WHILE ENGLAND LASTS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 29, Issue 740, 18 September 1953, Page 13

WHILE ENGLAND LASTS

THOMAS BEWICK, by Montague Weekley; Geoffrey Cumberlege, Oxford University Press. English price, 21/-. ALTHOUGH attempts have been_ made at various times-and especially in our own’ age-to construct a pure aesthetic that dispenses with the necessity of "subject matter," there is no doubt that much of the world’s greatest art derives its power from the artist’s love for this or that aspect of the world as directly perceived by ‘his senses. What are nowadays called "formal values" are, of course, indispensable: and it is undoubtedly possible to go to the limits of geometrical abstraction and produce a true wogk of art. Nonetheless, the landscapes of © Constable and "Rembrandt’s portraits (to mention only two examples) would lack the ‘greater part of their meaning if they were not also a record of. the artists’ loye of nature and humanity, expressed with urgency and directness. It is this same "truth of affection" that gives to certain quite modest works of art a quality of greatness. Among these no clearer instance can be found than the wood-engravings of Thomas Bewick, commonly reckoned the leading English artist in this field. They exemplify, too, the capacity of the English school to render sentiment without sentimentality. Bewick was born in 1753 and died in 1828, The publication of this beauti-fully-produced book coincides with his bicentenary. The binding, title-page and typography are of such high quality that one would be glad to have the book on one’s shelf for these things alone. But Mr. Weekley has given us a really good biography of Bewick, which provides a a vivid picture of the man and his times. Bewick was anything but the dul] and conscientious craftsman, True,

he did a vast amount of hack-work to make a difficult living; and in this, no less than in, his best work, he was always conscientious. But he had character and Aitality, and his reactions to social and political life (in what. was certainly a pretty bad period) were those of a man of spirit. Bewick was versatile, and handled a great variety of subjects, in ‘many moods. His social satires bring him close’ to Hogarth, and his imagination encompassed the most bizarre fancies at times. But it is by his pictures of birds and beasts, and of country ‘scenes, that he will always be best known. There is nothing pretty-pretty about them. Their charm is heightened by the. concreteness, even earthiness, of ‘the artist's vision. He was no day-tripper, but a solid countryman. Like all the great artists, poets and essayists of the peculiarly English tradition to which he belonged, his genius lay in fusing fact with imagination, and in proclaiming what Keats called "the holiness of the heart’s affections." The admiration aod love he inspired in England (undiminished to this day) are nicely expressed in some lines quoted by Mr. Weekley. They were inscribed in a copy of the History of British Birds belonging to Lord Ravensworth, and are supposed to have been written by Tennyson’s younger brother Arthur: j A gate and a field half-ploughed, A solitary cow, 2 A child with a broken slate And a titmouse on a bough. But where, alas, is Bewick, To tell the meaning now? .

A.R.D.

F.