Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-11-23


a set of automatons that bow and pirate
responsive to the will of Viereck. They
have no reality, no personality, no plau-
sibility 1t is doubtful if anything more
artistically unconvincing has often been
produced. The only personality in THE
House Of the Vampire" is the unescapa-
BILE personality of the author. The occa-
sional interpolated poems are from the
authors already published work; the
theories as to artistic temperament upon
which the plot and most of the dialogue
are based are easily recognizable by any
one who has read the poems. There
remains one thing to be hoped: That
the interpolated plan for a drama which
the Vampire is supposed to have drawn
out of the unfortunate poets brain is
not destined to be used by the author
in the future. Rather than that-Banzai
to the Vampire.
THE DAUGHTERS OF THE LITTLE
GREY HOUSE. BY Marion Ames
Taggart, author of THE Little Grey
House" New York: The Mcclure
Company. Washington: Woodward
d Lothrop.
The many friends of Wythie, Roberta
and Prue will be glad to dip further into
the book of their life. In THE Daugh-
tiers of the Little Grey House the girls
have grown out of childish woes and
joys into the problems of maidenhood.
Lovers come to two of them, just the
lovers that would have been expected
for the daughters of the Grey mother.
This is a charming and wholesome story
for young girls just voyaging into the
romantic age.
HESTER OF THE HILLS. A Romance
of the Ozark Mountains. BY Grover
Clay. With q frontiSpiece by Girls
void Tying. Boston: l.. G. Page &
h iroer mr.
An astonishing courtship, surely, this,
of the daughter of a Cracker" in the
Q lrk mountains by a brilliant man of
the world and man of affairs. AS brutal
as Sidney Stanton's views on the mar
riage question may seem to the romantic
reader, the author manages to make
them seem almost as reasonable to his
audience as they undoubtedly appear to
Mr.. Sidney Stanton himself. For. dis
guised by a very human and compelling
fine irony, the question at issue is plainly
the matter of scientific mating, as OPP
posed to the prevailing sentimental or
haphazard conditions. While Grover
Clay probably has little intention of being
taken seriously, he has provided food for
thought for many and food for discus
sion for more All theoretical "ques-
tons set aside, Hester Wallace is an
Interesting essay in femininity, and Sid
ney Stanton is almost as successful a
presentation of a. definite type of man.
GUNHILD; a Norwegian American Epi-
sode. By Dorothy Garfield. New
York: Henry Holt. Washington:
Ballantyne.
A party of American tourists stranded
in remote town, with one of their num-
Der painfully i'll, and with no Norwegian
word among them; Gunhild born in Kan
sas of Norwegian parents, looking like a
Morse goddess and speaking slangy Amer
icanese, are the dramatis personae of an
unusually interesting story. A love story
develops apace; but the main interest in
the book is in the presentation OF Gunhild
herself, with her fresh, brave. primitive
nature and. an entirely different type,
Aunt Nancy" gallant old maiden lady.
The nature setting of the romance is
vivid.
THE; RHINE GOLD. A Dramatic Poem
by Richard Wagner. Freely Trans
lated in Poetic Narrative FORM by
oliver Huckel. New York: Thomas
Z. CroweN & Co.
DR.. HuckeI has previously published
versions of other Wagner themes, SINH
lar in character to the present vo'ume
They respond to a need for a good lit
erary version of these fine stories-a need
Waich the author has successfully met.
The "Reingold' is the first Of the Ring
Cycle. 1t deals with the treasure stolen
from beneath the waters of the Rhine,
and the curse bestowed upon all 20 whom
the ilIgotten hoard passed. The present
version in blank verse is not so Tuch
translation as a paraphraSe
THE STORY OF THE RING. With Four
Colored Plates by Harry Rountree.
New York: Dodd Mead & Co. WASH
ington: Ballantyne.
The author has told simply and briefly,
the story of Wagner's great music
dramas, so that one who knows nothing
of them may learn easily what they
are all about. Parallel with the thought
| motives, he has presented the musical
| motives. In this way he has made
| 1t possible for any student to under
| stand how the music interprets the text,
or. rather, how the music is the full eX-
| preston of the dramas. The color plates
| are very fine.
THE WAGNER STORIES. Told by Fill
! son Young New York: Mcclure,
| Phillips & Co Washington: Wood
ward K Lothrop.
| In telling the stories of the Wagnerian
operas the author has derived his ma
4
| from the stage directions and from the
| music His object has been to inspire
the prose OF the narratives with some
! thing of the emotional atmosphere which
it is the peculiar quality of Wagner
music to produce.
TWENTY-THREE TALES BIZ Toll
| STOY. Translated by l.. and A
Maude New York: Funk C Wag-
nails Company.
| Tolstoy's theory: 1.-THE artist of the fu-
ture will understand that to compose a
fairy tale. a little song which will touch
a Lullaby or a riddle which will amuse OF
| to draw a sketch such as will delight
dozens of generations or millions of chill
dren and adults, is incomparably more
important and more fruitful than to COM
pose a novel'-is given practical utter.
auce in this collection of his short stories
| They were written, almost without eN.
ception for some purpose, humanitarian
educational, or to delight home.y lovers
of folklore tales. They are of the mos
representative work of the great Rus
Sian.,
A BOOK OF JOYS. The Story Of G
New England Summer. By Lucy
Fitch Perkins author of The Goose
l. Girl" With illustrations in color b,
the author. Chicago: A. c. McClurg {
Co.
Mrs Perkins has appropriately name,
her sketches of New England localit!
during a New England summer time
country on a May morning. or observing