Annotations of Annabel

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 22, 14 December 1928, Page 13

Annotations of Annabel

[J BAREST: The fine days that glow in this last month of 1928 bring forth Lve, fleet of foot, rapt and preoccupied of regard, carrying a repository of sorts in which temporarily to inter suitable increment towards glory-box of the Christmas-tide that once more is upon us. A happy time-if only there were more of it, so to speak-when opportunity is taken to*think of those who are dear, and make gesture of remembrance, however inadequate, in return for friendship and hospitality extended during flying days and months of a year that has almost vanished into limbo of the past. | RAPt in doubtful speculation as to ~ @lasticity of ways and means, we wend our way through plethoric emporiums, waved hither and thither by suave and dapper olympians, who, with courtesy and kindness hypnotise bewildered buyers towards the way they should go-the gleam and glitter of fabrie and jewel, and those lustrous, enchanting weaves of stocking and pyjama so well calculated to arouse lust of the eye and lure to financial disaster most purse-proud plutocrat of us all. : BETWEENWHILES vague wonder arises as to mental processes of certain shop assistants. One presupposes tact to be a trump card in conciliation of a customer whose cash or credit is the material mecca, and raison d'etre of existence of both shop and shop assistant. Wherefore, then, with zeal and temerity, emphasise weak spot in feminine armoury of a tentative buyer; the tco paliid complexion, the angles and the bumps ? Why. be crude, in fact, and irritatingly insistent on physical blemish ?

"QUFFERING from flat foot as you do, moddam," says a foolish virgin, "there’s no use expecting to wear pretty shoes! We are stockists of these for ladies so unfortunate !’’-displaying, for delectation of her victom, blucher-like enormities suggestive of the world’s worst. "With a Frame like yours," chirruped another tyro at the gentle art of persuasion, "you should wear this," and dangled strait-jacket of rubber and whalebone of terrifying length, and unyielding enough to petrify the grace of La Gioconda herself. "With this, moddam, those bulges will be barely noticeable ! Out Size! Twice ordinary price!’ ‘Thus was golden gate of opportunity slammed on valuable retreating customer by ill-advised comment on Junoesque figure that has been the admiration of painters and poets. OR the Wellington Art Gallery, long overdue but now in the imminent offing, much valued effort is just put forth, of every kind and degree, but all as welcome as the widow’s mite, nuts in May, or the flowers that bloom in the spring. (THE dancing that was an accompaniment of last week’s Pageant of Fair Women was beautiful indeed; in particular Miss Miriama MHeketa’s gyrations before Hgypt’s Cleopatra being a miracle of sinuosity, stealthy grace and languorous seductiveness, entirely in accord with the splendour, luxury and mysterious allure that surged and pandered. and battened in the court of Antony’s lovely one. Ina different genre, but as lovely and lissome in charming childish fashion, were the elves and pixies who capered and cavorted amid surroundings reminiscent of the fairy ring itself.

FTHR the spectacle we held heated debate, in the Capital City’s best restaurant, as to relative merit of rival representations. Richard proved enthusiastic anent nymph-like grace of motion and swaying youthfulness of Iphigenia, whose misty rose-garlanded draperies floated away from slimmest figure in the world, His usually silent satellite, who adores Richard in inarticulate fashion, entirely disagreed ; insisting that the lady who visited Solomon in all his glory, as impersonated by ye moderne mayde, easily eame first, resembling as she did some rare bird flaming and flashing in tropical trees, After which burst of poesy from one whom I had deemed a totally unimaginative Romeo, the rest was silence as far as he was concerned. (THOUGH not denying Miss Alison Kirkealdie’s pale beauty was arresting, haloed as it was with strangely iridescent peacock plumage and enhanced by shimmering shrouding draperies, befitting Sheba’s Queen, and splashed with green cf Chinese jade; yet my imalterable "pick" was Cleopatra with her strange entourage, impressive frieze-like figures that grouped around the stage, and curiously true to an ancient era made familiar to us by generations of plastic art. E argued until midnight without reaching amity; but ail adored chance of seeing representation of that lovely fantasy mirnged in the mind of a poet long dead, whose noble influence on literature for 2 time is in abeyance and scorned by a gexeration that sets up tin godea of literary dissonance and ejaculation which they are pleased to term self-expression. aw _-~ Your

ANNABEL

LEE