Surrounded by Aesthetes

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 923, 18 April 1957, Page 10

Surrounded by Aesthetes

N an interview with a visiting Australian author and educationist, printed last week, much was said that should be of interest to New Zealand. writers and readers. One statement of opinion, however, may cause surprise. Speaking of novels, Dr Colin Roderick had this to say: "The difference between the Australian and New Zealand approach arises not only from the difference in population, but also through the nature of the sub-conscious critical approach of the writer to his own work. The New Zealander comes to his work with the aesthete peering over his shoulder; the Australian sees thousands of ordinary men and women looking at him face to face." There are, it must be admitted, some New Zealanders who will agree with this opinion, though perhaps not for the right reasons. And in doing so they will have in mind the secondary meaning of "aesthete"--a person who pretends to care a great deal about beauty. In modern usage a certain taint of insincerity clings to the word. It is redolent of quaint little coffee rooms where young men in corduroy trousers discuss the more esoteric movements in art. A writer who heard himself described as an aesthete would smell an insult. Aesthetes are to be found in New Zealand, though not in large numbers: the social climate does not suit them. Their influence on writing, if it exists at all, is negligible. One probable reason why so much is made of it is the common misunderstanding about poetry. New Zealanders have done better work in poetry than in any other branch of letters. We have no great poets: there is no single name which stands as high in poetry as Katherine Mansfield stands in fiction. But the best is very good, and a surprisingly large number of men and women have produced it. Therefore it has been much discussed, and an impression has got abroad that the literary scene is peopled exclusively by poets, some of whom seem overanxious to draw attention to what they are doing. And since many people are convinced nowadays that poets, in addition to being vociferous, are wilfully obscure, a certain irritation is aroused. It will

probably be a good thing for New Zealand when novelists and other writers are not quite so heavily outnumbered by poets. There are signs that balance is already. being restored, But in the meantime the idea that all poets are aesthetes, and that New Zealand literature is too much under their influence, seems to have become prevalent, and even to have crossed the Tasman. The best poets we have known, in an extensive acquaintance with the clan, have nearly all been robust in physique and outlook. In city bars, and other places frequented by average New Zealanders, they could be taken for almost anything but poets. Far from being preoccupied with fads and fancies in the arts, they are most likely to be interested in "ordinary men and women." And although in their work they are sometimes aesthetes, in the true meaning of the word-in that they are sensitive to beauty-they are frequently laconic and satirical, A New Zealand writer who imagined these people to be peering over his shoulder would have a strong impulse to conceal what he had written-not because he felt unworthy of their interest, but because he feared their laughter. The sensation most likely to be felt beyond his shoulder would be an awareness of empty space. There are people, sometimes large numbers of them, who buy New Zealand books; but they do not clamour for the next novel; and we suspect that Australian readers can be equally passive. The significant point about Australians is that there are more of them. They also congregate in large cities, a habit which gives novelists a feeling for the crowd, a variety of theme, a stimulus of competition, and market opportunities which are not yet to be found in our thinly populated islands. Conditions here are changing, though not rapidly. But there are social and historical reasons why New Zealand writers, as they move more confidently into the future, will feel no special need to follow Australian examples. They are on roads of their own, and are still in country where aesthetes are almost as rare as the notornis.

M.H.

H.