The Houston daily post. [volume] (Houston, Tex.) 1886-1903, 1902-07-27
The Question of u u
"Greatnesso In Literature.
The Literary Digest.

The Literary Digest.
BY what standards shall estimate the supremey sre.
IN literature and what terms apply TO the enor
nous masses of literature that lie below line of great
ncssl w Trent professor OF English literature in Co
uHbia university, who sets hidsc these ques
ons in the International Monthly (May) admits that the
task is most difficult 1T is hard to conceive Of
Sae s' oms s sai' !. the phs Ct s0s he
every man stood in Of being deemed pesumpuous and
kept silence with regard to all vexed problems few at
emps would be made either settle come nearer set
Ting them He continues;
How do we as individuals the great in iiters
ture! We use 1t loosely. but loosely than In
other connections and presumably all mainly Of
things or persons that do something OF things persons
that are on the whole quiescen matter how full they
be OF potential energy The great statesman
ample is to each of the who aceonpshes something
in the sphere OF politics the who has merely
potentales of success. And he accomplish some
thing which in view large important influential
paravely permanent more or less original and unique or
literature in such way The poem the poet the
book or the writer must actually do something with us and
that something be large. important influential
paratvely permanent less original and unique.
Obviously there two spheres in which this large inn
portant something be doncthe sphere OF emotions
and the sphere of intelligence One hook strs feel
inss deeply and permanently another of
new ideas which make an impression our lives call
both these books great and rightly"
That individual judgments and collective judgments
often widely at variance are obvious Even the greatest
critics have applied the with totally different
results In spite OF these facts Prof Trent points that
there is small group of what sometimes called world
wrers-wrters chiefly poets supremey great who are read
nearly land and have been read almost since they
Wrote--who seem to be separated point
wide chasm from all other authors" He says;
They are very few in number Homer Sophocles Virgil
Dante Shakespeare Milton Goethe nearly exhaust list
Moee however should be added because he represents
the comedy of maryelously and should
doubtless include Cervantes and few others II clear
that the writers named their excellence and
it is also obvious that they have living In fact
there scarcely than authors
us who possibly entitled 70 such high rank and they
Victor Hugo and Balsse about whom the critics
still arguing pro and con-
Bcow these writer's yet above the majority even of
1 is freely applied,
"a small group OF writer's OF very eminent originality aad
power OF great reputation outside their own natoualities
but still universal in their genius dazzling in
their achievements as the supreme or world writer's We
quote again:
Into it would see to al such poets as Pndar in Greek
luoreus in Latin, Pearch lasso and Ariosto in Italian.
Chaueer and Spencer in English Schiller and Hcine in
give the French place ia the list would insert the
OF Victor Hugo but have Just he is candidate
for higher honors and personally should unhesitatinsy
assign those Sane high honos to Notare IN his capacity
OF prose writer and poet combined But whatever may
OF French poets, there least French prose
writer's who seem very great~Rahelals and Montaisne-
and to balance them may very great British
prose writers, Swift and Gibbon we tentative
m our illustrations for there Is little unanmy among the
critics be by comparing the rank given Chauce
by Matthew Arnold and that given him by Mr. Theodore
Wats-Dunton Not Jew OF US would like TO assert en-
phatieay the position OF the author Of he Can
erhury Tales but while his merits being and
Acknowledged by foreign scholars may be questioned
whether he has yet attained truly cosmopolitan fame
Still another classification be made OF writers whom
zone would think OF calling supreme, although one
would as little think OF calling them minor OF this grade
Prof Trent says;
mo attempt at enumeration is here demanded but we
may be reasonably that both Csuu and Horace belong
TO the Roman list. Leopard the Italian. In English
have in his class such poets as Marlowe Rem Tonson Dry
den probably Pope and perhaps Gray Burns Coleridgc,
Keats very probably Icnnyson and Robert Browning
well Wordsworth Byron aud Shelley unless the parsaus
the last group succeed in eevatug OF them
into the class OF the very great poets We need
add the Of corresponding of prose.
Those Of Charles Lamb and Lander aud Hawthorne will be
sufficient
"A that has been said concludes the writer "is intend
ed be suggestive merely Even if the classification had
been made lines needs filling and requires
many qualifications"