The Irish standard., 1899-05-20
Story of "The Collegians" is a
Remarkable Novel.
IS DRAMAIlzED BY DION BoUCICAULT
The Creative Work of Fiction is
Practically Unknown.

Lord Beaconsfeld, in one of his nov-
els-"Coningsby," or do forget myself
-dwells with graceful melancholy
which he could readily assume, and
which at all times became him, upon
the number of rarelygifted beings who
died in or about their thirty-seventh
year. The "fatal thirty-seven" he calls
it; and he enunerates a long list of
bright abilities who were its victims.
Raphael, Byron, Mozart, Mendelssohn,
these and many others whose spirits
were untitnely quenched he mentions,
paying to each his due need of mourn
ing. One name will be at once missed
by all Irishmen from the list, the name
of Gerald Griffin, says writer in the
San Francisco Nation.
1t may we'll be maintained that in all
the brilliant brotherhood OF youth re-
corded by the English novelists, Gerald
Griffin would have found only his peers.
In nor did the fire of genius burn more
ferveri,ly, to none was fortune kinder
or more cruel, by none was the too
early death faced under conditions of
54ioftier dignity or serener virtue.
The story of Gerald Grifin's life is
exceedingly simple and straightforward
He was born in Limerick, and his boy
hood was passed within the sight and
sound of the lordly river which races
at its swiftest there between its crowded
banks. In very early youth he showed
not merely those passionate aspirations
for literary distinction which are newt
able to all fnely-tempered boyhood, but
abilities of the rarest kind for gratify-
ing those aspirations and gaining the
coveted laurels. His keenest desire ap-
pears to have been for dramatic fame;
he longed to see the creations of his
brain taking their place with Cato and
Anthony, and the hero of "Venice pre-
served; and while still i'll the very dawn
OF manhood he crossed the Irish Sea
with manuscript play in his pocket
wherewith to conquer London and win
immortal fame The lonely young Irish
man fought the old fight in the great
city, with poverty, with indifference,
with the chilling influences of apathy
and disdain. The old, old story of geni-
us and the giant, of the war that is as
ancient as the mountains, and that will
outlast the cataract. Griffin, with his
heart on fire, flung himself against Lon
don. His was not the patient merit
which takes the spurns of the unworthy.
hu1nbly. The consciousness of his great
gifts informed and inspired him, and he
battled strenuously, desperately, with
evil fortune. London, swollen with
something of the old Athenian pride and
of the exclusiveness OF medieval Flor
ence, regards all those who come to it
from outside, be they Saxon or Gael, as
"barbarians' and Strangers" 1t has
to be wooed and won, like the Amazon
Brunhilda of the German epic, by force
OF arms; the wooing is desperate, the
winning difficult in the extreme. Ger
aid Griffin wooed London bravely, but
he did not win. For three years he
struggled and suffered, painting his
proud ambitious nature with failure.
Then he came back to Ireland to find
there the fame whose phantom he had
pursued in vain in the foreign city. He
wrote much marvellous PROSECUTION, he
wrote one masterpiece which must en-
dure as long as literature lasts. Sudden
ly in the warmth of his youth, on the
threshold of his fame, his whole soul
became imbued with profound sense
of the vanity of all worldly triumphs
and the insignifcance of all earthly am
bitions. He joined the Christian Broth
ers, and died in the ranks of that order.
After his death his play Gisippus, which
he had carefully preserved at time
when he destroyed all his other papers,
was acted in London, and was success
full at time when success was value
less for its author. Gisippus has not
held the stage, but it is dear to all lovers
of lofty dramatic literature.
"The Collegians" is one OF the most
remarkable, as it is one of most delight
full additions that have ever been made
to Irish fiction. Some little time ago
Mr. Ruskin, in letter which expressed
sympathy and even an enthusiasm for
Ireland not often manifested by Eng
lish writers, declared that for the proper
appreciation of the Irish Nation and the