Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-12-01

~ table. Beside them was Amy Lowel''s
Tendencies in Modern American Poetry"
There were Ezra Pounds latest book, n
collection of new verse edited by Alfred
kreymborg, Vachel Jndsey's Chinese
Nightingale and other Poems," Wittcr
Bynner's "Grenstone Poems." Matthew
Arnold's excellent selection of Words
worth's best verse and some others.
Priscilla Ames, who had come in with
Doctor McFabro and Dick owen, was
turning the leaves of volume after vol.
ume.
"Oh, you've got Amy Lowell's booi.
she exclaimed as soon as her eye caught
the title.
II like her poetry" she explained.
"Of course you do" said |. "She is
New Englander and so are you. She is a
sister of President Lowell. of Harvard
University, and she is woman of high
social standing. She can command at
tention where others less fortunately
affected by the accident Of birth are un-
heard. You New Englanders are clan.
nsh."
"That is not kind thing to say re.
marked The Lady. who had entered tho
room in time to catch the last sentence.
mot if you look at it in tho right
way" / explained "Clannishness, prop
erly understood, is one of the finest hu'
man traits. 1t is what keeps families
together 1t is what makes cities great
and prosperous. 1t is only patriotism
| in another guise. have no sympathy for
[ internationalists. When you attempt TO
spread the sentiment of patriotism over
| the whole world 1t becomes so thin that
| there is nothing left of It, not even loyalty
| to a group"
Hear. Heart" exclaimed Owen.
| IL am glad you agree with me-" said
! ]. "You will also agree with me when
! | say that concentration is the essence
| Of all virtues as we'll as the virtue of all
! essences.
Clannishnes is only "a form of concen-
| tration. But we are getting a long way
| from Amy Lowell. ! am not at all sur
prised that Priscilla admires her. She is
u woman of great intellectual gifts. 1t Is
my present opinion, subject to revision
that she is greater as a critic than as a
| poet She calls herself an imagist and
|
way of saying that she has fallen vic
| tim to the allurcments of the latest poetic
| fad and uses u verse form so different
| from that to which we have been accus-
| toned that it repels rather than attracts.
| The plain man who could read Burns or
| Wordsworth with understanding and de-
| light would turn in despair from the
verse of the imagists,"
What is an imagist?" Doctor Nc
! Fabre asked, as he picked up Wordsworth
! and began to read the great "Ode on In
timations of Immortality"
"I do not think the world is much more
seem to be-" replied. "It is matter that
occupies the attention of those who still
care more for the technique than the sub
stance of poetry. Yet one who wishes to
| understand all the intellectual move.
| ments, the little ones as well the big
ought to know something about the new
movement in poetry. of which imagism
is a feature Miss Lowell tells us that
imagist verse is verse written III conform
ity with certain tenets voluntarily adopted
by the poets as being those by which they
consider the best poetry to be produced.
The primary purpose of the imagists is
to produce a picture or image in the
mind of the reader. They discard rhythm
and use what they call cadence instead.
If I understand them Alright they think
that the ordinary rhymed metrical verse
bears about the same relation to great
poetry that the music of a hymn tune
bears to the Tannhaeuser overture. II
is perfectly comprehensive theory
Some poetic things have been produced
according to it's formula Miss Lowell
says that Hilda Doolittle, daughter OF
Professor Doolttle, director of the Flower
Observatory of the University Of Penn
sylvania, is one of the greatest of the
imagists. She admits that John Gould
Fletcher and herself are the other tive
of the noteworthy trilogy of American
imagists. Here is something of Miss
DooHttles. 1t is from "The Helmsman":
o be swift
we have always known you wanted Us.
We fled inland with our focks,
we pastured them in hollows,
cut off from the wind
and the salt track of the marsh
We worshiped in land
! we stepped past wood-fowers,
we forgot your tang,
we brushed wood-grass.
. We were enchanted with the fields
! the tufts of coarse grass
in the shorter grass
we loved all this
But now. our boat climbs-hesitates--
L drops
| climbs-hesitates-cra back
o be swift
we have always known you wanted us.
II can see the shore of the sea, IL
marshy tracts and the sheltered places
and / can see the boat struggling witt
the waves. 1t is all so true" exclaimed
| Priscilla.
| Whether you call it poetry or not
there is something fine in it," / admitted
| Her poem on 'Circe,' in which th'
| woman who could entice all men to he
i Iamapts tho absence of the one man q