A MEMORIAL EDITION OF MEREDITH.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 805, 30 April 1910, Page 9

A MEMORIAL EDITION OF MEREDITH.

.-if the new •memorial,; edition - of George Meredith's works, published by Messrs. Constable, is not quite so noble 'in appearance as that which has been shared between millionaires and the more: fortunate'of. reviewers, it is yet (says an-English journal) .a very-hand-some and sufficiently monumental affair. . It is excellently printed on good paper and bound neatly and, serviceably in a pleasant shade of green, and the cost is ■ 7s. 6d. a volume. ..The text is, we understand, "exactly the/same as that ; of the .more .expensive 'edition, •mi no ■■•doubt..-the scope.; of; the two : will ultimately coincide. .In the sidingup which will come ' with the later volumes, we .may expect the unfinished novel) "Saxon and Celt,", and the unfinished play, ':■ "The Sentimentalists," ]»th. of which have been obtrusive loose ends'in; Meredith's life for many years.'.. The present batch of weight iTolnines includes "The Shaving of ghagpat" and five of the novels, for though "Sandra Belloni" is , only . 57 pages longer than "Evan Harrington," Both it and "Victoria"'in Messrs. Constable's generous scheme, get two .•volumes apiece. 'We welcome gladly these successive editions of Meredith, though even .those whose bobk-buj'ings have had only the mildest tinge of col-; looting may feel some, kind of superiority towards these massive, •' definitive. volumes,' v which seem to roll but all the little irregularities. Yet the collector's' pride in early crudities or [freshnesses which Meredith. got rid,, of will .be discounted when; presently, a volume/ appears with a detailed history of- all the various changes. In some of the earlier works these are considerable, 'and l the reader who began;on these. is: sometimes doubtful or baffled. iWe could hardly have dreamt, for instance, that, at the..: end of Harry Richmond's rather lame apologia Ottilia's Professor used to throw ;his pipe into the fire, with ;'an exclamation • far more cordial than anything he utters now : The correction in this case is an extremely interesting one—we are'anticfpatingitis' repetition,'as. the particular novel is] not yet reached in the memorial, edition—and 1 these 1 : alterations made by Meredith.in-his work, should be of first-rate interest to students of his thought and style. • These students tend, perhaps, to become more formal and methodical, and 'there is one Northern University at least in whicbMeredith is taken as an advanced examina- " tionsubject;','.-■ ; .The': collector will still have ' his chances, for he is at the other, end of things from that eminent subscriber to' memorial .editions, Lord, Melbourno; who ..considered; it .satisfactory '■ .when: these fellows died, arid you could get their works complete on.your, shelves, and there an end of them. Wo have heard of a man who collected: all the -Meredith first editions, and then, dismayed at thb loss of his occupation, started afresh and'duplicated them. To have two of the preciou 8 edition of the early poems is rather' disgraceful, for opportunity could hardly come twice fairly, and so then" must have been a mere brutality of high.bidding..,:: It is ; well to think'that to a n'recdy collector there must be some disillusion in finality. Those who are not collectors", but just occasional buyers, may -still have some goodly little varieties •in i ,More-, 'dith's books. Some few years aeo'th'e first edition of "Modern Love" did.not cost a great deal, and it's shinyy.ipat-" terried! green back was quite unmodern:

"The Egoist" with the primitive symbolism of a golden peacock on its'blue cover is a kind of speciality nowadays; and ordinary persons may 'have a "jump to Glory' Jane" with Mr. Laurence Housman's queer, fine illustrations or "The Tragic Comedians" and "Farina" in the guile of the old Railway' novel. Even when tho • last word in -book-collecting is said, it may bo possible to persist in .penetrating into magazines and such original sources. In tho volumes before us there are reminiscences of "Once a Week" and Charles Keeno, and we may wonder whether when "Lord Ormont and His Aminta" comes there will be any reproductions of the very skilful illustrations that accompanied it in tho "Pall Mall Magazine." To make pictures of Meredith's heroines is ticklish work, and'when wo turn to Keehe's Rose Jocelyn—Evan is old-fashioned but not so bad—it does seem that these women must have been a generation.in front of their generation,- and that however well contemporaries would do for Dickens wo must illustrate Meredith ourselves. Perhaps it would be just as well not to illustrate him at all, and we may protest mildly that photographs of authentic places which Meredith might have had, in his mind's eye are not really relevant to his stories, though they are interesting. He may have managed to get Queen Anne's Farm out of the actual Byfleet Manor House which is here represented, but wo cannot. Perhaps ho has some advantage of us in imagination.