The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1900-05-31

hosts for their sins in the matters of /
international copyright and negro slav- /
cry. Shortly after his return he began |
one of the greatest Of his works, Mar
tin Chuzzlewit" 1t is perhaps under /
rated in this country, and not unnat-
urally, seeing what Walls OF Satire |
wrath its author pOurs out upon GER
tain American peccadillOs. But we may
at least take comfort in the fact that
the immortal Pecksniff is not an Amer
lean and never could by any possibility
have belonged to any other nation un-
der heaven than the English. The
moral purpose runs strongly through
this book SelfiShnesS in all its forms,
the national sin of brag, the national
sin of hypocrisy, are held up IN Dick
ems Iveliest fashion to scorn and r1dl-
Guile But, after all, it is not for the
moral purpose that we remember the
book, nor for the high comedy of the
I scenes at TodgeTs' and in America, for
the life and movement Of the dialogue,
and for the superb power of character
creation, which reached it's zenith in
the figure of Sairey Camp.
We must of necessity pass over much
| of Dickens work. The Christmas Ca
roll tempts us to linger over its genial
! humor and tender sentiment Dom
/ hey and Son" attracts us as much by
/ the fun of Captain Cutie and the pa
/ thOs of little Paul as il TepelS by the
melOdramatic figures of Carker and
/ handsome Alice. In some of its scenes
/ from would-be high life Dickens seems
/ to be tTeading upon ground belonging
/ to a greater artist and his work suffers
by the inevitable comparison. But in
/ his next novel he is his inimitable self
again and here he touches his highest
point.
David Copperheldr is by far the
most popular of Dickens books, and
with reason. Abandoning all pretense
| at a plot he here reverts to the old
seventeenth century fashion of story
telling and gives free vein to his fancy
in the creation of character and the
invention of incident. AS every one
knows. the story Of his own early LIE
and struggles is written large in this
book and for this reason perhaps there
is in it a depth and sincerity of SentI-
ment that we miss elsewhere. For
once. too, the stage villain and his IN
natural devices are banished. Steer
forth, who in a measure takes his place,
is a very human creature, perhaps the
best representative in English fiction
of a not uncommon type. Uriah Hep
is, no doubt, a gTotesque. but he has a
reality which is lacking in Dickens
earlier experiments in this direction.
/ And Just because the book lacks pur-
pose is not written to expose any sham
or to denounce any abuse, it is per-
Vaded by sunny genlahty that can
never fail to warm the heart. Human
kindness, Christian charity, the love OF
parent and child of husband and wife,
rise clear and strong above the clash
of cOntending passions, and the closing
scenes are perhaps the truest and ten
J derest in all the work of Dickens. He
did much and much that was good af-
: ter David Copperfield, but never
anything that was quite on the same
plane.
= His Later Work
From this time on we note a change
, in Dickens. Not altogether for the
{ worse. BLEAK House stands very
high among his books. Little Dorrit'
: and Great Expectations contain some
l of his most finished work and some o.
! the later sketches combine the ole
: keenness of observation with new
+ depth and wealth of experience. 1t il
4 plain, too that Dickens bestowed more
e time and pains upon his later work
His first books had been in effect i'm
provisations; they appeared as a ruiz
in monthly numbers, and Dickens wa,
seldom far ahead OF the printers devil
In 1855 he began for the first time L
. take notes for future work and to pial
his novels more carefully. Bat witt
- the first fine careless rapture much 0
IS the old light-hearted mirth had takel
flight There is, in fact, certain ton
of bitterness in some Of his later work
which is at once new and distressing
He experimental. too. not always sue
eessfully, in unaccustomed methods
1.-THE Tale of Two Cities" is a novel @
y pure incident. Hard Tines q novel 0
+ unmixed polemic. And, as always h
= took upon himself labor enough t
crush a dozen men.
In the last years Of his life Dieken
{. was not only most prolific novels
x but an editor, q public speaker and a
II amateur actor. He seemed 'pcsseSse
by n demon craving for empleymen