All vision fades, but splendor does not fail And hopes the heart of man will know are vain Samuel Roth PERSONALITY IN POETRY Poetry enables us to share many experiences, the epic desires and agonies of great cities, the homely triumphs and tragedies of field and farmhouse, the lyric pleasure of cool woods, subtle picturing, grave symbolism, and the zest of fluent ideas and emotions. In addition to all this, poetry enables us to share one other thing, a sense of that mysterious human inflorescence which we call personality. By virtue of his sympathetic imagination, a good poet enters many spiritual mansions and entertains many ghostly visitors. Often he knows more about us than we know about ourselves and about each other. For his proper study is mankind. Practical persons must always be concerned with facts, deeds, and events. But the poet is chiefly interested in that impulsive energy which is the causation of facts, deeds and events-the human spirit. A detective, for example, may be clever enough in using his constructive imagination, to learn that a certain old woman has stolen a diamond and hidden it in her stocking. But his achievement is small as compared with that of the poet who tells her story. For the poet will reconstruct her world and show it to us. Through his eyes we shall see her eager old face, her nervous, twitching fingers. Through his penetrative power we shall learn why she wanted the diamond. And he will cause us to share a definite feeling with regard to the theft-pain, disgust, compassion-as the case may be. This feeling will be strong and moving in proportion as the poet possesses the gift of characterization. Modern civilization, on the whole, has been favorable to the development of this skill. Many contemporary poets take up their task of presenting personality in poetry with an equip ment of knowledge that poets of earlier generations lacked, or had only by intuition. The growth of the spirit of democracy in the modern world has enabled many sorts of men and women to meet socially and for the transaction of business. We have travelled more than was ever possible in earlier eras. Each of the world's great metropolitan cities has become a small internation, affording every facility for spiritual interchange between national and racial types. Whenever we read a newspaper we are made aware of the needs and problems of people thousands of miles away. We eat food which they prepare for us, and we ourselves prepare other foods for them. It has been shown that we are all interdependent to such an extent that necessarily any great war must involve us all. All of the world is beginning to know all the world as neighbor. That is how it happens that a poet of to-day may have a broader knowledge of mankind than was possible for poets of an earlier period. But that is not all. In addition to this breadth of vision, which may be his if he wills it, he has the means of testing and deepening his knowledge of men and women. Science has destroyed many illusions, but it has fostered many faiths. Biology has shown us the marvellous ascension of life throughout all the ages. Psychology is explaining man's mind, the microcosm. All of the so-called exact sciences have stimulated the minds and imaginations of progressive persons by revealing laws and forces more wonderful than any of the miracles man dreamed. Dogma, always the bane of poets, is giving way before the pure love of questing for truth which Science implants in her devotees. Through science, as through democracy, we are learning more about ourselves and about each other. By the love of truth and by the love of the people poets grow wise for their work of interpretation. Therefore it is not strange that many contemporary poets are keen students of character and apt in their presentation of personality. Moreover, by virtue of being poets, they are able to make their presentation of character concise, vivid, emotional, and impressive in a degree not possible to most writers of prose. Perhaps that is why we remember poems like "The Everlasting Mercy," "Dauber," "Hoops," "A Hundred Collars," "Snow," and many others more readily than we remember any of the hundreds of short stories that we read in magazines. Short prose fiction must be the work of genius, like good narrative poetry, if we are to remember it. It seldom is. Gordon Bottomley is one English poet who excels in the presentation of personality. In his dramatic poem, "King Lear's Wife," he gives us a totally new conception of the fabled king. He teaches us to sympathize with the queen, Lear's wife. This poem is stark, uncompromising, grim and ugly realism from beginning to end. But it is unforgettable. Each character is like a heroic statue rough-hewn from granite. The work has been cruelly done. The expressions on the stone faces are cruel. But we have a sense of certainty as to the truth of it. Goneril, who despises her sister, Regan, describes her in the following vigorously scornful lines: "Does Regan worship anywhere at dawn? The sweaty, half-clad cook-maids render lard And Regan sidles among their greasy skirts, It is most unlovely, of course, and so also is the conversation of the common women who come to bathe the dead queen and dress her in grave-clothes. But it is a work of genius that the reader can never forget. Wilfrid Wilson Gibson is also a realist, but kinder. He writes about the people of our twentieth century world, chiefly about the English laboring class, men and women of the mines, the factories and the farms. He knows their life. He interprets it adequately. He gives us a true sense of the oppressive weight of poverty upon mind and heart, of the danger and difficulty of manual labor, of the bitterness of undeserved defeat. But he gives us also a sense of the sweetness and sanity of the respectable poor and of the dignity of the soul of the people. He writes about plain men and women with sagacious simplicity. But one thing he seems to be unable to do. He can not individualize them. We do not remember them as we remember Scrooge, Tiny Tim, or Mr. Pickwick. Mr. Gibson creates types rather than individuals. But a type, after all, is only a generalization from kindred qualities in many individuals. And the able presentation of a type is no mean achievement. As types, these people in his verse belong everywhere. The workman he describes is a real workman. The mothers he describes are real mothers. In his fine little dramatic poem, "On The Road," he tells the story of the ordinary man and the ordinary woman and the ordinary baby, all hungry because the ordinary man is out of a job; and all a little bit unhappy but very plucky. That is the whole story. But it is admirably told. As types, these people could hardly be better presented. Unlike Mr. Gibson, Walter de la Mare has, in his own shadowy way, a real genius for the presentation of individual personality. His poems are all combinations of twilight shades, charming compositions in violet, ivory and olive. But his pictures, made with colors that would seem to be evanescent, succeed in fixing themselves indelibly in our minds. Who can forget "Miss Loo" when once he has been properly introduced to her in the poem that takes its title from her name? "When thin-strewn memory I look through, I see most clearly poor Miss Loo, Her tabby cat, her cage of birds, She made some small remark to me.' John Masefield is known the world over as the poet of the wanderer and the outcast, and, in his narrative poems, rough men and women are presented in masterly fashion. They are |