New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1919-01-19
By Isaac Goldberg

lHE latter part of the fifteenth
century Spain, through Columbus
IL discovered America And now, at the
approach to the first quarter of the
twentieth, we have begun, in literary
manner, to return the compliment. General
ignorance of Spanish literature has in this
country long been out of all proportion to
the intrinsic worth of that nations letters
This is true of SPANS classic age almost as
much as of its modern and contemporary
literary epochs To be sure, Lopez de Vega
has long been a name to some; Cervantes
has been q comic book with more or less
pleasing illustrations, and all the rest, to
quote q noted Frenchman' witticism in the
exact words, but in totally different mean
ing, sis literature" There may be d slight
excuse for such Il state of affairs For the
most part to most people the Classics"
(uttered in a forbdding tone) a species
of elderly literary children, to be seen and
not read. Their place is upon the book
shelf. But what shall we say of modern
and contemporary Spanish letters, so rich
in shining names, so important in intimate
reference? What, even to some of our
leading critics who are fond Of assuming
an international pose, are the names of
Juan Valera, Perez Gados, Jose Maria de
Pereda, Palaco Vald6s, Pardo Bazan, Pho
Baroja? What, until yesterday was the
name of Blasco Ibanez? How many Of our
dramatic pontiffs know the wealth of Span
ish drama of yesterday and to-day? Eche-
garay's "Gran Galeoto" is familiar to them,
perhaps, through several transations of
widely differing merit and through dis
torted adaptation. How many of his other
plays do they know? A stray play by
Galdos that has eluded the censorship of
the publishers may have been read by
them; Benavente, in process of complete
presentation to English readers under the
care OF John Garrett Underhill, representa-
tive in the United States and Canada of the
Spanish Authors Society," will soon (let US
hope) be more than a reputation to them
And if such is the case with the critics,
what shall say of the public?
If ever the ice was to be really broken
however, and not merely cracked here and
there, now is the time. The war has
made the human heart bigger and the
world smaller. Both these occurrences
vra11 40
quate understanding of one another, not
only in the world of business but in that
Of art. An international mind is being de-
veloped and there could be little better
for such excellent purpose than a widen
ing of acquaintance with foreign
writers. Vast as we are from the Cont
mental standpoint there is, at least has
been, far too much of the parochial in our
literary outlook. Foreigners of cultivated
taste (and real cultivation without an in
ternatonal outlook is to-day an anomaly
have long laughed at us for our literary
Mandy pamby ism, for our pollyann@sthetic
preferences. And wkile we have established
critics here who, III books that purport to
be serious considerations of contemporary
literature, refer to native auctorial prud-
ishness as laudable reticence before the
divine mystery of sex, shall not our for
elgn friends laugh? This is not to say that
art for seX's sake should become henceforth
our IDEAL | maintain, nevertheless that we
must become accustomed to viewing these
matters in the other fellows light as we'll
oWn--that we must follow them 10
think as they think, not demand that they
think as we think they ought to think And
] protest that there is something wrong
somewhere when critics speak of reticence
before divine mysteries, all the time writing
within almost seeing distance of theatres
that exhibit very little retcence, ocularly
speaking, before the divine mystery.