[New-Poetry] Toads

[Skip Fox]

I love this, using the talkative toad in _The Wind and the Willows_, as the
genesis  for the phrase. This does not preclude the possibility that she was
gently deflating Yeats' sense of grandeur, which would be in keeping with
her more restrained views of the poet's mission and abilities. 

 

Well . . .  

 

-----Original Message-----
From: new-poetry-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu
[mailto:new-poetry-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu] On Behalf Of David Graham
Sent: Monday, July 02, 2007 2:30 PM
To: NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &Views
Subject: Re: [New-Poetry] Toads

 

 

On Jul 2, 2007, at 3:16 PM, Bob Grumman wrote:

I'm skeptical.  The phrase "literalists of the imagination" Moore ascribes
to Yeats, but not the toads.  She was typically very scrupulous about
acknowledging her borrowings.  

 

The Yeats is from *Ideas of Good and Evil*:  "The limitation of his view was
from the very intensity of his vision; he was a too literal realist of
imagination, as others are of nature...."  He's discussing Blake's
illustrations of Dante.

 

I could easily be wrong, but note that Moore puts the toads passage in
quotes.

 

--Bob G.

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>From Representative Poetry Online:

 

imaginary gardens with real toads in them: in some editions, Moore places
quotation marks around these words, but their source is unknown. Possibly
Moore had in mind "the garden front of Toad Hall" in Kenneth Grahame's The
Wind in the Willows (New York: C. Scribner's sons, 1907; 1913 copy at del F
Fisher Rare Book Library), a children's book with real poems in it. Cf.
Grahame's account of Toad of Toad Hall: "During luncheon -- which was
excellent, of course, as everything at Toad Hall always was -- the Toad
simply let himself go. Disregarding the Rat, he proceeded to play upon the
inexperienced Mole as on a harp. Naturally a voluble animal, and always
mastered by his imagination, he painted the prospects of the trip and the
joys of the open life and the roadside in such glowing colours that the Mole
could hardly sit in his chair for excitement" 

http://rpo.library.utoronto.ca/poem/1488.html

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========================================

David Graham

grahamd at ripon.edu

 

Home Page:

http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/About%20Me.html

 

Poetry Library:

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