THE NATION

New York City, New York, U.S.A.

16 November 1899

(Page 379)

RECENT POETRY.

Mr. Aleister Crowley, who used to write as "A Gentleman of the University of Cambridge," now published 'Jephthah and Other Mysteries, Lyrical and Dramatic' (London: Kegan Paul), and dedicates them to Swinburne. The hero of his 'Mysteries is a young poet, adrift in the streets of London, who, in answer to the question what he writes about, says naïvely: "I write about all the horrible things I see, and try to find beauty in them or to make beauty" (p. 105), and this seems to give a key to Mr. Crowley's method, although apparently he does not try very hard. The surprise is that there should be in the same volume some tender and thoroughly poetic things, such as "In the Woods with Shelley" (p. 211).