LAND & WATER 
August 10, 1910 
have recently been produced, will be familiar with some 
of their names, (it-crgian poetry is in its essence Aery 
different from the Victorian poetry which preceded it. 
It has a quaUty of its own, a cpiality not easy to define 
but very perceptible in its effects. The Victorian 
poet loved his art for its art's sake. The f Georgian poet 
loves his art as something which docs not remove him 
from the actual conditions of life, but which makes him 
keenly interested in all its material embodiments as well . 
as in its practical conduct. Tennyson, we might say, 
was a solitary artist, preoccupied with questions of 
technique. 
Men like James Stephens, I.ascelles Abercrombie, 
William Davies and others, ha\e no siich preoccupation. 
They arc, as a matter of fact, often careless of their 
metrical structure, and mere technical accomplishment 
as such does not seem to appeal to them. They are 
realistic or naturalistic, using their jioetic phraseology 
to give form to what they have discovered about the 
world and about men. The spirit m which they write 
is more important to them than their actual accomplish- 
ments. Robert Browning's work represents a sort of 
transition between the Victorian verse and the (leorgian. 
Much of what is written in our times might be fathered 
by Browning : little or nothing is dependent on either 
Tennyson or Swinburne. John Masefield appears to be 
the biggest of these men. He has a strongly dramatic 
gift, as he has shown both hi Potnpey the Great and in 
his 'more recent work Good Friday. If Ralph Hodgson 
had dor.e nothing else than write his poem about 'Uic 
Bull, he would still have done a memorable thmg, while 
if one wishes to find a characteristic piece of Wilfrid 
Wilson Gibson, one need not look further than the 
remarkable little study which he entitles Hoops. Some- 
times we find a hard kernel at the core of Georgian poetry, 
something a little crude, possibly immature. 
Rupert Brooke, who leapt into very deserved popularity 
accentuated by the tragic episode of his early death, 
has produced one or two superb pieces and written one 
or two superb lines. But if we take his drama Lithuania, 
we shall discover that there was an underlying stratum 
v»'itliin him, acrid and unpleasant, which he would 
most assuredly have grown out of had he -only lived. 
\nd Mr. Gordon Bottomley's curious play King Lear's 
Wife, apart from much that is spirited and elevatmg, 
especially in the character of the youthful (.oncril, gives 
here and there an impression of aridity at the heart. 
Mrs. Woods, though she emphatically belongs to the 
Georgian poets, in the way she attacks her subject, in 
the structure of her verse and in her general treatment 
of her themes, has attained to a level of artistry appa- 
rently beyond the reach of most of her colleagues. 
A French Critic's View- 
In a recent number of the Revue des Deux Mondes, a 
competent French critic, M. Emile Legouis, discussed the 
views on war taken by certain celebrated English writers. 
It is always interesting to note the fashion in which what 
is tolerably familiar to us appeals to a foreign mind, for 
it helps us to correct insular judgments even where we 
cannot altogether accept the point of view. In the pre- 
sent instance it is easy to see that the French critic is a 
little disappointed. He discovers in the attitude of 
English writers on the war a certain curious detachment, 
as though they were composing their books not under the 
pressure of an appalhng crisis, but in circumstances 
pleasantly remote from the crucial interests. He finds 
this d':tached standpoint not only where we should all 
expect it, in the case of (ieorge Bernard Shaw, but also 
in G. K. Chesterton, and to some extent even in John 
Galsworthy. Rudyard Kipling is, of course, a thorough- 
going Imperialist ; he has always been imbued with a 
military spirit and filled with an intense admiration for the 
deeds of our soldiers and sailors. But we can well under- 
btiLvA how difficult it is for the French mind to comprehend 
;i writer like Mr. Chesterton. 
Mr. Chesterton produces a book for instance entitled 
Tiie Crimes of England, his purpose being to show 
that any well-read Englishman could arrange a catalogue 
of wrong-doing on the part of our nation far more com- 
l)leic and exhaustive than the list of crimes produced, let 
us say, by a German critic. Biv, the whole intention of 
the autiior is. as we know 011 this side of the Channel. 
purely ironic. And there is another attribute of Mr. 
Chesterton which must be singularly bafHing to foreigners, 
just as it is to some extent baffling to ourselves. Mr. 
Chesterton's ordinary procedure is to advance through a 
series of more or less brilliant paradoxes to arrive at a 
conclusion which is quite orthodox and commonplace. 
He executes a number of somersaults, in order to prove 
that he is really walking with his feet firmly planted along 
a customary path. If one takes too much notice of his 
jKiradoxes one might for a moment be induced to think 
that he wasan inconoclast, but his conclusions are so sane 
that we sometimes rub our eyes in wonder at the tortuous » 
paths by which he has led us. A process of this kind must 
be very confusing to a logically-minded Frenchman. 
Writers of Fiction 
Mr. H. (">. Wells has done some brilliant work, but he 
writes under all the disadvantages which usually weigh on 
the head of a prophet when he is confronted, not with his 
own dreams, but with stark reality. Possibly one of the 
best things he has done in recent days is the yet 
unfinished book Mr. Britling sees it Through, which. is 
coming out in the columns of a weekly newspaper. 
The importance of Mr. Galsworthy's work will be more 
obvious to a future generation tlian it is to ourselves. 
For Mr. Galsworthy was and is an ardent pacifist, and was 
therefore confronted at the outset with the serious task 
of reconsidering his jjosition in view of current events. He 
has carried out his self-examination with all that con- 
scientious care and that love of ideal justice which have 
animated I)oth his dramatic and his novelistic tasks for 
some time past. He has convinced himself that the war 
is just and necessary, and his contributions to the subject 
are 3,11 the more valuable because they come from a 
man of singular honesty of mind, of delicate sensitive- 
ness and of the highest idealism. His recently publisheu 
Diagnosis of the Englishman which, if I remember riglu. 
was published in an Amsterdam paper, was an extremely 
acute and convincing piece of criticism. 
Men like these, however, have made their reputations. 
There remain others who are still making it. The war 
has put many difficulties in their way, but it is to their 
credit that they ha\e pursued their respective paths 
imbued with the idea that art is eternal, whereas the war 
is, and must be from the highest point of view, merely 
temporary. There are a number of interesting young 
EngHsh novelists — Mr. Gilbert Caiman, for instance, Mr. 
J. D. Beresford, Mr. \\. L. George — who apparently 
have a future before them. Mr. Hugh Walpole has 
made a great advance on his past work by writing The 
Dark Forest. Mr. D. H. Lawrence is a more puzzling 
jjersonality, for with all his undoubted cleverness he has 
curious traits and propensities which do not make the 
perusal of his work altogether a pleasant exercise. In his 
recent study of certain Italian towns. Twilight in Italy, 
there is a strained love of symbolism which tends to spoil 
the picturesque beauty of some of his effects. Mr. E. M. 
Forster, who wrote Longest Journey and Howard's 
End, has a distinct and most curious originality from 
which much may be expected in the future. Mr. Arnold 
Bennett I do not refer to, because ever since he wrote An 
Old Wives Tale his reputation has been secure. One of 
Our Grandmothers, by Ethel Coburn Mayne, is a novel of 
distinct promise. 
Oddly enough, the most dominant figure among con- 
temporary novelists is not an Englishman at all, but a 
Pole. No one has a more arresting personality than ^Ir. 
Joseph Conrad. From the time when he published 
Almayer's Folly, in i8g5, down to his most recent romance. 
Victory, he has shown most of the gifts of a consummate 
artist— not always popular, not always Eppcaling to the 
reading public, but exercising an influence over his con- 
temporaries which seems likely to endure and prevail. 
By the courtesy of the proprietors of Punch, L.^nd 
& W.ATER was able to publish, in its Empire Day number, 
Mr. Bernard Partridge's cartoon " To Victory." This 
seemed so appropriate to the present situation that wc 
republish it in this " Two Years of War " special number. 
It appears on the cover, and the jiroprietors of Land 
& Water have to thank Mr. Richard Haworth, 23, 
Preston Road, Blackburn, for his courteous permission 
to use it. he being now the owner of the original 
