RETROSPECT

OF

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART IN 1924.

LITERATURE.

(Books marked with an asterisk are specially noticed at the end of this section.) THE following analysis of books published in the United Kingdom during 1924 is taken from the Publishers' Circular, by kind permission of the Editor, Mr. R. B. Marston. As regards book production 1924 established a new record, exceeding the figures for 1913 by 327. The increase is chiefly localised under the headings of Fiction (to which reprints contributed largely), Biography, Travel, and Religion. For new books apart from new editions, however, 1913's record is still unbeaten.

CLASSIFIED ANALYSIS OF BOOKS PUBLISHED DURING THE YEAR 1924.

A number of literary monthlies made their appearance during the year. Perhaps the most notable among them was The Transatlantic Review, edited by Mr. F. M. Ford (Ford Madox Hueffer), which boasted some illustrious contributors; but the representatives of modern schools seem to depend for their effects upon unorthodox typography. The Northern Review set out "to rescue Scottish arts and letters from the slough of Kailyardism," and contained poetry, drama, addresses, and general articles befitting that aim. Another assurance of "regional" literary activity was The Voyager, published at Bristol. Several new magazines bore witness to the interest taken in contemporary poetry— among them The Decachord, to be issued bi-monthly if public support permits; The Poetry Magazine, hailing from Northallerton in Yorkshire, the work of a company of lovers of poetry, whose zeal, at least, deserved applause; and a quarterly extra of The Poetry Review entitled Poetry of To-day. Artwork, a quarterly, assembled valuable articles by distinguished practical exponents of the arts and crafts. In the interests of religious unity Sir Henry Lunn revived his "Constructive Quarterly," The Review of the Churches, which sought to encourage the co-operation of the different bodies in social reform as a more immediate end than doctrinal agreement.

Biography,

Except as witnessing the passing of two famous novelists, French and English, and the appearance of a dramatic masterpiece on the greatest of French heroines, 1924 did not promise to be a significant date in the history of imaginative literature. To the resources of future historians in other departments it made, however, copious additions. autobiography, and cognate works were overwhelmingly abundant, despite an evident and unregrettable slackening in the production of unofficial character studies of contemporaries. Exceptionally numerous and handsome were the volumes devoted to description and travel, albeit they included no work of serious exploration. Poetry and the drama provided several works of real distinction, and fiction maintained a high level of achievement and promise without revealing any unmistakable genius. In its material aspect general book production showed undeniable advance, several presses and publishing houses adding considerably to their laurels in this respect. The book trade itself enjoyed

unusual prosperity.

The centenary of the death of Byron was celebrated with a somewhat unexpected piety, and called forth several studies, rather of the poet's personality than his work. Mr. Samuel C. Chew presented Byron in England; Mr. Harold Spender had the congenial theme of Byron and Greece; Mr. Harold Nicolson combined irony and admiration in Byron : the Last Journey; and Mr. J. D. Simon pronounced a favourable verdict in Byron in Perspective. Statesmen were not so prominent as usual in the year's biography. Mr. John Budan's Lord Minto, a memoir of the fourth Earl, Governor-General of Canada and Viceroy of India, depicted the personality and career of an attractive and enlightened servant and ruler of the Empire. In General Botha, Earl Buxton portrayed the soldier-statesman with the skill arising from the intimacy that existed between South Africa's Premier and its Governor-General. The Life of Lord Wolseley, by Major-General Sir F. Maurice and Sir George Arthur,

*

claims its place here as the record of a career whose greatest victories were perhaps won in Whitehall. A figure of rare significance and worth was the subject of Thomas Burt, planned as an autobiography but supplemented by chapters by Mr. Aaron Watson. Brigadier-General J. H. Morgan evaded the late Lord Morley's ban on a set biography with the intimate reminiscences and conversations recorded in his John, Viscount Morley. Mr. J. Saxon Mills paid due tribute in David Lloyd George: War Minister, and the Earl of Birkenhead compiled a series of rather slight but interesting sketches in Contemporary Personalities. Sir James Marchant's Dr. John Clifford, C.H.: Life, Letters, and Reminiscences made an unexpectedly benign figure of the doughty preacher-politician. Illustrious scientists were the subjects of several volumes. After an interval of ten years, Professor Karl Pearson issued the second volume of his Life, Letters, and Labours of Francis Galton, dealing with the discursive but important researches of Galton's middle life. The fourth Lord Rayleigh gave a concise and engaging account of his father's achievements in John William Strutt, Third Baron Rayleigh, O.M., F.R.S. A great naturalist and polemist was the hero of Mr. Percy F. Bicknell's The Life of Fabre. Professor Gilbert Murray and Mr. Ramsay MacDonald joined Mr. George Glasgow in a tribute to a much regretted scholar and Philhellene in Ronald Burrows: A Memoir, and Mr. H. G. Wells in The Story of a Great Schoolmaster described what was lost to education by the death of Sanderson of Oundle.

To historical biography Miss Kate Norgate contributed a spirited account of * Richard the Lion-Heart. Professor Huizinga added to the Great Hollanders Series a brief study of Erasmus, a subject more adequately treated in Dr. Preserved Smith's Erasmus. A Study of His Life, Ideals, and Place in History; while Dr. and Mrs. Allen issued the fifth volume of their great edition of the Letters, Opus Epistolarum Des. Erasmi Roterodami. In John Donne, Mr. Hugh I'Anson Fausset provided a biography and critical study that has long been needed. Mr. Arthur Irwin Dasent's Nell Gwynne (1650-87) was of larger scope than the title suggests, ranging over her whole period and environment. Mrs. Edith Hinkley's Mazzini: the Story of a Great Italian, while excellent in many respects, covered quite familiar ground. The chief figure of Mrs. Rosita Forbes' El Raisuni, the Sultan of the Mountains (more familiar as Raisuli) does not yet, in spite of rumours, belong to past history; but these interviews with the brigand chief revealed him as an important factor in politics that were of pressing interest throughout the year. Authors were well to the fore in biography. Mr. D. A. Wilson's second volume, Carlyle to "The French Revolution," introduced its hero to London and Edinburgh and corrected many false impressions as to his relations with the men of distinction with whom he then associated. Patrick Bramwell Brontë, by Miss Alice Law, F. R.S.L., stirred up vigorous controversy over his part in the composition of Wuthering Heights. Mr. J. A. Steuart's "revelations" of the youthful errors of his subject in Robert Louis Stevenson seemed to excite resentment in many quarters. W. H. Hudson: A Portrait, by Mr. Morley Roberts, did not pretend to be a full-dress biography, but revealed by disconnected talks and incidents something of that elusive personality. The Life of Olive Schreiner was

the work of her husband, Mr. S. C. Cronwright-Schreiner, executed as only a labour of love could be. This also applies to the companion volume, The Letters of Olive Schreiner, 1876-1920. The publication of Mr. Ford Madox Hueffer's Joseph Conrad: A Personal Remembrance followed close upon the novelist's death. Among other outstanding volumes devoted to literary figures may be mentioned Dr. Greville Macdonald's George Macdonald and His Wife; Mr. Thomas Beer's Stephen Crane, chiefly valuable for the Introduction by Joseph Conrad; and the Life and Last Words of Wilfrid Ewart, by Mr. Stephen Graham. * Anatole France: The Man and His Work, by Mr. James Lewis May, suffered, at least as regards the account of his later life, by being published before the death of the great master of irony, and the appearance of such intimate studies as M. Brousson's irreverent Anatole France en Pantoufles and M. Marcel le Goff's Anatole France à La Béchellerie. Mr. Charles E. Pearce filled a notable gap with his Sims Reeves: Fifty Years of Music in England, while Paul Bekker in his * Wagner sought to reveal the mind of the master by a close study of his works.

Political autobiography has been better represented in preceding years. The historian of war-time administration will have to refer to the Rt. Hon. Christopher Addison's Politics from Within, 1911-1918, devoted to his experiences as Under-Secretary to the Ministry of Munitions and in charge of the Ministry of Reconstruction. Dr. Addison's work, especially in its later stages, was not remarkable for impartiality, but his account of the national effort in the supply of munitions was excellent and inspiring. Two leaders of two mutually hostile parties fighting for the same cause published their reminiscences: Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett, J.P., LL.D., in What I Remember, and Miss Annie Kenny in Memoirs of a Militant. Mr. Henry Wickham Steed described his Through Thirty Years, 1892-1922, as "the work of a journalist," but his intimacy with foreign politics, and the opportunities of seeing European history in the making afforded to an Editor of The Times, gave a definitely political character and importance to his two volumes, which, however, were slightly marred by a number of small slips of memory. Among legal memoirs may be mentioned Seventy-two Years at the Bar, the recollections of the veteran Sir Harry Poland, narrated in the form of conversations with Mr. Ernest Bowen-Rowlands, K.C., and The Years of My Pilgrimage, the life-story of the last Irish Lord Chancellor, the Rt. Hon. Sir John Ross, Bart. Several distinguished soldiers dedicated their leisure to similar ends. The Autobiography of General Sir O'Moore Creagh, V.C., G.C.B., described the honourable career of the recent Commander-in-Chief in India. General the Rt. Hon. Sir Nevil Macready, Bart., held a series of difficult posts as Adjutant-General to the Forces, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and Commander-in-Chief in Ireland, and his Annals of an Active Life were correspondingly full of alarms and excursions, with no little light relief. Spun Yarn, by H.E. Admiral Sir Henry Woods Pasha, K.C.V.O., abundantly fulfilled the promise of this combination of British and Turkish dignities. More peaceful adventures, and wistful memories of a vanished social order, were happily recalled by the late Lord Willoughby de Broke in The Passing Years, a volume to which Mr. Moreton Frewen's Melton Mowbray provided the most suitable

partner. Mark Twain's Autobiography, edited with an Introduction by Mr. Albert Bigelow Paine, proved to be a characteristically informal production, observing no order of time or theme, but illumined throughout by the spirit of its author even when his pessimism was most express. Memories and Friends, by Dr. A. C. Benson, LL.D., C.V.O., contained a wonderful gallery of Etonian portraits. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's * Memories and Adventures described early struggles and triumphs, war, whaling, boxing, medical work in West Africa, and world-wide travel, with unfailing gusto. A journal kept by Mr. St. Loe Strachey for his son's amusement provided the delightful miscellanea of The River of Life: A Diurnal Digression. Herself an artist, wife of an artist, and mother of a famous caricaturist, Mrs. E. M. Ward was able to load with interest her Memories of Ninety Years. Another unusually long and successful career, which closed during the year, was described in A Long Life's Work, by Sir Archibald Geikie, O.M. Sir William Orpen was in holiday mood when he wrote and illustrated his Stories of Old Ireland and Myself, while his compatriot Mr. George Moore provided another volume of his curious blend of reminiscences and criticisms in Conversations in Ebury Street. Theatrical personalities thronged the pages of Mr. Cosmo Hamilton's lively Unwritten History, and the memoirs of stage and racecourse compiled by one of our most lamented comedians, Mr. Charles Hawtrey, were edited by Mr. Somerset Maugham under the allusive title of The Truth at Last. Vols. III. and IV. of The Farington Diary, edited by Mr. James Greig, continued this entertaining miscellany from September, 1804, to January, 1808. Jane Welsh Carlyle: Letters to her Family, 1839-1863, collected under the editorship of Mr. Leonard Huxley, more than 200 letters, most of them the hasty, inimitable, but rather disloyal confidences of Mrs. Carlyle to two cousins. A more lovable spirit expressed itself in the Letters of Anne Thackeray Ritchie, edited by her daughter Miss Hester Ritchie, which included some forty letters from Thackeray himself.

In the category of historical works, the second volume of the *Cambridge Ancient History, edited by Professor Bury, Dr. S. A. Cook, and Mr. F. E. Adcock, took at least chronological precedence, being devoted to the Egyptian and Hittite Empires and reaching the relatively recent period of about 1000 B.C. The six Ford Lectures delivered at Oxford by the late Professor Haverfield, and revised by Dr. George Macdonald, composed The Roman Occupation of Britain. Such conclusions as that the Roman occupation had no effect on the later history of Britain, and that "the Roman has passed from Britain as though he had never been" would, however, be disputed by many readers. One region where his sojourn left emphatic traces was explored by Miss Jessie Mothersale in The Saxon Shore, and her account of Roman sites and defences, while popular in style, was the result of serious thought and study. Professor W. G. de Burgh added to the number of recent works on our debt to earlier civilisations with his The Legacy of the Ancient World, a study of the genius and influence of Israel, Greece, and Rome. In A Guide to World History (which, published late last year, was really one of this year's books), Mr. A. R. Cowan attempted to evaluate world history as a whole. Moving homeward to special episodes and institutions, we