Evening star., 1924-11-18
NEW BOOKS
AT. RANDOM
cow f n sA ATIONs q IN EBURY'
STREET. George Moore, Boni &

STREET. George Moore, Boni &
Liveright.
Ebury stSeet-victoria Station not
far away 20 the east; nearer yet,
buckingham Palace to the north:
just off to the vest Belgrave Square.
! At a1tvia isi ARury street George Moore,
| tIons". that now move out in greeting
| to the eagerly expectant devotees of
George Moore. That is exactly what
they .are-devotees, taking their man
and artist in a whole-hearted en-
thusiasm that promptly excludes from
their company even the mildest of
douhters and cavflers.
+ X = 4 X
Just now. in an easy chair drawn
up before the open fire. beside him
| cat for comfort and counsel, George
Moore sits turning over and over In
his mind various approaches and
landings for the conversations"
| At the moment he is remembering a
! letter from the "far-famed city of
Winnetka. Ill.," written by an author
| asking permission to transcribe on
vellum "The Brook Kerith." A beau
tifui thing It would be. so the young
man said, in any ones library and
later in nations possession. A
pleasing thing to read about a book
of ones own. In Moore's hand is q
story by this friendly writer. a
story about mine. And II sets him
| to thinking that the literary sting
must be deep. indeed. to- send this
Mr.. Husband 500 feet under the
| ground to find his theme.
Mr.. Husband. sir" said the maid
| And in walks the man himself, right
out of Winnetka, Ill.--come to hear
George Moore talk about books and
pictures and things. No, he has not
| seen the houses OF Parliament, nor
! the Tower. nor Westminster Abbey,
nor the royal palace. nor the national
| gallery. He has just arrived, only
| this morning. and has come at the
earliest moment to see George
| Moore.
And that's the beginning of the
| Conversations"
#'* = s.
And Moore talks of painting. He
starts with his own portrait by
Sickert. Eince his visitor in eager
loyalty repudiates It as no likeness.
contending youthfully that the like
ness is what a portrait is about.
Easily. stroking% the cat meanwhile.
| he unwifds his mind about por-
traiture and. finally. about painting
az a wholA. Unwinds IL little by
little, reaching out here and there
! for some loose-fiying thread which
| he DEITY and securely entwists with
tie main strand Of his the3khts and
conclusions about art. And here one
lgets glmpses-slimpses oniy-of
Moore's art life in Paris. of the full
| experience there that went, Ylti-
mateiy. into the substance OF Mod
ern Painting''-one Of the best books
on painting ever published in the
English tongue, so Lewis Hind says.
| And right in the midst of talking
about art something diverts him into
| the field of education. Not a man.
| George Moore, to be daunted by so
simple thing as education. whose
basic principle clearly divides the
I world into two classes-one, very
! small class, the other an enormously
large one. To the former alone does
EDUCATION apply and from it come the
| creative artists in letters, painting.
Larehitecture, music: from it comes
! the scholars and thinkers: and the
! exclasive intellectuals appreciative of
| these others, their patrons and sup
porters as well. The great lower
| class is not subject to education.
! These must be left in contented ig-
,,horance to tiH the fields. to guard
7 the forests. to turn the mills, to man
tfhe factories. to give glad household
kservice. Nonsense, of course. Ohso-
lete nonsense at that. But Moore
talks along his line of thought
! ttngenuously and engagingly as if ii
fwere a fact. as if the whole world
! were not alive In protest against his
| static philosophy. But. this is Moore
j<f 10 pall 20,
| Mayo. And no other aristocrat in
/ the world rs quite so incorrigibly
such as the Irish aristocrat. And
! George Moore carries off his argu-
ment viii an air of ingrained GER
F! titude thai is altogether irresistible
Maid-Mr. Freeman. sir. =
Freeman-I'm afraid ] am inter
ruptinS But nothing is an inter
! ruption that permits George Moore
to talk when the fit is on him.. And
this morning he is pondering the
reason for the sudden Oblivion OF
/ George Eliot. What are the causes
/ of her swift decline? Clearly, q
| SURPRISING mind. Clearly the gift
Of dramatic invention. Why do
/ people pass her by for otheps OF
nors- -,rreager powers? And here is
John Freeman, the very one to help
him in this dilemma. Where was she
born? To what station? What her
| education and her upbringing? What
her social influences? Why did she
come to London and what heset her
there? And Mr.. Freeman answers pa
tientIy and they go over the books of
George Eliot, both equally familiar
with all Of them. Repellantly un-
go nf
the moral conflict in which the writer
found herself involved" 49,. "If she
had been a happy woman her happi-
ness would have crept into her writ
inRs, for what is in the mind finds Its
| way on to the page. an almost need
less amplifcation of your criticism
that the moralist is seldom happy.
8 >. And let US agree that ancient
| literature was happier than modern.
Homer's fighting. though heavy
handed is always light hearted. The
wanderings of Odysseus are un-
touched by melancholy and the'very
name Of Theocritus brings up before
our eyes sunHy hillsides, with shep-
herds gathered under tamarisk trees.
and for single ornament torrent
dashing over the face Of the high
rock. More real. more true are these
than George Eliot's Nrrfolk hinds.
The shepherds and shepherdesses
have come down to us from more
than 1000 years, gaining in every
generation, II would seem, a new and
more intense life. More real than
Tom Tulliver is to me, or his sister
| Maggie" And SO the talk moves on
all by way Of accounting for the un-
mistakable decline of George Eliot.
e~ X = :
|
Mr.. Freeman goes his way and others
come to the sittings with George Moore
in Ebury street. Among them Walter de
la Mare and Desmond MacCarthy. Gran.