Chapter XVII: A Place to End 172 (5)

But to disconnect myself would not be easy. I was weighed down with obligations--obligations to the contributors who had confided their poems to me, to the authors whose books I had promised to review, and to the subscribers (an unknown number, aside from several of my friends) who had sent in their dollar a year, perhaps in part because of the belief that I was to be the editor. If I were merely to resign, and leave all these persons to the tender attentions of Mr. Post, I would be betraying them, almost as he had betrayed me. However, I had no desire or intention to resign. The fault, in the maimed and mutilated version of _Wings_ that lay before me, had not been mine; therefore, if there was to be any resigning, let it not be on my part.

After a sleepless night, I rushed down to the offices of the Authors’ League, whose representative, upon deliberation, informed me that I had some legal rights--yes, undoubtedly I had, though unfortunately they were not worth asserting. Then, at wits’ end, I telephoned Mr. Post; and he, obliging and amiable as always, consented to visit me on a specified evening. I do not know just how much intimation he had of what was in my mind; but when he arrived, it was with profuse apologies for the curtailment of the magazine, which, he said, had been unavoidable owing to a temporary financial embarrassment which he was suffering. I reminded him, in reply, of my own embarrassment in regard to a broken contract, and broken promises to authors. And I proposed that, since he was embarrassed financially and I was embarrassed editorially, he resign to me all rights to the magazine. This demand he at first violently resisted; but two hours later, after one of the stormiest sessions of my life, he had capitulated on every point. And before leaving my home that evening, he had put his signature to an agreement. I have managed to unearth my copy, typed on my private letterhead, and dated March 31, 1933:

1. Whereas the Editor agrees to undertake the financial control and
management of the magazine known as “Wings, A Quarterly of Verse,”
the Publisher agrees to relinquish all property and other rights in
the said magazine and all claims against it and to turn over to the
Editor the full and unqualified right of publishing said magazine,
and furthermore,

2. The Editor agrees that the Publisher shall retain all funds
hitherto turned over to him for subscriptions. But it is specifically
understood that all moneys turned in to the Publisher henceforward,
will be turned over by him to the Editor, and that all subscription
lists held by the Publisher will be turned over to the Editor.

3. The Editor agrees to discharge all obligations to subscribers, and
to relieve the Publisher of all responsibility to such subscribers.

There was, I thought, a measure of justice in permitting the publisher to retain all sums theretofore received for subscriptions, since he had made a considerable financial outlay. And there was, besides, the practical consideration that the amounts received were certainly not large, and that by no conceivable means, short of an undesired lawsuit, could I have forced Mr. Post to part with them.

What was I planning now that the magazine--or, rather, the half-born magazine--was exclusively my own? My one clear intention was to reissue the first number as I had originally conceived it; beyond that, I had vague ideas of continuing publication as long as seemed practicable. But that _Wings_ would still be printed, with unswerving regularity, ten years later, twenty years later, twenty-five years later; that a total of many tens of thousands of copies would be distributed during this time, that contacts would be established with poets and poetry lovers in many lands--these were possibilities that never for a moment occurred to me.

My immediate task now was the publication of the second version of Volume I, Number 1, which I wished to distribute to all who had received the first edition, as well as to newspapers and libraries, and as sample copies to all poets and lovers of poetry whose addresses I could obtain. A thousand copies in all were to be printed--truly, a formidable number, though actually all but a handful would be sent out, and even this handful would be reduced by requests that would come in for years to come.

What, however, did I know about publishing a magazine? Very little--nothing, in fact, aside from what I had learned during my disillusioning experience under Mr. Finnegan on the _Overland_. Here, indeed, was a case of the tyro leaping in where experienced men might have feared to tread. I did not even know any printer, and was not at all familiar with printing methods; but at this point, as I must record to Mr. Post’s credit, my erstwhile partner on _Wings_ came to the rescue by putting me in touch with his own printer (whom I was to employ only for the first issue), and also voluntarily stepped over to the new editorial office--in my apartment--in order to give me some valuable pointers when I made up the issue.

I wish that I could add that he was equally helpful in all other respects. Weeks later, and in fact months later, an occasional letter to the following effect was to arrive: “Dear Editor: A long while ago I sent your business office a dollar for a subscription, and have never received a copy. What has happened?” Unfortunately, I could have answered what had happened. The “business office,” before the time of our final agreement, had been Mr. Post’s establishment; and later, when any stray dollars reached him, he had presumably been too preoccupied to remember to turn them or the subscribers’ names over to the new editor. In all such cases, of course, I would put the person on the list without further charge; but I was never to know how many failed to make a report.

In any event, the reconstructed first issue did appear, with a cover design contributed by my friend Ignace M. Ingianni, and with all the material originally intended; glancing at it today, I see that it contrasts most favorably in appearance with the earlier edition. For a long while I was busy answering letters from subscribers (though subscribers were still far from numerous) who wished to know why they had received two quite different-looking copies of the same issue.

In the first number, I set forth the goal of the magazine:

... to achieve its full power and effectiveness ... poetry must have
an audience schooled to receive it--and it is precisely here that the
modern world fails most signally, and that a magazine such as _Wings_
may play its most beneficial role....

So far as possible, _Wings_ will devote itself ... to the
encouragement of the poetic spirit; it will provide a medium for the
publication of the best poetry, and the best poetry only, regardless
of the name or reputation of the author; it will open a critical
arena for views and reviews on subjects pertaining to its special
field....

But more significant, perhaps, was the statement which appears on page 1, and has been reprinted in every subsequent issue: “Wings is an independent poetry magazine, without patrons or outside supporters.” Unless the magazine was independent, it seemed to me, it would be valueless; _Wings_, whose birth-throes had witnessed a struggle for independence, had better go down with colors flying than capitulate and survive in bondage. It is understandable, of course, that many little magazines should seek patrons, should even find patrons indispensable; subscription lists, for such journals, are invariably small; advertising revenues are slight or non-existent; and unless there is some outside financial source, the printer cannot be paid. But all this, if unavoidable, is highly unfortunate. Very few human beings are so constructed that, having given with a free hand, they will not expect some return: even though Mr. X has provided funds with benevolent intentions, he may happen to remember a niece or a cousin or a grandson who has written some “wonderful poetry”--and how many editors would be over-scrupulous about fine points of literary quality when a large, deeply desired annual donation is hanging in the balance? The only way to avoid such problems, it impressed me, was to avoid donors and patrons. And if the magazine could not exist without such benefactors--then let it be decently interred.

Another point--which I mention only because I have frequently been questioned about it--was my decision to publish none of my own verse in _Wings_. This decision was not made because of false modesty, or because none of my work was available; the reason was that, when there is competition for space, the editor who picks his own poems is in effect acting as a judge between himself and other aspirants--with results hardly likely to err in favor of the others. With prose the case was different; no great quantity of competitive prose was ever to be submitted--and, besides, it is the function of an editor to contribute articles setting forth his views and policies.

These were, of course, but preliminary considerations. When I embarked blithely on the new venture in the spring of 1933, how much I could not foresee!--the long, slow, wearisome ordeals of manuscript-reading, and the eye-wearing strain of proofreading! the wrestling with problems of make-up, when forty-six lines of type would not squeeze themselves into a forty-three-line space! the letter-writing, the never-ceasing letter-writing; the answering of questions; the acknowledgments of courtesies; the commenting on submitted poems! the keeping of records; the typing of envelopes; the sending out of the hundreds of copies of each issue! But while much of this was tedious and irksome, how much would be gratifying!--the contacts with other poets, by letter and in person! the occasional unearthing of promising new talent! the satisfaction of exerting an influence (a good influence, I naturally hoped, even though a small one) amid the turmoil, the striving, and the confusion of the modern poetic scene! It may, indeed, be that I had come down with a form of insanity, which psychiatrists have not yet analyzed; but if so, it was a form of insanity that could not only be wearing and costly, but at times could add considerably to the variety and even to the enjoyment of life.

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

Trials and Rewards of an Editor

Men of experience will tell you that nothing is much more difficult than launching a new periodical. With a large staff, persistent efforts, capable planning, and an ample budget, including immense sums for advertising, it is sometimes possible to put a new magazine into the field. But what, when no staff at all is available, and no funds for advertising except through occasional circulars? This, in general, is the situation for all poetry magazines, at least those not backed by bountiful grants; and _Wings_, therefore, represented the rule and not the exception. Of course, no poetry magazine aims at corralling its readers by the millions; hundreds of subscribers look as numerous to its publishers as hundreds of thousands would appear to the proprietor of a more popular sheet; and there is no thought of the vast business arrangements necessary for its larger cousins.

The distinction, however, runs even deeper than this, for whereas the profit motive rules in most periodicals, it does not apply at all for a poetry magazine. There is no profit motive, since there is no prospect of a profit--I would not say, “no possibility,” for I know that _Wings_, which for long periods has achieved the feat of breaking almost if not quite even, one year actually earned a surplus of $95.13. Of course, such a banner success is rare; and the publisher, not expecting much if anything but debts to be left when the year is over, must necessarily subordinate the profit motive to the as-little-loss-as-possible motive.

Having made this dire confession, I must go on to report that _Wings_ was from the first an unexpected success. I say “unexpected,” for I had not known what to anticipate, and had listened just a little doubtfully to Flora’s prediction that the magazine would succeed. But let me point out that it seems to me that the idea of success has been grossly, vulgarly, ignorantly entangled in modern thought with the concept of financial gain: few of the great successes of history, from Confucius to Kant, and from Homer to Goethe, and Galileo to Einstein, and Gautama to Gandhi, are in any way memorable for monetary triumphs. Not that the motive behind a poetry magazine may be compared with the impulse that ruled any of these great figures, but that they all have at least one thing in common: their guardian star has been something other than money. The pecuniary status of a poetry magazine is, of course, irrelevant--irrelevant, that is, to anything but the owner’s pocket, a matter of no importance at all to the world at large. What is relevant is whether the effort has helped the cause of art or creation, whether it has broadcasted pleasure or inspiration, whether it has aided aspiring and worthy writers and given them a platform from which to be heard.

Before many issues of _Wings_ were out, approving letters, often accompanied by subscriptions, were arriving from all parts of the country; and floods of contributions, many of them from persons I had never heard of before, began to be addressed to “Editor, _Wings_.” Not that the great majority were of much value; but how eagerly I pored through the piles, hoping to unearth the rare divine contribution! I will not say that my search brought to light any latter-day Milton, or any new _Ode on a Grecian Urn_ or _Ode to the West Wind_; but many gratifying contributions were contained in those growing heaps of long envelopes, including poems that, I still believe, are of enduring value, though often the author was unknown and in some cases remains unknown.

I shall never forget, for example, the glow of discovery when Mary Cecile Ions, writing from Coral Gables, Florida, submitted to a _Wings_ contest her twelve-stanza poem, _Letter to the Dead in Spring_, beginning:

Do not be fretful of your old repose
Though April sunlight warm your hearts’ dust through
And fragrance of the everlasting rose
Assail the grave and penetrate to you.

Who was Mary Cecile Ions? I do not know, except that she had graduated from the University of Alabama with Phi Beta Kappa honors, and subsequently taught English and French. But I cannot say what else she has accomplished, and in fact have seen little of her work. Nevertheless, the poem, which the judges agreed in putting first of all the submissions, has clung to my memory. I was gratified when the well-known British anthologist Thomas Moult confirmed our good opinion by reprinting it in _The Best Poems of 1935_; and ten years later, I had no hesitation in giving it a place in my own anthology, _The Music Makers_.

Or take the case of Otto Freund. Although he had contributed to various magazines, I had known nothing of him or his work until he began sending me, from Portland, Oregon, a series of poems of unusual depth and accomplishment. Rarely, for example, does one come across four lines with the finality of _Requiescat_, written in memory of John Barrymore:

Unanswered encores, rue, and requiems sung,
Forgetful dust, the turning of a page,
But still the voice of Hamlet rings among
The silent galleries and an empty stage.

Whole elegies are contained in the above; and whole volumes of grief are compressed in _Heart Wound_:

The wound is healed, but still the pain is there,
And stabs with anguish, like a sudden sword,
When sunlight feigns the spun gold of her hair,
Or music finds her lost voice in a chord.

With sorrow I report that Otto Freund has silently dropped out of the fold. One day, many years ago, he wrote me that he was leaving for the east; he did not mention any reason, nor give any forwarding address--and that is the last I have heard of him or his work, though I have never ceased to regret his disappearance.

Or consider Francis Vaughan Meisling. All that I know of him is that he was a journalist and foreign correspondent, who sent me a single poem from Los Angeles. And yet this poem, _I Dreamt She Came_, has a real lyrical quality--the sort that makes an editor feel that his labors have not been wholly in vain:

I dreamt she came as fire and as rose,
Fragrance and light, and leaning o’er my head
Whispered those burning words none other knows
And took between her hands my peaceless head;

And kissed. There was a movement in the air
As if the blossoms of the year had blown
Their petals and their odors round us there,
As I awoke, as I awoke alone.

Next my mind goes back to Celia Keegan, a Long Island girl whose work, as in the case of Miss Ions, I first noticed among the submissions in a contest, though I afterwards met her at a gathering of _Wings_ contributors in my apartment in New York. She sent _Wings_ some of the most poignant poems of love I can remember; I cannot forbear quoting the whole of _Renunciation_:

How more than blind the hooded fates to weave
So sere a skein; to wing two hearts with fire
Of ecstasy and melody ... then leave
To human wills the quenching of desire!
I did not hide love from your loving eyes,
Nor do I whisper nobly, “I will go,”
Then teach my lips such trite and songless lies
As, “Happiness will come through doing so.”
This way I give you up: Against the blades
Rebellion lifts in myriad array,
I raise a sword whose clean strength surges ... fades ...
And wins again ... till I have cut my way
Past you, and love, and toward Tomorrow’s mark
Go stumbling, stricken, blinded, through the dark.

Miss Keegan, like Mr. Freund, vanished suddenly from my ken, and likewise from that of some mutual friends, who heard their last from her about twenty years ago. Whither has she gone? To join the songbirds of last spring?

Then there was the case of Florence Wilson Roper, formerly of Petersburg, Virginia, but now deceased, whose poems had first attracted me in the pages of the Dallas verse magazine, _Kaleidograph_, and who won one of the annual book-publishing awards of that periodical. She too contributed many moving poems of love, and many reflective pieces, as in the sequence of five sonnets, _Retrospect_, with some exquisite lines, such as

Remembering! It has a pleasant sound
Like water falling softly over stone--
A phantom hand that holds with fleshless bone
The present, past and future firmly bound!

But I have set out to write a narrative, and not to compile an anthology, and cannot go on to quote other excerpts. In any case, the occasional discovery of such material, more than anything else, made me feel that _Wings_ was indeed serving a purpose, and might be accounted a modest success.

Meanwhile, with the feeling of an inexperienced rider clutching at a balky steed, I was attempting to manage the new enterprise. The second and third issues were put forth in California, by a printer recommended by Arthur Chamberlain; but the following issues, during my remaining five years in New York and even for a time afterwards, all proceeded from the metropolis. But in New York, aside from Mr. Post’s connections, I knew no printer. I tried one who, due to an error, trimmed the magazine down so far as to give it a truncated appearance; I tried another, who inked the pages so badly that they were painful to read; and then one day, not knowing where to turn, I walked into the office of a small establishment in Washington Heights, the Artype Press, and made arrangements with its proprietor, Paul Grossman. Though picked merely by chance, he proved to be conscientious and capable, and did a good job so long as geographical considerations made it possible to leave the printing in his hands.

I need hardly add that our agreement provided for a price which, in these more expensive days, would hardly suffice for printing more than a few pages of _Wings_. Had present-day rates prevailed, I would have been blocked by unscalable walls, even before I started. And this makes me wonder as to the fate today of editors in approximately my former position. I should like to know just how the development of art, literature, and culture in general may be affected by our “higher” standards of living and the accompanying higher standards of inflation.

But let me go back to my problems as an editor. They were to be many, and seasoned with curious vicissitudes. Not a few of them, as I suppose is true for most editors, were to proceed from the daily mailbag, which was in a sense a grab-bag, since I never knew what I would pull out of it. In the course of the years, there were to be many sweet and beautiful letters, which I would value as among the chief compensations of an editor’s task; but there were also to be letters of various other types.

I will never forget, for example, the lady who mailed me a sentimental lyric on _The Old Plush Sofa_, and accompanied the manuscript with a strip of purple velvet. “I thought you might appreciate the poem better,” she obligingly wrote, “if you had a piece of the sofa before you.”

Again, there was the correspondent who, having sent me a page-long list of all the places where his work had appeared, from the Newtown High School _Quarterback_ to the Green Plains _Meteor_, followed it two days later with an air-mail apology: one of his poems had not actually seen the light in the _New Age Hardwareman_, as he had absent-mindedly declared; it had blossomed forth in the _New Era Hardwareman_.

Another case, which also earned an editorial smile, was that of the verse-writer who wrote in from a small Canadian town. He hoped I would publish his poems, but if so, would I not kindly pick a _nom de plume_? The reason, he explained, was that he could not let it be known that he wrote poetry: he was one of his city’s policemen.

Then occasionally a would-be contributor has sent a letter of several single-spaced typewritten pages, or, worse still, in largely illegible handwriting, devoted to personal reminiscences interlarded with questions. As well as I could, I have usually answered the questions, if they pertained to poetry; but time and eye-power are limited--and more than once an oversight has brought me another letter, of almost equal length, in which I am properly reproved: “Dear Editor: You have not answered the question in the third paragraph of the fourth page of my last note....”

The editor of a poetry magazine, I soon discovered, is regarded as the chief clerk of a public bureau of consultation and criticism, whose duty is not only to answer questions, but to give advice, and comment on manuscripts--all, of course, absolutely without compensation (not even in gratitude, since frank criticism is likely to win one nothing but an enraged correspondent). To an extent, the editor is willing, even glad to accept the mantle laid upon his shoulders--but there are, unfortunately, limits to his endurance. Those limits are reached, for example, when he receives a bulky manuscript, accompanied by a note: “Dear Sir: I am sending you herewith _Ruminations_, an epic of 4,700 lines, some considerable parts of which I hope you will publish in your next issue. If not, will appreciate detailed criticism.”

Again, one’s patience is severely tested by a letter such as this:

Dear Mr. Editor: I am a subscriber and well-wisher. I have sent you
poems several times, but do not hold it against you that you have
returned them. Of course, poetry is only a sideline with me; my
business is fire and casualty insurance. I have just written a book
of 179 pages on my experiences in this line, and am mailing it to
you under separate cover. Would appreciate your going over it, and
correcting all the mistakes in grammar and style.

Ah, if these people would only realize that the editor is not only engaged in running a magazine, but incidentally is trying to earn a living!

Beyond all the above, there is the aspiring contributor who goes out of his way to find ingenious means of attracting attention. An occasional method is to send a poem (one such, received not long ago, was exactly two lines long) in a huge envelope by special delivery; this usually arrives just when the editor is in the middle of dinner, and does succeed in drawing attention to itself--though not always the attention that results in an acceptance. Again, there is the versifier who mails a poem on each successive day for two or three weeks. One does, indeed, note the fact that he exists, and even gets used to him in a way; one rather misses him when at length the daily submissions cease. But alas for the assiduous poet! he gets just the same attention as everybody else, and if he stands out in any way, it is as just a sort of amiable pest.

More common are the decorative means of attracting attention. One poet, invariably a lady, will adorn her manuscript with graceful water colors in pastel tints--all very pleasant to look at, but, unfortunately, not in the least improving the quite hopeless verses. Another rhymester will submit poems in lavender or purple ink on goldenrod-yellow paper; still another will send poems typed in a glaring red, or typed all in capitals, or oddly letter-spaced--all of which do, indeed, give the poems a unique appearance, though the authors seem not to realize that their chances of acceptance are not improved by anything that makes the work harder to read.

But these are minor matters, which I can pass over with a smile. There is, however, one type of letter that causes me to glare. It arrives periodically, and is usually worded about as follows:

Dear Editor: Enclosed find three poems, entitled _Spring Flowers_,
_April Sunshine_, and _First Love_. Immediately upon acceptance of
any of them, my subscription will follow....

I need only say that the poems _Spring Flowers_, _April Sunshine_, and _First Love_ do not long clutter up the editorial office. Though I may be fiendishly eager for subscriptions, I am not quite so hungry for them as the correspondent evidently supposes. No, though I may be corrupt as old Boss Tweed himself, I am not to be tempted by bribes of one dollar. The author, by his supposed shrewdness, has insured an action I would not otherwise willingly take. Since I could not accept the poems without the imputation of having done so for ulterior motives, I have no choice but to return them without even a reading, and usually with a printed rejection slip.

In one of the several variations of the above letter, the author notifies me that he has just put out a book, and is sending it for review; immediately upon the appearance of the article, he will join the subscription list. He might be surprised to know that, after this letter, his chances for a review would be as great if the book were printed in Chinese.

Then there is the versifier--comparatively rare, it is true--who seems to imagine that a subscription dollar automatically provides a ticket of admission to the pages of the magazine. She (for I cannot recall any men who committed this particular indiscretion) begins with a fulsome letter of praise, telling how much the quarterly means to her, and how she would not be without it--no, not for the world. Accompanying the letter, is a dollar bill, and five or six poems. The dollar bill is accepted by the subscription department; the poems, being unworthy of acceptance, go back to the author, along with a polite note of thanks and regret. And thus the tempest is unleashed. By return mail, another letter arrives--one which, somehow, has lost the admiring tone of the earlier epistle:

Sir: What do you mean by sending my poems back? In your last issue,
you published some poems that were not half as good as mine. Besides,
better magazines than yours are glad to get my work So from now on I
want nothing whatever to do with you. Return my dollar at once, and
cancel my subscription.

Since it is worth more than the price to have the writer off the list, I do indeed return the dollar and cancel the subscription.

A less infrequent type of correspondent is the one who waits till the year’s end before making his feelings known. Then he vents his stored-up disappointment:

Dear Editor: I have just received a renewal notice. I am not
renewing, and this is why. During the past year, I sent you six
batches of manuscripts. They have all come back. That being the case,
I am saving my subscription dollars for magazines that will print my
work.

There is, of course, nothing for the editor to say in reply. But he cannot help asking himself why writers seem invariably to blame editors for the lacks in their own work; and he is inclined to wonder how many readers would be claimed by magazines such as _Harpers_, the _Atlantic_, and the _Saturday Review_ if they were expected to rely upon the subscriptions of contributors.

The sad fact is that there actually are some poetry magazines that publish only subscribers’ poems; I know of one that, some years ago, promised to print one poem a year by every subscriber. Such magazines, which cannot possibly maintain any standards whatever, have apparently given certain verse-writers the idea that they should be taken as models. And the results have not always been happy for other periodicals, as will be seen not only from the examples given above, but from a letter which reached me just today from a writer who, though never published in _Wings_, began by lauding the magazine, and went on to say:

When I get ahead of several subscriptions obliged by recent
acceptances, I will certainly add _Wings_ to my wanted ones.

The thing I particularly note here is the word “obliged.” I can safely attest that no writer, whatever his complaints, has ever been able justly to use that word in connection with _Wings_.

Along with the pricks and prods of those who would like to see the editorial and subscription departments merged, there have been the problems of submitted manuscripts in general. One of the first duties of an editor, of course, is to say “No!”; after all, it is difficult to find room for all the available good material. But “No!” is at all times a painful syllable to utter; the editor knows what warmth, hope, and even devotion have gone into many of the poems, and what a chilling blow a rejection can be. And if this is normally true, there are times when “No!” literally sticks on the lips. One of those times is when manuscripts are submitted or a book is sent in for review by an old acquaintance or friend, a writer whom one especially likes, or to whom one feels a personal obligation. Nevertheless, “No!” must be said just as firmly in these cases as in others--though the after-effects are sometimes disheartening. Thus, I remember that some poems were once submitted by another editor, toward whom I felt warmly disposed, and who had, some years before, accepted some of my own work for a college publication. But his own verses were not good--and so what could I do but return them with a friendly note, meant to be disarming? I had thought that an ex-editor, even though an editor only in a small way, would understand, but perhaps he was moved by higher principles, beyond my comprehension. In any event, I know that when, sometime later, I had occasion to speak to him over the telephone, he suffered a sudden attack of amnesia in regard to my name.

Another time when it hurts one to say “No!” is when an expectant contributor has been submitting again and again, trying very, very hard to produce acceptable material. “Why, _why_ do you not keep any of my work?” he may ask, plaintively. But can the editor help it if the writer has not mastered the problems of his craft? True, the editor can and does give hints and suggestions--at least, when the work seems promising. But there are many, very many cases in which hints or suggestions would be of no avail.

This brings me to the problem of criticism in general. Many contributors ask for it, and seem to look for it almost as a matter of course, as in the case of a letter (sent in with insufficient postage) in my current mail: “Enclosed please find copies of some poems. I do not necessarily expect that you would consider publishing any of them, but would appreciate criticism.” Unfortunately, if the editor heeded all the requests, he would not have time to eat or sleep. Even in the few cases in which he does attempt criticism, he proceeds at his peril--that is, when he deals with inexperienced writers (the “arrived” or professional author is invariably receptive to criticism). More than one beginner, having asked me for comments, has flared into fury upon receiving them, and has written in indignantly to put me in my place, assuring me, in effect, that I could not distinguish a poem from a potato. No wonder that editors become wary about criticizing!

Then there was the woman whose poem would have been acceptable except for one grossly inept word, for which it was easy to suggest a suitable substitute. Hence I wrote her, commending the poem, and returning it to her with the promise to accept it if it were changed as recommended. Back came the poem in an early mail, along with the author’s outraged assertion that her poems were put down just as God dictated them, and that to change a syllable would be sacrilegious. Of course, it is impossible to argue with God. And so the poem made its second return trip to the divinely inspired author. So far as I know, it has still not been shared with the reading public.

I shall never forget, likewise, the young man who, in the early days of _Wings_, made an impromptu and uninvited visit to my apartment, accompanied by a sheaf of poems, which he asked me to glance over. Being still greener than a cucumber, I took him at his word, and literally did glance over the material; a glance, in most cases, was all that was needed, since it is no more necessary to read all of a bad poem in order to know it is bad than it is necessary to swallow all of a bad apple in order to be sure it is not honey-sweet. But perhaps my speed of reading displeased the young author, or perhaps something in my expression was to blame (for I have never learned the art of the poker-face, a desirable acquisition for editors). Whatever the cause, he sprang to his feet, his cheeks flaming red; snatched the manuscript from my hand; and stormed toward the door. “If that’s how you read manuscripts, Mr. Coblentz--” was all he could sputter. Then, inarticulate with rage, he went stamping out, and slammed the door behind him. Since that day, I have made it a rule never, never to read a manuscript in the author’s presence.

And while on the subject of criticism, let me tell about Mr. Cooley. Who he was, I cannot say; I have never seen him, and do not even know if I spell his name correctly; all that I can say is that, during the fledgling days of _Wings_, he introduced himself to me by telephone as a native of the Bronx, and proceeded to read one of his poems, on which he solicited my comments. No one but a newcomer at editing, I am sure, would have given the comments: nowadays I would ask the writer to send the manuscript through the mails. However, I did yield to Mr. Cooley’s request, and thenceforth, unhappily, whenever he committed a poem, he would hastily telephone me. As his favorite time of composition was late at night, the telephone usually rang just as I was in the process of retiring; more than once, having no clairvoyant perception of who was at the other end of the line, I rushed out of bed, and hastily donned my dressing gown. But I was less elated than Cooley may have supposed when I heard his hearty voice, “I’ve just written another, and will read it to you!” Poor Cooley! I had then, as ever since, a great amount of sympathy for the creative fervor. But there were times when, yawning and hardly able to keep awake while he read some interminable bit of blank verse, I devoutly wished that the telephone had never been invented.

Another problem, affecting _Wings_ in its early days, was connected with another magazine, an aviation monthly which went by the same name. Whether it antedated my publication I do not know, but I have an impression that it had existed before, had been discontinued, and had been revived after the establishment of my own magazine. Though neither periodical ever questioned the other’s right to use the name, both were put to much inconvenience--I know this from the sets of poems occasionally forwarded to me from the other _Wings_ (which did not publish poetry), and from the long stories on flying experiences that sometimes added to my own mail, along with articles on subjects such as _The Problem of Air-Cooled Engines_ and _Projected Explorations of the Upper Stratosphere_. Many years later, after the rival _Wings_ had ceased to be, I still received an occasional letter inquiring in which issue we had published a discussion of _High Octane Gasoline and Cargo Planes_ or _Air Flight Records in the Southern Hemisphere_.

As if such problems did not add sufficiently to life’s spice and variety, there was the recurrent dilemma of the racketeer. You would suppose that, in a field like poetry, where idealism is supposed to rule and the prospects for financial profit are slight, the racketeer would be as unknown as the hired assassin. But such, I discovered, was far from the case. In a page of short comments and news items entitled _Wing Beats_, I like to give publicity to new enterprises of possible advantage to poets; but it was always difficult to be sure whether or not a given project would actually be beneficial. And in the callow early years of the magazine, I had several unfortunate experiences.

One case was that of the publisher who announced a forthcoming anthology, for which he was seeking contributions. He mentioned several well-known poets who would be represented, and requested a brief notice, which I was constrained to grant. What he had neglected to say, however, was that while the well-known poets did indeed appear and of course were not asked to pay, the rank and file of the contributors were required to subscribe for half a dozen copies each, at four dollars a copy.

A similar scheme, for which I was repeatedly asked to give space, involved composers who set poems to music, as the basis for promised public concerts that were never held; and collected fees of about ten dollars for each selection. This, it must be said, was hardly more reprehensible than the action of the publisher who, also inviting a free notice, issued a _Who’s Who in American Poetry_; it turned out that this “indispensable directory,” aside from listing a few of the obvious leaders, acknowledged the importance only of bards who would dole out four dollars and seventy-five cents each for a copy. I fear that I smiled just a little wrily to discover that many devotees of the Muse, who “just could not afford” one dollar to support a legitimate enterprise, had apparently no hesitation about investing in rackets of this type.

But for unblushing chicanery, the publishers of the alleged _Who’s Who_ were scarcely equal to a certain mid-Western authors’ review which solicited an exchange advertisement. As it claimed a considerable circulation and I knew of no good reason to distrust its statements, I thought it to my advantage to accept the advertisement--which announced that it would begin publishing poetry with its next issue, and would pay a specified sum. So far, so good! not only _Wings_, but six or eight other poetry magazines, ran the advertisement. And how deeply we were all to regret our rashness! Before long, our mailbags began to bear almost daily complaints; many readers had submitted manuscripts to the authors’ review--and invariably with the same result. One poem by each writer was accepted, but not by the magazine to which it had been submitted. The poem enjoyed the still more inviting fate of being kept for the _Thornwall Anthology_, a “beautiful volume” in preparation “on a cooperative basis”--which is to say that each contributor must cooperate to the extent of purchasing twelve dollars’ worth of copies.

I should add that the authors’ review, now long out of existence, never did publish or pay for any poem whatever.

CHAPTER
FIFTEEN

A Challenge to Giants

There are magazines whose policies are as devious as a river; there are others that, like the proverbial arrow, aim straight toward their destination. Certainly, it is no exaggeration to say that I have tried to keep _Wings_ in the latter category, particularly with regard to the perennial controversy between traditional and “modernistic” verse. In this controversy _Wings_ has played a part that some would call conservative, or even ultra-conservative--which is a little strange, in view of the fact that the editor is not in other things a conservative. He has sometimes wondered, also, whether the true conservative is not he who drifts with the crowd; whether, in a world where the vast majority proclaims itself in favor of “modernism,” the independent who stands out against “modernism” is not the actual radical.

I will not deny that in some ways the situation in contemporary poetry is deeply confused. But in other regards, everything has impressed me as pellucidly clear. First of all, it has always struck me that certain elements are necessary in poetry, in this age as in all others. One is the ingredient of music: “She dwells with Beauty--Beauty that must die,” has a musical sound, as much today as when Keats wrote it, and therefore has at least one of the qualities of poetry; but “She dwells with ash-cans--ash-cans by a brick wall,” has no more music than the thumping of a garbage truck. In much the same way, poetry creates, and always has created, a magic or suggestiveness which is not that of prose; and in this respect also the line about beauty qualifies, but that about the ash-can does not. And, finally, poetry--like all writing--should be as clear as the subject-matter and the skill of the writer make possible; which does not imply that the meaning must always stand out like a steel engraving, but that it must be as lucid as the theme and the author’s ability permit, and that murkiness must not be sought for its own sake.

These are, in brief, the principles that I have espoused in editorials and reviews in _Wings_ ever since its first issue. But these principles, though they might seem simple and self-evident, run counter to the accepted mandates of the age, which have tended to abandon music, and to make poetry uninspiring as a cement mixer, and unclear as a fog-bank. And what do I mean by the “accepted mandates” of the age? I mean the mandates of the group in power--those who control the policies of our leading literary and sophisticated magazines, those who sit in authority in prize committees, those who act as poetry advisers for some of our major publishers, those who compile anthologies, and write articles and reviews for some of the more influential media. At no time have I denied that many of these are honest, capable, and convinced men; but it seems to me that not a few are bewildered, and ignorant of poetry, its nature and its history; not a few are but following the normal human tendency to embrace whatever happens to be fashionable, and commit the error of mistaking fashion and right.

Yet the fact is that much that is in style nowadays, and much that is generally called poetry, has none of the qualities by which poetry in past ages was recognized. Which majority, therefore, shall one be aligned with?--the great preponderance of all the poets and critics who have lived before our own century, or the few who within the past several decades have striven to undermine yesterday’s accumulated lore and skills? For my own part, I consider one thing self-evident: if “modernistic” critics and verse-writers are right in their dominant attitudes, then all of our famous predecessors, from Chaucer to A. E. Housman, were in error. But if all the latter were in error, that fact must be demonstrated by more cogent arguments than have yet been adduced.

Yet can it be that all the proponents of “modernism” are wrong? Before attempting to answer this question, let us ask whether history shows no other cases of mistaken majorities. What of the belief in witchcraft several centuries ago, when savants and nobles and common men alike, from King James I of England down to the most ignorant serving maid, were convinced believers in the reality of black magic? What of slavery, whose abolition, it was honestly believed by many a good man in England, America, and elsewhere, would bring inevitable ruin to the world? What of headhunting, ceremonial cannibalism, human sacrifice, widow-burning, and other dread rites, all of which were accepted by large masses and even fervently defended, in some cases in comparatively civilized lands? I do not, of course, mean to compare modernism in verse to any of these horrors; but I do wish to emphasize that mass acceptance of any theory, belief, or principle does not prove the validity of the doctrine.

And in the case of recent poetry, what do we find? That some, like Amy Lowell and John Gould Fletcher, came over to the new camp after unskillful efforts to write in the older forms; that others, like Wallace Stevens, William Carlos Williams, and Marianne Moore, revolted against traditional verse without ever having shown that they could write it; that others again, such as T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, formed an _entente cordiale_ of mutually expressed admiration; that still others, always ready to embrace the new, endorsed the “advanced” principles for the sake of showing themselves to be different and emancipated; that certain others, like “e. e. cummings” with his typical lines such as “goo-dmore-ning(en” and “sing thatthis is which what yell itfulls o,” performed the antics of circus clowns, and finding themselves taken seriously, performed still more bizarre antics; that many opportunists, of the sort who exist at all times and in every circle, joined the procession for the sake of personal advantage; that more and more bystanders trailed along out of fear or in order not to appear behind the times; and that the great majority, deeming themselves incompetent to judge and not daring to deny the word of authority, stood by in apparent acquiescence though actually in profound bewilderment and even in secret disgust.

Such, in a word, is my own interpretation of the rise of “modernism” in verse, and indeed in all the arts. And such has been the conviction behind the editorial policy of _Wings_. From the first, I realized that my stand was challenging giants. I realized that I might put myself under a personal cloud. But in the long run, all that counted was the truth, and the only truth I could defend was truth as it appeared through my own eyes. My judgment, like that of any human, might be blurred, distorted, or perverted; but such as it was, it was my own; it was all I had to go by, and it would have been despicable and cowardly to stand by and muffle the convictions burning within me. And what if I were to be penalized for speaking? In what period of history, and in what land, have men not been penalized for speaking? Not that I had any taste for martyrdom; but that I was convinced that the game of poetry, like every other game, was not worth playing except in one way. There may be those who can complacently accept whatever they believe to be the mood of the age, and adapt their style to that mood; but I must unhappily confess that I am not one of those pliable souls, and that I should hide my face in shame even were the high honor of a Pulitzer Prize or a Nobel Prize to come to me for work that I knew to represent a compromise with standards that were not my own, and a truckling to mere vulgar acceptability.

On the road which I have followed, followed perhaps with a mulish intractability but certainly without wide meanderings, there have been both penalties and compensations. The penalties have been those of shut doors--and of occasional abuse and misrepresentation. Once or twice a small “modernistic” magazine has honored me with a long article in which my purposes, principles, and methods were entirely misstated. And more than once a larger magazine has lent its pages to the controversy; in one case the writer even descended to language of the gutter in counter-attack when logic evidently failed him. And in other cases, as in Randall Jarrell’s widely circulated _Poetry and the Age_, my statements are subjected to a deliberate or unconscious distortion that make them look about as a man’s image would appear through a convex mirror. I do not wish to harp upon this point, but let me give an example. Mr. Jarrell, referring to the preface of my anthology _The Music Makers_, reports that I say that any poem must be, among other things, “easy to understand.” This could logically be taken to mean that I think that every poem should be on the level of Mother Goose; and if I meant anything like that, I would be even more of a fool than nature has made me. But what I say is the following:

Poetry may have both a satisfying rhythm and a touch of magic and yet
not be completely satisfying if it be without a third factor, which
for want of a better term we may call clarity. This is not to say
that it need have the simplicity of a kindergarten exercise; complex
themes by their very nature require complexities of utterance, yet
since the purpose of all expression is communication, whether of a
thought, a mood or an emotion, the consummate writer in any field
will phrase his messages as clearly as is consistent with their
thorough presentation.

There are more ways than one of damaging a reputation; and not the least effective is by misstating a writer’s position so as to make him appear silly. I should add that Mr. Jarrell’s publisher, though a man of the highest reputation in his profession, and though writing me that “I certainly would not want any reputable person like yourself to feel that a book published by us did him substantial injustice in any way,” refused my request for changes in the offending passages in subsequent editions of the book; nor did Mr. Jarrell at any time apologize or offer to make even partial amends.

In quite another way, I was to have a glimpse into the sharp and biassed discrimination that occurs in the supposedly high-minded and idealistic realm of poetry. The incident was a minor one, of no intrinsic importance; and would not be worth reporting except for its implications. There was a certain man (let me call him “Jones”) who had once briefly visited me at my home, and was editing a magazine of free verse--to which, naturally, I did not seek admittance. But one day I read that Jones had started a new magazine, to be devoted exclusively to traditional poetry. Since this was in my field, I had no hesitation about mailing him two or three poems, along with the usual stamped return-envelope. Sometime later the poems came back, along with a note: “Dear C.: I rather like your verses entitled _Compensation_ and would have ordinarily accepted them; but in view of what is being said as to the position you have taken in poetry, I am afraid I must send them back.”