New-York tribune., 1922-05-21

., pDSsio'e 10 ADMIT that many of
naoaeiaife' poems are ashes in the
mouth. mat they are often forced and
meretriciously decadent, that in "my
Heart Laid Bare" he laid nothing hars
except many poor epigrams and Mat.
Iuoes; put it Is not reasonable to dem
ms influence upon literature or tho
oclcacy of several of his poems or the
er1ucai inclslveness of his prose. of his
sure sense OF certain phases OF beau
~: Wilson finds in Baude
ia're letters to his mother that he had
shoddy soul and a natural mode Of
expression which is sloppy and inde-
slsivc' and ne concludes that Baude
Ialre style, his attitude, his poetry
ere an anectations. But Baudclaire
vas at pains to assert this very THING.
mat was the base Of his creed Of
"Dandyism," His theory was that one
must assume an attitude, in art as in
me- II he have it not. Pose always,
was hls admonishment. And he suc
ceeded, l think. rather we'll at it.
:,,; Wilson told me that he had
read read ulysses and considered it proba-
n,ls ,he greatest prose work of
,he twentieth century in English;
ne found in it, too. passages from
wnich ne asserts Ezra Pound took
ld1oms directly and used as his own:
and that he felt that Joyce had Jared
very badly in life, had probably lived
IN soualid surroundings in Dublin, met
with misunderstanding and disdain and
that has sensitive soul had been
scorched thereby. But Ernest
BOYD and others who know Joyce de-
scribe his life in Dublin as being only
little more INDECENT than the aver
age, and this largely on account of
his own wild schemes for making mil
mons and his actual lack of any eco
nomlcal or financial sense. Erd
Brandt introduced me to Samuel Mer-
Win. the novelist and short story
fellow with slight paunch and a bald
spot. =. Read George Jean Nathan's
THE Critic and the Drama" which
contains the soundest theory of the
function of criticisms that I have en-
countered. No one since Shaw writes
more entertainingly of the theater or
has so many provocative ideas. But
Nathan pushes his skeptcism to q too
logical conclusion. He ends often by
saying whats the use?" and in CON
sequence has never made the most Of
his abilities. His essay called "The
Unimportance of Being Earnest" is
one OF the few original contributions
to aesthetic analysis; but his intellect
sclntillatcs often only for the intel
lectual practical joke he is always
playing whereby he may have his little
laugh on the reader
MAY IL
READ a piece in "The Atlantic
~ Monthly" this morning bv Jomes
Stephens, which is the silliest nonsense
you can imagine. Think of the author
of "The Crock Of Gold" writing such
hollow and pompous sentence as "It
is safe to predict that America is en-
terlng upon a renaissance of litera-
ture!" Ernest Boyd tells me
that Stephens never reads American
books. but that he is incredibly fond
Of "Tip Top Weekly" which he buys
gave him "Jurgen" and ne refused to
read it. Then Harold Loeb, the editor
of Broom" who idolizes and flatters
Stephens, came along and bought for
high price the copy of "Jurgen"
Stephens had given away, told Stephens
he ought to read it. and this Stephens
did, going about afterward in high
state Of enthusiasm about it.
Saw Fanny Hawthorne" tonight and
it impressed me no less than when |
first saw it some years ago in Chicago
as "Hindle Wakes" 1t is, I believe,
one of the great modern English plays.
GPENT the afternoon nosing about
~ the bookshops and bought more
books than l can afford, 80 when Ter
ence Holiday tempted me further with
new and expensive edition Of the
letters Oscar Wilde wrote Ross from
Paris after his imprisonment I sat
down and read them ALL They are
pathetic and tragic documents, from
beaten, broken, chastened but un-
changed man, who describes his char
acter as non-existent and his position,
airily, as "of the criminal class" dis
illusioned and fallen favorite, grimly
philosophical about the increased ha-
tired his prosecutors bore him be-
cause they could merely imprison him
and not satisfy fully their sadistic
frenzy. Ernest and Madelaine
Boyd and Ruth and Robert Wiseman
came up in the evening, and Madelaine
told some anecdotes about James Ste
phens and the monocle he acquired
when he was appointed to post in the
National Gallery in Dublin. Boyd and
Mrs. Wiseman got into an argument,
precipitated by. my wife when she said
that it was high time for women to
write some novels telling the truth
about men as women see them, observ-
ing that May Sinclair and the author
of elizabeth and Her German Gar
den" had riddled targets that were too
easy, for the men they depicted were
utter imbeciles. Boyd maintained that
if women began to write what they
actually thought of men the race would
be doomed, because the truth would be
devastating and would remove all the
props from mans silly vanity. We all
agreed that women writers always
adopt a masculine view of men; but
Ruth said she didn't think women had
the same complexities troubling them
that men have or that they were as in
prospective as men. Boyd said she was
prompted in this by the feminine in
stinct to protect the women's trade
secret lest the earth lecome trackless
| waste.
MAY IA
MRS. FARRAR, mother of the editor
I'A of "The Bookman," had break
fast for John Dos Passos, John Weaver.
Kenneth Andrews, Milton Raison, John
Farrar and myself, after which | was
astounded to learn that Weaver thinks
that something must be done about the
younger generation, which, he thinks
is carrying things too far. He and
Farrar are greatly concerned with the
endangered morals of the younger set.