Evening star., 1925-04-14
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
l. &: NJ.
nonrmr IotIs arEyENsoN. John

ROBERT LOUIS sJEvENSOS. John
EiuustS Lille. Brown a. co.
within the 80 yours since Robert
Louis Etsynus1u's depfh biography
IN respect ~ stevenson hinrclf has
run the ihtoa stages 80 clearly de-
llned bY the three distinct purposes
That Originate Hud direct thia form OF
writing The first rf There is en-
bodied IN Graham EnlfDur.B lie of
Ei"prnErbs The srcpud, IN FRANK
Swinnrft"u's purely critical appraisal
Of Htcyebanu's Wprk. The ihird, IN
these tWo volumes bv John a. SicuhTt.
The lirst Of these Geographic atages
lH TIA" voIutniupIE one. alWhtH. ltS
background is n arurc pf immediate
loss. Here the feelings are upper
most, The instructive movement IS
that Of gathering in every detail oi
the personal lifr, every attribute OF
personality. The effect Is that Of an
uncUnHidcrcd and confused effort to
give the individual immunity from
dissolution. Abundance, with little
Of coordination. with less Of proper
ton and Orlcntgtion, Is the general
effect here. This period, as a rule,
derives It's chief value from the fact
that 1t IL a body Of raw material
whose proper use Hes in the future.
The second phase Of biography swings
as far as possible away from the nfSt
one. Here an expert takes the mat
ter IN hand. His exclusive concern
Is. with quality Of achievement. For
the human being, rs such, he has
little interest. So, alongside the per
feet pattcrn-we always have his
word for Il that It Is the perfect pat
tern-he lays that which has been
done, in literature, or art, or what
not. Neatly he notes the points Of
contact between pattern and product.
Sharply he sets off the lines Of de
parture from the norm in hand. Con
clusively he passes judgment. The
result Of this is an abstraction of the
mind with no scrap of the original
man left in il. Then, in between
these two the third Geographic stage
finally makes its way. Its agent Of
a different kidney from those Operat-
ing in the other two parts Of this
single geographic field. His attitude
is not theirs. 1t is for him 10 ac-
count for the mans work solely by
way of the mans life. There is no
other way to do it. so he says. No
other way to measure this wOrk--itS
nature, its quality, its scope, its in
fiuence, it's rability--eXCept TO dig
down inside the man who achieved
it, there following every clue to fresh
NlISCONGiN j illS bIOS dpIAtl VI q " ?
freely from the first Yoluminous stage
of raw material There he searches
for the shaping family and personal
life, for the source of motive. for the
line of effort that finally brought such
achievement as TO make the story a
compulsory contribution to the great
story of human progress. In spirit,
but with a somewhat chastened tech
mic, he draws, too, from the pure
critic as we'll Out of this reasoned
and proportional treatment the third,
and best, Geographic stage creates a
man and his work, mutually eXplana-
tory and satisfying. the one a per
feet counterpart of the dominating
forces in the life of the other.
Graham BalfOur is not the pure eu-
logist of Robert Louis Stevenson. Not
at all A relative of Stevenson, he is
telling the family story, to certain
extent SO, once in while, the fam
lily pressure outweighs the narrative
of Robert Louis. Nor does Frank
Swinnerton entirely ignore the man
in his process of discovering a really
mediocre talent for Stevenson. But it
is quite clear that for a good mastery
of the art of true evaluation applied
to Robert Louis Stevenson, the man
and the writer, John A. Steuart stands
pre-eminent among many writer's on
Stevenson, who represent one or the
other of these three classes of bi-
ographic outlook.