VERBAL FLY-FISHING

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 78, 20 December 1940, Page 14

VERBAL FLY-FISHING

Sir-Could an absolute outsider — a neutral, so to speak-have the impertinence to butt in upon this little war between "Thid" and "John Doe"? Strictly speaking, my remarks are addressed to "Winchester" (Auckland), with regard to his letter in this week’s Listener. It recalls to mind a remark I heard recently that there was "no worse snob than the literary one." Fancy a company of people daring to class themselves as "cultured company" who would hardly tolerate a man who could not scan a Greek or Latin verse at sight Millions to-day cannot scan an English verse at sight, or at any time, and yet are cultured. Admittedly it must have been very thrilling in the House of Commons during debates to have quotations from classics flying "back and forth across the House like machine-gun bullets in May." What a pity one of the "gentlemen of classical education" with (Continued on next page)

(Continued from previous page) an énterprising eye to the future had not jotted them down in shorthand as they flew about. He might have compiled an intriguing little book. I know quite a few who would have purchased a copy, but this practice, unless done to keep their wits sharpened, was obviously a form of airing their knowledge, and when boiled down amounted to a lofty form of ping-pong in working hours, and, by the way, I expect that to "knock the stuffing out" of a man, does, according to "Winchester," sound more cultured than giving "‘Itler ’ell." What I, the neutral, would ask, is who does the most real good in the world, regardless of creeds, cults, etc.? I leave the finer pleasures of metaphorical "flyfishing" to others.

NEUTRAL

(Petone).