The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1894-06-12
NOvELIsTs AND FICTION.
A satirist's View of His Famous Con.
tempornries-Of Robert E,Ismere.

II
temporaries-Of Robert EIsmere.
eff something cannot be done to
check. or at least modify. our mon
strous worship of facts, art will becomg
sterile and beauty will pass away from
the land
Even Mr.. Robert Louis Stevenson,
that delightful master of delicate and
fancifd prose, is tainted with this
modern vice, for we know positively. 10
other name for it. There is such a.
thing as Tobbing a story of its reality
by trying to make 1T too true, and
The Black Arrow" is SO fnapttatic as
not to contain a single dnaCnrCnism to
beast OF, while the transformation OF
DR.. J5kyn reads dangerously like an
experiment. out Of the Lancet As for
Mr. Rider Haggard, who really has, or
mad CnCa, the makings of a perfectly
magnificent liar, he is now 50 afraid of
being suspected of genius that when ne
does tell Us anything marvellous he
t3eiS bound to invent a personal Temin-
iscence, and TO put it into a foot note
as a kind of cOwardly corroboratfCn
NOR are our other noveliJts much ueiL-
ter. Mr.. Henry James writes fiction AZ
II 1T We're a painful duty, and wastes
upon mean motives and impeTceptiOls
points Of view his neat literary. s.tyls.
c2ustic satire. Mr.. Hall Game 1T is
true, aims at the grandiose, but then
he writes at the top Of his voice. He
IS so loud that one Cannot hear what
ne says Mr.. James Payn is an adept
in the art of concealing what is not
w0pth finding. He hunts down tine OBJ
vious with the enthusiasm of shopt-
sighted detective. As one turns over
the pages the suspense of tine author
becomes almost unbearable. The horses
OF Mr.. Blacks phaelton do not soar to-
ward the sun. They merely brighten the
sky at evening into violent chromOli5ho-N
graphic enectS- On seeing them ap-<
proach, the peasants take refuge I'M
dialect. Mrs. Oliphant pTattles pleas
antiy about curateS, lawn tennis par
ties, domeSticity and other wearfSomA
things. Mr.. Marion Crawford has Gass
molated himself upon the altar of ldEa1
color. He is like the lady in the
French comedy who keeps TAKING
about 'le beau ciel d'Italie.' Besides he
has fallen into a bad habit of utterins
moral platitudeS. He is always telling
US that TO be good is to be good. and to
be bad is to be wicked. At times he is
almost edltylng. Robert Elsmere is of
course Masterpiece masterpiece of
the genre ennuyeux.' the one form of
literature that the English people seem
| to thoroughly enjoy. A thoughtful
young friend of ours once told us that
II reminded MIN OF the sort OF CONVEX
sation that goes on at a meat tea in the
house Of a serious Nonconformist
family, and we can quite believe it.
Indeed. it is only in England that such
book could be produced. England is
the home of lost ideas. As for that
great and daily increasing school of
noVelists for whom the sun always rises
in the east end, the only thing that
can be said about them is that thew
find life crude. and leave it raw.
AS for Robert Elsmere' L am quite
devoted to it. Not that 1 can look
upon it as a serious work AS a. state
ment Of the problems that confront the
earnest Christian it is ridiculous and
lantiquited. 1t is as much behind Thea
age as Paley's Evidences or Colenso' 81
method of Biblical exegesis Nor could
anything be less impressive than the
unfortunate hero gravely heralding a
dawn that. rose long ago, and so com
pletely missing its true significance
that he proposes to carry on the bust
ness of the old firm under the new
name. On the other hand it contains
several clever caricatures, and a bean
| of delightful quotations, and Green's
philosophy very pleasantly sugars che
somewhat bitter pill of the authesls
fiction.