New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-09-16

The autumn lists of the publishers are in
themselves good reading this year. The most
salient feature-especialIy noticeable more
over in that it is shared by several hOuses-S
the list of reprints from the classics of English
literature Enterprise in this field can never
be too highly commended, particularly when,
at the present time, the publishers unite upon
the policy of giving their reprints handsome
form and putting them on the market ut a low
figure. Considerable fiction by authors well
known for interesting work is promised, and
there will be the usual contingent of deliberately
illustrated books. We are glad to note how
ever that the picture book of stereOtyped gOr-
geouSnesS-ahd banality-which once re-
gardcd Indispensable to the fall and holiday
&adc is apparently dead beyond all possibility
Of resurrection. The illustrated volumes thus
far announced promise satisfactorily to demon
stratc their right to exist. OF works in pure
literature there is not great deal to expect,
but the list of historical, biographical and crit
zeal books is, on the whole, sufficiently extended,
when the unsatisfactory state of the publishing
world during the last year is taken into con
sdcration. The South African war may not
have worried the scholars in their Seclusion but
publishers have not unnaturally felt the intlu-
ence of the prevailing atmosphere which has
ana they are still cautious about ventures that
are not at any time widely popular.
AprOpoS of scholarship and the literary mar
ket, one author with, we fancy, an unpublished
history of mediHyal philosophy up his sleeve.
has recently uttered plaintive vail over the
public Indifference toward solemn works of light
and leading. He ascribcs it all To the triumph
of fiction, to the absorption of the many -headed
in books written solely to amuse. and to the
willingness of the publishers TO sacrifice the best
interests of literature to il mercantile OppOr-
tunty This is nonsense. There are far too
many trashy novels printed every day. there
too many pretty books about books there is too
much miscellaneous mediOcrity brought out be
tween covers. But this has nothing to do with
the attitude of the public and the publishers
toward serious literature The real reason for
the subordinate position of such literature
among new books is the fact that mighty little
of it gets itself written The conrcit Of the
popular and rubhiShy novelist is, as we all
know, Il sight to behold, but it is as Il tallow dip
beside Ncsuvius in eruption when t.omparcd
with the self satisfaction Of the minor scholar
who has produced big bundle Of manuscript
on, say the metaphysics of Etrusran burial
customs. Like the enhancing Savaut comuem-
grated by AnatoIc France. the man who thought
OF writing tom" on Il division of the system
OF weights and measures under an ancient
Egyptian dynasty, an author of that SORT takes
himself with colossal seriousness and is really
about as fruitful as the mountain in labor We
get in the course of year. a respectable body
of solid scholarship With our losses in this
direction the cheap novcliStS should not br
charged assuming that suffer losses
'RV 1Sl1 WIN ba Hi
Andrew Lang, "Tennyson had become the re-
cipient of the other poets poems 'Itasc;ls send
me theirs per post from America books
OF which | can't get through one page for of
all books the most insipd reading is second
rate verse. If Mr.. Lang had been writing mt
that time TennysOn might have learned from
him how to pluck comfort from the sting of
persecution. Somewhere in his multifariOus
writings the brilliant critic has set forth the
true end and destiny of second rate verse" i'm
presentation copies. 1t makes perfect filling h.,
has shown us, for the end Of IA book shelf
Wher" il is Snugly out of sight ana stands be-
tween a valuable book ANA the woodwork