AMONG THE ANNOUNCE-MENTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14281, 1 August 1908, Page 13

AMONG THE ANNOUNCEMENTS

There has been published the first volume of a new series of novels at 3jd! It is " The Shadow of a Crime," by Mr Hall Caine, and Messrs Collins are to issue it in paper covens. • It is a marvel of cheapness, but surely books are already quite cheap enough. _ Professor Flint's'famous book on Socialism will make a timely reappearance in a new and cheaper form. The work was first published 14 years ago, but it bus been brought up to date, and ought to serve a useful purpose at the present hour. Messrs Pitman and Sons are the publishers of the new edition. "The Life-work of Heuderielc Ibsen" and the "Life-work of Calderon," both from the Russian of Merejkowski, have been published by .Alexander Moring, Ltd. (Is 6d net). They are useful little treatises, half critical and half biographical, and owe some of their interest to the fact of the Russian standpoint from which they are written. The opinions of the ablest Russian critics on tho great writers of other countries have a quite peculiar piquancy. The first of the Library of Memoirs, a new series (Sisley, Limited, Is net) is the " Life of (Lionel Hutchinson," by his widow. The book is well printed, coitjflons several capital portraits and other illustrations, and has been carefully edited by Helen Keudrick Hayes. A judiciously written introduction contains particulars the Hutchinson family, and also reminds the reader that in perusing the book itself some allowance has to be made for the partiality of a loving woman, who could see no fault of any kind in the god uf her idolatry. Messip, L. C. Page and Company,' of Boston, U.S.A., have arranged for ;in English edition of Bliss Caiman's "The .Making of Personality." This will appear under tho imprint of James Clarke and Co., who make a specialty of books of a thoughtful nature. Messrs Clarke are also,.the publishers of the English " Literary World," ope of the oldest and best known literary periodicals published. There have just appeared with Mr David Nutt in the works of William Ernest Henley, "Poems," volumes I and H; " Essays," volumes I aud 11. £2 2s per set of seven volumes. These are the first four _ volumes of the plain and handsome definitive edition for which Henley's count" less admirers have waited so long and patiently. Tho frontispiece is tho familiar photogravure after Rodin's bust, hitherto prefixed to the "Poems and London Voluntaries." "Tho Shakespeare Problem R-cstiitod" is tlie title of a book which Mr John Lane publishes. Tho author, Mr George Greenwood, makes no attempt to uphold the Baconian or any other theory of authorship, or to arrive at- any positive solution of " the Shakespeare problem." But he rerstatcs the arguments for tho negative case—namely, that the Stratford player was not the real Shakespeare—and claims that- such a proposition is worthy of serious consideratiion from open-minded and unprejudiced thinkers. Tho Cambridge English Glassies continue to provide the students of English literature with a series of admirably «!ited and excellently printed texts. The lafost volume is the first of the "Poetical Works of. Giles and Phineas Fletcher" (Cambridge University Press, 4s Gd). Here wo have Giles Fletcher's " Christ's Victory and Triumph," a beautiful, if somewhat "over-conceited," poem; Phineas's verses on the accession of James, Sicclides, and the dreadful ]x>ems, Latin and Eiifdifili, on the Jesuits aud Rome. Here we have the worst tradition of Spencer faithfully followed, a- tradition whose bad-taste, at times amounting to blasphemy, shocks and surprises continental critics of our literature,.

Among recent reprints of stajidard verse we cannot but cemmend a volume in Messrs Ma-anillan's Golden Treasury series, the " Poems of T. K. Brown." that line Manx spirit, edited by liis sod ajid a pupil, with an introduction in the hliest tone of appreciation; and also two additions to Messrs Rout-lodge's extended shilling reissue of the Muses's liihrnrv. these are "Moore's Melodies," with an introduction by Mr Stephen Gwymi, M.P., much in the vein of his volume* on .Moore in tha English Men of Letters; and the complete poems of "Hartley Coleridge," edited and prefaced viUi care and sympathetic insight, by Mr Ramsay Coikk It is s, happy (lay for discerning rcadetii when they can get standard poetry in such an .attractive and inexpensive form. i'hci-0 are old-fashioned admirers of Viscount Morley of Blackburn who may rejoice that in his publishers' announcemont of a- new work from his pen they Stick _ to the less pretentious and mora familiar name. Messrs Macmiltai promts* a further series of his " Miscellanies," hut neglect to add whether is will appear or not in the Kvcrsley edition. It- contame papers on Ataehiavelli and on his reviews of Mr Frederic Harrison's " New Calendar of Great Men," and of 'his historical romance, "Theophano"; "John Stuart Mill," a- paper written in commemoration of the philosopher's centenary in 1906 j a criticism of Locky's work on " Democracy and Liberty" ; and an article on Mr L. T. flobhousa's " Democracy and Reaction." " Modern Makers of Music," which was announced by Messrs T. Scaley Claa'k and Co. (Ltd.) last year, will be published shortly. The delay has been caused bv a change of editors. The present editor, Mr H. Saxe Wymdham, secretary of the Guildhall School of Music, and a'utihor of "The Annate of Covont Garden" and "A Memoir of Sir Arthur Sullivan," is greatly enlarging the scope of (ha work 'by including tho biographies of all the eminent musicians of the past 25 3>ears, and adding some valuable appendices, one of which has been contributed by the courtesy of Mr Ned Forsyth, M.V.0., and Mr E. G. Moore, stage manager of Covont Garden Theatre. This is a complete list of all the artiste who have appeared under the auspices of the Royal Opera Syndicate. Messrs Nowncs have entered the field of cheap publishing with a promising series called " Nownes's Shilling Novels." the volumes present am inviting appearance ill quiet green cloth covers with gilt backs, decorated tit!© pages and good paper and print. Better still, the choice of books takes info account the best public tastes. We gladly welcome Mr J. M. Barries '* Whon a Man's , Single," now published at Is for the first time. Romance lovers will greet, with equal heartiness, Mr Haggard's " Allan Quartermain," Mr Stanley Weyman's "The New Rector," Mr S. R. Crockett's "The Cherry Bibband," Sir Gilbert Parker's "The Trail of the Sword," Mr Pombeiton's " Beatrice of Venice," and Mr Hall Caine's " Capt'n Davy's Honeymoon." Many people, too, will be Curious to read " Joltnof Gerkm," as early work of Mr John Oxenbain, author of the "Pageant of Darkness and Light." Other old favourites are Anthony Hbpo's "Phroso," Charles Garvioe's " Marcia Drayton," and W, B. Maxwell's "The Countess of May bury." Messrs Maxmillan and Co, have just published the Poet Laureate's " Sacred and Profane Love" (4s 6d net). This new volume of Mr Austin's does not show any advance on his previous work, nor any particular change in style or maimer. In the title poem there is some blank verse which is more Tennysonian than Mr Austin's blank verse is apt to be; but otherwise the poem is distinctive of the peculiar talent of the author. Mr Austin's best gift is a capacity to see a picture and present it clearly; tho slight description of the famous Titian, in the Borghese, is not lacking in vivid colour and'good I outline. Inevitably tho speeches of the two figures in that beautiful canvas are somewhat of an anticlimax. We feel sure that the wonderful Sacred Love would never ba quite sx> didactic as Mr Austin makes her out. However, ho is, of course, handicapped by seeking to illustrate a point, which even Browning might have hositated to use a peg for a philosophical poem; and only Browning could have made a great poem out of it. Wo prefer some of the simpler works in the volume, particularly the sonnets and such verses as "The Wind Speaks." The last poem in the book, "The Evening Light," has .the charm of quiet and in no way conspicuous thought which lias made much of Mr Austin's work popular; ho has a. pretty way of putting tho obvious. Ho is not, perhaps, quite such a master in this as was Longfellow, but his talent is uof dissimilar to the American's, and he has the same- sincere love for Nature and natural sights and sounds. In his new novel, "The Last Shore," Mr Vincent Brown, well and fashionably known as the author of " A Magdalen's Husband" continues to concern himself mainly with tho things of tho spirit. That will probably not be the reflection of every reader ol the book. Superficially, tho story of "The Last Shore" is chiefly occupied with physical passion. It may perhaps be a little difficult to say that its heroine, Laura. Lady Renvil. has anything of the gramlc amourcuse in her, in spite of the fact tint, though still young and pretty, she- has, before the ' story, opens, been tk wile of one man, when it opens is the wife of another, then becomes the mistress of a third, and is left promising her hand to a fourth—rather reminding one of the unctuous Nonconformist gentlemen who, in a sermon on love, referred to " the rich and amolv matrimonial experiences of Henry.Vll." Vet as one reads her story one finds, ithard to condemn hei. She is the victim of circumstances—perhans also of her blood, for her mother had beeu unmarried. She often hates herself for her backsliding; and if at the last. s\\& seems to take tho.good the gods provide with rather more xbnn a suggestion of being worthy of it, the reader still feels that there is a spirit in bar that will go on flaming and questioning and being questioned, The same applies 1o tho fignre of the man, Charles Confessor, who, having drawn her from her second husband, becomes her lord and master in illicit relations. He is no mere seducer. In him the spirit is for over arguing with the flesh, and in the end,the spirit wins. There is a third characler,*one Hnckworth, with designs on Laura and against Charles. Lust and murder are alive in him; he is a gross, dull materialist, Yet he, too, is made to feci the terror of the intangible, the' stirrings of cowardice of conscience. Lastly, there is Laura's honourable adorer, all selfishness (or nearly all) and chivalry, and trembling devotion and pitifnlness. To sum up, therefore: As one looks back upon. the book one feels that it is in its presentment of this ever-sounding call of the spirit that its veal power arid distinction lie. Tho story is told with ■sustained strength. It is a long story, but'looked at in any way it seldom becomes a dull one. The invention is often verv happy, and many of the developments come, with a sense of surprise. One still has tho feeling that Mr Vincent Brown interests himself too exclusively with the spiritual side of life, and not'(Sufficiently with the " living manners as they rise," of which tte novelist cannot know too much if his tynos are to be real; but in these days that is verv conspicuously a fault on the right side. Upon the whole "The Last Shore'" ir% n. very considerable piece of work, illuminated with countless' flashes of fine insight anil touches of generous feeling, written with finish and charged with nassion, and graced with a tender love of Nature and a power of intimately describing her. The fact that Mr John Galsworthy has challenged criticism with a book of satirical sketches entitled "A Commentary" (Grant Richards), moves the critic of the Daily Mail to deliver himself as follows:—"How far is it necessary that every man and woman in what are called comfortable circumstances should take upon their shoulders the burden of the poverty and cruelty and injustice of the world? That is the real problem that is posed in Mr Galsworthy's biting satires. Nobody will deny the truth of the greater part of his indictment of modem social conditions. He eees things more cleaylj- than most of us, and fa is a great artist iu the way in which he presents his vision. If you read this collection of studies yon will realise, perliaps, as vou never realised before, how hardly the law presses on the poor, how ignorant is our treatment of those who have come under its ban, how- deadening to the mind and the soul is a life of fashionable ease, how mean self-satisfaction may be made to look, and a groat many other lessons which it will probably do you no harm to take

to heart. And yoii will be made very uncomfortable if you belong, let u<t say, to one of those strata of society that pay income-tax, for you will not- avoid the conviction that you share many of the traits of those- whom Mr Galsworthy satirises. But inexorably to pose this vision of dreadful, hopeless poverty on the one fide and selfish complaisance on the other is not to see life whole. It is, iu fact, to see'it- more crudelv. We have road all the studies in tins book, and some of them more than once, but we cannot remember an instance of anybody above tho. submerged or nearly submerged class beh.g assigned any virtue whatever. A kindlier phdosopliy would have served tho author's purpose tatter. If you work on a man's good feelings you may get him to do something. If you merely make him look like a fool or it knave ho shrugs hid shouldem and is quite sure you have made a mistake •;;amvwhcre.' And so yon have. ,Yon have made Mr Galsworthy's mistake. You have denied him a 6oul.'J