The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-01-17

| Miss Mary H. Krout delivered tht
Authors" on Tuesday afternoon on tbs
lanai of Mrs. Charles Cookies residence
on Beretania avenue, which has beer
kindly lent for the entire series. The
day had been extremely unfavorable
it having rained heavily all the morn
ing. In spite of this, there was large
attendance. The management of the
talks had been placed in the hands OF
Mrs. Walter Jones and Miss Kate
Graydon. professor of English htera-
ture in Oahu College.
Mrs. Chas. Wilder, Mrs. Geo. Angus
and Mrs. Grace Cooke acted as a COM
mittee of reception and discharged
their duties gracefully and acceptably
Miss Krout was introduced by Prof
W. D. Alexander, as "a true friend to
Hawaii He also alluded to her liter
airy work and her painstaking study,
extending over many years, of the
themes which she had chosen. Miss
Krout prefaced her talk with illusions
to former visits to Honolulu, recalling
the warm appreciation which a series
of talks at that time, given at the
residence of Mrs. w. G. Wilder, had
received.
She then gave brief analysis Of the
true function of the novelist, which,
lika of he ST hn RYnraSSp6
his ideas in clay or in colors, was to
depict life as it is-not from any one
narrow point of view, but from all it's
many aspects: it's joy and sorrow. its
comedy and tragedy, the good with the
evil. Every period had produced its
spokesman - Smollett and Fielding,
Scott and Bulwer, Thackeray and Dick
ems, with a revival of the romantic
school in Disraeli in the middle V1cto-
rian period
The present epoch included Meredith,
Hardy. the two greatest of living writ
ers, the founders of distinct schools,
with their many imitators. She had
not been able to include both in the
present restricted series, so had chosen
Hardy, as affording greater variety,
taken in connection with those to fol-
ION. one gave q SAiOlt OAc6Ao PAAASe@A
sketch of the author, touching upon his
work as an architect. then his futile
attempts as a poet, his marriage to
Emma Clifford, the daughter of an
archdeacon of the Established Church,
he could scarcely be regarded
as in sympathy with any form of recog-
nized orthodoxy.
The list of his works was given, with
some idea as to the motive of each,
and two examples of his short stories
were analysed, for it was pointed out
that he excelled in the difficult art of
telling short story, as well as in
carrying out to it's artistic conclusion
an intricate and well-sustained plot.
The examples of his greater work Sc
lected for consideration We're Under
the Greenwood Tree, Tess of the
D Urbervilles" and Jude the Obscure
One charge brought against Hardy
was that he was immoral, but she held
that this could no more be sustained
in his case than in that of Homer or of
Like them, he dealt with |
the great elemental passions, with vice |
as well as with virtue, but with no in |
tent of making evil appear other than
Il was-a destructive force She closed |
By describing Stonehenge, which she
had once visited on a gray December |
lay, and Concentration Day at Ok
ford, which closed with d splendid fete
IN the garden at Wadham College, |
during the year of the Queens Jubilee, |
when princes and potentates, scholars, |
scientists and peers of the realm We're
present. AT Stonehenge she did not /
.hink of the ancient Druidical rites COR
he events of history which had been
there), but of Tess, lying t
Upon the sacrificial stone, waiting her
loom. AS she passed out of the gates
IF Wadham College she saw a sad
risaged man with three little children
ooking down from a window opposite
lpon the splendid company that pour
ID out OF the gates of the ancient col
eye, and Jude came TO mind, with his
ra gical efforts to break through the
ruel and selfish caste of English
cholasticism. To be able SO to inspire
he creatures of the imagination with
ife. she pronounced to be the mani
estation OF consummate genius.
Among those present We're Judge and
Irs. Sanford B. Dole, Mrs. VIM. c.
Wilder, Mrs. c. W. Ashford, Mrs.
udd. Mrs. w. o. Hall, Mrs. L. L. Nc
,andless, Mrs. A. Fuller. Mrs Geo.
,ooke, Mrs Clarence Cooke, Mrs. j. a.
IcCandIess, Mrs. Marx, Mrs. W. Mon
arrat. Mrs. A F. Judd, Mrs. E. Jor-
an, Mrs. A. Carter, Mrs. Witherby,
lrs. Smith, Miss Harvey. Mrs. Tenney
'eck, Mrs. Geo. Rodiek, Miss Neuman,
Hiss Agnes Alexander, Miss Mary AL
xander, Mrs. W. D. Alexander, Miss
.orna Iaukea, Mrs. a. G.. Grifflths, Miss
josephine Locke, Mrs. Raymond Lay
I'd, Miss Nina Adams.
The subject of the next talk. which
Till be given at o'clock on Friday,
Robert Louis Stevenson" There
vas an impression that only ladies
7ere expected to be present at Miss
lrout's talks, but that is an error.
Gentlemen who have the leisure and
he wish to come will be made well
ONE.
A HABIT TO BE ENCOURAGED.