THE DAILY CHRONICLE

London, England

27 August 1901

(page 3)

THE LYRIC MUSE.

“The Mother's Tragedy, and Other Poems.” By Aleister Crowley. (Privately printed.)

Early last century it was boldly prophesied that dramatic poetry would supersede all other branches of the art. Lyric and epic were classed as outworn, barbarous forms, incapable of expounding the complexity of modern life.

[ . . . . . . . . . . ]

The second is a larger class, including Aleister Crowley. They are in search of thoughts, which, never finding, they describe. Aleister Crowley, it seems to us, does not justify by any wit, or legitimate pathos, or music, his choice of subjects, difficult or unclean, which makes him a sinister rival to the mutoscope. These few lines cannot suggest the unpleasant whole of his ode on “Sin,” but they are quite characteristic of his manner:—

Ye rivers, and ye elemental caves,

Above the fountains of the broken ice,

Know ye what dragon lurks within your waves?

Know ye the secret of the cockatrice?

The basilisk whose shapeless brood

Take blood and muck for food?

The author, too, has a strong stomach. In another place he twits the sea with being “cave-relling.” Most modern lyrists apparently think that in “Nature” they have a subject ready-made. Nature is as productive of bad poetry as were Chloë and Delia long ago.