The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-04-30

pressing briefly and strongly the phases
of our widely different forms of life
( The short stories now done so we'll will
prove a rich inheritance for the future
novelist
Among your own novels. which is
your favorite?'
Il don't know that that is a question
which an author has right to answer.
/ like "A Modern Instance for but one
reason, and Indian Summer for an
other. The reasons are purely personal.
The public has liked best A Hazard of
New Fortunes. The Rise of Silas lap
ham holds second place. 1t will prob
ably live as long as anything I have
done, as it is typical of so much that is
American"
Most Significant of Books.
What do YOU consider the most sig
nlt1cant among recent books?"
Il have read SO little of late I cannot
say that any book impressed me as es-
pecially significant. Hardy's Jude, the
Obscure, l thought very strong-about
the strongest thing in recent fiction
Everybody knows that Mr.. Howells is
an Ohio man; he himself says laughing
ly he is ashamed to tell tit is too
much of q recommendation" He grew
up in country printing office, got
most of his education at the case and
through desultory reading, svrote, as
very young man, campaign life of
Lincoln, and was rewarded for it by
appointment as consul at Venice The
consulate, as has been we'll said, was
his university course. There he wrote
the Venetian Letters" whose success
doubtless fixed his native inclination
for purely literary life Now for
some years he has made New York his
home.
His family relations are of the happt-
est. He is blessed with wife wholly
devoted, and two children of unusual
promise. The daughter, Miss Mildred
Howells, is a very pretty girl, with a
very pretty talent both for water colors
and for literature. Her pictures have
appeared in the Paris salon, and her
farces show that she inherits much of
her fathers gift of expression. The son
is an architect newly come from Paris,
where he has finished a course of study
several years long.
In literature Mr.. Howells stands half
way between the old order and the new.
He began to write when Lowell, Long
fellow, Emerson and Thoreau were in
their prime. He is q methodical worker
spending the morning and early after
noon at his desk, then going out for d
long walk. Just now he is putting the
Wedding Journey" which was one of
his earliest successes. His study is
small room, sparsely furnished, but
with well-filled book shelves. a visitor
rarely penetrates it, though once is
there of right, he finds himself in Il
genial presence. Mr.. Howells owns a
democracy as sincere as his culture,
and sympathies as broad as his stand
ards of life are high. An avowed So
cialist, his interest is entirely with the
hopes and the conditions of the aver
age man.
1t is a mistake to set him down
stern critic. He sees whatever good
there may be. but cannot see only good
where there is also evil. The honesty
of clear vision compels him to see good
and evil even in the English classics
However sharp he may be over them,
he is never ungenerous to the men of
his own time. No other writer has ever
aided by praise so many young authors
He has never sought notoriety. He
has been content with the abundant
fame that has sought him. If he has
never been the man of the moment, he
Is assuredly one of the men of his time.
VAUGHAN KESTER.