Books and Persons; Being Comments on a Past Epoch, 1908-1911 Read online

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  I know that people buy motor-cars, for the newspapers are full of the dustof them. I know that they buy seats in railway carriages and theatres, andmeals at restaurants, and cravats of the new colour, and shares incompanies, for they talk about their purchases, and rise into ecstasies ofpraise or blame concerning them. I want to learn about the people who buynew books--modest band who never praise nor blame, nor get excited overtheir acquisitions, preferring to keep silence, preferring to do good insecret! Let an enterprising inventor put a new tyre on the market, andevery single purchaser will write to the Press and state that he hasbought it and exactly what he thinks about it. Yet, though the purchasersof a fairly popular new book must be as numerous as the purchasers of anew tyre, not one of them ever "lets on" that he has purchased. I wantsome book-buyers to come forward and at any rate state that they havebought a book, with some account of the adventure. I should then feelpartly reassured. I should know by demonstration that a book-buyer didexist; whereas at present all I can do is to assume the existence of abook-buyer whom I have never seen, and whom nobody has ever seen. It seemsto me that if a few book-buyers would kindly come forward andconfess--with proper statistics--the result would be a few columns quitepleasant to read in the quietude of September.

  JOSEPH CONRAD & THE ATHENAEUM

  [_19 Sep. '08_]

  The _Athenaeum_ is a serious journal, genuinely devoted to learning. Themischief is that it will persist in talking about literature. I do notwish to be accused of breaking a butterfly on a wheel, but the_Athenaeum's_ review of Mr. Joseph Conrad's new book, "A Set of Six," inits four thousand two hundred and eighteenth issue, really calls forprotest. At that age the _Athenaeum_ ought, at any rate, to know betterthan to make itself ridiculous. It owes an apology to Mr. Conrad. Here wehave a Pole who has taken the trouble to come from the ends of the earthto England, to learn to speak the English language, and to write it like agenius; and he is received in this grotesque fashion by the leadingliterary journal! Truly, the _Athenaeum's_ review resembles nothing so muchas the antics of a provincial mayor round a foreign monarch sojourning inhis town.

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  For, of course, the _Athenaeum_ is obsequious. In common with every paperin this country, it has learnt that the proper thing is to praise Mr.Conrad's work. Not to appreciate Mr. Conrad's work at this time of daywould amount to bad form. There is a cliche in nearly every line of the_Athenaeum_'s discriminating notice. "Mr. Conrad is not the kind of authorwhose work one is content to meet only in fugitive form," etc. "Those whoappreciate fine craftsmanship in fiction," etc. But there is worse thancliches. For example: "It is too studiously chiselled and hammered-out forthat." (God alone knows for what.) Imagine the effect of studiouslychiselling a work and then hammering it out! Useful process! I wonder the_Athenaeum_ did not suggest that Mr. Conrad, having written a story, tookit to Brooklands to get it run over by a motor-car. Again: "His effectsare studiously wrought, _although_--such is his mastery of literaryart--they produce a swift and penetrating impression." Impossible not torecall the weighty judgment of one of Stevenson's characters upon the_Athenaeum_: "Golly, what a paper!"

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  The _Athenaeum_ further says: "His is not at all the impressionisticmethod." Probably the impressionistic method is merely any method that the_Athenaeum_ doesn't like. But one would ask: Has it ever read the openingparagraph of "The Return," perhaps the most dazzling feat of impressionismin modern English? The _Athenaeum_ says also: "Upon the whole, we do notthink the short story represents Mr. Conrad's true _metier_" It may bethat Mr. Conrad's true _metier_ was, after all, that of an auctioneer;but, after "Youth," "To-morrow," "Typhoon," "Karain," "The End of theTether," and half a dozen other mere masterpieces, he may congratulatehimself on having made a fairly successful hobby of the short story. Themost extraordinary of all the _Athenaeum's_ remarks is this: "The one shipstory here, 'The Brute,' makes us regret that the author does not give usmore of the sea in his work." Well, considering that about two-thirds ofMr. Conrad's work deals with the sea, considering that he has written"Lord Jim," "The Nigger of the _Narcissus_" "Typhoon," "Nostromo," and"The Mirror of the Sea," this regret shall be awarded the gold medal ofthe silly season. If the _Athenaeum_ were a silly paper, like the_Academy_, I should have kept an august silence on this ineptitude. Butthe _Athenaeum_ has my respect. It ought to remember the responsibilitiesof its position, and ought not to entrust an important work of letters tosome one whose most obvious characteristic is an exquisite and profoundincompetence for criticism. The explanation that occurs to me is that "ASet of Six" and "Diana Mallory" got mixed on the _Athenaeum's_ librarytable, and that each was despatched to the critic chosen for the other.

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  "A Set of Six" will not count among Mr. Conrad's major works. But in themere use of English it shows an advance upon all his previous books. Insome of his finest chapters there is scarcely a page without a phrase thatno Englishman would have written, and in nearly every one of his booksslight positive errors in the use of English are fairly common. In "A Setof Six" I have detected no error and extremely few questionable terms. Theinfluence of his deep acquaintance with French is shown in the position ofthe adverb in "I saw again somebody in the porch." It cannot be called badEnglish, but it is queer. "Inasmuch that" could certainly be defended(compare "in so much that"), but an Englishman would not, I think, havewritten it. Nor would an Englishman be likely to write "that sort ofadventures."

  Mr. Conrad still maintains his preference for indirect narrative throughthe mouths of persons who witnessed the events to be described. I dare saythat he would justify the device with great skill and convincingness. Butit undoubtedly gives an effect of clumsiness. The first story in thevolume, "Gaspar Ruiz," is a striking instance of complicated narrativemachinery. This peculiarity also detracts from the realistic authority ofthe work. For by the time you have got to the end of "A Set of Six" youhave met a whole series of men who all talk just as well as Mr. Conradwrites, and upon calm reflection the existence of a whole series of suchmen must seem to you very improbable. The best pages in the book are thosedevoted to the ironical contemplation of a young lady anarchist. They aretremendous.

  THE PROFESSORS

  [_26 Sep. '08_]

  The death of Professor Churton Collins appears to have been attended bypainful circumstances, and one may be permitted to regret thedisappearance from the literary arena of this vigorous pundit. He had anagreeable face, with pendant hair and the chin of a fighter. His industrymust have been terrific, and personally I can forgive anything to him whoconsistently and violently works. He had also acquired much learning.Indeed, I should suppose that on the subject of literature he was the mostlearned man in Britain. Unfortunately, he was quite bereft of originaltaste. The root of the matter was not in him. The frowning structure ofhis vast knowledge overawed many people, but it never overawed anartist--unless the artist was excessively young and naive. A man may heapup facts and facts on a given topic, and assort and label them, and havethe trick of producing any particular fact at an instant's notice, andyet, despite all his efforts and honest toil, rest hopelessly among theprofane. Churton Collins was such a man. He had no artistic feeling. Apartfrom the display of learning, which is always pleasant to the man ofletters, his essays were arid and tedious. I never heard him lecture, butshould imagine that he was an ideal University Extension lecturer. I donot mean this to be in the least complimentary to him as a critic. Hisbook, "Illustrations Tennyson," was an entirely sterile exercise provingon every page that the author had no real perceptions about literature. Itsimply made creative artists laugh. They knew. His more recent book onmodern tendencies displayed in an acute degree the characteristicinability of the typical professor to toddle alone when released from theleading-strings of tradition.

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  I fear
that most of our professors are in a similar fix. There isProfessor George Saintsbury, a regular Albert Memorial of learning. In mypensive moments I have sometimes yearned to know as many facts aboutliterature as Professor Saintsbury knows, though he did once, I am told,state that "Wuthering Heights" was written by Charlotte. (That must havebeen a sadly shocking day for Mr. Clement Shorter!) I have found hisLiebig "History of French Literature" very useful; it has never failed toinform me what I ought to think about the giants of the past. Moreimportant, Professor Saintsbury's critical introductions to the wholeseries of Dent's English edition of Balzac are startlingly just. Over andover again he hits the nail on the head and spares his finger. I havenever understood by what magic he came to accomplish these prefaces. Forthe root of the matter is no more in Professor Saintsbury than it was inChurton Collins. He has not comprehended what he was talking about. Theproof--his style and his occasional pronouncements on questions as towhich he has been quite free to make up his mind all by himself!

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  I remember one evening discussing the talents of a certain orchestralconductor, who also played the violin. I was talking to a member of hisorchestra, a very genuine artist. We agreed that he had conducted badly;but, I said in his defence, "Anyhow his intentions are good. You mustadmit that he has a feeling for music." "My dear fellow," exclaimed thebandsman pettishly, "no one who had any feeling for music could possiblystand the d----d row that that chap makes on the fiddle." I was silenced.I recall this episode in connexion with Professor Saintsbury. No one whohad any feeling for literature could possibly put down the ---- style thatProfessor Saintsbury commits. His pen could not be brought to write it.Professor Saintsbury may be as loudly positive as he likes--his style isalways quietly whispering: "Don't listen." As to his modernjudgments--well for their own sakes professors of literature ought to bindthemselves by oaths never to say anything about any author who was notsafely dead twenty years before they were born. Such an ordinance would atany rate ensure their dignity.

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  Yet another example is Professor Walter Raleigh. Fifty per cent. of youwill leap up and say that I am being perverse. But I am not. It has beendemonstrated to me satisfactorily, by contact with Liverpool people, thatProfessor Raleigh's personal influence at that university in certain waysmade for righteousness. Nevertheless, Professor Raleigh has himselfdemonstrated to me that, wherever the root of the matter may be, it is notin _him_. One must remember that he is young, and that his underivedopinions are therefore less likely to clash with the authoritativeopinions of living creative artists on their contemporaries andpredecessors than if he were of the same generation as the Collinses andthe Saintsburys. But wait a few years. Wait until something genuinely newand original comes along and you will see what you will see. If he wishednot to ruin his reputation among artists, among people who really createthings, he ought not to have published his books on "Style" and on"Shakespere." He ought to have burnt them. For they are as hollow as adrum and as unoriginal as a bride-cake: nothing but vacuity with an icingof phrases. I am brought back again to the anecdote of the musician. Noone who had the least glimmering of an individual vision of what styletruly is could possibly have tolerated the too fearfully ingenious mess ofwords that Professor Raleigh courageously calls a book on "Style." Thewhole thing is a flagrant contradiction of every notion of style. It maynot be generally known (and I do not state it as a truth) that ProfessorRaleigh is a distant connexion of the celebrated family of Pains,pyrotechnicians. I would begin to go to the Empire again if I could see onthe programme: "10.20. Professor Raleigh, in his unique prestidigitatoryperformance with words." Yes, I would stroll once more into the hallowedPromenade to see that. It would be amusing. But it would have no connexionwith literature.

  MRS. HUMPHRY WARD'S HEROINES

  [_3 Oct. '08_]

  It was the commercial genius of Mr. Hall Caine that invented the idea ofpublishing important novels during the "off" season. Miss Marie Corelli,by a sure instinct, followed suit. And now all sorts of stars, fromgenuine artists to mere successful artisans, take care to publish in theoff season. Thus within the last few weeks we have had novels from EdenPhillpotts, Miss Beatrice Harraden, Anthony Hope, Mrs. Humphry Ward, andMiss Marie Corelli. At this rate the autumn will soon become the slacktime; August will burn and throb with a six-shilling activity; publishers'clerks will form a union; and the Rt. Hon. W.F.D. Smith, M.P., who hasalways opposed an eight hours day, will bring in a Bill for an eightmonths year.

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  That a considerable social importance still attaches to the publication ofa novel by Mrs. Humphry Ward may be judged from the fact that the_Manchester Guardian_ specially reviewed the book on its leader page. Thisstrange phenomenon deserves to be studied, because the _ManchesterGuardian_'s reviewing easily surpasses that of any other daily paper,except, possibly, the _Times_ in its Literary Supplement. The _Guardian_relies on mere, sheer intellectual power, and as a rule it does notrespect persons. Its theatrical critics, for example, take joy in speakingthe exact truth--never whispered in London--concerning the mandarins ofthe stage. Now it is remarkable that the only strictly first-class morningdaily in these isles should have printed the _Guardian_'s review of "DianaMallory" (signed "B.S."); for the article respected persons. I do notobject to Mrs. Humphry Ward being reviewed with splendid prominence. I amquite willing to concede that a new book from her constitutes the matterof a piece of news, since it undoubtedly interests a large number ofrespectable and correct persons. A novel by Miss Marie Corelli, however,constitutes the matter of a greater piece of news; yet I have seen noreview of "Holy Orders," even in a corner, in the _Guardian_. Surely the_Guardian_ was not prevented from dealing faithfully with "Holy Orders" bythe fact that it received no review copy, or by the fact that Miss Corellidesired no review. Its news department in general is conducted withoutreference to the desires of Miss Marie Corelli, and it does not usuallyboggle at an expenditure of four-and-sixpence. Why, then, Mrs. HumphryWard being reviewed specially, is not Miss Marie Corelli reviewedspecially? If the answer be that Mrs. Humphry Ward's novels are better, asliterature, than Miss Corelli's, I submit that the answer is insufficient,and lacking in Manchester sincerity.

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  Let me duly respect Mrs. Humphry Ward. She knows her business. She is anexpert in narrative. She can dress up even the silliest incidents ofsentimental fiction--such as that in which the virgin heroine, in companywith a young man, misses the last train home (see "Helbeck ofBannisdale")--in a costume of plausibility. She is a conscientious worker.She does not make a spectacle of herself in illustrated interviews. Evenin agitating against votes for women she can maintain her dignity. (Shewould be an ideal President of the Authors' Society.) But, then, similarremarks apply, say, to Mr. W.E. Norris. Mr. W.E. Norris is as accomplishedan expert as Mrs. Humphry Ward. He is in possession of a much betterstyle. He has humour. He is much more true to life. He has nevercompromised the dignity of his vocation. Nevertheless, the prospect of the_Guardian_ reviewing Mr. W.E. Norris on its leader page is remote, for thereason that though he pleases respectable and correct persons, he does notplease nearly so many respectable and correct persons as does Mrs. HumphryWard. If anybody has a right to the leader page of our unique daily, Mrs.Humphry Ward is that body. My objection to the phenomenon is that the_Guardian_ falsified its item of news. It deliberately gave the impressionthat a serious work of art had appeared in "Diana Mallory." It ought tohave known better. It did know better. If our unique daily is to yield tothe snobbishness which ranks Mrs. Humphry Ward among genuine artists,where among dailies are we to look for the shadow of a great rock?

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  Mrs. Humphry Ward's novels are praise-worthy as being sincerely andskilfully done, but they are not works of art. They are possibly the beststuff now being swallowed by the uneducated public; and they dea
l with thegoverning classes; and when you have said that you have said all. Nothingtruly serious can happen in them. It is all make-believe. No real dangerof the truth about life!... I should think not, indeed! The fearfulquandary in which the editor of _Harper's_ found himself with "Jude theObscure" was a lesson to all Anglo-Saxon editors for ever more! Mrs.Humphry Ward has never got nearer to life than, for instance, "Rita" hasgot--nor so near! Gladstone, a thoroughly bad judge of literature, madeher reputation, and not on a post card, either! Gladstone had no sense ofhumour--at any rate when he ventured into literature. Nor has Mrs. HumphryWard. If she had she would not concoct those excruciating heroines ofhers. She probably does not know that her heroines are capable of rousingtemperaments such as my own to ecstasies of homicidal fury. Moreover, inliterature all girls named Diana are insupportable. Look at Diana Vernon,beloved of Mr. Andrew Lang, I believe! What a creature! Imagine livingwith her! You can't! Look at Diana of the Crossways. Why did Diana of theCrossways marry? Nobody can say--unless the answer is that she was aridiculous ninny. Would Anne Elliot have made such an inexplicable fool ofherself? Why does Diana Mallory "go to" her preposterous Radical ex-M.P.?Simply because she is tiresomely absurd. Oh, those men with strong chinsand irreproachable wristbands! Oh, those cultured conversations! Oh, thosepure English maids! That skittishness! That impulsiveness! That noxiouswinsomeness!