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A Satire Anthology
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Год написания книги
2017
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On the lake or in the cave,
Stole the steadiest canoe,
Ate the quarry others slew,
Died – and took the finest grave.
When they scratched the reindeer-bone,
Someone made the sketch his own,
Filched it from the artist – then,
Even in those early days,
Won a simple Viceroy’s praise
Through the toil of other men.
Ere they hewed the Sphinx’s visage,
Favouritism governed kissage,
Even as it does in this age.
Who shall doubt the secret hid
Under Cheops’ pyramid
Was that the contractor did
Cheops out of several millions?
Or that Joseph’s sudden rise
To Comptroller of Supplies
Was a fraud of monstrous size
On King Pharaoh’s swart Civilians?
Thus, the artless songs I sing
Do not deal with anything
New or never said before.
As it was in the beginning,
Is to-day official sinning,
And shall be for evermore.
Rudyard Kipling.
THE CONUNDRUM OF THE WORKSHOPS
WHEN the flush of a new-born sun fell first on Eden’s green and gold,
Our father Adam sat under the Tree and scratched with a stick in the mould;
And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was joy to his mighty heart,
Till the Devil whispered behind the leaves, “It’s pretty, but is it Art?”
Wherefore he called to his wife, and fled to fashion his work anew —
The first of his race who cared a fig for the first, most dread review;
And he left his lore to the use of his sons, and that was a glorious gain
When the Devil chuckled, “Is it Art?” in the ear of the branded Cain.
They fought and they talked in the North and the South, they talked and they fought in the West,
Till the waters rose on the pitiful land, and the poor Red Clay had rest —
Had rest till that dank blank-canvas dawn when the dove was preened to start,
And the Devil bubbled below the keel, “It’s human, but is it Art?”
They builded a tower to shiver the sky and wrench the stars apart,
Till the Devil grunted behind the bricks, “It’s striking, but is it Art?”
The stone was dropped at the quarry-side, and the idle derrick swung,
While each man talked of the aims of Art, and each in an alien tongue.
The tale is as old as the Eden Tree, and new as the new-cut tooth,
For each man knows, ere his lip-thatch grows, he is master of Art and Truth;
And each man hears, as the twilight nears to the beat of his dying heart,
The Devil drum on the darkened pane, “You did it, but was it Art?”
We have learned to whittle the Eden Tree to the shape of a surplice-peg;
We have learned to bottle our parents twain in the yolk of an addled egg;
We know that the tail must wag the dog, for the horse is drawn by the cart;
But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old, “It’s clever, but is it Art?”
When the flicker of London Sun falls faint on the Club-room’s green and gold,
The sons of Adam sit them down and scratch with their pens in the mould;
They scratch with their pens in the mould of their graves, and the ink and the anguish start,
For the Devil mutters behind the leaves, “It’s pretty, but is it Art?”
Now, if we could win to the Eden Tree where the Four Great Rivers flow,
And the Wreath of Eve is red on the turf as she left it long ago,
And if we could come when the sentry slept and softly scurry through,
By the favour of God we might know as much – as our father Adam knew!
Rudyard Kipling.
EXTRACTS FROM THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR CAYENNE
WAKE! for the Hack can scatter into flight
Shakespeare and Dante in a single Night!
The Penny-a-Liner is Abroad, and strikes
Our Modern Literature with blithering Blight.
Before Historical Romances died,
Methought a Voice from Art’s Olympus cried,
“When all Dumas and Scott is still for Sale,
Why nod o’er drowsy Tales, by Tyros tried?”
A Book of Limericks – Nonsense, anyhow —
Alice in Wonderland, the Purple Cow
Beside me singing on Fifth Avenue —
Ah, this were Modern Literature enow!
Ah, my Beloved, write the Book that clears
To-Day of dreary Debt and sad Arrears;
To-morrow! – Why, To-Morrow I may see
My Nonsense popular as Edward Lear’s.
And we, that now within the Editor’s Room
Stole the steadiest canoe,
Ate the quarry others slew,
Died – and took the finest grave.
When they scratched the reindeer-bone,
Someone made the sketch his own,
Filched it from the artist – then,
Even in those early days,
Won a simple Viceroy’s praise
Through the toil of other men.
Ere they hewed the Sphinx’s visage,
Favouritism governed kissage,
Even as it does in this age.
Who shall doubt the secret hid
Under Cheops’ pyramid
Was that the contractor did
Cheops out of several millions?
Or that Joseph’s sudden rise
To Comptroller of Supplies
Was a fraud of monstrous size
On King Pharaoh’s swart Civilians?
Thus, the artless songs I sing
Do not deal with anything
New or never said before.
As it was in the beginning,
Is to-day official sinning,
And shall be for evermore.
Rudyard Kipling.
THE CONUNDRUM OF THE WORKSHOPS
WHEN the flush of a new-born sun fell first on Eden’s green and gold,
Our father Adam sat under the Tree and scratched with a stick in the mould;
And the first rude sketch that the world had seen was joy to his mighty heart,
Till the Devil whispered behind the leaves, “It’s pretty, but is it Art?”
Wherefore he called to his wife, and fled to fashion his work anew —
The first of his race who cared a fig for the first, most dread review;
And he left his lore to the use of his sons, and that was a glorious gain
When the Devil chuckled, “Is it Art?” in the ear of the branded Cain.
They fought and they talked in the North and the South, they talked and they fought in the West,
Till the waters rose on the pitiful land, and the poor Red Clay had rest —
Had rest till that dank blank-canvas dawn when the dove was preened to start,
And the Devil bubbled below the keel, “It’s human, but is it Art?”
They builded a tower to shiver the sky and wrench the stars apart,
Till the Devil grunted behind the bricks, “It’s striking, but is it Art?”
The stone was dropped at the quarry-side, and the idle derrick swung,
While each man talked of the aims of Art, and each in an alien tongue.
The tale is as old as the Eden Tree, and new as the new-cut tooth,
For each man knows, ere his lip-thatch grows, he is master of Art and Truth;
And each man hears, as the twilight nears to the beat of his dying heart,
The Devil drum on the darkened pane, “You did it, but was it Art?”
We have learned to whittle the Eden Tree to the shape of a surplice-peg;
We have learned to bottle our parents twain in the yolk of an addled egg;
We know that the tail must wag the dog, for the horse is drawn by the cart;
But the Devil whoops, as he whooped of old, “It’s clever, but is it Art?”
When the flicker of London Sun falls faint on the Club-room’s green and gold,
The sons of Adam sit them down and scratch with their pens in the mould;
They scratch with their pens in the mould of their graves, and the ink and the anguish start,
For the Devil mutters behind the leaves, “It’s pretty, but is it Art?”
Now, if we could win to the Eden Tree where the Four Great Rivers flow,
And the Wreath of Eve is red on the turf as she left it long ago,
And if we could come when the sentry slept and softly scurry through,
By the favour of God we might know as much – as our father Adam knew!
Rudyard Kipling.
EXTRACTS FROM THE RUBAIYAT OF OMAR CAYENNE
WAKE! for the Hack can scatter into flight
Shakespeare and Dante in a single Night!
The Penny-a-Liner is Abroad, and strikes
Our Modern Literature with blithering Blight.
Before Historical Romances died,
Methought a Voice from Art’s Olympus cried,
“When all Dumas and Scott is still for Sale,
Why nod o’er drowsy Tales, by Tyros tried?”
A Book of Limericks – Nonsense, anyhow —
Alice in Wonderland, the Purple Cow
Beside me singing on Fifth Avenue —
Ah, this were Modern Literature enow!
Ah, my Beloved, write the Book that clears
To-Day of dreary Debt and sad Arrears;
To-morrow! – Why, To-Morrow I may see
My Nonsense popular as Edward Lear’s.
And we, that now within the Editor’s Room
Другие электронные книги автора Carolyn Wells
Последний отзыв
Удивительная книга. Как никогда актуальна сегодня. Язык и стиль автора настолько тонок, лёгок и изыскан, что легко поведёт читателя в мир героев, кото...
Далее