The sun., 1919-01-12

THE COMING OF A GREAT MAGICIAN
DEL an Irishman and find magician He is
the Old Sod of myth He is an inversion,
reverson, an aavisn. He brings fairies out of fire
plugs His blackthorn is an Aladdn's lamp. His
pOrridge bowl is magic we'll His black eye,
ceived in no matter how stupid tavern brawl, he
wears as his Crox de Guerrc. The Irishman is
Baron MUNcHAUsEN, D'ARTAGNAN and Francois
WILLOW.
Lord DUNS,NY is coming TO this country TO lee
ture-that is, to have great literary
gician with Us, traveller from a fabulous dimen-
sion of the spirit. But not ghost by any means,
for he has wounds not received in Babbulkund on
the River Onnrana, but from solid shrapnel and
the singing shells in France; soldier in the Great
War, more terrible, mysterious and fateful than
any of his marvellous tales and parables-an epic
in which Nan the Achilles.
His Plays and Stories.
The plays and stories of Lord DUNsANY are a
perfect expression Of the fantastic imagination.
Not since WILLIAM BLAKE's prophetic Books =
the strangest creations in all iteraturc-have
read of such curious creatures cities, rivers and
wars The names of the creatures and cities would
alone have inspired EDGAR ALLAN POE to write i'm
mortal poems
His brain is one Of the garrets of heaven store
room of worlds. His humor, his irony that runs
through all he writes like mufied thunder clear
starlt nights, are the humOr and the irony of the
implacable gods that fling the suns into space His
stage is set the edge of the world, which is the
borderland Of his skull. The flashing temples Of
immemorial demons and galleons with purple sails
that founder in ultraviolet sunsets and mountains
that buttress gromic moons and strange kings that
are sent on secret crrands by jade and Jasper
Tishnus-of such are the Kingdoms Of DCNsANY
A Reactonary Substance.
He is a tremendous reaction against civilization.
Anywhere, anywhere, out Of the world, he
seems TO say with CHARLES BAUDEIARE. The fate
of man is bound up with his imagination. 1t is the
imagination and not KARL MARX or the Bolsheviki,
that shall set rl> free Man cannot live by banks
alone, and it is easier for Zeppelin TO 90 through
the Pyramid of ChcOpS than it is for a sentimental
soap-boY rcformer to enter the Kingdom of the
= Imagination.
Lord DUNSANY'S work leads literature back TO
its sources For literature is the unwilling Of the
eternal the imnutable, the fugaclouS 1t is, M It's
essence, the record of a myth done into words,
words selected BY master-brain, words that hold
the vision in a wise of gold and glass. Was it GAU
TIER or FI.AI BERT who said that each thought had
its one word in which it perpetually sought incar
nation! Lord DUNsANY always finds that exact
word, that exact phrase. His style fits his dream
as air fits the lungs. 1t is the prose poetry Of the
Bible-thrca,> OF magic uterancc that weave his
tale before our enchanted eyes.
Achieves His Effects.
His plays ARE plays of Doom, convincing rs
MAETlRIINCH :. without the latter faults senti-
mentality. lie stands nearer TO the of
himself than does the Belgian playwright. He
achieves his effects with Joss cfOrt-apparently In
MAETERiNcfl there is always some human reality.
In DrNSANY'S work there is only sheer fiction, Il
purely fabulous irrcaity. Unlike CHEsTERToN, he
cares nothing about the Brightness of right or the