Charles William Dalmon (1862–1938)[1] was a British poet, 1890s decadent, 1920s film designer,[2] and friend of Noël Coward.[3]
Life edit
Dalmon was a contributor to The Yellow Book, and was published in The Living Age, in the mid-1890s. His poems subsequently appeared in many anthologies,[4] but his reputation was never bright.[5] Jean Moorcroft Wilson[6] notes that Siegfried Sassoon and Ralph Hodgson planned to publish "small, neglected authors", into which group Dalmon fell with Thomas Ashe and Primovard Dugard.
There are ascriptions to Dalmon of Manx songs and ballads, which may be collector's or editor's rather than author's credits. O what if the fowler my blackbird has taken? is given as by him,[7] but there is a related old ballad.[8] The (Red) Fuchsia Tree, set by Roger Quilter[9] and John Raynor,[10] is attributed to Dalmon but may be traditional.[11]
In December 1934, Charles Dalmon 'Sussex poet' and 'descendent of Tudor Court Favourite' joined the British Union of Fascists.[12]
Works edit
- Minutiae (1892)
- Song Favours (1895)
- Flower And Leaf (1900)
- A Poor Man's Riches (1922)
- Singing As I Go (1927)
- The Last Service (1928)
External links edit
- Archive Material at Leeds University Library
Notes edit
- ^ Births Index Jun 1862 Steyning 2b 233, Deaths Index Mar 1938 Finsbury 1b 567 aged 76.[1]
- ^ Work with Lucky Cat Films in the early 1920s.[2]. Credits for art direction for a 1928 film The Blue Peter[3].
- ^ Dalmon is supposed to have uttered the outrageous my ambition is to be crushed to death between the thighs of a guardsman."In July 1927, Cecil Beaton photographed the Honourable Stephen Tennant on the occasion of his twenty-first birthday". Archived from the original on 2007-09-29. Retrieved 2007-01-23..
- ^ Including his Camelot in the 1929 John Drinkwater Twentieth-Century Poetry.
- ^ A review in The Daily Telegraph >[4][dead link] (25 June 2006) noted that John Betjeman was a fan, classing Dalmon with "dim and half-forgotten poets" such as Theodore Wratislaw, William Renton and Edmund John.
- ^ In her Siegfried Sassoon, volume II (1918-1967) from 2003, p.257.
- ^ Index to 'Manx National Songs' by W.H.Gill at www.isle-of-man.com
- ^ Broadside ballads entitled 'The Blackbird' and 'My Name is Duncan Campbell' at www.nls.uk
- ^ "Roger Quilter". Archived from the original on 2005-02-22. at www.btinternet.com
- ^ British Composers: 20th century English composer John Raynor Archived 2006-08-27 at the Wayback Machine at www.kcedensor.freeserve.co.uk
- ^ See the Preface [5] to the 1896 collection of arrangements Manx National Songs, by W. H. Gill, for the context.
- ^ The Blackshirt, 7 December 1934, p.10