Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-03-30


obel Strong. joint author with Lloyd
Osbourne Of Memories Of Vailima. -
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
Washington: Brentano's.
4 LOVINGLY curious world has
~ followed the steps of Robert
- Louis Stevenson closely that
nothing new, it would appear,
remains to be said about him.
This tiny sketch is only rather closer,
rather more intimate. than much that
has come before it. Its point and value
lie in just that degree of greater near
ness. of illuminated comprehension. The
author follows the usual course of the
biographer. considering Stevenson as
child and youth and man. as traveller
writer, teacher, poet and friend. One
cannot help wishing that this plan had
been sacrificed for the less symmetrical
one of staying longer by those rare
Nailima years and saying more about
them, those years In which Mrs. Strong
herself had a deeply personal part. How
ever. it is a rare and valuable little book
just il stands. 4 picture of Steven
son, one not before published. a speaking
picture. fronts this little story of the be-
loved mans life.
OSCAR WILDE: A Critical study. By
ell Kennerley.
For several years nobody said Wilde's
name. Then. for some years, so-called
critics used up time and space nervous
ly skirting his sins in fear and fascina-
ton. and describing his clothes and at
titudes- The mere gossps having squeez-
ed the subject dry and. therefore, having
ceased to care for it. intellectual and
literary writer's. capable and critical
Judges. have, for a few years now. done
good service to the world by bringing
10 it, In respect and admiration, the work
of Wilde. that iridescent reflection of a
stimulating personality, of a charming
Henderson rather tropicaily and foridly
describes as that of ''orchidaceous mod
ernity and brilliant exoticism.
Arthur Ransome here makes one OF the
very best of the Wilde studies getting
down at once to Wilde's work with no
sort of preliminary smirk of apology He
takes the stand that Oscar Wilde is a
genius of certain mold. whose work of
unique quality, we cannot afford TO miss
a quality approached by no one. unless
Fl be by Bernard Shaw, and even here
HkenesSes fade in dissimilarities of out
look and motive. Mr.. Ransome has a
good hold on proportion, that is COM
mon sense guides his other senses He
has tools of literary Interpretation to sup
port those of personal literary creation
He eomprehends the artists many-col-
analysis of Wilde'S works interviewer
with the issues of his career MIR. Ran
some says: He leaves three things be-
hind him. a legend, his conversation and
his works. The legend will be that of
beautiful boy, SO gifted that all things
were possible to him. so brilliant that in
middle age men still thought him young.
stepping through imaginary fields of lilies
and poisonous irises and finding the
flowers turned suddenly to dung, and his
Feet caught in quagmire not only
poisonous but ugly. . He spoke in
parallels. and. he was an artist he
made more of the parallels than of their
meanings. They are a little heavy with
gold and precious stones. They are visit
1ul like princesses in fairy tales who
look out on the world from under their
crowns. when other children toss their
hair in the wind. No other English
taiker has talked in this style. Beside
Lamb suffered jests. Habits incisions.
Coleridge's billowy eloquence. Wildes
tapestried speech must be set among the
regrettable things of which time has
carelessly deprived U.s. Wilde's talk is
gone, put Its effects remain in the con-
versational ease of mis- prose and in the
mental attitude that his writings per-
petuate.'
Room. BY Arnold Bennett. author
OF The Old Wives Tales etc. New
YORK: George III. Doran Company
1t Is surely ones misfortune to come
upon the adulated Arnold Bennett when
obviously, he is not behaving at his
best Just now no literary gossip of
The brand commonly used by the cul-
tured American high school teacher ia
quite SO fifty favored as that which
losses the name Arnold Bennett" to
and fro in an easy play of acquaint-
ance I'D comprehension. Therefore
one painfully regrets that. SO far. only
..p trivial book of ESSAYS and these
Polite Farces" stand for his rather
unsatisfactory meetings with this young
genius. Both the subject and the sub
stance or the. essays have sunk to the
unconscious deeps The .Farces" are
in hand-a clowns contribution to
laughter and good humor. One is a bit
OF Understandable nonsense about a
woman whose double profession ap-
One is a scrap of horseplay about a
baby that makes a mess of things by
being a girl when the least glimmer
OF business sense would have made 1t
boy with an Inheritance The other
one is about good woman''-a
woman whose goodness is put on so
insecurely. and SO awry at that. that it
IS all supposed to be a matter of un-
controllabie mirth. AS was said in the
beginning. it is important to meet Mr.
Bennett on ore of his high days.
THE POLITICAL STATUS OF WOMEN
IN THE UNITED STATES: 4 Digest
of the Laws CONCERNING Women In
tho Various states and Territories.
Compiled by Bertha Rembaugh
member of the New York bar An
Introduction by Harriet Stanton
Blatch. president of the Women's
Political Union. New York: G. p
Putnam's Sons.
profoundly interesting exhibit. inter
esting not only to the women who are
fighting for full enfranchisement, but
also TO the student of social and DOlitical
evolution. This compact and admirably
ordered volume rnarshaIs the states of
the Union in alphabetical file and ex-
amines them, one by one upon the single
point of womens political rights. A uni