Studies and Reviews
Alice French (“Octave Thanet”)—novelist.
Born at Andover, Massachusetts, and educated at Abbott Academy there; Litt. D., University of Iowa, 1911.
Upon going to live in the Middle West, Miss French became interested in the local color of Iowa and Arkansas and in the labor conditions with which she came in contact as a member of a family of manufacturers. The sociological and propagandist elements are strong in her work.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Robert Lee Frost—poet.
Born at San Francisco, 1875. At the age of ten, he was taken to New England where eight generations of his forefathers had lived. In 1892, he spent a few months at Dartmouth College but disliking college routine, decided to earn his living, and became a millhand in Lawrence, Massachusetts. In 1897, two years after he had married, he entered Harvard and studied there for two years; but he finally gave up the idea of a degree and turned to various kinds of work, teaching, shoe-making, and newspaper work. From 1900-11, he was farming at Derry, New Hampshire, but with little success. At the same time, he was writing and offering for publication poems which were invariably refused. He likewise taught English at Derry, 1906-11, and psychology at Plymouth, 1911-2.
In 1912, he sold his farm and with his wife and four children went to England. He offered a collection of poems to an English publisher and went to live in the little country town of Beaconsfield. The poems were published and their merits were quickly recognized. In 1914, Mr. Frost rented a small place at Ledbury, Gloucestershire, near the English poets, Lascelles Abercrombie, and W. W. Gibson. With the publication ofNorth of Bostonhis reputation as a poet was established.
In 1915, Mr. Frost returned to America and went to live near Franconia, New Hampshire. From 1916 to 1919 he taught English at Amherst College. But he found that college life was disturbing to his creative energy, and in1920 he bought land in Vermont and again became a farmer. In 1921, the University of Michigan, in recognition of his talents, offered him a salary to live in Ann Arbor without teaching. This position he accepted, but it is reported that he intends to return to farming to secure the leisure necessary for his work.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Make a list of subjects that you have not found treated elsewhere in poetry. Test the truth of the treatment by your own experience and decide whether Mr. Frost has converted these commonplace experiences into a new field of poetry.
2. Read in succession the poems concerning New England life and decide whether they seem more authentic and more valuable than the others. If so, why?
3. Is Mr. Frost’s realism photographic? Consider in this connection his own statement: “There are two types of realist—the one who offers a good deal of dirt with his potato to show that it is a real one; and the one who is satisfied with the potato brushed clean.... To me the thing that art does for life is to strip it to form.”
In view of the last sentence it is interesting to consider the kinds of details that Mr. Frost chooses for presentation and those that he omits.
4. Read several of the long poems to discover his relative strength in narrative and in dramatic presentation.
5. Examine the vocabulary for naturalness, colloquialism, and extraordinary occasional fitness of words.
6. Try to sum up briefly Mr. Frost’s philosophy of life and his attitude toward nature and people.
7. What do you observe about the metrical forms, the beauty or lack of beauty in the rhythm? Do many of the poems sing?
8. What do you prophesy as to Mr. Frost’s future?
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Henry Blake Fuller—novelist, short-story writer.
Born in Chicago, 1857. Educated in Chicago public schools, graded and high; and at a “classical academy” in Wisconsin. In Europe, ’79-’80, ’83, ’92, ’94, ’96-7. Literary editorChicago Post, 1902. EditorialsChicago Record Herald, 1910-11 and 1914; at present,Literary Reviewof theNew York Evening Post, for theFreeman,New Republic,Nation, etc.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Compare Mr. Fuller’s stories of Europe with his studies of life in Chicago. What is their relative success? What inferences do you draw?
2. Considering dates, materials, and methods, where do you place Mr. Fuller’s work in the development of the American novel?
3. Before readingOn the Stairs, cf.Dial, 64 (’18): 405.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Zona Gale—novelist, short-story writer, dramatist.
Born at Portage, Wisconsin, 1874. B. L., University of Wisconsin, 1895; M. L., 1899. On Milwaukee papers until 1901. Later on staff of theNew York World.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Hamlin Garland—short-story writer, novelist.
Born on a farm near West Salem, Wisconsin, 1860, of Scotch and New England ancestry. During his boyhood, his father moved first to Iowa, then to Dakota. As a boy, Mr. Garland helped his father with all the hard work of making farmland out of prairie. While still in his teens, he was able to do a man’s work. His schooling was desultory, but he finished the course at Cedar Valley Seminary, Osage, Iowa, then taught, 1882-3. In 1883 he took up a claim in Dakota, but the next year went to Boston and began his career as teacher and writer.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Read the autobiographical books,A Son of the Middle BorderandA Daughter of the Middle Border, to get the background of Mr. Garland’s work. Then read his essays calledCrumbling Idols, for the literary theory on which his work was created.
2. Two literary landmarks in Mr. Garland’s history are: Edward Eggleston’sThe Hoosier Schoolmaster(1871), and Joseph Kirkland’sZury: the Meanest Man in Spring County(1887). Read these and decide how much they influencedMain-Traveled Roadsand similar volumes of Mr. Garland’s.
3. Mr. Garland says that he presents farm life “not as the summer boarder or the young lady novelist sees it—but as the working farmer endures it.” Find evidence of this.
4. Consider how far Mr. Garland’s success depends upon the richness of his material, how far upon his philosophy of life and his honesty to his own experience, and how far upon his technical skill as a writer.
5. What are his most obvious limitations? What is the relative importance of his novels and of his short stories?
6. Consider separately: (1) his power of visualization; (2) his choice of significant detail; (3) his originality or lack of it; (4) his range in characterization; (5) his power of suggestion as over against his vividness of delineation; (6) his economy—or lack of it—in expression. Where does his main strength lie?
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Katharine Fullerton Gerould (Mrs. Gordon Hall Gerould)—short-story writer, novelist, essayist.
Born at Brockton, Massachusetts, 1879. A. B., Radcliffe College, 1900; A. M., 1901. Reader in English at Bryn Mawr College, 1901-10, except 1908-9 which she spent in England and France.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Mrs. Gerould belongs to the school of Henry James, but shows marked individuality in her themes and in her dramatic power. A comparison of some of her short stories with stories by Mr. James (q. v.) and by Mrs. Wharton (q. v.) is illuminating for the powers and limitations of all three.
2. Another interesting comparison is between Mrs. Gerould’s stories and the collection entitledBlissby the English writer, Katherine Mansfield (Mrs. J. Middleton Murry); cf. Manly and Rickert,Contemporary British Literature.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Fannie Stearns Davis Gifford (Mrs. Augustus McKinstry Gifford)—poet.
Born at Cleveland, Ohio, 1884. A. B., Smith College, 1904. Taught English at Kemper Hall, Kenosha, Wisconsin, 1906-7.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Arturo Giovannitti—poet.
Born in the Abruzzi, Italy, 1884, of a family of good social standing, his father and one of his brothers being doctors, and another brother a lawyer. Educated in a local Italian college. Came to America in 1900, full of enthusiasm for democracy. Worked in a coal mine. Later, studied at Union Theological Seminary. Conducted Presbyterian missions in several places.
In 1906, he became a socialist and one of the leaders of the I. W. W. During the Lawrence strikes he preached the doctrine of Syndicalism and was arrested on the charge of inciting to riot. He also organized relief work for the strikers.
On an Italian newspaper; editor ofIl Proletario, a socialist paper. His first speech in English was made at the time of his trial and produced a powerful effect upon his audience. During his imprisonment, he studied English literature and wrote poems, of which the most famous is “The Walker.” His chief concern is with the submerged, and he writes from actual experience of having been “one of those who sleep in the park.”
Suggestions for Reading
1. What are the main features of the social creed at the root of Giovannitti’s poetry?
2. Is he a poet or a propagandist? Test his sincerity; his passion; his truth to experience.
3. What are his limitations as thinker and as poet?
4. Compare and contrast his work with Whitman’s in ideas and in form.
5. Do you find marks of greatness in him?
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Ellen (Anderson Gholson) Glasgow—novelist.
Born at Richmond, Virginia, 1874. Privately educated. Her best work deals with life in Virginia.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Susan Glaspell (Mrs. George Cram Cook)—dramatist, novelist.
Born at Davenport, Iowa, 1882. Ph. B., Drake University and post-graduate work at the University of Chicago. Statehouse and legislative reporter for theNewsand theCapitol, Des Moines. Connected with the Little Theatre movement through the Provincetown Players.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Montague (Marsden) Glass(England, 1877)—short-story writer. The creator of Potash and Perlmutter.
For bibliography, seeWho’s Who in America.
Kenneth Sawyer Goodman—dramatist.
Born in 1883. Lieutenant in the Navy, chief aide at Great Lakes Naval Station. Coöperated with B. Iden Payne at Fine Arts Theatre, 1913. Died in 1918.
Bibliography
Robert Grant—novelist.
Born at Boston, 1852. A. B., Harvard, 1873; Ph. D., 1876; LL. B., 1879. Judge since 1893. Overseer of Harvard, 1895—.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
“Grayson, David.”SeeRay Stannard Baker.
Zane Grey(Ohio, 1875)—novelist.
Writes of the West, from Idaho to Texas. For bibliography, seeWho’s Who in America.
Arthur Guiterman—poet.
Born of American parents in Vienna, Austria, 1871. B. A., College of the City of New York, 1891. Editorial work on theWoman’s Home Companion,Literary Digest, and other magazines, 1891-1906. Lecturer on magazine and newspaper verse, New York School of Journalism, 1912-15.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Francis (O’Byrne) Hackett—critic.
Born in Kilkenny, Ireland, 1883. Son of a physician. Educated at Clongowes Wood College, Kildare. Came to America in 1900. Began as office boy and gradually worked his way up as critic and editorial writer. Connected with theChicago Evening Post, 1906-11. Associate editor of theNew Republic, 1914-22.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Hermann Hagedorn, Jr.—man of letters.
Born in New York City, 1882. A. B., Harvard, 1907. Studied at University of Berlin, 1907-8, and at Columbia, 1908-9. Instructor in English at Harvard, 1909-11.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Clayton (Meeker) Hamilton—critic, dramatist.
Born at Brooklyn, New York, 1881. A. B., Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, 1900; A. M., Columbia, 1901. Teacher of English and lecturer in various schools and colleges, 1901-17. Dramatic critic and associate editor of theForum, 1907-09. Dramatic editor ofThe Bookman, 1910-18, and of other magazines. Has traveled widely.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Arthur Sherburne Hardy—novelist.
Born at Andover, Massachusetts, 1847. Graduate of U. S. Military Academy, 1869. Honorary higher degrees. Studied and taught civil engineering, 1874-78, and mathematics, 1878-93, at Dartmouth. Represented the United States in Persia and in various countries of Europe as minister, 1897-1905.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Frank Harris—man of letters.
Born in Galway, Ireland, 1854, but came to the United States in 1870. Naturalized. Educated at the universities of Kansas, Paris, Heidelberg, Strassburg, Göttingen, Berlin, Vienna, and Athens (no degrees). Admitted to the Kansas bar, 1875. Later, returned to Europe and became editor of theEvening NewsandFortnightly Reviewand secured control of theSaturday Review.
Mr. Harris’s work belongs in a class by itself. It is valuable partly for its content, as in the case of his intimate portraits of famous men whom he has known, and partly for the force and brilliancy of the style.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Henry Sydnor Harrison—novelist.
Born at Sewanee, Tennessee, 1880. A. B., Columbia, 1900; A. M., 1913.
Suggestions for Reading
Read the article by Robert Herrick listed below, and compare Harrison’s work with that of Dickens, Sterne, and Meredith. Deal with each novelist separately according to the influences noted by Mr. Herrick.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Ben Hecht—novelist, dramatist.
Born in New York City, 1893. Traveled much until he was eight years old, then lived in Racine, Wisconsin, and was educated in the Racine high school. Went to Chicago, intending to join the Thomas Orchestra as violinist, but instead, joined the staff of the ChicagoJournaland later that of theDaily News. War correspondent in Germany.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Joseph Hergesheimer—novelist.
Born at Philadelphia, 1880. Educated for a short time at a Quaker school in Philadelphia and at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Note Mr. Hergesheimer’s use of setting and atmosphere. What is the relative importance of these to plot and character? Is the author’s main interest in developing a story, in creating characters that live, or in suggesting particular phases of life, each with its own physical and emotional atmosphere?
2. What evidences of originality do you find in his books?
3. Is the author a realist or a romanticist? Is it true, as has been said, that he stands midway between the “unrelieved realism” of the new school of writers and the “genteel moralism” of the old?
4. Consider these two criticisms of Mr. Hergesheimer’s work: (1) He aims to set down “relative truth ... the colors and scents and emotions of existence”; and (2) he is at times as much concerned “with the stuffs as with the stuff of life.”
5. Make a special study of his style: (1) of his use of suggestion; (2) of his choice of words; (3) of his feeling for rhythm. It is true that there is both art and artifice in his methods?
6. In what ways, if any, has he made actual contribution to American literature? Can you prophesy as to his future?
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Robert Herrick—novelist.
Born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1868. A. B., Harvard, 1890. Taught English at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1890-3, and at the University of Chicago since then, becoming professor, 1905. More important for interpretation of his work is the fact that he has carefully studied modern English and Continental literatures and is deeply interested in philosophy and the social sciences.
Suggestions for Reading
1. Much of Mr. Herrick’s work must be regarded as primarily social criticism of American life. Does the interest tend to centre rather upon the problems of the characters, growing out of their circumstances, or upon the characters themselves?
2. Is Mr. Herrick’s work more notable for scope and breadth or for intensity?
3. Note, especially in the novels previous to 1905, the conscientious artistry, the compactness of structure, and the unity of tone commonly associated with poetry. What other qualities characteristic of poetry appear in Mr. Herrick’s work?
4. With the structure of his earlier work compare that of theMemoirs of an American Citizenas showing an attempt at greater breadth of canvas and greater variety of tone. Trace this attempt further in his later work.
5. What evidences do you find in Mr. Herrick’s novels of a carefully wrought theory of the art of the novelist?
6. Someone has called Mr. Herrick “a discouraged idealist.” Is this just?
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
Robert Cortes Holliday (“Murray Hill”)—essayist, critic.
Born at Indianapolis, 1880. Studied at the Art Students’ League, New York, 1899-1902, and at the University of; Kansas, 1903-4. Illustrator for magazines, 1904-5. Bookseller with Scribner’s, 1906-11. Librarian, 1912-3. Held various editorial positions with New York publishers, 1913-8. Associate editor ofThe Bookman, 1918, and editor, 1919—.
Bibliography
Studies and Reviews
William Dean Howells—novelist, dramatist, critic, poet.
Born at Martins Ferry, Ohio, 1837. Of Welsh, English, Pennsylvania Dutch, and Irish ancestry. His father was a country editor, and Mr. Howells, living as he did under pioneer conditions, had very little formal education, but educated himself in working on newspapers as printer, correspondent, and editor. He read continually in boyhood, and taught himself to read six languages. As the result of a campaign life of Lincoln, he was appointed U. S. consul at Venice and lived there, 1861-5. After a year on the staff of theNation, he became assistant editor of theAtlantic Monthly, 1866-72, and editor, 1872-81. Later, he became an editorial writer forHarper’s Magazine, 1886-91, and finally writer of the “Editor’s Easy Chair,” for the same magazine.
Although Mr. Howells did not go to college, he received many honorary higher degrees, and was offered professorships by three Universities (including that which had been held by Longfellow and Lowell at Harvard); but he refused these, not considering himself fitted for such work. In his editorial capacity he gave much advice and help to authors who afterward became famous. He died in 1920.
Suggestions for Reading
1. For just appraisement of Mr. Howells, it is necessary to be familiar with the facts of his life, and with his theories of fiction. For his life the two autobiographical booksYears of My YouthandMy Literary Passionsare most valuable. After reading these, it is possible to see the large use of autobiographical material in the novels.
2. It is interesting to group the books of Howells according to the sources of the material: (1) those growing out of his early life in Ohio; (2) those growing out of his life abroad;(3) those growing out of his life in Boston and New York. This last class might well be subdivided into those written before he came under the influence of Tolstoi and those written after. The turning-point is inA Hazard of New Fortunes. Does Mr. Howells’s interest in sociological problems add to or lessen the final value of his work?
3. The realism of Howells set a standard for American literature, the effect of which has not yet passed. Study his theories of fiction (Criticism and Fiction, andLiterature and Life) and consider the good and bad effects of his work upon the development of the novel.
4. Use the following quotation from Van Wyck Brooks, on Howells’s “panoramic theory” of the novel as a test of his work: