The Inn of Dreams

by Olive Custance

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Genres: Poetry, Lesbian

90 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1911

About the author

Olive Eleanor Custance (7 February 1874 – 12 February 1944) was a British poet. She was part of the aesthetic movement of the 1890s, and a contributor to The Yellow Book.

Reviews

[Lami Daja]

The Inn of Dreams was the opening verse of Olive Custance’s last book of poetry, which carried the same title. And it is a mass of symbolism.

Olive was a rebellious daughter of the establishment, who plunged into the world of the Decadents and the Yellow Book, unabashedly bisexual, infatuated with one of Oscar’s boyfriends and marrying another of them, thus becoming Lady Alfred Douglas. As this volume appeared (1911), her disapproving father had gained custody of their troubled son, her husband turned angrily against his late lover and converted to Rome, their unconventional marriage largely suspended, though she would die holding his hand, thirty years later.

The inn of the title is a metaphor for her own heart, alight and welcoming, but warning of the transience of the moment: “Spur your fleet horses, this is Beauty's hour!” and “Come now, sweet friends! before the summer die.” Is this a new longing (at thirty-seven) for sublime, youthful experiences - noting that another poem in the collection sings out “God pity me and give me back my voice! God pity me and give me back my wings!”?

At that rate, her work might be called over-personalised. If, like myself, you find her an attractive and intriguing figure, the poems can reward analysis as well as aesthetic response. But under the test, they cannot be placed in the first class, being neither memorable nor quotable. Like Edith Sitwell’s, they rank as good journeyman verse, never bad but never great.

Personalised as they are, then, I feel we might have expected a female voice for the recording (with respect to the mysterious Irishman ‘Nemo’ who still delivers a good recital).

[c_branwell]

Urocze są to wierszyki

[graceofgod]

Simple yet enjoyable.