The New York herald., 1921-12-25

from modernfty" and its CO.
lossal stupidities as irrevocably
as John Keats. He apparently will
have nothing to do with his time. He
has for the things that lie about him
at the most an inverted interest-ex-
pressed by satirical silence.
Amid the general hubbub he has
builded himself a mansion of romance
and irony. Amid a Babel of Dreisers,
Dells, Lewises, Franks, Sinclairs and
other what nots. carpet sweepers and
falsetto realists he has planted a
Round Table that he bought of some
impossible Nicolas de Caen in some in
conceivable Poictesme. And the while
Mencken digs and Lewis spans, Caben
is host to Dame Melicent, Florian de
Puysange, Messire Jurgen, Sylvia
Darke, Catherine de Vaucelles, the
Lady Ettaire, old John Falstaff and a
hundred or so other persons of some
fabulous yesteryear which the winds
may have blown quite away but which
the Prospero of Dumbarton Grange
our sophisticated moon.
And in such wise and of such
verify (ah, I have fallen quite under
the spell of the Cabellian logos!) has
he recreated q past that never ex-
listed in a present that is as equally
non-existent, that / take this occasion
to pronounce him the greatest literary
magician at present living in the Eng
disappearing world actively plying his
trade.
I will admit that / cannot read too
much Cabell at a sitting-not even
that Incompatible and immortal "Jur-
gen." .=He tires me-but so do Keats,
William Morris Anatole France and
Don Quixote." To keep his palate
everlastingly fresh for sparkling Bur-
gundy one must indulge in great guam
titles of home brew and bootleg gin.
l said somewhere in reviewing a
previous book of Cabell's that he was
romantic ironist." I must stick to
it in reading the tales in these two
latest volumes. Romantic irony is next
to ecstasy the rarest thing in Anglo
American fiction. Cabell is a romantic
the Lie Magnificent shall make you
freel-and in every page of his prose
l hear the overtones-often subtle,
tenuous and sometimes almost inau-
dible of his ironic soul. He is the De-
busy of irony. 1t is an irony so ex-
quisite, so finely nuanced that none
but those who are nerve strung and
brain strung to catch the low laughter
of the Immanent Jester can hope to
capture it.
In Beyond Life" Cabell gave us his
credo. Imagination and the will-to-
Illusion take man godward. Art is the
humor of life. The things one cannot
see with the eye or touch with the
hand are the eternalities. To conceive
life as it is not (the formula is that
of Jules de Gaultier) is the one gift
bestowed on man that differentiates
him from the sub-kingdoms. Art is the
eternal illusion--it is the perpetual
creation of Maia-and it is Maia alone
who has the power of rending the veil
of Isis. Illusion being the very es-
sence of existence, art is the only
reality.s The universe itself is a fiction
of God. The Immapent One is q ro-
mantle ironist. The author Of "Jur-
gen" works with celestial paint and
brush-and sword.
"Chivalry," or, as it is subtitled, the
"Dizain des Reines," is composed OF
series of tales unified in theme and
dealing with an all important choice
in the life of person who, by his or
her order. Is directly responsible to
God for the outcome of the decision.
It is this responsibility which Cabeli
has indicated to be the keynote of the
chivalrous attitude, an attitude OF
which the entire book is, in reality,
study. The tales are. told by that
Nicolas de Caen to whom Cabell has
attributed the authorship of "Domnei.'
They form volume which upon it's
first appearance in 1909 Mark Twain
greeted with the comment: II cannot
say enough of the subtle poetic art
with which Mr.. Cabell has flung the
light of romance about dark and sor-
did chapters of history"
Among these tales I cannot choose.
am no literary critic-and never
read a book unless I know 1t is fine
book before I read 1t. "The House. |
wife" is as fine a bit of ironic romance
as ever found It's way to paper.
"The Line of Love" is a series of
episodes-a revised version of one of
Cabell's first books. with "The We'd
ding Jest" and Porcelain Cups"
which were not included in the first
edition. "The Wedding jest" is a
bit OF Perfection. There Is a little
hidden away in this
volume called "Love-Letters Of Fall
staff" II gives us Sir Jack In quite
another role than that which he plays
in Shakespeare.
There Is the usual characteristic in
PRODUCTION by III. l.. Mencken. the
bouncer in tho American Pantheon.
Mencken's opinion of Cabell is worth
quoting: He knows where red
noun should be and where n peacock
blue verb. and where an adjective as
darkly purple as a grape. You may
like his story and you may not like u.
but if you don't like the way he tells
II, then there is something wrong with