Transcript

020 - Some Novels · Reviews

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Speaker 1: Section nineteen of reviews by Oscar wild This is a
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Speaker 1: LibriVox recording or LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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Speaker 1: For more information not a volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
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Speaker 1: According by Tim Bulkeley, Reviews by Oscar Wilde, edited by
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Speaker 1: Robert Ross, Section nineteen, Some novels, pam Al Gazette, April fourteenth,
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Speaker 1: eighteen eighty six. After a careful perusal of TwixT Love
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Speaker 1: and Duty by mister T. Hopkins, we confess ourselves unable
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Speaker 1: to inform anxious inquirers who it is that is thus sandwiched,
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Speaker 1: or how he or she got into so unpleasant a predicament.
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Speaker 1: The curious reader with a taste for enigmas may well
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Speaker 1: be advised to find out for himself if he can.
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Speaker 1: Even if he be unsuccessful, trouble will be repaid by
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Speaker 1: the pleasant writing and clever character drawing of mister Hopkins's tale.
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Speaker 1: The plot is less praiseworthy. The whole Madeira episode seems
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Speaker 1: to lead up to this dilemma, and after all it
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Speaker 1: comes to nothing. We brace our nerves for a tragedy
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Speaker 1: and are treated instead to the mildest of marivodage, which
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Speaker 1: is disappointing. In conclusion, one word of advice to mister
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Speaker 1: Hopkins let him refrain from apostracizing his characters after this fashion,
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Speaker 1: Oh Gilbert read what are you about that you dally
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Speaker 1: with this golden chance? And so forth? This is one
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Speaker 1: of the worst mannerisms of a by gone generation of
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Speaker 1: story tellers. Mister Galagia has written, as he says, a
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Speaker 1: tale without a murder, but having put a pistol ball
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Speaker 1: through his hero's chest and left him alive and hearty. Notwithstanding,
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Speaker 1: he cannot be said to have produced a tale without
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Speaker 1: a miracle. His heroine, too, if we may judge by
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Speaker 1: his descriptions of her, is all a wonder and a
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Speaker 1: wild desire. At the age of seventeen, she was one
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Speaker 1: of the great Maker's masterpieces, a living likeness of the
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Speaker 1: Dresdom Madonna. One rather shudders to think of what she
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Speaker 1: may become at forty, but this is an impertinent prying
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Speaker 1: into futurity. She hails from Maryland, my Maryland, and has
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Speaker 1: received a careful, if not a superior education. Mebad that
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Speaker 1: she marries the heir to an earldom, who, as a foreshead,
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Speaker 1: has had himself perforated by a pistol bullet on her behalf.
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Speaker 1: Mister Galenier's division of this book into acts and scenes
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Speaker 1: is not justified by anything specially dramatic, either in its
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Speaker 1: structure or its method. The dialog in Truth is somewhat stilted. Nevertheless,
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Speaker 1: its first hand sketches of Roman society are not without interest,
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Speaker 1: and one or two characters seem to be drawn from nature.
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Speaker 1: The life's mistake, which forms the theme of Missus Lovett
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Speaker 1: Cameron's two volumes, is not a mistake after all, but
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Speaker 1: results in unmixed felicity, and as it is brought about
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Speaker 1: by fraud on the part of the hero, this conclusion
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Speaker 1: is not as moral as it might be for the rereess.
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Speaker 1: The tale is a very familiar one. Its personages are
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Speaker 1: the embarrassed squire with his charming daughter, the wealthy and
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Speaker 1: amorous mortgagee, and the sailor lover, who is either supposed
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Speaker 1: to be drowned or falsely represented to be fickle. In
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Speaker 1: Missus Cameron's tale, he is both in succession. When we
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Speaker 1: add that there is a stanza from Byron on the
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Speaker 1: title page and a poetical quotation at the beginning of
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Speaker 1: each chapter, we have possessed the discerning reader of all
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Speaker 1: necessary information, both as to the matter and the manner
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Speaker 1: of Missus Cameron's performance. Mister e O. Pladl Bouverie has
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Speaker 1: endowed the novel writing fraternity with a new formula for
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Speaker 1: the composition of titles. After j s or trivialities. There
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Speaker 1: is no reason why we should not have a b
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Speaker 1: or or platitudes MN, or sentimentalisms, wise ed or inanities.
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Speaker 1: There are many books which these simple titles would characterize
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Speaker 1: much more aptly than any high flown phrases. As aptly,
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Speaker 1: in fact, as mister Boovery's title characterizes the volume before us.
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Speaker 1: It sets forth the uninteresting fortunes of an insignificant person,
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Speaker 1: one John Styles, a briefless barrister. The said John falls
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Speaker 1: in love with a young lady inherits a competence amidst
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Speaker 1: to tell his love, and is killed by the bursting
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Speaker 1: of a fowling piece. That is all, the only point
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Speaker 1: of interest presented by the book is the problem of
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Speaker 1: how it ever came to be written. We can scarcely
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Speaker 1: find the solution in mister Bouverie's elaborately smart style, which
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Speaker 1: cannot be said to transmute his trivialities into flies in amber.
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Speaker 1: Mister Swinburne once proposed that it should be a penal
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Speaker 1: offense against literature for any writer to affix a proverb,
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Speaker 1: a phrase, or a quote to a novel by way
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Speaker 1: of tag or title. We wonder what he would say
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Speaker 1: of the title of penn Oliver's last book. Probably he
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Speaker 1: would empty on it the bitter vial of his scorn
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Speaker 1: and satire all but is certainly an intolerable name to
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Speaker 1: give to any literary production. The story, however, is quite
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Speaker 1: an interesting one. At Laxenford Hall live Lord and Lady
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Speaker 1: Arthur Winstanley. Lady Arthur has two children by her first marriage,
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Speaker 1: the elder of whom, Walter Hope Kennedy by name, is
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Speaker 1: heir to the broad acres. Walter is a pleasant English boy,
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Speaker 1: fonder of cricket and of culture, Healthy, happy, and susceptible.
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Speaker 1: He falls in love with Fanny Taylor, a pretty village girl,
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Speaker 1: is thrown out of his dog cart one night through
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Speaker 1: the machinations of a jealous rival, breaks one of his ribs,
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Speaker 1: and gets a violent fever. His stepfather tries to murder
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Speaker 1: him by subcutaneous injections of morphia but is detected by
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Speaker 1: the local doctor and Walter recovers. However, he does not
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Speaker 1: marry Fanny after all, and the story ends ineffectually. To
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Speaker 1: say of a dress that it was rather under than
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Speaker 1: over adorned is not very pleasing English, and such a
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Speaker 1: phrase as almost always but by no means invariably, is
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Speaker 1: quite detestable. Still, we must not expect the master of
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Speaker 1: the scalpol to be the master of the stylus as well.
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Speaker 1: All but is a very charming tale, and the sketches
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Speaker 1: of village life are quite admirable. We recommend it to
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Speaker 1: all who are tired of the productions of mister Hugh
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Speaker 1: Conway's dreadful Disciples. One TwixT Love and Duty a novel
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Speaker 1: by tig Hopkins, Chatto and Windus. Two Jenny Jennet, A
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Speaker 1: Tale Without a Murder by A. Galena Chapman and Hall.
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Speaker 1: Three A Life's Mistake, a novel by Missus H. Lovett, Cameron,
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Speaker 1: Warden Downey. Four J. S. Saw Trivialities, a novel by
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Speaker 1: Edward Oliver, playdle Bovery, Griffith, Farron and Cow Five All
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Speaker 1: But a Chronicle of Laxenford life by pen Oliver F. R. C. S.
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Speaker 1: Kegan Paul end of section nineteen Some Novels. Recording by
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Speaker 1: Tim Balkley of Big Bible dot org