Buried Treasure
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davidkmLorraine, Lilith, 2009, Time grows thin, Hilltop Press, 4 Nowell Pl., Almondbury, Huddersfield HD5 8PB England, perfect-bound trade pb, 122 p. Introduction and biography by Steve Sneyd, cover by Gunter Wessalowski, ISBN 978-0-905262-43-7, £7.50, $15.00.
Time grows thin consists of an introduction and biography by Steve Sneyd, a bibliography of Lilith Lorraine, and 92 poems. The summary in this paragraph is taken from the longer biography by Steve Sneyd. Lorraine was the first important female speculative poet (work included science fiction, fantasy, and horror poetry). She published from the 1920s through 60s, and her achievements include the first poetry collection by a woman totally devoted to genre verse and the first genre poetry magazine, Challenge, which she edited.
In his biography of Lorraine, Sneyd recounts the story of how she met her husband . Cleveland Wright was a cowboy. While out riding he found a scrap of paper that bore a poem obviously written by a young girl. He later met and married Mary Maud Dunn (who took the pen name Lilith Lorraine not long after). Six months later he showed her the scrap of paper, and it was one of her poems. Lorraine stayed married to Wright her whole life, moved frequently, held a wide variety of jobs (crime reporter, publisher, business manager, pulp writer, and more), and died at the age of 73 in 1967, after writing more than 6,000 poems. Most are short: two to a page is the rule.
Many themes Lorraine explored are commonplace now, such as nuclear armageddon, intelligent computers, hidden conqueror races, doomed universes, and necromancy, but these were fresh ideas (no pun intended) when she wrote of them. Even now we can enjoy her rhythm and language, though the amazement her contemporary readers might have felt is difficult to recreate.
Among the poems in Time grows thin are delightful jewels, like a paean to Hyracotherium ("Eohippus") the dawn horse, albeit not a science poem. "The flaming sign" is perhaps the best of several poems of warning, curses, and redemption, directed at human society, which fell, and falls, far short of Lorraine's ideals. This poem reminds me of Alan Dean Foster's story "With friends like these..." in theme, though not in style. Some of her poems are reminiscent of the wistful and dark poems of Clark Ashton Smith, whom she knew. And that doesn't even count her contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos, represented in this book by "The acolytes," a brief poem of strange eons.
Steve Sneyd has attempted to distill from Lorraine's oeuvre (not all genre) the best crafted, most evocative, and most important of her genre work. Fairly he said in the introduction that Lorraine's poems are so tightly knit it's difficult to pull out meaningful parts to quote. Here are few tastes that may give the flavor.
From "Boarder"
We walk this little earth and half-believe
We are alone in space, yet all the while
Strange ears may listen, alien spies deceive,
Dark stars maintain their embassies of guile.
From "The golden women"
The conquerors always seek the Golden Women
The final conquerors, desperate and sublime,
And they shall find them in the dusk of dreaming,
The Golden Women at the end of time.
From "Religious controversy"
Some iron prophets say they turned their chill
Hate on each other, but the young say, "No!
No god would lift his kindly hand to kill
Earth (Gaia?) personified and a serpent god in "The plumed serpent" provide an early example of fantasy erotica:
Thrills to her god and trembles at his touch,
Quakes to his passion in the secret night,
Some poems are almost psychedelic. From "Lines to a last lover":
There shall be something stirring in the whirls
Of broken light so desperately globing
The breasts of darkness in the violate tomb,
"Dark science" is about re-creation of the dead. Its theme of science reaching too far, at great cost, is a familiar one, but the language treats her version of zombies lyrically.
But it was Hell to see each well-loved form,
And know its soul was distant as a star.
And it was hell to know with every breath
That still between us flowed the stream of death.
So there you have it. A few snippets of the bounty that is Time grows thin. It is wonderful to be able to read such an important part of the history of genre poetry. I really have only one problem with this book: the cover curls up – a lot! Wish Steve had used stiffer stock.
Time grows thin consists of an introduction and biography by Steve Sneyd, a bibliography of Lilith Lorraine, and 92 poems. The summary in this paragraph is taken from the longer biography by Steve Sneyd. Lorraine was the first important female speculative poet (work included science fiction, fantasy, and horror poetry). She published from the 1920s through 60s, and her achievements include the first poetry collection by a woman totally devoted to genre verse and the first genre poetry magazine, Challenge, which she edited.
In his biography of Lorraine, Sneyd recounts the story of how she met her husband . Cleveland Wright was a cowboy. While out riding he found a scrap of paper that bore a poem obviously written by a young girl. He later met and married Mary Maud Dunn (who took the pen name Lilith Lorraine not long after). Six months later he showed her the scrap of paper, and it was one of her poems. Lorraine stayed married to Wright her whole life, moved frequently, held a wide variety of jobs (crime reporter, publisher, business manager, pulp writer, and more), and died at the age of 73 in 1967, after writing more than 6,000 poems. Most are short: two to a page is the rule.
Many themes Lorraine explored are commonplace now, such as nuclear armageddon, intelligent computers, hidden conqueror races, doomed universes, and necromancy, but these were fresh ideas (no pun intended) when she wrote of them. Even now we can enjoy her rhythm and language, though the amazement her contemporary readers might have felt is difficult to recreate.
Among the poems in Time grows thin are delightful jewels, like a paean to Hyracotherium ("Eohippus") the dawn horse, albeit not a science poem. "The flaming sign" is perhaps the best of several poems of warning, curses, and redemption, directed at human society, which fell, and falls, far short of Lorraine's ideals. This poem reminds me of Alan Dean Foster's story "With friends like these..." in theme, though not in style. Some of her poems are reminiscent of the wistful and dark poems of Clark Ashton Smith, whom she knew. And that doesn't even count her contributions to the Cthulhu Mythos, represented in this book by "The acolytes," a brief poem of strange eons.
Steve Sneyd has attempted to distill from Lorraine's oeuvre (not all genre) the best crafted, most evocative, and most important of her genre work. Fairly he said in the introduction that Lorraine's poems are so tightly knit it's difficult to pull out meaningful parts to quote. Here are few tastes that may give the flavor.
From "Boarder"
We walk this little earth and half-believe
We are alone in space, yet all the while
Strange ears may listen, alien spies deceive,
Dark stars maintain their embassies of guile.
From "The golden women"
The conquerors always seek the Golden Women
The final conquerors, desperate and sublime,
And they shall find them in the dusk of dreaming,
The Golden Women at the end of time.
From "Religious controversy"
Some iron prophets say they turned their chill
Hate on each other, but the young say, "No!
No god would lift his kindly hand to kill
Earth (Gaia?) personified and a serpent god in "The plumed serpent" provide an early example of fantasy erotica:
Thrills to her god and trembles at his touch,
Quakes to his passion in the secret night,
Some poems are almost psychedelic. From "Lines to a last lover":
There shall be something stirring in the whirls
Of broken light so desperately globing
The breasts of darkness in the violate tomb,
"Dark science" is about re-creation of the dead. Its theme of science reaching too far, at great cost, is a familiar one, but the language treats her version of zombies lyrically.
But it was Hell to see each well-loved form,
And know its soul was distant as a star.
And it was hell to know with every breath
That still between us flowed the stream of death.
So there you have it. A few snippets of the bounty that is Time grows thin. It is wonderful to be able to read such an important part of the history of genre poetry. I really have only one problem with this book: the cover curls up – a lot! Wish Steve had used stiffer stock.
