The times., 1901-05-12
Chicago stories.


Wyatt is a collection of Chicago stories,
the first of their kind. George AIDE. with
his Stories of the Streets and of the
Town." and his Fables in Slang" voiced
the spirit of Chicago, but in an essen
TALLY journalistic style. His extrava-
gances and burlesques are part of Ameri-
can literature, and true to life in their
way, but the realistic Chicago literature
was yet to come. Some novelists attempt
ed, in a tentative way, to give pictures of
life in the Windy City but somehow or
other all the novels had weak point of
construction or character work. 1t is al
ways somewhat dubious business to at
tempt to portray the life of a big city
in a novel. The New York novelist has
not yet appeared, and with all the time
that fiction writers have had to work on
London, there have been few masters who
have achieved the real novel of the me-
tropolis, in the sense that Balzac por-
trayed the life of Paris
The work of Edith Wyatt is not pre-
tentious enough to be called a novel, but
it is literature; and it comes nearer to
being the real literature of Chicago than
anything else has. With a good plot it
might have been possible to introduce
into one book all the characters which she
has wrought into this volume of short
stories, for the same people reappear in
many OF them, and the same atmosphere
is to be found throughout. Moreover, the
general aim in all the stories is the same
the idea being to show how people of diff
ferent social and racial traditions are
thrown together in community so cos
mopolitan as that of the metropolis of
the Middle West, and how standards
which seem to their possessors the only
ones on earth are necessarily modified and
often made to seem ridiculous when they
come in contact with other standards
The book is thoroughly democratic in
tone. and this, after the pseudo-aristoc-
racy affected by many of the younger
American writers, is refreshing.
Although this writer may some day
produce a good novel, her briefer ro-
mances are so good that she viii do we'll
not to be in a hurry about undertaking
longer one. The themes of these tales
are such as make the shorter form nee
essary, though the characters might well
merit more extended acquaintance They
are of several nationalities and different
grades of society, and the comedy ele-
ment, which is very strong, comes in
when these grades are brought into con-
tact with each other. There are twenty
one of the stories, no two so much alike as
to have any effect of sameness. There
are object lessons on the futility of ex-
pecting certain types of people to under
stand each other, and others on the duty
of people who differ in their views to
learn what they can from one another;
and the two things are not exactly in
Some of the stories are pure
pf nd a q nathGfip
and some are tragic When there is ro-
nance it is shown in the midst Of COM
sometimes even squalid sur
and in this, perhaps, more
than in any other way, the author shows
herself thoroughly American. Romance
does not happen 10 be the birthright of
rich and picturesque people; and she has
made 1t her business to show how the
whimsical little god bestows his favors
where some folk affect to think he can
not.
Two Citizens" is a study of highly
decadent-literary critic and
a perfectly northumberland cTude-Ger-
man family. the meeting point of the
two being the marriage of the critics
brother and the Germans daughter. One
suspects after reading this little idyl that
culture may not be the only or the most
valuable thing in the world, and that it
may be worth while even to be the daugh-
ter of a man who has his name embroId-
cred in foliage plants on his lawn, if one
is kind-hearted, sunny-tempered, and
whoIesomely fond of life. Limitations"
is a little sketch of heroism in everyday
life among people who are what an Eng
lishnen would call cads. They are un-
deniably vulgar but there can be fine
qualities even in such people. "A Com
pulsory Hero" is one of the funniest bits
of character study In recent literature,
and the humor is so delicate and depends
so much on the writer's thorough knowl-
edge of the type of feminine nature
which she describes that it is all the more
on that account. THE Fox and
the Stork' is likewise funny, and carries
almost as useful a lesson as the fable
after which it is named. There is happy
sketch of ild-character in Jack Sprat'
and a pretty bit of romance in Beauty
and the Beast
The author is perhaps at her happiest
in dealing with would-be cultured people
who squirm with ill-concealed disgust
when they come across anything which
they call common She is not unchari-
table toward them, but she does not like
them. Here is sample scrap Of her
character work in the pictures drawn of
]. Hoffman and Richard Elliot, saloon
keeper and literary man respectively:
There was once a rich and popular
German alderman. saloonkeeper,
who lived in a double red-brick house
in Chicago.
For his business. he sold beer and
distributed jobs in return for political
influence. He appropriated a suitable
percentage on these Jobs, and he con-
Quoted their sale ON the just and
STRAIGHTFORWARD principles of II COM
mission merchant For his pleasure,
he had around his house large yard;
and in summer this yard was filled
with little flower beds shining with
petunias, portulacas, and zinnias. In
their centre was a sputtering little
fountain and near the fountain were
two artificial deer and small sum
mer house. In front of the summer
house was the saloonkeepers name
j. Hoffman, done IN gerantumS and
foliage plants.
ION Sundays Mr.. Hoffman used to
sit in his summer house doorway, com
pletely filing it, FOR he was levia-
than of a man, smoking meerschaum
pipe. and wearing gay red velvet
smoking jacket and cap, deeply bor-
dered with bright silk flowers, beauti-
fully embroidered by his daughter.
I'm the same city with j. Hoffman
there lived an American, in very mod
crate circumstances.
His business was writing, in con-
ventional and academic style, critical
reviews expressing conventional and
academic ideas. In these reviews he
divided all authors into classes,
schools and periods When he found
an author who had no period, and who
could not be put into class n
school he did not write about him. un-
less he became even In academic cir
cles. a great fayorite. In that case he
mentip,sSd thSt the autbar was-aelight-