"Pilgrim's Progress" In Modern Form

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 29, 4 February 1939, Page 10 (Supplement)

"Pilgrim's Progress" In Modern Form

TT is two and a half centuries 1 this year since the death took place of John Bunyan. As a preacher, this .remarkable man, with little education, and less culture, has - long since been practically forgotten, though he. was a great .'preacher in liis day, with, a gift of speech and a mastery of English that enabled liim'to sway his hearers, including even the House of Commons. As a writer of two books in particular, one of tlieni "The Pilgrim's Progress," which so notable a judge of literature as Samuel Johnson wished had been longer, he is still, remembered,'and will be remembered as long as the English language lasts.. "The Pilgrim's Progress" has been variously described—as a manual of devotion, an allegory, a

prose poem, and a poem of character— and each description is appropriate. As to its popularity, it caught on from the first, and the man would have a difficult task before him who would set himself to discover the number of languages and editions in which it has appeared. Now, however there has been published another English edition of it different from all others. It is the work of E. W. Walters, and the publishers are Messrs. Duckworth. What Mr. Walters has done is to reset it ill modern fashion, strip it of its notes and referencs, its italics and superfluous capitals, and arrange it for the reader of to-day. The result is an up-to-date, as well as a handsome volume. Forewords have been written by the Dean of St. Paul's, London, and Professor Waterhouse, of the University of London.