Contemporary British War-Poetry, Music, and Patriotism Author(s): Marion Scott Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 58, No. 889 (Mar. 1, 1917), pp. 120-123 Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/908185 . Accessed: 24/12/2014 16:56 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Musical Times Publications Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Musical Times. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.235.251.160 on Wed, 24 Dec 2014 16:56:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 120 THE MUSICAL TIMES.-MARCH I, I917. CONTEMPORARY BRITISH WAR-POETRY, called 'A Modern Reading of St. Francis of Assisi,' by MUSIC, AND PATRIOTISM. Katherine Collins, and runs thus: The more one reads and studies the life of St. Francis BY MARION SCOTT. of Assisi, the more one is struck by the applicability of his teaching to modern needs. His ideal of the best [Presidential address delivered before the Society of kind of life is certainly as valid for our day as for his. Women Musicians, December 2, I916.] We know how he cast away the superflous, and reduced No one is more keenly aware than myself of the to a minimum the care for food and raiment, and we are responsibility which devolves upon me in apt to think more of what he refused than of what he to-day delivering as my Presidential address before the Society of Women kept absolutely essential. He lays great stress on Musicians. Though the Society is still young in years, it has cleanliness and good manners; a fine courtesy is to him already a splendid tradition of distinguished Presidents, and one of the attributes of God. We know how ardently fine addresses-a tradition which adds greatly to the honour, he sought the beauty of Nature in mountain and plain, and also to the responsibility of my task ; the more so, when and how there must be flowers in all Franciscan gardens. Music I consider that I am speaking to a picked audience which and poetry are indispensable, and he listens gladly includes many of the foremost women in London. to the romance which bids us follow after any high ideal. Now I suppose that the thoughts of all of us are more or This is a simple life which is rich indeed ! less occupied in considering the record of work which Music and Poetry: those are the Arts which St. Francis has just been presented to us in the S.W.M. Report for last retained as indispensable; and it is just those very Arts which year. It is no mean achievement to have done so much in have glowed into fuller life during the war. But you may so many directions during war-time, and the Society may ask ' Why should not Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture well be proud of itself. When Miss Eggar said a year ago in have shared in this kindling spirit ?' The answer cannot be her address that 'far from wishing to let the Society lapse, better given than by a quotation from Romain Rolland's these hard times had made members realise that they were a essay on 'The Place of Music in General History.' He says: of Society friends,' she spoke prophetically, as well as in It is quite evident that in a kingdom wrecked by war retrospect, for the S.W.M. has surprised even those who or revolution, creative force could only express itself in knew it best by its abundant energy and vitality. The architecturewith difficulty, for architectureneeds money Society has never been so flourishingas it is to-day. and new structures besides prosperity and confidence in But behind these thoughts of music and successful the future. One might even say that the plastic arts in work, I suppose we all have that immense and tragic sense of general have need of luxury and leisure, of refined the War, which has been our inner companion for over two society, and of a certain equilibrium in civilization, in years now. We cannot forget it, even if we would, and we order to develop themselves fully. But when material shall carrythe mark of it with us to our dying day. I do not conditions are harder, when life is bitter, starved, and propose any attempt to forget it here ; instead, I want to see if harassed with care, when the opportunity of outside in this gathering of comrades we can come to some quiet, and I development is withheld, then the spirit is forced back hope comforting, realisation of our relationship to the much upon itself, and its eternal need of happiness drives wider of movements which we, almost unconsciously, form a it to other outlets; its expression of beauty is changed part. and takes a less external character, and it seeks refuge At first sight, nothing may seem stranger than that I in more intimate arts, such as poetry and music. should talk of our prosperity as a Society and the terrible This is exactly what has in the two of the War in one and the same breath for happened past tradegy ; prosperity years, and is happening now. It will more than repay is so unexpected nowadays (unless it springs from munitions!) us to that study it, for in doing so we come into direct a superficialobserver might suppose it to be a pure freak touch with the of of fortune on our War spirit England. Besides, it is always behalf. brings the ruin of nearly all good, and an enrichment to our own work to know material, and indeed, if we had existed for things money- something about the other Arts. As wise old Sir Joshua making or selfish ends, I think the chances are we should said, ' It is have under. Reynolds by the analogy that one art bears gone But we know (be it said in all humility) to another, that are that our has striven for many things ascertained, which Society always something better than were either but faintly seen, or perhaps, would not have been materialism; it has striven for an ideal, and it is in so far discovered as we at all, if the inventor had not received the first share in the nation's life of the spirit that we earn our hints from the practices of a sister art on to and stand or a similar occasion. right exist, fall as a Society. This is true with to for our own Do remember when war especially regard poetry, you how, broke out, many art of music is more closely linked to it than to people wondered what would become of Art? There seemed any other, and composers have actually to re-create or translate poems no place for it in a world of such gigantic horrors and into music when set them unchained forces. they as songs. Many people even thought that all Art So it is profitablefor us, both as and to should be as a unsuited to the patriots musicians, put aside, frivolity dignity of look around and see what is happening in British Armageddon. That still obtains in certain poetry opinion quarters, and music. On making such a survey, one's first impression but we musicians have never believed it (we never will !), and is of enormous the the increase in poetical output. This may men of the Navy and Army have more than supported not our view. In the two seem a soul-satisfying result in itself, but it is very years in which they have been battling significant, for there is seldom with enemies such as man first-rate quality in work never met before, facing without voluminous quantity, since fine and such trials poets composers hardships past imagination, enduring as seem are not so much isolated entities as greater waves in an superhuman,they have done another very wonderful thing: have inflowing tide. they brought a fresh spring of life into English poetry One's second and music ! who has impression is, that though this mass of poems Anyone watched events consistently ranges through all degrees of excellence from to must have been amazed and measure at the genius rejoiced beyond doggerel, the quality, taken all in all, is extraordinarilygood. clear, free spirit which has come from the camps and For battlefields. poetry is a real, live thing nowadays, and poems are Nor have the civilians remained untouched. written, not as artistic exercises, but as irresistible Much of the old neurotic art has become impulses uninteresting, or, towards the expression of thought and emotion. better still, been for while the swept away ever, sane, healthy I do not intend to discuss here the work done by our impulses have been strengthened. established since the A minute or two I poets war, since in most cases they have ago said that we musicians never had not been influenced it. The Poet of conscience as to the of powerfully by Laureate, any qualms right music to exist, for Sir Henry Newbolt, Mr. Kipling, Thomas and we know that it is bound with much of the best that is in Hardy, up others, remain much where they were three years ago, us.