Lisping in Numbers

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 782, 16 July 1954, Page 4

Lisping in Numbers

JOURNAL called Numbers has just announced itself as a quarterly "aiming to reflect and foster movement in the Arts of New Zealand." It is apparently to be the latest, but not the last, of the small magazines which are carried with banners and a faint sound of trumpets across the literary scene. Some of them have had serious purposes, have printed good writing, and have deserved a longer life than could be given them in a small market. There is, however, not much room here for the publication which exists merely to provide a coterie with its own platform. The luxury is too expensive. It is natural for younger writers to be iconoclastic; but sometimes, when they announce their intention of pulling down the idols, we wonder what they propose to offer -as substitutes. Nothing is to be gained by complaints and large, cloudy generalisation. "New Zealand," says the Numbers editorial, "is rapidly taming any artist whose attempts can be seen as existing outside the borders of the established order of shopkeeper values and suburban living." The genuine artist cannot be tamed, even by the need to earn a living as well as to express himself creatively. Moreover, the older writers, who apparently are now hopelessly suburban, had to work under much harder conditions than are known today. In spite of a smaller market and a complete lack of patronage, they were able to produce work of some value. They will presently be replaced by younger men with new ideas and clearer voices; but they will not be replaced by thore who strike out blindly, or who enlarge their personal frustrations in a myth of the wicked society. There can be agreement with Numbers that "nothing is more needed than a breath of cultural fresh air." It is

always needed, and is provided whenever someone writes perceptively of the life around him. But something more is suggested. "We wish Numbers to represent the voice of the contemporary artist in this society: not the fellow who is busy glorifying the ripe, rotten and dying to the already deadbut he who is trying to make of his death a living thing-some-thing which affects the rest of us -in the face of the easier virtues which much of New Zealand society and its ‘art’ would impose upon him." It is surely a-little late in the day for this sort of juvenile nonsense. As far as can be judged from a badly written editorial, the intention is to publish experimental or outspoken writing which presumably could not be printed elsewhere. A handbill announces that "early issues will contain works by many of our best-known writers, some new..." It is not explained how new writers can also be well known. The interesting point, however, is that the names of future contributors include several poets of distinction who seem to have no difficulty in publishing their work. Perhaps they are among those contributors who, according to a bland statement in the editorial, "have known nothing of plans to issue this publication. Our presentation of their work may even give them offence." The general impression is of haste, inadequate preparation, and undefined purposes. New Zealand writing has suffered much from an amateurish outlook. No service is done to letters by people who play at publication, who imagine that a few more poems, parables and short stories can save the arts. What is needed is some hard thinking and good writing. The platforms are already there, and will become stronger as artists learn better how to use them,