The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-02-19
LITERARY NoTEs.

Austin Dobson desires It to be known that
a rnuch-quoted verse attributed to him
satirizing American poets is forgery.
1t is proposed that the memorial of VIII
liam Black take the form of a lifeboat
named after him and stationed in the
Hebrides.
Mrs John Russell Young is preparing for
publication a compilation of the best writ
ings and letters of her husband, the late
librarian of Congress
Miss Clara E. Laughlin contributed to
the Chicago Times-H Herald of last Sunday
an extended review of Ir Charles Major $
novel, when Knighthood Was IN FloWef'
1t is reported that $4,000 is the price to be
paid to Miss Marie Corelli for her new book
which is a fact. the New York Tribune
thinks, more creditable to the business anil
ity of Miss Corelli than to the brains or the
readers of her silly books
Mr.. Ian Maclarens book of short stories,
Afterwards and Other Stories is meeting
with mild approval. The complaint is very
justly made that nearly all the stories de-
scribe deathbed scenes. and half dozen
consecutive deathbeds are rather more than
a story reader cares to meet.
Some one has written to the London
Academy of John Halifax, Gentleman"
that sit is dead. and it's destiny is limbo"
In contradiction to this the London publish
ers make the statement that last year they
sold of the various editions some 24,190
York Times, many newly born books very
much more dead than is John Halifax,
Gentleman"
Mr. Cecil Rhodes is at last to play his
part in fiction. Mr.. Morley Roberts i'm
proved the occasion of his recent journey
to the cape to study Mr.. Rhodes for the
purpose of introducing him into a new
rovel, which will be published very soon
Many people assumed that Mr.. Anthony
Hope intended to paint MIR. Rhodes's por-
I,fs Nd fhd (Nar 1l1f inc
according to a London writer was further
from Mr.. Hopes intention.
The publication of Miss Terriers CORE
spondence recalls the story that old Mr..
Ferrier who loathed the idea Of female
author once when Ill asked his daughter to
read him a book, conditionally on its not
heing by WomSaTn e she read MN her 9W n
the best book she had ever brought him, but
Tidiculed the suggestion that its author was
q woman. She put the MS. into his hands;
he saw the truth and burst into tears.
Mrs. Craigie John Oliver Hobbes) is pre-
pairing a monograph on 'FrcNde." and Mr.
Augustine Birrell one on Browning" Mr..
Andrew Lang is dealing with Tennyson.
and Mr.. Sidney Lee, the biographer Of
Shakespeare with George Eliot" Thack-
cray has been consigned to the tender mer-
to those of Mr.. W. E. Henley. All these
volumes are to be included in series of
Modern Engi1Sn writers projected Dy an
English publishing house.
English authors, it is said, consider it
detrimental to writer's reputation, as also
to his profit, to publish more than a couple
of books in year. The London Mail says
that the assumption is that if books come
too fast they cannot be good. "At least
five Well-knOWn authors could be mentioned
who are regularly producing novels upon
whose title pages assumed names appear
A half-pathetic, half-sensational novel pub
lished the other day and attributed to a new
humorist and a decidedly risky novel which
appeared a few weeks back is in actually
the unacknowledged production of an
author reputed for the strictly religious
tendency of his fiction"
Mr.. w. l.. Alden says in his London lit
erary letter to the New York Times: "A
little book entitled An Idyl of the Wabash,
by Miss Anna Nicholas, has been repub-
lished in London and the other day 1 saw
a very flattering notice of it in a leading
paper l have read the book, and as Il col
lection of short stories it is certainly much
above the average. 1t is a pity, since ii has
been republished here, that it is so eminent
~ American as to be in some things quite
unintelligible TO English readers. The Eng
fish reader of novels is at a loss to under
stand the peculiar religion of the Western
Methodist and Baptist and, to tell the
truth, does not find it interesting. Miss
pleasing an English well American
audience Harold Frederic managed to do
that, and no more typical American ever
lived"