Poems, Letters and Memories of Philip Sidney Nairn
A poignant memoir and tribute to the Oxford poet Nairnby the author who went on to create The Worm Ouroborosand the groundbreaking Zimiamvia fantasy trilogy.Eric Rucker Eddison’s first book, originally published privately in hardback during the First World War, is a poignant memoir and tribute to the Oxford poet Philip Sidney Fletcher Nairn, whose work was so inspired by his Scottish ancestry, life in the Lake District, and his subsequent travels across Asia.This first official paperback edition includes a poignant and evocative biography, a dozen photographs, and more than 50 of Nairn’s poems, and marks the centenary of his untimely death in Kuala Lumpur in May 1914, aged just 30 years old.
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POEMS, LETTERS, AND MEMORIES OF PHILIP SIDNEY NAIRN
ARRANGED BY
E. R. EDDISON Late of Trinity College, Oxford
PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION
LONDON, 1916
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Copyright © E. R. Eddison 1916
Jacket illustration © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 2014
E. R. Eddison asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
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Source ISBN: 9780007578078
Ebook Edition © 2015 ISBN: 9780007578085
Version: 2014-12-16
P. S. F. NAIRN IN 1907.
[From, a photograph by Martin Jacolette.]
CONTENTS
Copyright
List of Illustrations
Preface
I. Introduction
II. Family, Birth, and School Life
III. Oxford and Stettin
IV. Kelantan and the Federated Malay States
V. Life and Literature
POEMS
Exile
To J. C.
Desiderium
To E. R. E. (on receiving a certain letter)
To Miss M. H.
In the Buchheide
The Dawn of Love
Retrospect
A Fallen Socrates
Reverie
Rejected Verse
Blore’s
To Smudge – my Dog
To my German Class
To Mrs Honey
For Jess
For Miss E. S.
To Phoebus Apollo
For Barbara
For Miss E. Brown
For Miss M. Brown
Advance, Australia!
‘Altogether Piffle’
Why Not?
At Parting
To the Unknown Goddess
To J. M. C.
Off Malacca
Sundown in the Rains
To E. R. E. (on news of his engagement)
Fragment
Trois Ans Après
Hélas
F. M. S. DITTIES:
To my Nearest Neighbour
The Point of View
Mischievous
The Volunteer Dance
‘He slumbered in Carcosa’s stead’
Metamorphosis
Upon the Troublesome Times
The Seats of the Mighty
Day-dreams or Nightmare?
Furious Driving
Still the Everlasting ‘Dreadnought’
Some Quatrains from the Selangor Golf Club
TRANSLATIONS:
Near to my Love
Night
Late Summer
The Asra
Anacreon’s Grave
To my Absent Love
Ultimus Cursus Vitae
Appendix I
Appendix II
Footnotes
Also by E. R. Eddison
About the Publisher
1. P. S. F. Nairn in 1907
2. Five Years Old
3. At the Foot of Wastwater, April 1906
4. At Oxford, on the Cherwell
5. Nairn’s Bungalow at Kota Bharu
6. A Garden Party at the Residency
7. Group on the Tennis Lawn
8. Nairn with his Sikhs
9. Proclamation of King George V at Kuala Pilah
10. Two Scenes on the Straits of Malacca
11. The District Officer’s Quarters at Port Dickson
The verses which form the original and essential part of this book are somewhat overshadowed in bulk by the introductory Memoir. The justification of this (to my mind a complete justification) is that it is due not (at least I hope not) to prolixity on the part of the editor, but to the inclusion of long quotations from Nairn’s letters and from his diary. Some of the poems are undoubtedly worthy, in themselves and for their own sake, to be preserved. But their author wrote himself down less vividly and unmistakably in these essays in finished art than in his less studied writings, and any lasting value possessed by this compilation will, in my opinion, rest chiefly on such success as it may have in snatching from oblivion some living traits of a personality which has far more than a personal interest.
Of the defects of my share in the book I am painfully aware. It has been written in time of war, on Sundays or on late evenings, in such moments of leisure as could be found amid urgent official duties. In more favourable circumstances the area of correspondence covered might have been widened, and the balance of the whole better adjusted.
In my estimate of Nairn’s character I do not pretend to be judicial. I have, however, kept a watchful eye on the pardonable leanings of a friend’s judgment towards mere eulogy. I have made no statement which has not been weighed, nor any which I do not believe to be true.
I desire to thank my friend Mr Henry Nairn for the compliment he has paid me in asking me to undertake this work, and for the assistance and information which he has ungrudgingly placed at my disposal. Also my old friend Captain M. H. Woods, for permitting me to take his name in vain. For the local and historical particulars of Kelantan I am chiefly indebted to Mr W. A. Graham’s book, which is, I believe, still the chief authority on that State. I must finally record my obligations to the Editors of the
