The Letters of Annabel Lee

Radio Record, Volume I, Issue 52, 13 July 1928, Page 6

The Letters of Annabel Lee

MY dear Elisabeth: | "Little deeds of kindness, little : words of love," of many and varied» descriptions, are to be passed to the’! credit of that Society in our midst | whose admirable and strenuous slogan is "Service before Self." Latest andj greatest of its efforts is one of generous spontaneity and endeavour to ameliorate the condition of the ‘Wellington unemployed, those who for the moment, through force of unhappy circumstances, are unable to help themselves. Little crying ‘children will be warmed and cheered, and discouraged men, whose luck is out, will perahance take heart to seek that work, which at worst is hard but remunerative toil, and at its best salvation. Mr. Springhall is to be honoured for his inspiration of kindliness in starting the campaign, and those others also who, in responding with energy and generosity, literally have kindled a fire in dark places, a glow more welcome than those lights fiecking the sky at morning which, after a white night of memories, herald beautiful, eold sunrise of a winter day. BY strange and happy chance, prices are cheaper than ever at the sales this year, and a pleasant practice prevails of marking down, for perhaps a couple of days, covetable wraps, silken shawls, and coats of many colours, fashioned of tweed, velvet, and a new and unattractive material resembling old-fashioned plush that has been oué all night in the rain. Each to his taste, however, and to some women these coats hold distinct allure, being delightfully cut, flared, and splashed with fur not too reminiscent of our national asset, the ubiquitous bunny; one of especial invitation, in a window in Willis Street, being of amethyst velour, beguilingly befurred with skilful eye for effect, all to be acquired for the not inordinate sum of four guineas, and calculated to "keep out the cold" as effectively as that "little something’? so warmly extolled in an un-

pleasant Scots song popular in a decade that is dead. N another window, of a bookshop this time, and a second-hand one, my eye lighted upon a paper-bound pamphlet, on the cover a reproduction of the formal, pointed writing of Grandmama, setting forth "How to Write Letters for All Occasions," by a Lady of Title. With a Corollary on "The Best Way to Win Love, Make Love, and Retain Love." Invaluable knowledge, it will be admitted, more easily purchased than a love philtre, and well worth the money, whatever the cost! Beside it, perched at perilous angle, was discovered a dusty tome on The Care of Canaries, decorated with presentment of one of those fat yellow songsters whose gentle flutterings are so amazingly at variance with strident vocalisation. Another book with title that intrigued was "The Passionate Parrokeets, " which was jostled, surprisingly, by a quite excellent edition of the works of George Borrow. Hastening to possess myself of a copy of that "Bible in Spain,’’ so loved, so mourned for many a moon (my beloved and battered copy having been suborned by conscienceless enthusiast), attention was diverted to the most unlovely "jacket" of my experiencewhich is saying much, having regard to colour and conception of some present-day posters-illustrating Humorous Recitations, and depicting small, black figure gesticulating upon thin edge of the world, surrounded meantime by varying aspects of the human mouth, in an ascending scale of the Grin Incarnate. All very toothy and terrible, and eminently adapted to recall one’s worst day with the dentist, or the crudest nightmare of them all. THE Royal Academy Show does not appear to be striking this June, except for some strange, luminous pictures of. spiritual portrayals, a legacy left by the late Charles Sims. Stark and bewildering seem these excursions into another world than this

phantasmal expanses of colour, over long enough with the eye of faith. | pleasant mundane land of ours; which glide figures of a dim grace; that are to be described if one peers’ All of an infinite portent, without doubt, to their creator, whose own life | grew grim and tragic at its close. Material things discarded, his im-,| agination soared beyorid these voices, revelling in and conveying an atmos- | phere and an elusiveness that fascinate and baffle. In his earlier, and some would say, his saner method, this artist did memorable work, characterised by fine draughtsmanship and sense of colour, coupled with notable gift of portraiture; but: these latter fantastic meanderings : in paint are at times repellant, having something in common with those stormy frescoes that were the work of Somerset Maugham's sinister painter in the South Sea Islands, though they lack the sombre genius of those crude and terrible masterpieces. PIs the play that pays! The more sensational the better and not necessarily bearing any verisimilitude to life. In which doubtless Mr, Edgar Wallace would concur, as he reels out, with the mechanical dexterity of an R.U.R., those erude melodramas, containing no glimmer of truth of portryaal nor literary quality whatsoever, on which nightly the proletariat-"maistly fools" as the blunt Carlyle considered-gorges itself. And now the versatile Mr. A. A. Milne has tried his hand at sensational drama, which begins with a straight out murder, the rest of the acts being concerned with unravelment of the mystery, and the audience sees it all from the startan original touch, this, and as such to be commended. "The Fourth Wall" runs_ successfully, but one finds it hard to reconcile its author with the creator of Christopher Robin, Piglet and the other great adventurers, Your

ANNABEL

LEE