Bendemeer Bing?

New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 332, 2 November 1945, Page 8

Bendemeer Bing?

‘THAT Regency Sinatra, Tom Moore, was the subject of 3YL’s latest "Lives of the Poets" broadcast; how he sang his songs in melting and yearning accents and how young ladies fainted before him in heaps and rushed into his cabin to kiss him-who said anything new ever happened? Nor, I am afraid, are his songs yery much superior to those of his, latter-day successors. You can turn on the wireless any day and hear Mr. Sinatara, Miss Shelton, Miss Lynn, old uncle B, Crosby and all singing songs which are fully equal to "I never loved a dear gazelle to charm me with its soft brown eye, But when it came to know ‘me well and loved me it was sure to die." Examine this, or "Believe me if all . . -’ or "Bendemeer’s stream," in cold blood and it is impossible to deny the comparison. And the broadcaster declared that it was really Tom Moore who started the Romantic Revival. ("In the eighteenth century there was really ‘very little of what we should call poetry. The stately classical style of Pope .. ." It is really time somebody was burnt at the stake for propounding this doctriné to an innocent public.) Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron and others merely followed in his wake. Well, the dates may-though I doubt it-bear this out; but the programme concluded with an incidental verse addressed to Moore by Byron, and the contrast afforded by the vigour and virility of Byron was startling. In spite of this rather vehement grousing, I enjoyed the broadcast; it gave a clear picture of Moore’s life and the anecdotes, especially. that of the duel, were excellent.