To begin at the beginning, I shall of course be pleased to meet
Josephare if he come this way; if only to try to solve the problem of
what is in a fellow who started so badly and in so short a time was
running well, with a prospect of winning "a place." Byron, you know,
was the same way and Tennyson not so different. Still their start was
not so bad as Josephare's. I freely confess that I thought him a fool.
It is "one on me."
* * * * *
I wonder if a London house would publish "Shapes of Clay."
Occasionally a little discussion about me breaks out in the London
press, blazes up for a little while and "goes up in smoke." I enclose
some evidences of the latest one--which you may return if you remember
to do so. The letter of "a deeply disappointed man" was one of
rollicking humor suggested by some articles of Barr about me and a
private intimation from him that I should publish some more books in
London.
Yes, I've dropped "The Passing Show" again, for the same old
reason--wouldn't stand the censorship of my editor. I'm writing for
the daily issues of The American, mainly, and, as a rule, anonymously.
It's "dead easy" work.
* * * * *
It is all right--that "cry unto Betelgeuse"; the "sick enchantress"
passage is good enough without it. I like the added lines of the poem.
Here's another criticism: The "Without" and "Within," beginning the
first and third lines, respectively, _seem_ to be antithetic, when
they are not, the latter having the sense of "into," which I think
might, for clearness, be substituted for it without a displeasing
break of the metre--a trochee for an iambus.
Why should I not try "The Atlantic" with this poem?--if you have not
already done so. I could write a brief note about it, saying what
_you_ could not say, and possibly winning attention to the work. If
you say so I will. It is impossible to imagine a magazine editor
rejecting that amazing poem. I have read it at least twenty times with
ever increasing admiration.
Your book, by the way, is still my constant companion--I carry it in
my pocket and read it over and over, in the street cars and
everywhere. _All_ the poems are good, though the "Testimony" and
"Memorial Day" are supreme--the one in grandeur, the other in feeling.
I send you a criticism in a manuscript letter from a friend who
complains of your "obscurity," as many have the candor to do. It
requires candor to do that, for the fault is in the critic's
understanding. Still, one who understands Shakspeare and Milton is not
without standing as a complaining witness in the court of literature.
* * * * *
My favorite translation of Homer is that of Pope, of whom it is the
present fashion to speak disparagingly, as it is of Byron. I know all
that can be said against them, and say _some_ of it myself, but I wish
their detractors had a little of their brains. I know too that Pope's
translations of The Iliad and The Odyssey are rather paraphrases than
translations. But I love them just the same, while wondering (with
you, doubtless) what so profoundly affected Keats when he "heard
Chapman speak out loud and bold." Whatever it was, it gave us what
Coleridge pronounced the best sonnet in our language; and Lang's
admiration of Homer has given us at least the next best. Of course
there must be something in poems that produce poems--in a poet whom
most poets confess their king. I hold (with Poe) that there is no such
thing as a _long_ poem--a poem of the length of an Epic. It must
consist of poetic passages connected by _recitativo_, to use an opera
word; but it is perhaps better for that. If the writer cannot write
"sustained" poetry the reader probably could not read it. Anyhow, I
vote for Homer.
I am passing well, but shall soon seek the mountains, though I hope to
be here when Scheff points his prow this way. Would that you were
sailing with him!
I've been hearing all about all of you, for Eva Crawford has been
among you "takin' notes," and Eva's piquant comments on what and whom
she sees are delicious reading. I should suppose that _you_ would
appreciate Eva--most persons don't. She is the best letter writer of
her sex--who are all good letter writers--and she is much beside. I
may venture to whisper that you'd find her estimate of your work and
personality "not altogether displeasing."
Now that I'm about such matters, I shall enclose a note to my friend
Dr. Robertson, who runs an insanery at Livermore and is an interesting
fellow with a ditto family and a library that will make you pea-green
with envy. Go out and see him some day and take Scheff, or any friend,
along--he wants to know you. You won't mind the facts that he thinks
all poetry the secretion of a diseased brain, and that the only
reason he doesn't think all brains (except his own) diseased is the
circumstance that not all secrete poetry.
* * * * *
Seriously, he is a good fellow and full of various knowledges that
most of us wot not of.
Sincerely yours,
AMBROSE BIERCE.
[Washington, D. C.,
June 14, 1904.]