The Golden Treasury of American Songs and Lyrics Book Reviews

The Golden Treasury of American Songs and Lyrics by Frederic Lawrence Knowles Book Summary

I have made it no part of my design to grant to the better known poets a larger number of lyrics than those given later and younger men. I have paid no regard to that purely conventional idea of proportion, that would assign to five or six writers a dozen selections each, and to another set of poets, in proportion to their popular fame, half that number. We can safely leave the final adjustment of all rival claims to Time, the best critic; in the meanwhile having the more modest aim of selecting, irrespective of contemporary judgments, whatever is best suited to our purpose. A word more should be said about the title. I have not interpreted the term lyric so rigidly as to exclude sonnets, ballads, elegiac verse, or even pieces of almost pure description. If I had held to the strictest sense of lyric, this book would never have been compiled; for I suspect nothing will strike the reader more forcibly than the fact that, despite the excellence of the poems included, there is a notable lack of unconsciousness—of pure singing quality. Such things as Pinkney's 'Health' and Holmes's 'Old Ironsides' are the exception. The poems are composed cleverly, but they do not quite sing themselves to their own music. The best American verse, while not insincere, is seldom wholly spontaneous. This is not saying that much spontaneous verse has not been written in this country; much has been, but the singer's voice has too often been uncultivated, and the product inartistic. The names of many popular poets are entirely omitted. In no case, however, was this probably due to oversight. I have gone over carefully a wide field of verse, not without finding much to admire, but never quite happening upon that final touch of successful achievement where art and inspiration join. I am especially sorry to leave unrepresented a writer—more imaginative, possibly, than any American poet except Poe—whose utter contempt for technique in the ordinary sense places him wholly outside my present purpose.

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