New-York tribune., 1916-07-22

And one more. "The Messages:
81 cannot quite remember.
There were five
Dropt dead beside me in the trench
Whispered their dying messages to
me.
Back from the trenches, more dead than
alive, -.
Stone-deaf and dazed, and with brok-
en- knee,
He hobbled slowly, muttering vacant
ly:
al cannot quite remember. :
There were five
Dropt dead beside me IN the trench,
and three
Whispered their dying messages to me.
"Their friends are waiting, wondering
how they thrive
Waiting a word in silence patiently
But what they said, or who their friends
may be,
81 cannot quite remember. .
There were five
Dropt dead beside me In the trench
and three
Whispered their dying messages to
me
OF the second part Of the book, en-
titled Friends" the poems to Rupert
Brooke are first in Importance as they
are in place. The second sonnet, which
we quote, is the finest poetic tribute
to the soldier-poet we have yet read:
Once in my garret-you being far away
Tramping the hills and breathing up
land air,
Or so | fanced- in my chair,
watched the London sunshine feeble
and gray
Dapple my desk, too tired to labor
more, :,
When, looking up, saw you standing
there,
Although I'd caught no footstep on the
stair,
Like sudden April at my open door.
Though now beyond earth's furthest
hills you fare, -.
Song-crowned, immortal. sometimes it
seems to me
That, if ] listen very quietly,
Perhaps III hear a light foot on the
stair
And see you, standing with your angel
air,
Fresh from the uplands Of eternity.
Charles Wharton Stork. who has
translated the poems of Gustaf Frod-
ing, says in his introduction to the
volume: ain the long array of dis
tingushed Swedish poets the most
striking and probably the greatest fig
ure is that of Gustaf Froding.
The visionary gift appears in poems of
almost Shelleyan ideal beauty and his
power Of dramatic narrative has viril-
ity which makes the work Of Kipling
seem journalistic" This may be the
sincere expression of an admiring
critic, but it is a rash statement for a
translator TO put in his preface. Will
he, we Immediately wonder, live up to
it? Mr. Stork. we regret TO say, does
not. After rousing our expectation in
this way he presents us with volume
of mediocre poems. Surely the most
striking of long line Of distinguished
poets" cannot be TO blame. We sus-
pect il must be the translator.
We turn, therefore, with some curl
osity to "Sea and Bay" an original
volume of Mr. Stork's. Our suspicious
are confirmed. "Sea and Bay" is long
narrative poem, much after the man
ner of Robert Frost, but lacking the
condensed emotional value or imag-
NATIVE power of North of Boston"
( 1t is the life story Of man told in
/ the first person, and it may be real,
/ but it is certainly dull. Reality may
excuse a thing for existing. but not for
( existing in poetry. This is the danger
/ of the trail which Mr. Frost has blazed
| He trod the common path on winged
/ feet, but he has made it, alas, safe
/ and alluring for the more pedestrian
poet.
madonna Dianora" is the second
| short play of Won Hofmannsthal pub
/ lished in the Contemporary Dramatists
Series by Badger. The translation is
/ by Harriet Betty Boas and is infinitely
| better than that Of the first play
/ death and the Fool" Nevertheless
reading this play Immediately after the
poems of Gustaf Froding. we are led
to question the general advisability OF
poetic translations. There is nothing
original or striking in the conception
of this little triangular tragedy. Its
value must lie in Won Hoffmannsthal's
/ lyric power, of which the translator
| gives us but a suggestion. Poetry is
the most condensed Of all forms. To
translate it into poetry, 10 preserve Its
meaning, to recreate its beauty and
above all to recapture the spontaneous
impulse which inspired it is a work SC
/ difficult that only a master should at.
tempt II. And perhaps not even a
master. For he had better put his ef-
fort into original work.