ALL collectors of _Vers de Société_ agree that there is no possibility
of an English equivalent for the French term. None exists; and the
attempts to coin one have invariably resulted in failure.
Society Verse, Familiar Verse and Occasional Verse are all wide of the
mark in one direction or another; and perhaps, after all, the simple
term Light Verse strikes nearest home.
One might suggest Gentle Verse, but it would be with the restricted
meaning of the adjective that is applied to the courteous and
well-bred; the innately fine, polished by the experience and
sophistication of truly good society.
Gentlefolk are never excessive. Their enthusiasms are modified, their
emotions are restrained, their humor is delicate. As a result of wise
and intelligent culture, their tastes are refined, their fashions
correct. They breathe the air of polite worldly wisdom, which endows
them with a gracious ease, and removes all trace of self-consciousness.
D’Israeli says, “Genius is not always sufficient to impart that grace
of amenity which seems peculiar to those who are accustomed to elegant
society.”
Gentle Verse then, would imply lines written of the gentlefolk, for the
gentlefolk, and by gentlefolk.
Society Verse is an inadequate term, because Society has come to
include both the gentle folk and the others.
Familiar Verse, though staunchly defended by one of our foremost men
of letters, allows a latitude of informality that is too liberal for
a precise equivalent. Occasional Verse is ambiguous, and Easy Verse,
absurd.
_Lyra Elegantiarum_ is an adequate translation, but not into English.
And none of the graceful titles yet chosen by our modern poets from
“Brightsome Balladry” to “_Lingerie de Poesie_” has as yet fulfilled
all requirements.
* * * * *
Granting then that there is no perfect English translation of the
French phrase, and accepting _Vers de Société_ as our field, we are
again confronted by great difficulties and embarrassments in defining
its boundaries.
One of the greatest masters of the art, Mr. Austin Dobson, gives us
twelve definite rules for our guidance; but of these, only three refer
to the matter of the poems, the others being advice as to manner.
Though manner is equally important, yet the choice of matter for _Vers
de Société_ depends upon certain definite characteristics.
But to limit these characteristics is to ask the question, “who shall
decide when doctors disagree?” The scholarly gentlemen who have devoted
special attention to the matter, advance conflicting opinions.
Frederick Locker-Lampson, doubtless the greatest master of the
art, both in a critical and creative way, allows wide latitude of
discretion. But so infallible is his individual judgment and so
unerring his taste, that it is with him, a case of “Know the Rules, and
when to break them.”
He asserts that “_Vers de Société_ by no means need be confined to
topics of conventional life.”
Contradicting this, is the word of W. Davenport Adams, whose collection
of “Songs of Society; from ANNE to VICTORIA,” admirably supplements Mr.
Locker-Lampson’s earlier collection.
Mr. Adams tells us that “_Vers de Société_ should be applied to the
poetry of fashionable life alone; should be limited to the doings and
sayings of the world of fashion, and should deal exclusively with such
things as routs and balls, and dinners and receptions.”
* * * * *
Our own American collector, Mr. Brander Matthews, inclines to Mr.
Locker-Lampson’s views, and therefore prefers the term Familiar Verse,
as allowing excursions outside of Vanity Fair; while Mr. Edmund
Clarence Stedman again narrows the field by declaring in favor of “the
more select order of society verse,” which he designates “Patrician
Rhymes.”
Indeed, authorities on the subject of _Vers de Société_ seem somewhat
in the position of the charming philosopher of _Wonderland_ fame:
“‘When _I_ use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone,
‘it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.’
“‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you _can_ make words mean so
many different things.’
“‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘Which is to be the
master—that’s all.’”
* * * * *
But though there is variance of opinion concerning the limits of the
field, there is harmony of conviction regarding the intrinsic qualities
of _Vers de Société_.
Mr. Locker-Lampson directs us that it should be “short, graceful,
refined, and fanciful, not seldom distinguished by chastened sentiment,
and often playful. The tone should not be pitched high; it should be
terse and idiomatic, and rather in the conversational key; the rhythm
should be crisp and sparkling, and the rhyme frequent and never forced.
The entire poem should be marked by tasteful moderation, high finish
and completeness; for subordination to the rules of composition, and
perfection of execution are of the utmost importance.
“The qualities of brevity and buoyancy are absolutely essential.
The poem may be tinctured with a well-bred philosophy, it may be
whimsically sad, it may be gay and gallant, it may be playfully
malicious or tenderly ironical, it may display lively banter, and it
may be satirically facetious; it may even, considering it merely as a
work of art, be pagan in its philosophy or trifling in its tone, but it
must never be flat, or ponderous, or commonplace.”
The remarks of Mr. W. Davenport Adams are much in the same line.
He says, “There should be little or no enthusiasm: the Muse should
not be over-earnest, nor need it by any means be over-flippant. It
is essential to ‘Society verse’ that it should have the tincture of
good-breeding;—that if it is lively, it should be so without being
vulgar; and that if it is tender it should be so without being
maudlin. Its great distinction should be ease—the entire absence
of apparent effort—the presence of that playful spontaneity which
proclaims the master.”
Professor Brander Matthews, in his able essay on the subject, agrees
in general to all these stipulations, and observes: “No doubt, Social
verse should have polish, and finish, and the well-bred ease of the
man of the world; but it ought also to carry, at least a suggestion
of the more serious aspects of life. It should not be frothily
frivolous or coldly cynical, any more than it should be broadly comic
or boisterously funny. It is at liberty to hint at hidden tears, even
when it seems to be wreathed in smiles. It has no right to parade
mere cleverness; and it must shun all affectation as it must avoid
all self-consciousness. It should appear to possess a colloquial
carelessness which is ever shrinking from the commonplace and which
has succeeded in concealing every trace of that labor of the literary
artist by which alone it has attained their seemingly spontaneous
perfection.... It must eschew not merely coarseness or vulgarity, but
even free and hearty laughter; and it must refrain from dealing not
only with the soul-plumbing abysses of the tragic, but even with the
ground-swell of any sweeping emotion. It must keep on the crest of the
wave, mid-way between the utter triviality of the murmuring shadows and
the silent profundity of the depths that are dumb.”
Mr. Edmund Clarence Stedman’s views coincide with those above quoted,
and are thus briefly summed up: “In fine, the true kind is marked by
humor, by spontaneity, joined with extreme elegance of finish, by the
quality we call breeding,—above all, by lightness of touch.”
* * * * *
These same authorities agree that not every poet may write _Vers de
Société_. To quote Mr. Locker-Lampson: “The writer of Occasional verse,
in order to be genuinely successful, must not only be something of a
poet, but he must also be a man of the world, in the liberal sense of
the expression; he must have associated throughout his life with the
refined and cultivated members of his species, not merely as an idle
bystander, but as a busy actor in the throng.”
Mr. Adams corroborates this by saying: “Although a clever literary
artist may so far throw himself into the position of a man of society
as to be able to write very agreeable Society verse, yet few can hope
to write the best and most genuine _Vers de Société_ who are not, or
have not at one time been, in some measure at any rate, inhabitants of
‘Society.’”
* * * * *
As an instance, however, of the disagreement among the doctors, the
following may be noted:
Mortimer Collins, himself a writer of _Vers de Société_, declared that
the lines by Ben Jonson, beginning,
“Follow a shadow, it still flies you;”
is the most perfect bit of society verse written in our language. And
speaking of the same poem, Mr. W. Davenport Adams says, “I cannot bring
myself to look upon Ben Jonson as a ‘society poet,’ or upon the verses
in question as a ‘society poem’ in the proper sense of the term—in the
sense at least, in which I understand them.”
So we see, that in a degree, at least, _Vers de Société_ is, like
Beauty, in the eye of the beholder.
But a consensus of opinion seems to prove that the keynote of _Vers de
Société_ is lightness, both of theme and treatment. Yet though light,
it must not be trashy. It is the lightness of beaten gold-leaf, not the
lightness of chaff. It is valuable, not worthless.
The spirit of the work depends on an instant perception and a fine
appreciation of values, seen through the medium of a whimsical
kindliness.
Let this be expressed with perfect taste and skill, and with a courtly
sense of humor, and the result may be classed among those immortal
ephemeræ which we call _Vers de Société_.