Logic and Imagination. —It proves impossible, however, to draw any
line between thinking and feeling, or between those works the chief aim
or e¤ect of which is aesthetic pleasure, and those which give aesthetic
pleasure in the production of some other e¤ect. The work of poetry is
often said to be performed by the use of images; by a cumulative succession
of images each fusing with the next; or by the rapid and unexpected combi-
nation of images apparently unrelated, which have their relationship en-
forced upon them by the mind of the author. This appears to be true, but
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e l i o t ’ s c o n t e m p o r a r y p r o s e
it does not follow that there are two distinct faculties, one of imagination
and one of reason, one of poetry and one of prose, or that “feeling,” in a
work of art, is any less an intellectual product than is “thought.”
To attempt to construct a theory with the terms I have been using
would be a futile building with straw; my remarks are only valid, if valid
they be, so far as they are destructive of false distinctions. I object to the
term “prose-poetry” because it seems to imply a sharp distinction between
“poetry” and “prose” which I do not admit, and if it does not imply this
distinction, the term is meaningless and otiose, as there can be no combi-
nation of what is not distinguished. If the writing of prose can be an art
just as the writing of verse can be an art, we do not seem to require any
other admission. Versification, in any of the systems known to European
and other cultures, brings in something which is not present in prose,
because it is from any other point of view than that of art, a superfluity, a
definite concession to the desire for “play.” But we must remember, on
the one hand, that verse is always struggling, while remaining verse, to
take up to itself more and more of what is prose, to take something more
from life and turn it into “play.” Seen from this angle, the labour of Mal-
larmé with the French language becomes something very important; every
battle he fought with syntax represents the e¤ort to transmute lead into
gold, ordinary language into poetry; and the real failure of the mass of
contemporary verse is its failure to draw anything new from life into art.23
And, on the other hand, prose, not being cut o¤ by the barrier of verse
which must at the same time be aªrmed and diminished, can transmute
life in its own way by raising it to the condition of “play,” precisely because
it is not verse.
The real decadence in literature occurs when both verse and prose
cease their e¤ort: Alexandrianism, or more truly Georgianism, is present
when verse becomes a language, a set of feelings, a style quite remote
from life, and when prose becomes a mere practical vehicle.24 The attempt
to impart motion to this lifeless condition may result in such writing as
is now pretty current in America: verse which is simply prosaic, and prose
which is simply artificial, and verse again which mimics the artificiality
of the artificial prose.
Practical Conclusion. —We must be very tolerant of any attempt in
verse that appears to trespass upon prose, or of any attempt in prose that
appears to strive toward the condition of “poetry.” And there is no reason
p r o s e a n d v e r s e
1 6 5
why prose should be confined to any of the recognised forms, the Novel,
the Essay, or whatever else there may be in English. I have heard Mr. James
Joyce’s Ulysses condemned on the ground that it is “poetry” and therefore
should have been written in verse; whereas it seems to me to be the most
vital development of prose that has taken place in this generation.25 I only
wish to take the precaution of looking upon the Monna Lisas of prose, the
drums and tramplings of three conquests, the eloquent just and mightie
deaths, with a suspicious and interrogating eye, and making quite certain
what, if any, solid and genuine bit of life they have pounced upon and
raised to the dignity of poetry.26
l o n d o n l e t t e r , m a y 1921 1
The Phoenix Society
In my last letter I mentioned an approaching performance by the Phoenix
Society of Ben Jonson’s Volpone; the performance proved to be the most
important theatrical event of the year in London.2 The play was superbly
carried out; the performance gave evidence of Jonson’s consummate skill
in stage technique, proceeding without a moment of tedium from end to
end; it was well acted and both acted and received with great appreciation.
Almost the only opportunity for seeing a good play is that given by a
few private societies, which by reason of their “private” character are al-
lowed to give performances (for subscribers) on Sunday evenings. These
are not commercial enterprises, but depend upon the enthusiasm of a
few patrons and the devotion of a few actors, most of whom have other
engagements during the week. The Phoenix, which restricts itself to Eliza-
bethan and Restoration drama, is an o¤-shoot of the Incorporated Stage
Society, which produces modern and contemporary plays of the better sort
—the better sort usually being translations.3 At the beginning of its venture,
last year, the Phoenix was obliged to su¤er a good deal of abuse in the
daily press, especially from the Daily News and the Star. These two journals are, to my mind, the least objectionable of the London newspapers in their
political views, but their Manchester-School politics gives a strong aroma
1 6 6
l o n d o n l e t t e r , m a y 19 2 1
1 6 7
of the Ebenezer Temperance Association to their views on art.4 The bloodi-
ness of Elizabethan tragedy, and the practice of the Society in presenting
the complete text of the plays, were the points of attack. The Daily News
reviewed the performance of The Duchess of Malfi under the heading, “Fun-
nier than Farce!” Mr. William Archer mumbled “this farrago of horrors
. . . shambling and ill-composed . . . funereal a¤ectation . . . I am far from
calling The Duchess of Malfi garbage, but . . .”5 Still droller was a certain Sir Leo Money: “I agree with Mr. Robert Lynd that ‘there are perhaps a
dozen Elizabethan plays apart from Shakespeare’s that are as great as his
third-best work,’ but I should not include The Duchess of Malfi in the dozen.
. . . I did not see the Phoenix production, but I hope that some fumigation
took place.”6 Sir Leo writes frequently about the Tari¤, the income tax, and
kindred topics. For my part, I am more and more convinced that the Phoe-
nix is wholly justified in its refusal to admit any expurgation whatever.
The sense of relief, in hearing the indecencies of Elizabethan and Restora-
tion drama, leaves one a better and a stronger man.
I do not suggest that Jonson is comparable to Shakespeare. But we
do not know Shakespeare; we only know Sir J. Forbes-Robertson’s Hamlet,
and Irving’s Shylock, and so on.7 The performance of Volpone had a signifi-
cance for us which no contemporary performance of Shakespeare has
had; it brought the great English drama to life as n
o contemporary perfor-
mance of Shakespeare has done. Shakespeare (that is to say, such of his
plays as are produced at all), strained through the nineteenth century, has
been dwarfed to the dimensions of a part for Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson,
Sir Frank Benson, or other histrionic nonentities: Shakespeare is the ave-
nue to knighthood.8 But the continued popularity of Shakespeare perhaps
has this meaning, that the appetite for poetic drama, and for a peculiarly
English comedy or farce, has never disappeared; and that a native popular
drama, if it existed, would be nearer to Shakespeare than to Ibsen or Che-
khov. It is curious that the popular desire for Shakespeare, and for the op-
eras of Gilbert and Sullivan, should be insatiable, although no attempt is
ever made to create anything similar; and that on the other hand the crud-
est American laughter-and-tears plays, such as Romance or Peg o’ My Heart, should be constantly imported.9 Curious, again, that with so much comic
talent in England—more than any other country—no intelligent attempt
has been made to use it to advantage in a good comic opera or revue.
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e l i o t ’ s c o n t e m p o r a r y p r o s e
Music-Hall and Revue
This is an age of transition between the music-hall and the revue. The
music-hall is older, more popular, and is sanctified by the admiration of
the Nineties.10 It has flourished most vigorously in the North; many of its
most famous stars are of Lancashire origin. (Marie Lloyd, if I am not mis-
taken, has a bit of a Manchester accent.) Lancashire wit is mordant, fero-
cious, and personal; the Lancashire music-hall is excessively intime; success depends upon the relation established by a comedian of strong personality
with an audience quick to respond with approval or contempt. The fierce
talent of Nellie Wallace (who also has a Lancashire accent) holds the most
boisterous music-hall in complete subjection.11 Little Tich and George
Robey (though the latter has adapted himself in recent years to some infe-
rior revues) belong to this type and generation.12 The Lancashire comedian
is at his best when unsupported and making a direct set, pitting himself,
against a suitable audience; he is seen to best advantage at the smaller
and more turbulent halls. As the smaller provincial or suburban hall dis-
appears, supplanted by the more lucrative Cinema, this type of comedian
disappears with it.
The music-hall comedian, however, can still be seen to perfection,
whereas the revue comedian never is, because the revue is never good
enough. Our best revue comedienne, Miss Ethel Levey, has seldom had
the revue, and never the appreciation, that she deserves.13 Her type is quite
di¤erent from that of Marie Lloyd or Nellie Wallace. She is the most aloof
and impersonal of personalities; indi¤erent, rather than contemptuous,
towards the audience; her appearance and movement are of an extremely
modern type of beauty. Hers is not broad farce, but a fascinating inhuman
grotesquerie; she plays for herself rather than for the audience. Her art
requires a setting which (in this country at least) it has never had. It is not
a comedy of mirth.
An element of bizarrerie is present in most of the comedians whom
we should designate as of the revue stage rather than the music-hall stage:
in Lupino Lane, in Robert Hale and George Graves; a bizarrerie more ma-
ture, perhaps more cosmopolitan, than that of Little Tich.14 But the revue
itself is still lacking.
l o n d o n l e t t e r , m a y 19 2 1
1 6 9
Caricature
Baudelaire, in his essay on “Le Rire” ( qui vaut bien celui de Bergson), re-
marks of English caricature:
Pour trouver du comique féroce et très-féroce, il faut passer la
Manche et visiter les royaumes brumeux du spleen . . . le signe
distinctif de ce genre de comique était la violence. 15
Perhaps the best of the English caricaturists of journalism is H. M. Bate-
man. He has lately held a very interesting exhibition at the Leicester Gal-
leries.16 It is curious to remark that some of his drawings descend to the
pure and insignificant funniness without seriousness which appeals to the
readers of Punch; while others continue the best tradition from Rowland-
son and Cruikshank.17 They have some of the old English ferocity. Bate-
man is, I imagine, unconscious of the two distinct strains in his work;
Mr. Wyndham Lewis, in his exhibition now on show at the same gallery,
is wholly conscious and deliberate in his attempt to restore this peculiarly
English caricature and to unite it with serious work in paint. Mr. Lewis is
the most English of English painters, a student of Hogarth and Rowland-
son; his fantastic imagination produces something essentially di¤erent
from anything across the Channel.18 I have always thought his design at
its greatest when it approached the border of satire and caricature; and
his Tyros may be expected to breed a most interesting and energetic race.
The State of Criticism
The disappearance of the Athenaeum as an independent organ, and its
gradual su¤ocation under the ponderous mass of the Nation, are greatly
to be deplored. It leaves the Times Literary Supplement and the London Mercury as the only literary papers.19 The former is a useful bibliographer; it fills, and always will fill, an important place of its own. This place it can
only hold by maintaining the anonymity of its contributions; but this ano-
nymity, and the large number of its contributors, prevents it from uphold-
ing any definite standard of criticism. Nevertheless it possesses more au-
thority than the Mercury, which is homogeneous enough, but su¤ers from
the mediocrity of the minds most consistently employed upon it. Mr.
Murry, as editor of the Athenaeum, was genuinely studious to maintain a
serious criticism. With his particular tastes, as well as his general statements,
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e l i o t ’ s c o n t e m p o r a r y p r o s e
I find myself frequently at variance: the former seem to me often perverse
or exaggerated, the latter tainted by some unintelligible Platonism. But
there is no doubt that he had much higher standards and greater ambi-
tions for literary journalism than any other editor in London. When he is
not deceived by some aberration of enthusiasm or dislike, and when he
is not deluded by philosophy, he is the only one of the accredited critics
whom I can read at all. There is Mr. Clutton-Brock, whose attention is not
focussed upon literature but upon a very mild type of philosophic humani-
tarian religion; he is like a very intelligent archdeacon.20 There is Mr. Robert
Lynd, who has successfully cultivated the typical vices of daily journalism
and has risen to the top of his profession; and there is Mr. Squire, whose
solemn trifling fascinates multitudes; and there are several writers, like
Mr. Edmund Gosse and Sir Sidney Colvin, whom I have never read and
so cannot judge.21
I cannot find, after this muster, that there is any ground for the rumour
current in the chatty paragraphs of the newsprint several months ago,
that the younger generation has deci
ded to revive criticism.22 There has
been a brisk business in centenaries. Keats and Marvell have just been
celebrated in this way.23 The former has been particularly fortunate. All
the approved critics, each in a di¤erent paper, blew a blast of glory enough
to lay Keats’ ghost for twenty years. I have never read such unanimous
rubbish, and yet Keats was a poet. Possibly, after the chatty columns of
the newsprint have ceased to cheer the “revival” of criticism, they will get
a tip to lament its decay. Yet the “revival” of criticism as a “form” is not
the essential thing; if we are intelligent enough, and really interested in
the arts, both criticism and “creation” will in some form flourish.
The True Church and the Nineteen Churches
While the poetry lovers have been subscribing to purchase for the nation
the Keats house in Hampstead as a museum, the Church of England has
apparently persisted in its design to sell for demolition nineteen religious
edifices in the City of London.24 Probably few American visitors, and cer-
tainly few natives, ever inspect these disconsolate fanes; but they give to
the business quarter of London a beauty which its hideous banks and
commercial houses have not quite defaced. Some are by Christopher Wren
himself, others by his school; the least precious redeems some vulgar
street, like the plain little church of All Hallows at the end of London Wall.
l o n d o n l e t t e r , m a y 19 2 1
1 7 1
Some, like St. Michael Paternoster Royal, are of great beauty.25 As the pros-
perity of London has increased, the City churches have fallen into desue-
tude; for their destruction the lack of congregation is the ecclesiastical
excuse, and the need of money the ecclesiastical reason. The fact that the
erection of these churches was apparently paid for out of a public coal tax
and their decoration probably by the parishioners, does not seem to invali-
date the right of the True Church to bring them to the ground. To one
who, like the present writer, passes his days in this City of London ( quand’io
sentii chiavar l’uscio di sotto) the loss of these towers, to meet the eye down a grimy lane, and of these empty naves, to receive the solitary visitor at
noon from the dust and tumult of Lombard Street, will be irreparable and