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Show RILEY EASY TO UNDERSTAND For That Reason There Is a Clas That Refuses to Recognize Him as a Great Poet. Widely enjoyed and beloved, the poetry of James Whitcomb Riley will probably always in our lifetime encounter en-counter a species of objections in the minds of many Americans. His poetry . sings. Its force is emoO"ual. Its sincere charm is absolute, and depends de-pends not at all on being somelning like something else on the audience's recollection of Greek verse, or familiarity fa-miliarity wdth Japanese art, or impressionistic im-pressionistic landscape. To the kind of reader for whom a recognizable, musical Idea limits, instead of greatly liberating the communicative faculty of poetry, to the kind of render who thinks of poetry as a species of mere tight-mouthed and cryptic prose, to the kind of reader who is worried by poets who will not give him, so to speak, any reliable library references for their Inspiration to such American Ameri-can readers as these James Whitcomb Whit-comb Riley's poetry must always 6eem all wrong and misguided. Anyone Any-one can understand his songs. People Peo-ple have always been cutting them out of the newspapers and reciting them at Ice-cream sociables and church benefits. Tbey are a part of the national consciousness. New Republic. |