Slike stranica
PDF
ePub

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS' NEW BOOKS.

VOLUMES III. AND IV. JUST PUBLISHED:

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES.

By HENRY ADAMS. Vols. I. and II.: THE FIRST ADMINISTRATION OF THOMAS JEFFERSON. $4.00. Vols. III. and IV.: THE SECOND ADMINISTRATION OF THOMAS JEFFERSON. $4.00.

"In the third and fourth volumes the admirable qualities become more and more apparent. Prominent among these is the remarkable combination of condensation with interest and vivacity. Mr. Adams's thorough and captivating work is full of nervous life. We should be inclined to call this the best book which has yet been written upon American political history. In point of literary execution Mr. Adams is easily the best of our political historians."-N. Y. Times.

LITERATURE AND POETRY.

By PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D. 8vo. $3.00.

The essays which make up this volume treat of "The English Language, ," "The Poetry of the Bible," "The Dies Irae," "St. Bernard as a Hymnist," " The University-Past, Present, and Future," "Dante Alighieri," and many other interesting literary topics, revealing throughout the breadth of the author's learning, the acuteness of his critical faculty, and the popular character of his method and style.

THE POETRY OF TENNYSON.

By HENRY Van Dyke, D.D. 12mo. $1.50. "The volume addresses the cultivated tastes of all who love a true poetry. It is the fruit of years of appreciative study of the poet. We owe the author a debt of thanks for giving us this estimate, so careful, so scholarly, so full of true devotion to poetry in its largest meaning.' - Rev. James O. Murray, Professor of English Literature in Princeton College.

AMONG CANNIBALS.

An Account of Four Years' Travels in Australia, and of Camp Life with the Aborigines of Queensland. By CARL LUMHOLTZ. With over 100 illustrations. 8vo, $5.00.

AN OPINION FROM DR. SCHLIEMANN.

"I have read the book with immense interest and delight. It is a work which will have a very long life, for it is full of useful knowledge. The reader forgets that he is reading a mere description, and thinks he is at the author's side, and shares with him the hardships, dangers, and joys of the life among cannibals in the wilderness of Australia. The whole civilized world must be grateful for this really wonderful work."-H. Schliemann.

THE RELIGIOUS ASPECT OF
EVOLUTION.

By JAMES MCCosн, D.D., LL.D. 12mo. $1.00. An able critique of the Evolutionary doctrine from the standpoint of Christianity.

"One of the best epitomes of the relation of the Creator to his earth, in the process of creation, that has been written." -Hartford Courant.

DOWN THE ISLANDS.

A VOYAGE TO THE CARIBBEES.
By WILLIAM AGNEW PATON. Beautifully illustrated.
New Edition. Square 8vo. $2.50.

"An exceedingly entertaining book of travels. Mr. Paton relates what he has seen in the Windward Islands, from St. Kitts to Trinidad, and with this he interweaves a vast amount of official and historical information. The story is highly romantic."-Boston Beacon.

EMIGRATION AND IMMIGRATION.

A Study in Social Science. By RICHMOND M. SMITH, Professor of Political Economy and Social Science in Columbia College. 12mo. $1.50.

CONTENTS.-Introduction; The History of Emigration; History of Immigration; Immigration and Population; Political Effects of Immigration; The Economic Gain by Immigration; Competition with American Labor; Social Effects of Immigration; Assisted Emigration and Immigration; Protecting the Emigrant; Chinese Immigration; Legislative Restriction of Immigration; The Question of Principle and of Method.

The comprehensive scope of Professor Smith's book is indicated in the foregoing summary of its contents. It is a popular examination of one of the most urgent of present-day problems from historical, statistical, and economic points of view, the information being full and exact, and the author's style being a model of terseness and clearness.

THE AMERICAN RAILWAY.

Its Construction, Development, Management, and Appliances. With 225 illustrations. Bound in half leather. 8vo, $6.00 net.

"The first satisfactory popular account of the American railway. It is a striking example of thoroughness and judgment. In the general design, in the selection of writers, in the illustrations, and in the arrangement of the matter, the book is a model,”--Christian Union.

THE VIKING AGE.

The Early History, Manners, and Customs of the Ancestors of the English-Speaking Nations. By PAUL B. DU CHAILLU. With 1,400 illustrations. Two vols., 8vo, $7.50.

These luxuriously printed and profusely illustrated volumes undoubtedly embody the fullest and most detailed account of our Norse ancestors extant. It is an extensive and important work."-N. Y. Tribune.

For sale by all Booksellers, or sent, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the Publishers,

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS, 743-745 BROADWAY, NEW YORK.

A NEW ÉDITION DE LUXE OF

CHARLES DICKENS'S COMPLETE WORKS.

LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND NUMBERED COPIES.

Unquestionably the handsomest edition of Dickens's writings - the nearest approach to the highest ideals of perfection in book-making-ever attempted in this country.

The type is from a new font especially cast for it, and never used for any other purpose. The paper-also especially made for it-combines the qualities of excellence in finish and in the materials used, with a lightness of weight that prevents the volume from being uncomfortably heavy to hold and read.

The illustrations-half the value of a good edition of Dickens-are incomparably superior to any ever issued in any edition printed in this country, and are only excelled-if at all-by the original issues of each volume, sets of which bring from one to two thousand dollars.

All the original etchings by Cruikshank and others have been carefully re-etched, line for line, from brilliant original proof impressions, and proofs taken for this edition on Imperial Japanese paper. The wood engravings are printed on Japanese paper from electrotypes never before used, furnished by Dickens's original publishers.

The set will be completed in forty-five volumes, at the rate of about two volumes per month.

Price, bound in vellum cloth, gilt tops, uncut,

$2.50 per vol.

Issued by subscription only, and no orders taken except for complete sets. Prospectus, -with specimen showing type, page, paper, etc., with specimen illustration-mailed free upon application.

ESTES & LAURIAT, PUBLISHERS, BOSTON.

Translated by Miss Wormeley: THE BAGPIPERS.

By GEORGE SAND, author of "Mauprat," "The Snow Man," etc. 12mo, half Russia. Uniform with our edition of "Balzac's Novels." Price, $1.50.

“George Sand is nowhere more charming in a pastoral way than in Les Maîtres Sonneurs,' which Miss Katherine Prescott Wormeley has rendered into English under the title of The Bagpipers.' In it that personal love for nature and for rural life which shows itself so often in the novelist's work is felt with a warmth and a fulness such as one encounters in very few of her books. The plot of the tale is simple, and yet it is of sufficient interest to hold the attention of the reader, while the whole atmosphere of the tale is delightful. Miss Wormeley's translation is in thorough harmony with the spirit of the original, and will commend itself to every reader of taste and judgment."-Boston Courier.

ALBRECHT.

A Story by ARLO BATES, author of " A Lad's Love,” “Berries of the Brier," etc. 16mo, cloth.

Price, $1.00.

"There is neither a forced situation nor an unnatural expression in the volume. Sharply-contrasted characters are delineated with equal definiteness and grace. There are bits of description which will stand beside any in contemporary fiction. In brief, Albrecht' is charming to read and weighty to consider. Absolutely free from the dilettante pessimism which has been the keynote of too much of Mr. Bates's work, it marks such a distinct advance in his art as to give no small warrant for the hope that Hawthorne will yet have a successor."-Boston Times.

TWO BOOKS WHICH ARE NEARLY READY.

THE HOUSE OF THE WOLFINGS. By Wм. MORRIS. 1 vol., 8vo, cloth. Edition limited to 500 copies. Alexander Young says in The Critic: "This is one of those rare creations of genius which reproduce the life and manners of a remote past, and of peoples of a grand kind that civilization cannot assimilate. They live in the stories of their deeds, and whether these are recorded in veritable sagas, or told by some writer of an alien race and of later times, their power over the mind is due to their adequate expression of the thoughts, experiences, and emotions of a by-gone people. The House of the Wolfings' is especially remarkable for its essentially poetic character, although it is written in both prose and poetry."

A NEW VOLUME OF BALZAC :

SONS OF THE SOIL ("Les Paysans"). By HONORE DE BALZAC. Trans. by KATHERINE P. WORMELEY. This is the fifteenth of these remarkable translations by Miss Wormeley, which have met with such universal commendation. We quote from the author's own introduction: The object of this particular study startling in its truth so long as society makes philanthropy a principle instead of regarding it as an accident-is to bring to sight the leading characters of a class too long unheeded by the pens of writers who seek novelty as their chief object. It is necessary to enlighten not only the legislator of to-day but him of to-morrow. In the midst of the present democratic ferment into which so many of our writers so blindly rush, it becomes an urgent duty to exhibit the peasant who renders law inapplicable, and who has made the ownership of land to be a thing that is, and that is not."- -De Balzac.

Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the publishers,

ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON.

D. APPLETON & COMPANY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & Co.'s

HAVE JUST PUBLISHED:

I.

Hygiene for Childhood.

SUGGESTIONS FOR THE CARE OF CHILDREN AFTER THE PERIOD OF INFANCY TO COMPLETION OF PUBERTY. BY FRANCIS H. RANKIN, M. D., President of the Newport Medical Society. 12mo, cloth. Price, 75 cents. "The physician, in his round of visits, is made aware of a woful lack of knowledge of the laws of health. It is hoped that the suggestions contained in this little manual will afford practical aid in the care of children, and enable mothers to avoid numerous hygienic sins of omission and commission." -From the Preface.

II.

Evolution of Man and Christianity.

By the Rev. HOWARD MACQUEARY. 12mo, cloth. Price, $1.75.

"There can be little doubt,' says Professor Le Conte, 'that we are now on the eve of the greatest change in traditional views that has taken place since the birth of Christianity. This change means not a readjustment of details only, but a reconstruction of Christian theology.' It is because I am firmly convinced of the truth of these profound words that I have written this book. Evolution is in the air,' and its fundamental tenets are being accepted (perhaps unconsciously) by all classes of minds. It behooves us, then, as religious teachers, to recognize this fact, and adjust our theology accordingly."-From the Preface.

[blocks in formation]

NEW BOOKS.

William Cullen Bryant.

Vol. XI. in American Men of Letters Series. By JOHN BIGELOW. With a Portrait. 16mo, gilt top. $1.25. A noteworthy addition to a notable series.

PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED.

WASHINGTON IRVING. By Charles Dudley Warner.
NOAH WEBSTER. By Horace E. Scudder.
HENRY D. THOREAU. By Frank B. Sanborn.
GEORGE RIPLEY. By O. B. Frothingham.
J. FENIMORE COOPER. By T. R. Lounsbury.
MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI. By T. W. Higginson.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON. By O. W. Holmes.
EDGAR ALLAN POE. By G. E. Woodberry.
N. P. WILLIS. By Henry A. Beers.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. By J. Bach McMaster. Each with Portrait. 16mo, gilt top, cloth, $1.25; half morocco, $2.50.

Conversations in a Studio.

By WILLIAM W. STORY, author of "Roba di Roma," etc. 2 vols., 16mo, $2.50.

Two volumes of fresh, thoughtful, informal conversations on a great variety of topics, in art, history, society, and liter

ature.

Dr. Muhlenberg.

Vol. III. of American Religious Leaders. By Rev. WILLIAM WILBERFORCE NEWTON. 16mo, gilt top, $1.25.

An interesting account of the life and effective work of a leader in the Episcopal Church, and a saint of the Church Universal.

The North Shore Watch,

And Other Poems.

By GEORGE E. WOODBERRY, author of "Edgar Allan Poe" in the series of American Men of Letters. 16mo, in an artistic binding, gilt top, $1.25. Very few of these poems have been printed before, and the tasteful volume comprises such poetic power and achievement as first volumes of verse rarely possess.

American Whist Illustrated.

By G. W. P. With numerous diagrams. Full leather, flexible, $1.75.

"American Whist Illustrated" is a digest of “American Whist" and "Whist Universal," with all the amendments, revisions, and changes in play required by the application of recent inventions and improvements in the practice of the American game.

Agnes of Sorrento.

BY HARRIET BEECHER STOWE. Riverside Paper Series. 50 cents.

For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by mail, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the Publishers,

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.,

BOSTON, MASS.

VOL. X.

THE DIAL

MARCH, 1890. No. 119.

CONTENTS.

HENRIK IBSEN. W. E. Simonds

RECENT SOCIAL AND POLITICAL DISCUSSION.

John Bascom

[ocr errors]

A MAN OF MANY FRIENDS. C. A. L. Richards RECENT STUDIES IN CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY. James O. Pierce.

BRIEFS ON NEW BOOKS.

Davis's Recollections of Mississippi. - Uncle Dick
Wootton, the Pioneer Frontiersman.- Letters of the
Duke of Wellington to Miss J.- Murdock's Recon-
struction of Europe.-Lucy Larcom's New England
Girlhood.-Anderson's Modern Horsemanship.-Van
Dyke's The Poetry of Tennyson.-Miss Selfe's Life
of Dr. Arnold of Rugby.-Paris' Manual of Ancient
Sculpture.-H. H. Bancroft's History of Nevada,
Colorado, and Wyoming.- Markham's Life of John
Davis, Navigator.-Allen's Korean Tales.-George
Bancroft's Life of Martin Van Buren.

TOPICS IN MARCH PERIODICALS.
BOOKS OF THE MONTH.

HENRIK IBSEN.*

301

303

306

308

312

315

316

Miss Lord's translation of Ibsen's comedydrama "Et Dukkehjem" was originally published in London in 1882. The American publishers have given us, apparently, a reprint of this translation in the dainty volume in green and white which is now before us. There is no hint of this earlier appearance, however, upon the title-page.

Inasmuch as all our knowledge of the dramatist's life and character has come to us upon the ephemeral leaves of the magazines, a more extended biographical sketch would have been acceptable, especially as Miss Lord, in her brief essay on the philosophy and methods of the playwright, is unable to do either the subject or herself the justice she perhaps intended. Her exposition of the play and of the spirit of its truly great creator is commendable. The lady shows herself an appreciative reader; at the same time she is admirably fair towards the critical philistines.

Ibsen's career as a dramatist really began

THE DOLL'S HOUSE: A PLAY. By Henrik Ibsen. Translated from the Norwegian by Henrietta Frances Lord. New York: D. Appleton & Co.

with the appearance of his "Catiline," in 1852. Its thesis is, that responsibility for guilt does not always lie at the door of the individual who commits the crime. Rome, not Catiline, is responsible for the troubles and anxieties occasioned by the conspirators' attempt. Here, as elsewhere, he rebels against the fate of environment. The State, and all its institutions, are boldly attacked, and weaknesses and defects remorselessly exposed and vigorously assailed. The attitude which he then assumed, Ibsen still to a great degree maintains. But let no one suppose that Ibsen is a socialist, or even, for that matter, a republican. Every form of government within his ken is delusive. The State would have us its debtors: as a matter of fact the State is tremendously the debtor to all its citizens. "The individual!" is Ibsen's watchword; and thus far none of Ibsen's criticisers has succeeded in interpreting to the world precisely what the poet means.

In 1862, the "Comedy of Love" appeared. Ibsen now turned his attention to the home and the institution of the family. Again he held a mirror up to nature-a mirror that did not flatter nor deceive. With a stern pitiless hand, he pointed out the wrinkles and blotches on the simpering face of a social life that he saw about him. Ruthlessly he dragged from the closets, whither the social pillars had agreed to banish them, the grinning skeletons, and left them gibbering there in all their nakedness. The critics declared that it was out of his own wretched experiences that Ibsen was writing. The poet had married in 1857; his wedded life had not proved altogether happy, and there was sufficient, perhaps, to give color to the insinuations of his enemies.

From what has been said, the reader may form some idea of Ibsen's peculiarities of thought and method. The State and Society are the culprits whom he arraigns, and whom he charges with high crimes and misdemeanors. Each one of those dramas which are distinctively Ibsenian-if I may use the word—is merely a statement of some such specific charge. His social dramas are assertions of social problems. He rarely suggests even an implied solution.

"I question for the most part, to answer is not my office," he declares plainly in his "Emperor and Galilean" (1873).

Our space will not permit us to examine the later plays of Ibsen individually. They are variations and amplifications along the lines already indicated. It is these later dramas which have made Ibsen's name familiar in America as well as Europe. Their order is as follows: "The Young Men's League" (1869), "Pillars of Society" (1877), "The Doll's House" (1879), "Spectres" (1881), "An Enemy of Society" (1882), "The Wild Duck" (1884), "Rosmersholm" (1886), and “The Lady from the Sea" (1888).

[ocr errors]

"The Doll's House is one of the strongest plays that Ibsen has produced. In the way of character-painting, and artful and artistic handling of the situations, he has done nothing better. It is a pity that we could not have had "The Enemy of Society," with its strong autobiographic suggestiveness, first; but there is no more characteristic play upon the list, nor one more indicative of the author's mind and power-if only it be read with fairness and appreciation, than the one selected. The heroine of The Doll's House" is its light-hearted pretty little mistress, Nora Helmer. She has been eight years the wife of Torvald Helmer, and is the mother of three bright vigorous children. She is her husband's doll. Torvald Helmer calls her his little lark, his squirrel, provides for her every fancy, hugely enjoys her charms of person, forgets that she has a soul -and is sure he loves her most devotedly. Nora has always been a child; her father, a man of easy conscience, has brought her up entirely unsophisticated. She knows nothing of the serious side of life, of its privileges, its real opportunities, nothing of the duties of the individual in a world of action. Nora is passive, she submits to be fondled and kissed. She is happy in her "doll-house," and apparently knows nothing outside her home, her husband, and her children. Nora loves her family with an ideal love. Love, in her thought, is an affection which has a right to demand sacrifices; and in turn is willing to offer up its own treasures, whether life, honor, or even its soul, be the stake. She is not merely ready for such a sacrifice-poor sentimental Nora!she has already, though in part ignorantly, made it, and has committed a crime to save her husband's life.

There is much machinery to carry on the plot; but in spite of the abstract nature of the theme, the episodes are so dramatic and the dialogue so brisk and natural that the drama moves without perceptible jar, and our interest

intensifies and the suspense increases until the dénouement occurs. Herein lies the secret of the success of this and all the other of Ibsen's kindred dramas. Along with the poet's insight and the cold clear logic of the philosopher, he possesses in an eminent degree the secret of the playwright's art, and knows well how to clothe his abstract dialogue on themes philosophical or psyschological, so that the observer follows every incident and every word with an interest that grows more and more in

tense.

It is impossible to tell all of Nora's story here. Miss Lord's translation will do that best, if only curiosity may be aroused concerning it. Suffice it to say that the catastrophe falls in a situation characteristically dramatic. The curtain descends just as Nora, the wife and mother, turns her back upon husband and children, and passes, by her own free choice, nay, in accord with her relentless insistence, out from her doll-home into the night, andwhither? This is the question that all the hosts of Ibsen's censors are repeating. Whither? And did she do right to leave her children and her husband? And what a revolutionary old firebrand Ibsen must be to teach such a moral, and proclaim the doctrine that all those unfortunate mismated women who find themselves bound to unsympathetic lords may, and should, turn their back on the home and abandon their offspring to the mercies of strangers! But alack! this isn't the moral of Nora Helmer's story. It was the doll-marriage and the relation between Torvald Helmer and his doll-wife that was at fault. Nora's abandonment was an accidental, though a necessary, episode. It is the dénouement of the play, to be sure; but the end is not yet. There is an epilogue as well as a prologue to the drama, though both are left to the reader's imagination to perfect. "A hope inspires" Helmer as he hears the door close after Nora's departure; and he whisperingly repeats her words "the greatest of all miracles!"

This particular phase of wedded life-and perhaps it is becoming not so very infrequent a phase even on this side the water—is a problem which confronts us in society. Is this your idea of marriage? demands Ibsen. Is it a marriage at all? No; he declares bluntly. It is a cohabitation; it is a partnership in sensuality in which one of the parties is an innocent, it may be an unconscious, victim.

Nora goes forth, but we feel she will one day return; her children will bring her back. Nei

« PrethodnaNastavi »