A Trophy of Arms by Ruth Pitter (1936)

This volume won the Hawthornden Prize and, in so doing, established Pitter on a new level among her contemporaries. It is not hard to see why. Very, very rarely does any piece among these strike a false note. (In fact, there are times when the perfection of the pieces appears almost like the gloss of mother-of-pearl on the clouds of some ineffable Heaven! Some are almost registering in an undetectable octave such as only animals can hear! I think I've been reading too much John Cowper Powys lately.) It is in her small, solitary fight against depression, against worldliness, in her dive into the healing dark spaces striving for contrary unity, that she achieves most. These poems are truly transformative and great. I am assuming that the tart whimsicality of her previous volume has not disappeared; that perhaps this is a kind of holiday-mode for her which will be expressed at irregular intervals. Volumes such as this one, by contrast, are the mainstay; they are her working at the core seam. These first signs of absolute greatness, no matter how minor the key, are inspiring. All power to her gentle toughness, and her standing apart from the crowd.