Paris"
This extraordinary High Church quar-
tcrly ranks Miss ALDRICH with SAPPHo in
some respects, but not in all. The verses
it has discovered are "of extraordinary
promise, utterng the cries and meanings
OF passion with an intensity and direct
ness worthy Of SAPPHo, though of course
without that marvellous imprint OF SUI
| premest genius that makes tho slightest
! fragment of the Lesbian scintillating
| gem" Nevertheless she Is Il pretty fair
| SAPPHo for the nineteenth century, and if
| the old original SAPPHO could have met her
| she would have hailed hcr as sister We
quote from tho ReUier established by the
faculty Of the University of the South:
| "Iu the bthe DAYS. when she sported with her
| nifty maidGps. SAprHo would not have understood
all that Miss ALpRIrH meant; hut when the mad love
| for PHAuS came and she stood upon the Leucadian
| rock ready TO quench in the purple waters ~ tho
Egeau the flames that consumed her soul. she would
have recognized IN Miss ALDRlCH n Trailer paler
sadder sister and would have clasped her to her
BOSOM"
Fine writing for IA Church and college or
gan, Isn't il ? And yet we omit things that
will hardly suit the propricties OF The
Suns columns.
] Now listen 10 the prediction OF the ardent