The Academy Volume 36 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 Excerpt: ...to the exclusion of Mr. John Payne, Mr. P. J. Bailev, and others. Of course, no exigency should have allowed the editor to talk of "biographical adumbrations"; and the poet accused of being "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of classical inspiration" may be expected to derive considerable amusement from the expression of the charge. The want of arrangement is marked. Even an alphabetical order would have been better than none. Some idea of contrast may, perhaps, have guided the editor. Dean Plumptre follows Sir Edwin Arnold, and Mr. A. P. Graves precedes Lord Tennyson, with the bewildering effect of a public picturegallery. Then the title is inaccurate. Between the two "Locksley Halls" are sixty years, representing not one but two periods and the beginnings of a third. Still there is no reason why this book should not serve its purpose, which is to spread the knowledge of presentday poets among those who have hitherto taken little interest in them and their works. To Dr. Japp has been entrusted the notices of Lord Tennyson, Mr. Browning, Mr. William Morris, Mr. Swinburne, and Mr. Buchanan His criticisms are not deficient in sympathy and discrimination. In his remarks on Tennyson, he insists rightly that "Locksley Hall: Sixty Years After," is not a true completion of "Locksley Hall." Is it not the case that in " The Princess," with its "For woman is not undevelopt man, But diverse, ' we have the true dramatic sequel to the "Woman is tbe lesser man, and all thy passions match'd with mine, Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water unto wine," of " Locksley Hall "? Mr. Underhill writes of Mr. George Meredith, Mr. Dobson, and Mr. Gosse. His note on Mr. Meredith contains a good ...