New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1896-08-23

|
the human spirit, they treat Of men, not mani
kins signor DAnnunzio talks nj great length
about what might he felt by n soul " Souls
were made on earth but with souls placed there
| by God he has not the smallest acquaintance
The four pondcrous novels which have thus far
done most for his fame are nothing more nor
| loss tbnn tediouslv drawn-out demonstrations
| of the dissatisfaction OF some central puppet,
! like the idotc Aurispo. of "Trionto dei'I
| Morte" with the restraints Of famiiiar eN-
| perIence and environment. It Is Nietzsche all
over again. spread thin over the infertiie sur
faces Of n silly ego. The composer or ihcse III
| gubrious dissertations Is fond OF music iohd
of art In any OF its forms. FOND OF VINE aHu
| the accompanying quantities OF the weii-Nho""
| phrase: bat not anything he can say OF BOUT
| cell or Italian landscape serves To remove the
| conviction ne leaves at the end cohVlctioh
that he IL fonder of himself than of any OF his
| bvnothetical possessions We say hypothetical,
| for along with the sense Of D'AnnunZios ego
tisno there comes suspicion Of his sincerity
| ,vhicb no fails TO conquer. This Is the case with
| his prose and II IS still more the case with MS
| verse Occasionally he seems on the brink OK
satisfying the ear which Graves resonance OF
| feeling In lyric lines. which asks of the singer
| that he be in tune with his theme from the very
soul Of him to his quiyering lips; and one taxes
on a kindly mood before the lit of such
passage in the Rural Of the 'Isotteo' vol
ume this.
Olvi. albert sacr. ude. udite
la preghiera deli uomo!
In a moment however the presage OF lyric
music gives way to the hard actually OF mere
verbal nuance which Is clever enough, but only
needs to be compared with. say the common
| riac of no of NpErl
show that D'Annunzo is worthy to rank with
neither the one nor the other He has. it is per
haps fair to assert. precision Of touch when
his feminine rival lacks; he has more craft more
daintlness more of that sort of polish which
among artisans Is counted great But Of true
| poetic fire he has no share at all. he fails. TO
| move the reader with that stir of emotion. that
impetus. that noble rage which even the most
modern of psychologists might claim IL he were
to remember that the psychology Of imagination
| Is one thing. the psychology of rhetoric another
II any reader desires to prove these things for
| himself and Is appalled, by the 800 pages, more
| or less of "Trionfo della Morte." or the 40 Of
| lie Vergine dele Rocce" let him pick up the
much smaller production which the author calls
Giovanni Episcopo" Let him read it In the
pretty Neapolitan quarto of Luigi Pierro or In
the version of Miss Myrta Leonora Jones. out
OF consideration for the latter. II might be pref
cradle to read Giovanni Episcopo' rather than
"Episcopo and Company" one IS as bad as the
other. but in the original one Is Disguised by
D'Annunzo alone: In the translation there Is
the added shame OF realizing that a woman
could in the name Of LITERATURE NEEDLE with
such ofal Miss Jones prefixes to her exqus-
itelv printed volume Introduction which Is
also exquisite-in its way. She observes. for ex-
IN, do
succeeds where Tostol failed. In convincing us
that sensualty leads to crime The conclusion
Is as Irresistible az the catastrophe In Greek
tragedy" As a matter OF fact there IL no com
norison possible between Tolstoi and DAN
nunzio save I'm the sense that wisdom and folly
NAV be contrasted. We have no disposition to
reopen the controversy over the Russian novel
lists famous polemic. but to call It a failure and
"Trionfo della Morte'' a success Is 10 talk non
sense "Trionfo della Morte" carries no convic-
ton on the subject Of crime or It's origin IT con-
vnces us merely that Signor DAnnunzio has
very small faculties of invention, ana matters
himself that a rechauffe of decadent notions as
| old as Baudelaire will be taken for tragic IN
suiration It Is not inspiration, it is not cir
resistible" as Greek tragedy is irresistible II
the epithet may be applied at all to "Trionfo
della Morte" we should say of the latter that 1t
is irresistiby comic.
We diverge however. from the main point Of
the volume which Miss Jones has had the te-
merty to publish Her perfervid Introduction Is
not after all. OF much consequence. The fate
OF introductions and predatory pages generally
Is we'll Known. For her reader. for Miss
ZONES herself "Epscopo and Company Is the
ching We have no hesitation In saying that
,nora degrading narrative has never been put
forth by reputable American press. Giovanni
Eniscono the central figure is a coward, and is
mentally diseased His wife, Ginevra. is mon
s,er of depravitv The boy Giro who figures in
his household would appear TO be an epileptic;
ard Ciulio Wanzer Giovannrs evil genius Is
the yilest Of all the vile in this precious company
Giovanni tells his own story, a recital OF
humiliation dirt. murder Many persons of
taste protest that filth has been treated by
,,aunossant and others of similar ideals in
manner highly entertaining Would they in
clude "Episcopo and Company In ther ca'a-
logue Of delectablc books? II would DE interest,"
ing 10 know The work Is almost curiousiy re-
pulsive Dulness brOods over It's every page anu
the reader who opened it In expectation Oh NOR
bid sensations would close 1t In )iiiy as the
concentrated quintessence OF boredom why
did Miss Myrta Leonora Jones translate IL why
did her publishers publish 1t? Because there Is
q fad for d Annunzio in Europe. and they "iSheh
f. anticipate the fad here? That seems the only
plausible explanation. for II IL difficult 10 con-
ceive OF even a half-baked American decadeht
90 ,nterested enough in Giovanni Episcopo' to
translate It for its own sake.
A LITERARY COUPLE.