LITERATURE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3103, 3 September 1913, Page 78

LITERATURE.

BOOK NOTICES,

Life’s Last Gift.” By Louis de Robert. Translated by Arthur Franks, with a.n introduction by Dr F. A. Hedgcock. London ; Stanley Paul and Co. (3s 6d,

2s 6d.) To this book a committee of Parisian ladies awarded a prize of £2OO for the beet French novel published in 1911. It is pathetically poignant, the atmosphere thick with that sense of tragedy which touches despair. Of the author and the circumstances under which the book was written Dr Hedgcock tells us iu his introduction ;—“ More than 10 years ago M. Louis de Robert published several novels which excited a certain attention by their subtle analysis of the human heart and their poetic style. Suddenly the young author ceased to write. He had fallen ill of consumption. Ten years of stubborn struggle with disease. 10 years paused in what, to a man used to the literary life of Paris, must have seemed the wilderness of Swiss or Pyrenean health resorts, and then suddenly M. Robert returned to the world of letters holding in his hand a bouquet plucked from those distant lands. Red (lowers of passion ; dark blue flowers of pain; white lilies that are put on men s coffins, and rosemary, that’s for remembrance. And the bouquet is beautiful, because the blossoms are set there as picked, and neither mounted on wires nor tricked out with pretty grasses.” This “bouquet,” this persona legacy of pain, has been named by its English translator “ Life's Last Gift.” Of poets it has long been said that “they learn in suffering what they teach in song.” M. Robert is a poet, and his volume a poem in prose. It is very French, else it had never been translated. It has all the frank emotionalism of the Latin people, so that, while the author’s keen Gallic observation allows him to be psychologically exact, the freedom of French custom permits him to pathologically complete. The reticence that is generally adopted by British writers has never found much favour under warmer skies, a.ud it is indeed difficult to give a complete picture of human existence if you omit all mention of the coarser instincts and appetites. Even in translation M. Robert’s soft, flowing prose is singularly musical and harmonious. The periods flow from his pen like the strains of a well-played violin heard at twilight. The day is over; the night, with all its mystery and vague promise, is at hand. Will it contain a love-gift? and may not this gift, by the very emotion which it excites, hasten the dissolution which is so near? The book begins with a gentle peace, the forecast and promise of longer rest. The sufferer is resigned, almost content. As the tired body longs for the rest of sleep, so his tired heart longs for a still deeper repose. Then come his mother, his doctor, and his friends, who all urge him “to make an effort,” to summon Ids scattered forces, to “ will to live.” He goes to Switzerland, to Davost, and then when the company of so many other invalids becomes too trying, he proceeds to Val-Roland, in the Pyrenees. Here he meets Javottc, and receives from her “ Life’s Last Gift.” But Javotte is a coquette, a born courtesan. She loves many rneu, and delights to rouse their passions and their jealousy. To rouse the fighting instinct in them is delightful to her; it gives her the keen zest for life which would otherwise be micsing. The anguish of loving such a woman is too great for the invalid’s weak frame. Ha flies from Val-Rolaud, and goes with his mother to a little chateau in France to die; but the torture of remembrance is still with him, and the memory of his faithless love poisons the peace of his last hours. Among English men of letters George Gissing is probably the only one who could have written anything like

“Life’s Last Gift,” and there are many parks of it which remind ns of (he “ Pycroft Papers.” In each we find the same gentle pessimism, the same yearning love of Nature, the same tenderness for all who suffer, the same gratitude for little favours, and the same hopeless, despairing outlook, or rather want of outlook, on the Great Unknown. But M. Robert is a young man with all the passionate promptings of youth in his veins, and his book is as vivid as his despair. It is already in its second English edition, and seems likely to make a considerable stir in literary circles.

“ Topham’s Folly.” By George Stevenson. London: John Lane. “The Bodley Head.” (3s 6d, 2s 6d.) In a town of the English Midlands stands a neglected, once handsome house, foo large for its position, and too expensive to lind a purchaser. Its ornamental gates are falling to pieces, its fine garden is weed-grown. Its some-time proud owper called it “ Belmont ” : the neighbours name it “ Top ham's Folly.” It is the story of this house and its builder that Mr Stevenson sets out fo tell his readers. The story is that of a successful country lawyer, who, from small beginnings, obtained considerable wealth and a good position. He built and furnished his great house-; but ho was greedy and merciless, and finally dishonest; and his ill deeds brought their inevitable result in an unhappy borne and disobedient children. The story is told with great sympathy and understanding. Topham himself is a care fully-studied character; with many redeeming points, and a heart which is, in the end. touched to a true repentance. His wife is a gentle lady, who early merits and receives ali our sympathy ; but it is around Mary Ann Wintersgill that the chief interest centres. Her family have been cheated by 'J’opba.m, and she herself is only a servant in his fine house; but so beautiful, helpful, and sweet is her nature that her story ton cites all that is best in Mature and Art, turd gives us a very beautiful picture of the true, simple life which leads to a great and beaiuiiV.l convent, and a confident faith In the Great Awakening which shall show •' the meaning of all lives.”

“Called to Judgment.” By Coralie Stanton and Heatli Hosken. London : Stanley Paul and Co. (3s 6d, 2s 6d.) „ This is a melo-dramatic, sensational story, full of action and adventure. The central character is a man who, after 10 years’ imprisonment for fraud, returns to the world to find his past so effectually burled and forgotten that he is able to obtain and maintain a position as a man of wealth and property, a member of Parliament, and a powerful advocate for prison reform. Of course in the cud he, too, is “ called to judgment,” but not before his chroniclers have given ns a thrilling story full of mystery and excitement. “ Thousands of persons followed this strange man to his grave, and warm eulogies were delivered from the pulpit of every Nonconformist place of worship an the land, for he perished after almost superhuman efforts to save with his own hands men engulfed in a flooded mine, and to this day men speak of his inexhaustible courage and endurance. Of such a man the public will believe no ill, feeling that his ill deeds, whatever their nature, have been fully atoned.”

‘That Which Was Written.” By Sybil Cormack Smith. London: Methuen and Co. (C oth 65.)

This story, the work of the increasing band of South African writers, centres around the secret tragedy of a woman’s life, the action of fate in revealing that secret, and the ultimate triumph of love iu disregarding that revelation. Like all South African Stories, it deals with strong elemental passions, apparently engendered by the violent extremes of a climate alternately fiercely hot and deliciously cool, varied by storms of abnormal fierceness—climatic influences which have in a few generations changed the stolid Dutch settlers into slumbering volcanoes of passion, and seem to be doing the same for the more recent British colonists. In this story the forces of heredity are strongly shown in the Burke family, in which the Boer stock has been grafted on the Irish, with surprising results in the characters of the four children, each of whom is a careful study, speaking highly for the author’s keen observation and skill in delineation. In the vivid romantic sotting thus provided strong situations as well as strong characters are evolved, and the climax is reached when two men come to grips in the fight for a woman’s soul. LITERARY NOTES.

The Kilmarnock Standard and Ayrshire Weekly News celebrated its jub lcc on the 21st June last. —“ Little Thank You,” by Mrs J. P. O’Connor (Putnams), is official list of the best selling books in America. Professor Jacks, the editor of the Ti bbert Journal, has been offered but has declined the Chair of Christian Ethics at Harvard. He has recently received the LL.D degree from Glasgow University. —Mr Harold Hodge is rolinqu’sh’ng the editorship of the Saturday Review at the end of August. He has been editor of the Saturday for 14 years, and desires to devote his time henceforward to social reform and polit cal work, in which ho has always taken an active interest. Mr Gcrvase Beckett, M.P., will act ns editor-in-chief, arid Mr George A. B. Dewar will be literary editor, with a place on the board.

• Madame Judith, the noted French aotrrss of a, past generation. in her recently published autobiography, gives an unflattering picture of the famous novelist George Sand. “ She had fine black eyes.” says Madame Jud'th. “ but their beauty did not make up for her common appearance as a whole. Whatever her mental qualities, she certainly had ‘no’- feminine graces in her external appearance. A masculine voice, a martial gait, and bold, blunt manners—Nature certainly made a m : stake in her case, for she ought to have been a man.” The actress also makes the assertion that the novelist smoked —not daintv cigarettes, but a clay pipe. Gerhart Hauptmann is at present the hero of a great literary sensation in Germany, caused by the suppression of his patr otic n'ay, which was to have appeared at the Fostspiel, in Breslau, at the instance of the Crown Prince. Moreover, he is the latest winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the English public :s promised a complete translation of bis plays in the corning autumn. Hauptmann was born in 1862, and after a stormy school career and a great deal of precocious wrting of heavy historical plays, fo!lowed his brother, Carl, to study under Haeckel at Jena in 1882. A grand tour in France and Italy followed, and bore fruit in Hauptmann’s first published book, cbarncterstioally enough, an epic, ‘‘ Pre-mctlrdonlos,” 1885. In 1884 the had married and settled in Erkner, a suburb of Berlin, where he stayed for four years, until 1889. when his first drama was published and staked.

Sir Ralph Williams, who began bis nro-consnlar work 30 long years ago, in liis fascinating book. ‘‘How I Became a Governor” (Murray), gives the following amusing rendu sconce of bis time at Gibraltar: —During the Duke of Cambridge’s visit, at a vbnner-pnrty of 42. my wife sat on the Duke s other s do, be. of course, having taken down Ladv Biddulph. who was not very talkative. General Sir Robert Grant took my wife in, and their conversation got upon the Society of ‘ Souls,’ not ■then so well known as Inter. • Do tell me,’ said my wife. ‘ what this Society of Sou's really is and why they are called ‘Souls?’ “Don't von know?” replied the General. “They fall them souls because they make so many little sPps.’ The l>iike beard and was so delighted with the mot that ho insisted on re-telling it himself right across the table to the Governor, ‘ who was torn asunder between his respect for the Duke and his horror of the story.’ ” A passage hi the journal of Francis VV. H. Cavendish., in “Sociotv. politics, and Diplomacy, 1320-1854.” (Unw : n). relatce to bis cousin. Lord Or.ford (3rd Kadi, an amusing man of the old school. “ who used to consume enormous quantities of ,-laret without turning a hair.” Invited to become president of the Norwich Bible Society, he declined in these terms Sir, —I am surprised and annoyed by the contents of your letter —surprised, because ray well-known character should have exempted mo from such m application: and annoyed, bccaiw*-* it. obliges me to have even firs communication with you. I have long been addicted to the gaming-table: I have lately taken to the turf; I fear I frequently Was-rdu-me; but I hive never disrribtlti-d religious tracts. All this was well known to

you and your society, notwithstanding which, you think me a fit person for your pres dent! God forgive your hypocrisy. L would rather live in the land of sinners than with such saints!” Chikamatsu Monzremon, a Japanese dramatist, comparable with Shakespeare, was born at Hagi, in Chosu, in the year 1690. He came of Samurai stock, and his career is the subject of an article by Mr FI. Kazunii, in the Japanese Magazine. Like the great Japanese novelist, Bakin, ho afterwards renounced Irs class and became a renin. These ronin, or masterless Samurai, says Mr Kazumi, “ wore the terror of mediaeval Japan.” Just how lie came to turn his attention to play-writing is not made clear, but ”in 1690 we find him associated with the marionette theatre in (Osaka.” and hero, “he lad the foundation of the modern stage in Japan.” Although Chikamafsu’s plays average about the same length as a Shakespearean drama, some of them are said to have been written in a single night So moving were his Sbinju-mono, or plays in which the victims d:e for love, that “stories are still told of how lovers died together after seeing them.” We read further;—To many students .the works of Chikamatsu at first sight do not appear like dramas at all, but simply romances with .an unusual proportion of dialogue. All the Joruri contain a large narrative element of a more or less poetical character. The poot;c part : s chanted to music by a chorus, while the narrative is declaimed as the puppets pet form. •—T.P.’s Weekly took a referendum on the cpirstion, “ Who shall bo laureate?” It resulted in an overwhelm ng majority for Rudyard Kipling, who received 22,659 votes. Mrs Alice Meyncll came next with 5593 votes. Then in order came—John Masefield 3267. Thomas Hardy 2170. 'William Watson 1086. Henry Newbolt 821, G. K. Chesterton 777, Robert Bridges 710, Maurice Hewlett was sixteenth and last with 35 votes. Of Kipling, Bernard Linlot writes; —“But it is not so much the duality of Kipling's verse that counts ns the amount of new vision lie gets into his poetry. When you have stripped away from ha poems evervthing in the nature of jingoism, a vivid and magnificent sense >if power and imagination remains. Leaving all political opinion, on one side, -t must be admitted that Rudyard Kiplimr has felt the reality and the romance of Empire as they were never felt in tills country before. His song has done more to knit together the scattered peoples of the British dominions beyond the seas than any other force. He has put into verse-form the feeling, the emotion, the "sentiment, or whatever you like to call it. which undeiTes the cleanest Imperial aspirat'on. .In doing so h« has made ns emotional 1 v conscious of Emp're. And whether wo like it or' rot, whether we are Imperialists or not, floes not alter the fact that the achievement is only possible to a poet.”