THE WORLD OF BOOKS.

Press, Volume LXII, Issue 18668, 17 April 1926, Page 13

THE WORLD OF BOOKS.

HALF HOURS IN A LIBRARY. (SPBCIALLT WRtTTBH MR "THX HESS.") By A. H. Grlnujcg. CLXI.—OX SOME LITERARY LOSSES. Numbers of new writers are constantly making their appearance upon the literary horizon, but the recruits are to a large extent counterbalanced by the losses. Recently death has removed several whose names at least were known to the majority, if their works were only read by the few. There died towards the end of last year Ladislas St. Reymonr, the Polish novelist who recently won the Nobel Prize with the his four volume novel "The Peasants." He was the second Pole to win the prize, the first being Henry Sienkiewicz, author' of "Quo Vadis," who won the prize over twenty years .ago. . It is a.curious commentary that St. Reymont was only beginning to acquire international fame when he died. "The Peasants," which is undoubtedly his masterpiece, is now in course of translation into English, three of the volumes having appeared, the fourth being still in preparation. "Spring" appeared in Polish in 1904-5, and the other three "seasons" in 1904-6, but until he was awarded the Nobel prize his work was scarcely known outside his own. country. In "Poland's Case for Independence,", published ten years ago, the following reference occurs:—; St. Reymont, a powerfully expansive elemental nature, feels the best, the characteristic phenomena, and loves the best the unmixed poetry of the elements.' The drawing of hit intellectual types-is not always flawless, but in "Chlopi" (The Peasants) his forceful picturing of .the souls of the Polish peasants and their patriotism, springing from the love et their land, has something of the grandeur and Indomitableness of the elements among which they live. This work has been translated into •English,-French, and German. The present war stopped the publication of his last creation, "The Year of 1794," in which in glowing . words paints the epoch of the last Partition of Poland. Major Charles Phillips, who served Th Poland during the war period as a member of the American Red Cross Commission, published only three years ago a 'book on "The New Poland," in which he sheds light upon the character of St. Reymont The Polish novelist's first story was called "The Comedienne," written in 1896, it appeared in America in English translation in 1920. Major Phillips uses a quotation from the book to illustrate the literary catholicity of the Poles. Glogonski, tire dramatist, is speaking: — "But Shakespeare is the whole universe. *W"e can merely contemplate him, never understand him." "And Schiller?" "A Utopian; an echo of the Encyclopedists and the French Revolution. He represents aristocracy, order, German doctrinarianism, and pathetic, wearisome declamation." "And Goethe?" "That means only Faust. But Faust is so complicated • a machine that since the death of the inventor no one knows how to wind it or start it going. The commentators push the wheels, take it apart, clean it and dust it but | machine will not go, and already it is rusting a little." "And Shelley and Byron?" . "Aha.'Byron. Byron slapped England's face with masterpieces. And Shelley? The. poet of the elements, not .for us mortals. ... Ibsen makes a queer impression on me.' He foreshadows .something mightier than himself. As regards the newest -lover-praised iand ■ over J advertised Germans, Sudermann and Co., they are '-'! merely prating about small things. They want to convince the world, for instance, that it is unnecessary to wear suspenders with yonr trousers, because you can sometimes wear trousers without suspenders." ', . When Major Phillips was in- Poland he found everyone reading Zeromski and Reymont, "The two giant living masters of Polish literature." And he remarks: "In Continental Europe they are'accepted as masters, but their works are only beginning to be read in English. Their many volumes are found everywhere in Poland,, in shops and news stands, cheap in price, neatly bound in paper covers, as practically all the current literature of Europe is. Nothing of Zeromski .'s has yet'been introduced to America. But it is not difficult to predict a veritable 'Polish seasos'- when once he and Reymont become known .to our people. They are both realists of the higher type. They ■ . ■ i

wrote forcefully/but with Wades, not bludgeons." Continuing his comment, Major Phillips says:— 6( rural origin. B«««»$£,,?«£' huVv.l. of this genre •»«« °£ moat in Europe, according to the of French and German crit cs, oy *°» ?J writing, are iustly «£«£?JJ<« significance to .11 whoi are w the study of »w«> P£^"e o ,ugt. or tho not 1 mit hu scope to »"""•?, he de . citj- and its industrial life. It is said that when Poland «• ™*£ German domination the German officials were instructed to read the ™\*£ Revraont in order to gain a k»°*l«te« of the psychology of the people tho were sent to govern; »« os * *" d searching is the Polish novelists analysis of character in his stories. In ine Promised Land" Reymont conveys the quintessence of the German view ot the Pole in a speech put into the moutn of Kessler. a rich Ix>dz manufacturer, when addressing his Polish competitors:—"Not one, not ten of your factories will be the foundation of your industry. You must first Income civilised and create a certain industrial culture before your efforts cease to be ridiculous. I know you Poles only too well. You are gifted, charming, grand seigneurs. Whv don't vou go to Monaco? Whv don't vou attend the season at Nice." in Paris, in Italy? There vou would arouse admiration, and that "is all you thirst for—to be admired. You do everything to lie admired, to show off before the world for the sake of fine words, your work, your noble sentiments, your art, your literature, life—they are all nothing .more than so many phrases, more or less well declaimed before the gallery; or if there he'no gallery, then for your own delight. Above all things you are Kings of the Flirts. You are children making believe you are grown up."' To which tirade Reymont makes the Pole gives this significant answer: — "You are right. And again you are wrong. For instance, take a pig. If a pig could reason about an eagle it' would reason in just that way. If it could compare its sty, its vulgarity, its stupid brutal strength, its hideous grunting voice, its intelligence, limited to the capacity for stuffing itself; if a pig could compare all .that it is and all that* it knows, to the beauty of an eagle, its passion for liberty, its desire of soaring up to the very sun its pride, its love of space, then the pig would hate the eagle and nourish only profound contempt for it. What you say is not a synthesis, but only the snarl of an animal of the lower species." In anothef part of the same novel Reymont revealsjn a flash the Polish soul, the soul of an eagle:— "How terrible life is," sighed Anka. "No. It is only our exactions of■ life that are terrible. It is only our impossible conceptions of beauty and good and justice that are terrible—because they are never realised, and at the same time they prevent us taking life as it is. That is the real sonrce of all our sorrow and suffering." "And of all ear .hope," Nina added. Indislas St.. Reymont was born in 1868, and in hi* childhood he attempted to translate Chopin's music into verse... He next essayed some : short stories and his first book, "The' Pilgrimage to Jasnagora," was published in 1895., Another litterateur whose death has recently been reported is Edmund Chandler, journalist and traveller. He went to Thibet in 1904 and he told a story of the expedition in a brilliant book, "The Unveiling of Lhasa," which had a great vogue and which was. afterwards issued in that notable*, pre-war series, Nelson's .Shilling.Library.. I have a copy in front' of me as I write, and I note in the brief preface the /secret of the book's success. "The greater part," says Chandler, "was, written on the spot while the impressions of events and scenery were still fresh." Another recent death is thnt of Professor E. G. Browne, of Cambridge, a great authority on all things Persian. Tt was he who,' in his "Literary History of Persia," first disclosed the'fact that "The Rubaiyat" as done into English by Edward Fitzgerald, was not the 'Rubaiyat' of Omar Khayyam 'and that Omar, instead of the man presented by Fitzgerald, was quite another person. In spite of the professor's discovery the original -impression still remains. One other death remains to be commented upon, viz., George Herbert Mair. I know him,'as author of an invaluable little text book in the Home University" Library on "English Literature; Modern." The Home University Library was another valuable pre-war series, many volumes of which are out of print. Alas and alack, from the book lover's point of view, for the days of long ago. Multitudes of books are being published to-day, hut the prices are high and the Content of many of them is negligihle.Those pre-war series were admirable jn every ; respect,- but there is no indication that they will ever come again.