Lascelles Abercrombie

Georgian Poetry 1920-22 Lascelles Abercrombie

When the fourth volume of this series was published three years ago, many of the critics who had up till then, as Horace Walpole said of God, been the dearest creatures in the world to me, took another turn. Not only did they very properly disapprove my choice of poems: they went on to write as if the Editor of Georgian Poetry were a kind of public functionary, like the President of the Royal Academy; and they asked - again, on this assumption, very properly - who was E. M. that he should bestow and withhold crowns and sceptres, and decide that this or that poet was or was not to count. This, in the words of Pirate Smee, was a kind of a compliment, but it was also, to quote the same hero, galling; and I have wished for an opportunity of disowning the pretension which I found attributed to me of setting up as a pundit, or a pontiff, or a Petronius Arbiter; for I have neither the sure taste, nor the exhaustive reading, nor the ample leisure which would be necessary in any such role.