Mexico weekly ledger., 1884-09-18
READE's OPINION.
What the Dead Novelist Thought OF
Contemporaries-Queer C~ritiques.
From Temple Bar.

Reade y1eIueo tHc pain
lone to Dickens. Him he always
acknowledged as his master.
Jext, for variety and scope, he
bought came Bulwer.
Carlyle, he said, was a "John-
pedant, bearish, boorish
md bumptious, egotistical and ar
His Tentonic English
vas barbarous and cacophonous
yet, Notwithstanding, every line
ne wrote was permeated with vigor
and sincerity, and his Cromwell
is a memorial to two great men,
the hero and the author"
Macaulay always posed himself:
who should say I am Sir Oracle,
And when / ope my lips let no dog bark
but with this intellectual AFRO
gance he combined a grand ryth-
mical style, a marvellous learning
and a miraculous memory.
Disraeli was ''the most airy and
vivacious of literary coxcombs, the
most d~exterous and dazzling of po-
litical harlequins, the most auda-
cious of adventures, the most
lovable of men (when you get on
his we.k side), and altogether the
most unique and remarkable per-
sonage of the age"
"Esmond," he added, ''is
worthy of Addison at his best, but
some of the 'Yellowplush Papers
would be a disgrace to Grub street,
and the miserable personal at
tacks on Bulwer, who has written
the best play, the best comedy and
the best novel of the age, are I'm.
worthy of a gentleman and a man
of letters ?"
"Trollope wrote a good deal thai
was interesting and a good dea.
that was-not interesting"
"For literary ingenuity in build
ing up a plot and investing it with
mystery. give me dear old Wilkit
Collins against the world"
George Eliot's meter appears
to me to consist principally in de
scribing with marvellous accuracy
the habits, manners and Gus
toms of the animalculae as they
exist under the microscope"
"Ouida has emerged into digni
ty, and there is nothing NOR
touching and beautiful than tn
tale of Two Little Woodel
Shoes"
"VictM Hugo is the one grea
genius of this century; unfortu
nately he occasionally has tn
nightmare"
"George Sands should hav
been a man, for she was a mos
manly woman"
"Glorious old Alexandra Duma
has never been properly appreci
ated-he is the prince of dramai
lists"
"Walter Scott was one of tn
worlds benefactors."
-Reade execrated %poetasters, bu
adored poets ; although he main
tanned that there was no noble
vehicle to give expression t
thought than nervous, simpl
prose.
Tennyson, he alleged sis mol
pretty than potent" Whe
"The Cup" was produced at tn
Lyceum, he said: "It migf
have proved an interesting spec
tacle If the words had been lie
out"
! Drowning is a man of genius
but he gives me too much troub]
to understand"
buchanan is a poet, but I lik
his prose best; it is most poet
| prose-"
edwin Arnold has sparks
the divine aflatus, and holds h
own among the best"
: "Swinburne has a heart of gol
a muse of fre-a little to fer
: perhaps =; but l was young on
myself, and I, too, loved the gre
god Pan"
J, He always harked back to B
. ron, Shelley and Scott-the latte
5 however, was his greatest fave
lite, and he would recite by heal
! with fervor, cantos of "Marmior
and 1.-The Lady of the Lake"
He sometimes complained b
terly of what he called 'tl
: Shakespearean craze stout
maintaining that the people wi
talked most of the bard knew lea
about him. In a more gent
mood he frankly admitted the s
;, premacy of the Celestial thief
9 all men, who came before or aft
him. I could only set him goil
E about "Othello''-the one perfe
e play through all the ages
would discourse "thunder al
:. lightning"
. Music was his special deligh
t but his taste was as exacting as
was cultivated. italian opera,
s always maintained, was both
form and method an emasculat,
. and degraded school of art. W.
f ner was a giant a hundred yea
8 in advance of his age, and b
theory was sublime; but, alas
t lacked melody.
:, FUSION BOILERS.