England, that swan's nest Ed,w.rd Thomas orn the Countrysidc: al %election of his Prose and Vcrse, edited by Roland Gant (Faber, ?4.95) Thlere is a tenidenicy to ohik of Idward Thomas as a hounded back wvho, Onlce en- listed it the 1914-18 WVar-, founzd hiintself rliieved of Grub Str eet responsibilities, flowered inito a poet, and died vyiniug froitn ait cxplodintg shell in 1917. The flowering is right; so is the tr-agic untimely end ; btut the hounided hack (nearly 20 years of him) is neither a disr eputable nor a negligible figure. Thomas's prose, much of which admittedly he wvrote to or-der. has qualities wvhich deserve more than brief attention. Deadlinies, after aill, can be good for authors. Roland Gant has done mtich over the years (shnce 1948 in fact) to ftirthel thc just cause and claims of Edward Ihomas. In this present selectioni he is aible to str enigthen the conviction that in Thomas we possess a true and unpretentious poet who wrote in his owni immediately recognizable way. He gives us comparatively few poems ; and this is perfectly right because about the value of his poetry there is no longer ally need to argue. And by beinig stingy here, Mr Gant has enough space to establish that Thomas can not onily write pieces that are acctirate and belles-lettristic after the manner of his tine-this is a fact which has been urged much too enthusiastically-but is also master of a prose which is wide-ranging, exact, strong and mnovingly evocative of a Britain we have come close by now to destr ovyiig utterly. This evocative power is what gives his writing its melancholy fascinationi. Readinig him, we are strongly reminided of tiouch that we alte in danger of losing altogether: solitude, and peace, and the tunable noise of itatural tlhigs. Sotiietiines he can be self- conscious anid over-decorative: ".. . a few hazels overhung the other side; anid in their discontented writhing roots . . ." is aii example of the pathetic fallacy striking ans attitude. But to offset this, he can describe himself standing ils an old, denise wood at tvilight, atid bring to the experienice Words- worthian intimations of immortality. Writitig neat ly 80 years ago. he is already aware of the vast upsets of the natural order and stability that we at least have lIati pushed right under our noses. This brinigs hinm close to us. For a momcnt . . .I seent to see tihat Englaniid that swits's niest . . . w/hich a nmant's heart was nzot too big to love utlerlP. But niow . . . tb,e choice offered to tvhomsoever would be patriotic is emnbarrassing, and lhe is fortunate twho catz find an ideal England of the past, the present, and the futtre to tworship, anu einhod!) it int his natii-e fields. as ili a gravc Y irnage. This leads hint to stress what he hopes will be permanent. "The huxgc vacant halls of dawn give a senise of god-like power" is onie of his sentences. Does this say what he wants it to say? I think it does, hovever hard it is now to recapture Thomas's ex- perience of the dawn flooding tip in silence. We have destroyed silenice, and with that destruction our senise of the numinous. In a phrasc Thomilas re-cieates the dawn of the vorld. For consolation lie dwells mostly nn the power of nature to reassert herself. This is the motive eniergy behind much of his poetry wvhere he celebr ates loneliness anid the assimilation of deserted artifacts: rusted superannuated farm inmplements overgrown vith dusty nettles, atid the tanig of the nettle- smell brought out by a showver. He stalks renioteness : " the lake that rests and stirs not in its nook.'as in the hollow of a collar- bone ". This is the poet in him (and he wvas mostly poet) writing with har-d atid menitor- able veracity. Yet he isn't always a solitary figure in his landscapes. Fellow creatures appear niowv aiid then aitd these are painted in with a sort of stealthy awve which turns them into creatures out of the earth's lonig past-out of elflafid almost : Captaini Rowvlanid, the dedicated angler wvho casts for trout in black clothes and a pot hat, or riffraff folk who "on the morniitg of the races . . ciawled out of all sorts of holes ". And these houseless puriters have their granideur : thtey doni't worry about benefits, are uncoiicerned about inl-depth in- quihies froni social security officers. Thanks to this delightful book wc now liave Thontas the vindicated writer of prose to set beside the poet already known and loved. Don't worry about the occasional tired phrases' of a hard-pressed nman: Edward Thonmas cait usually be relied upon to play his own notes clearly, without imitativeltess and without loss of pitch. True, it is minor- key stuiff mainly, but there was plenty of cause for that. Melancholy is the dontinant theme makitig over and over its plangentt ret entries: "Autumn . . that gradual pompous dying that has no parallel in humait life . . . ". Certainly it had not for him. David Williams To he published on Jtotc 28. Tlw Diary of Edward Thomas, jqnuary I-AprilI 8, 1917 (Whittingtont Press, limited edition, ?16). England, that swan's nest