NOTES

New Zealand Tablet, 10 March 1921, Page 26

NOTES

Dunsany When somebody asked him how he acquired his style, Lord Dunsany replied that his mother forbade him to read the newspapers and made him read the Bible. And as nothing con Id be more removed from the abomination of journalese” than Dunsany’s prose, so, too, there is nothing in English that is so saturated with the poetry and the beauty of the Old Testament. From the Bible he got his limpid clearness and his wonderful rhythm prose like his is the only suitable medium for the expression of the rich fantasies of his Celtic imgaination : and even readers who find no great delight in his fancies are carried away by the melody of his words. W. B. Yeats said of him that he “has imagined colors ceremonies, and incredible processions that never passed before the eyes of Edgar Allan Poe or of De Quincey, and remembered as much fabulous beauty as Sir John Mandeville.” Whether he tells us of strange cities and peoples, or of fabulous worlds and deities, or of spiders larger than a ram, or of the dragon-crocodile whose cry was like the sound of a church bell that had become possessed of an evil soul, or of nameless horrors and of birds that* shudder with fright, he clothes his tales in language in which the stately power of the Bible is illuminated by the true Celtic spirit. Of his visions, Ernest Boyd says: "Lord Dunsany’s visions appear far away from the life of our time because of his inventiveness, which has allowed him to dispense with even those roots in the past to which his contemporaries cling. The marvels he describes for us are 'often but the simplest

phenomena seen through the eyes of a poet, the rustling of the sands on the seashore, the weird noises of the night, the dancing of butterflies in the sun. At his touch . these things take on the wonder and mystery which the Celtic imagination has descried everywhere in nature. That Lord Dunsany should have opened up a new region of fantasy does not constitute him an alien in the old mythological and legendary world of Ireland. His people are of, the same stock as their ancestors, children of romance and beauty."

The Sea He loves the sea like every Irishman, and he has a predilection for old sailors that Irishmen will understand. In The Coming of the Sea we have his fancy at its highest flight. Imagining an attempt made by Slid and his host of waves to capture the green earth, ho tells us how Slid by his waves overcame the four winds, and after sending them limping back to their masters, said: "Wo have met this new thing that has conic upon earth and have striven against its armies but could not drive them forth; and the new thing is beautiful but is very angry and is creeping towards the gods.” The gods sent "a great array of white cliffs” to defend them, but the rocks were shattered until the downlands were called upon to halt, the army ot Slid, who not being able to advance "crooned a song such as long ago troubled the stars” : and the song went on moaning, awaking pent desires till the rivers heard it and crept down to find the sea: "they cam© behind the white cliffs, splitting them here and there, thus making an opening for the army of the waves.” Then the gods were angry and called upon their eldest-born, the Mountain Tintaggon, which was made of black marble, and Tintaggon stood firm and beat back the attacks of Slid and of the fixe oceans he had summoned to his aid. The sea was beaten but the fight max' one dav bo resumed :

"Sometimes in their dreams, the war-scarred warriors of Slid still lift their heads and crv their battlecry ; then do dark "clouds gather about Tintaggon's swarthy brow and ho stands out menacing. . .The gods know well that, while Tintagffou stands they are safe • _ • • whether Slid shall" one day smite Tiutapreon is hidden among the secrets of the sea."

Babbulkund Here is a description of one of his dream-cities; I will arise now and see .Babbulkund, city of marvel. She is of one age with the earth the stars are her sisters. Pharaohs of the old time coining conquering from Araby first saw her. a solitary mountain in the desert, and cut. the mountain into towers and terraces. . . She is carven, not built: her nalaces are one with her terraces; there is neither joint noi cleft. Here is the beauty of the youth, of the world. She deemeth herself to bo the middle of the earth, and hath four gates facing outward to the nations.” But the end of Babbulkund came. A day dawned when winged lions no longer flitted like bats about he city, when the alcove of opal wherein the King sat was gone, and the gorgeous streets were no more. The plot was carefully prepared. A traveller in the desert heard a whisper of it at night. "All that night the desert said many things softly and in a whisper, but f knew not what he said. Only the sand knew and arose and was troubled and lay down again, and the wind - eW c ; i ]lc wen all was ready a wind came out of the South and “the sand lifted and went by in great shapes all whispering : and there were little cries among them and the sounds of passing away.” Perdondans, BabbulkundV beautiful rival, was' overcome in the same way. “The Tents of the Arabs” The lure of the desert called 'Dunsany 'from his youth and its voice is heard in many of his stories. In The Tents of the Arabs a King lingers a year in the desert and allows a camel-driver to usurp his throne

rather than declare his identity. The King loves ■ a gypsy girl, named-Eznarza, and Mr. Boyd points out that the love-passages between the two are reminiscent of Synge. There is the rhythm of poetry in the line's they speak. Eznarza says: "We shall hear the sand again whispering low to the dawn wind/' and the King replies: "We shall hear the nomads stirring in their camps far off because it is dawn." In Eznarza's last words there is an echo of the wonderful prose of Deirdre: "I will raise up my head of a night time against the sky, and the old, old unbought stars shall 1 twinkle through my hair and we shall not envy any of the diademed queens of the world," "Yeats, Synge, ' A.E./ and James Stephens'see Ireland illumined by the beauty of old legends and traditions," says Mr. Boyd. "Dunsany is carried by this re-awakening of the spirit into a world beyond the Kim , All have the same dream of beauty, which enables the'hi to transfigure reality."