Title: The spyglass
First published: 1963
Description: "Donald Davidson is well known as a poet and essayist, but few know or remember that during the 1920's he was also a book reviewer. The Nashville Tennessean asked Davidson to conduct its book page in 1924, and he saw in this assignment an opportunity to create a forum of Southern literary opinion, to some extent compensating for the lack of a good Southern literary journal. From his own column, at first called THE SPYGLASS and later THE CRITIC'S ALMANAC, a selection is presented here. The essays are grouped under six headings: Southern Fiction, Other American Fiction, Poetry, Critics and Commentators, Society and the Arts, and Backgrounds of Agrarianism. Included are reviews of books by such writers as Earnest Hemingway, Thomas Wolfe, and Elinor Wylie, written when these authors has not yet fully established their literary reputations, and Davidson's opinions have often foreshadowed the now generally held views. Through the essays there is his acute critical intelligence, his matchless literary style, and his absolute integrity. There is also a biographical sketch of Davidson--native Tennessean, teacher since the age of 17, full professor at Vanderbilt since 1937."