Various Literary Quotes: Lawrence, On Joyce, On Helton and Poetry

The satire, which in The Man of Property really had a certain noble touch, soon fizzles out, and we get that series of Galsworthian ‘rebels’ who are, like all the rest of the modern middle-class rebels, not in rebellion at all. They are merely social beings behaving in an anti-social manner. They worship their own class but they pretend to go one better and sneer at it. They are Forsyte antis, feeling snobbish about snobbery. Nevertheless, they want to attract attention and make money. That’s why they are anti.
Phoenix (1936) by D.H. Lawrence (pg 547)

Streets intersect, shops advertise, homes have party walls and fellow citizens depend upon the same water supply; but there is no co-operation between human beings. The individual stands motionless, like Odysseus becalmed in the doldrums.
James Joyce (1944) by Harry Levine pg 96

"Roy Helton’s: 'May Jones Takes the Air'
Proud queens, old queens, pale and dead and fair,
Who will be waiting to match her beauty there?
The night is nailed aloft with gold, the wind is on her hair.
And love is searching through her eyes; if time has love to spare
Bring love! Show love! Raise it like a crown!
May Jones of Filbert Street is walking into town!

Nations are marching. Cities yet unseen
Roar on the pavements where her feet have been:
New Worlds! Wise Worlds! Worlds all gold and green!
This is your birth night. Rain your splendours down!
May Jones of Filbert Street is walking into town.

“A little street walker seen through a poet’s eyes! Plato is right in calling him divinely mad.
Rapture may be a force that rushes imperfect poetry to great heights.” (183, Flaccus)