The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1895-11-25

tutor has succeeded in selling a publish
ing house, let the teacher himself tell his
class the story of the life of the man they
are going to study. Here is the place for
lecturing. The teacher is better fitted
than anybody else to introduce his class
to an author. He knows what things in
the life of an author will appeal to the
class, and what things will not. He
knows when to elaborate, and when to
| abridge. And if the teacher would make
the story interesting let him not omit the
little things how the man looked, bow
he dressed, what were his recreations, who
were his friends, whether he was rich or,
poor.
Boswell's Life of johnson is the best
biography ever written, because it is full
OF things trivial enough in themselves, yet
of the sort that tell us first what kind OF
human being
DOCTOR SAMUEL J JOHNSON WAS.
And then there are some things about
the lives of most authors that better not
be told. 1 don't see how it can help the
young student to know that Burns and
! Charles Lamb were often in their cups,
and that Edgar Allan Poe died in the
gutter; or to be familiar with the facts
about the domestic infelicities of Shelley
etllu "a Lulu DJIOu k1Au hHOW10uSO VI
this sort may do a vast amount of HARM
Only a little while ago, a woman told me
that since she had read the story of the
life of George Eliot, she had ceased to care
for George Eliot's novels. 1t is certain
that Carlyle's influence in the world has
waned a good deal since the publication
of the Froude memorials. Many genius
seems to have been Doctor Jekyll and a
Mr. HYDE and I think it is quite as we'll
to keep the Mr. Hyde hid. Tell children
the truth, but not always all the truth
What author shall the class in English
literature read first? is question of
great Importance. A good many teachers
begin at the beginning. They take
Chaucer first, and then Spencer. and then
Shakespeare, and Lord Bacon, and then
Milton, and then Dryden, and then Pope,
and SO on. And this habit of
SLAVISHLY FOLLOWING
the chronological order in which writers
lived, is responsible for most of the dis
taste pupils feel for the study of English
literature. A boy doesn't care anything
about Chaucer or Spencer, and by the
time he reaches somebody in whom he
would materially be interested, he has
made up his mind that the study of
literature is a pretty tiresome business.
And when a boy decides that study is
tiresome, it is pretty hard work to get
him to change his decision. Any road
leads to the end of the world, and any
book leads out into all literature. Begin
with somebody in whom theclass are like
ly to be interested. If Huckleberry Finn
attracts and Paradise Lost repels,
should say Huckleberry Finn is better
| loo ~. Io +hn, d..
Lost.
I do not know any good reason for
studying men in the order in which they
lived and wrote. If your class are read
ing Milton's Lycidas, why should they
wait half year before reading Shelley's
AdOnais? or three quarters Of a year be-
fore reading Mathew Arnold's Thyrsis
Milton and Shelley and Arnold are linked
together by the pond of grief and the
centuries cannot seperate them. Geniuses
do not grow out of each other. Each new
writer is not the heir of the last. There is
NO ORDER OF SUCCESSION
in literature. Men who live at the same
time do not think the same thing.
Thomas Carlyle stood nearer to the
Prophet jeremiah than he did to John
Stuart Mill or Lord Macaulay. Pope
SuOOo AO0IOI w dOIbOo uDaA uo 0Lu TO
Shakespeare, though separated from
Horace by sixteen centuries, and from
Shakespeare by hardly four generations.
Men who lived at the same time and
were intimate friends, talking with one
another writing to one another, influence
ing one another in countless ways, may
proftably be studied together. Each of
the men who belonged to the Mermaid
club-Shakespeare and Ben Jonson and
Beaumont and Fletcher-is a more in
teresting personality on account of his
relation with all the others. Samuel
Johnson, Edmund Burke, Oliver Gold
smith, Sir Joshua Reynolds and James
Boswell that best OF biographers, from a
group, every member of which is more
intere sting to us because of his illustrious
friendships The Lake poets, Wordsworth
and Coleridge and Southey were
neighbors.
Shelley and Keats and Byron are bound
together by wsrmest friendship and
closets companioushlp. The Brook Farm
experiment forms centre around which
one groups a good many makers of
literature.
But there are other ties than those of
friendship and association that bind men
together. If your class are studying
Browning and learn that he was strongly
idAhChOoN ~ N1ACllOy, ~ 10 ROUu Ul1Q0
to read Shelley to see what kind of a poet
it was that Influenced Browning. Or if
your class are studying Shelley and learn
that he WAS strongly influenced by
Spencer, it is a good Time to read Spencer
to zee what kind of poetry it was that in
fiuenced Shelley.
Men who wrote
ABOUT THE SAME SUBJECTS
may proftably be read together If your
class are reading Add ison's Sir Roger De
Coverly Papers, it is good time to go to
reading Irving's Braoebridge Hall, for
they describe the home life of an English
squire.
And don't like the plan of fencing off
groups of writers by any artificial classifi-
cations. For example: in many minds
American literature and English litera-
ture are entirely different and distinct
from each other. and are not to be studied
together. I know a school board so
patriotic that it insists on more time be-
ing given to American literature than to
English literature. And there are not
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