Voices On The Wind - Second Series 1924

Edited and Arranged by S. Fowler Wright.

Published by: The Merton Press Ltd., Abbey House Westminster, London. SW1
1924

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        It is somewhat over twelve months since the first volume of this series was issued.

        A second impression was required within six months of publication, and it is still in steady demand.

        Its success has justified an arrangement by which a similar volume will be issued annually in future.

        The aim of the series is not to be either exclusive or comprehensive in character, but to form an annual of contemporary verse, either by known or unknown authors, much of which might be otherwise forgotten, and which is the aggregate indicates the poetic tendencies of the time, both on their creative and perceptive sides.

        It is inevitable, in a book of this kind, that the whole of the contents will not appeal equally to any one reader. If it were otherwise I should be condemned as incompetent for the work I have undertaken.

        There has been a tendency during recent years for preference to be shown both by the critic and the anthologist for certain morbid elements in contemporary poetry, to which they have given prominence, until it has been made to appear that they have been made to appear that they have been its dominant characteristics, and as though portraits of women 'about to be hanged', are not merely origins of poetic inspiration, but are the only ones deserving of serious consideration.

        I believe the theory of art to be entirely false, and the assumption of fact to be mainly fiction.

        To the extent to which the latter has been substantial, - and the critics did not invent the morbidity which they advertised, - I am content to know that such slight influence as I have had has opposed it consistently, and I am glad to realise that its day is already darkening.

        Even in the short interval since I wrote the preface to the previous volume, there has been a perceptible change of tone and outlook, and writers of the order of Messrs. Lawrence, Flint, Eliot, and the like, can no longer issue their abortions in the comfortable certainty that criticism will approach them on respectful knees.

        Even the fiction of D.H. Lawrence is no longer a revelation unquestioned, and a writer in the English Review rudely suggests that there may be some people of decent instincts in the world which his genius has disregarded.

        It is true that the poetry of Thomas Hardy is still on its central pedestal, but there is a noise of approaching crow-bars, which may shortly cast it to a contempt which may not be entirely merited.

        I suppose that the poetic tendencies of any period may be appraised more justly by a consideration of its 'minor' poetry, than by the work of its occasional genius, but I do not know that anyone has yet defined a 'minor' poet successfully.

        When I endeavour to resolve the question I find that quantity is the essential requisite of the major poet, even though the most part of his production be of an unreadable quality.

        A minor poet should be one who produces only minor poetry. Yet Fitzgerald is classified among the 'minor' poets by the historians of the last century's literature. I suppose that he would have been a major poet beyond challenge had he published his admitted masterpiece amidst a bulky volume of inferior verse.

        Would Coleridge have been a major poet had he published nothing but 'Christabel', 'The Ancient Mariner', and 'Kubla Khan?'

        Would the remainder of his published verse have separately sufficed to win him any continuing fame whatever?

        These are curious questions, which could be applied to most of the 'major' poets with equal relevance.

        We approach the a formula. The work of a major poet is equal to that of two minor poets, one of whom would be remembered, and one forgotten!

        I am not contending that this is a volume of 'major' poetry. Even were it true, it would be useless to say so, for the first credential of a major poet is a death certificate. But here, at least, is much of freshness and variety of beauty for those of open and responsive minds; and some poems at least which may win to a permanent recognition, which they might otherwise have failed to reach.

        What prospect of immortality would there have been for Alice Meynell's 'A Shepherdess of Sheep' had her literary work begun and ended with that one poem, and had it appeared only - its most probable fate - on the magazine page of a local newspaper?

        If Miss A.D. Johnson were a voluminous writer I believe she would rank among the very first of our women poets. As it is, her work is almost unknown except to those who seek the best for themselves, and is only accessible through the media of magazine and anthology.

        To-day there is a revived interest in poetry, which is the more hopeful because it is a movement from below not from above. I believe it to be gathering force, and that it will sweep into deserved oblivion the preferences of poetry which have masqueraded successfully during recent years.

        One of the conspicuous results of this movement has been a keen demand for anthologies, in preference to the work of any individual author. In this I think the public instinct is sound. In average quality and in variety of form and content an anthology, even moderately well-chosen, must be superior to the work of almost any single mind.

        There is another reason. The professional poet, even of the first rank, - and none would admit it more readily, or more generously - cannot control his inspiration, and, just because he is a professional poet, he will produce much which is rather of the nature of exercises in verse than authentic poetry, and the fact that it may be very skilfully written does not remove it from that category.

        The occasional writer, - the amateur, if you will, - when at his best may write bad poetry, or (more probably) good poetry badly expressed, but 'verse' as distinct from what is poetry at all he is less likely to perpetrate.

        It is a difference which criticism does not always sufficiently recognise; but which the general reader - the lover of poetry, who is not necessarily a technicist - instinctively appreciates.

        These volumes - 'Voices On The Wind' - are confined to the work of writers in Great Britain. A companion series - 'From Overseas' - represents the work of Dominion and Colonial authors.

Abbey House, Westminster. Feb. 1924

INDEX

THE TEMPTATION OF PERCIVAL.

PUBLISHER'S ANNOUNCEMENTS

POETRY OF TO-DAY

RECOMMENDED BOOKS OF NEW VERSE.

SCENES FROM THE MORTE D'ARTHUR

S. Fowler-Wright

SOME SONGS OF BILITIS.

S. Fowler-Wright

JUST PUBLISHED.

Poets of Merseyside        2/6 and 3/6

Birmingham Poetry 1923-4        2/6 and 3/6

NOW IN PREPARATION.

A Manchester Anthology        2/6 and 3/6

Some Yorkshire Poets        3/6

FROM OVERSEAS        3/6 and 5/- net.

An Anthology Of Dominion And Colonial Verse.

        This is the first of a companion series to Voices on the Wind.

Its intention is to introduce the contemporary poetry of the various centres of literary culture scattered throughout the English-speaking world, both to each other, and to English readers.

First Published 1922.        VOICES ON THE WIND.        (First Series)

An Anthology Of Contemporary Verse By Nearly A Hundred Of The Best Of Our -Living Poets-

With a Preface by S. Fowler-Wright.

        A companion Volume representing the best work of Dominion Authors is now in preparation.

THE EMPIRE POETRY LEAGUE.

Headquarters: Abbey House, London, S.W.1

President: Sir Arthur Quiller Couch, M.A., D. Litt.

Chairman: L.H.B. Knox, Esq.

Vice-Presidents:
Miss Lillian Baylis.The Rt. Hon.
Sir Frederick Black, K.C.B.Sir Gilbert Parker Bt., P.C.
Dr. F.S. Boas, LL.D.Mrs. Dorothy Una Ratcliffe
Clive Carey, Esq.Sir Landon Ronald.
The Countess Of Carrick.Mrs. Jopling Rowe, R.A.
Mrs Paterson Cranmer.E. Marston Rudland, Esq.,
W.H. Davies, Esq.Sir Owen Seaman.
Oliver C. de C. Ellis, Esq.Henry Simpson, Esq.,
Capt. Gilbert Frankau.Miss Muriel Stuart.
Miss Rose Fyleman.Miss Sybil Thorndike.
The Hon. Lady Gordon.E. Temple Thurston Esq.,
Sir Sydney Lee.Hugh Walpole, Esq.,
Dr. Habberton Lulham.Israel Zangwill, Esq.
Thomas Moult, Esq. 

Vice-Presidents and Representatives of Colonial Branches:

Dr. L.H. Allen (Duntroon, Australia).

Mrs. Ida M. Cooke (Wellington. N.Z.)

Dr. P.S.G. Dubash (Karachi)

Dr. Ernest Fewster (Vancouver)

D.O.H. Holland, Esq., (South Africa)

Fredoon Kabraji, Esq., (Bombay)

Dr. J.D. Logan (Toronto)

J.E. Clare MacFarlane, Esq. (Jamaica)

Mrs. D.H. Wilcox (Syndney, N.S.W).

Hon. Sec.: Miss Fowler Wright, Abbey House, Westminster, S.W.1.

Hon. Treasurer: Mrs. Hamilton Scott, 9, Queen's Gate Gardens, S.W.7.

Auditors: Messrs. Trevor Davies & Co., Basinghall Street, E.C.

        This league is a fellowship of those who are interested in poetry, and are banded together with a view to extending the love and knowledge of all imaginative literature.

        Full particular's, programmes, &c., can be obtained on application to the Hon. Sec. as above.

Loren H.B. Knox, Chairman.

End of this file.

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