6–37588.
6–37588.
6–37588.
6–37588.
Descriptive note in Annual, 1906.
“The form is a rhymed four-line stanza in iambic octometer, the rhymes being in couplets. It is a jog-trot movement, and grows very monotonous after a few pages. But a great poem in the higher sense, this epic is not, and a fair sense of its historical importance is obtainable from the present version.”
“All in all, this effort seems praiseworthy; but a comparison of the average of the verse with the Lachmann text shows more than one radical departure from the sense of the original, departures that other versions seem not to have required.”
“A fine swinging translation.”
Nicholson, Frank C.Old German love songs; translated from the Minnesingers of the twelfth to the fourteenth centuries. *$1.50. Univ. of Chicago press.
A selection from Minnesong sufficiently varied and extensive to illustrate roughly the nature and range of the art, indicating the main lines of its development.
“On the whole, we have real admiration for the manner in which Mr. Nicholson has carried out his difficult task, and are confident that his book will prove a stimulus to the study of the subject.”
“Mr. Nicholson’s book is the first attempt to deal with the Minnesang as a whole, and to give to English readers specimens of the poetry of all its more conspicuous masters. For this task he is in many ways exceedingly well equipped; his work is evidently a labour of love, and he has prepared for it by a very close and intelligent study of his subject.”
Nicholson, Meredith.Port of missing men.†$1.50. Bobbs.
7–5062.
7–5062.
7–5062.
7–5062.
A stirring drama which involves the throne of Austria is here enacted among the Virginia hills just outside of Washington. The love story of the truly American heroine who, in spite of herself, follows her heart against her reason, and of the hero, heir to much Austrian greatness, who does his country service and then renounces all for the democratic life of an American, in itself holds the reader enthralled. But there are added to it many other interesting characters and some scenes of war and strategy, which will endear the book to lovers of adventure. The plot is well devised, the romance pretty, the encounters of both sword and word are clever; in all the story is a worthy successor to “House of a thousand candles.”
“This tale not only lacks the element of probability ... but it is wanting in the cleverness of ‘House of a thousand candles.’”
“Is frankly only a story of adventure builded on a shop-worn model, but very well done of its kind.” Grace Isabel Colbron.
“The story is fashioned after the conventional romantic pattern, and displays no little skill in both plot and characterization.” Wm. M. Payne.
“Something more than a mere catalog of horrors is needed to produce the thriller aimed at by this type of novelist.”
“Except for an occasional pleasing passage of scenic description, written with a poetic touch and an artistic restraint not evident in other parts of the book, and now and then a bit of clever conversational fencing, the novel offers nothing of intellectual entertainment except its exciting story.”
Nicholson, Watson.Struggle for a free stage in London. **$2.50. Houghton.
6–38899.
6–38899.
6–38899.
6–38899.
“Dr. Nicholson, who is instructor in English at Yale, traces the history of nearly two centuries in which London tried to free herself from the theatrical monopoly. The triumph was reached when the passage (on August 22, 1843) of the parliamentary act known as the Theater regulation bill deprived the two patent theaters, Drury Lane and Covent Garden, of their monopoly of playing Shakespeare and the national drama.”—R. of Rs.
“A record so satisfactory is a welcome addition to the libraries of all who are interested in the drama and its varying fortunes.”
“Evidence is scrupulously weighed, original documents are carefully collated and minutely examined, the whole thing is done with scientific precision: the artistic aspects of the matter are severely let alone.”
“This book although not likely to prove very attractive to the ordinary reader of theatrical biography or gossip, will be valuable to the genuine student of dramatic history.”
“Mr. Nicholson, who has approached his subject in a thorough and scholarly manner, has drawn his material from a multitude of sources including many old documents.”
“Mr. Nicholson has given a carefully constructed narrative.”
Nicoll, William Robertson (Claudius Clear, pseud.).Key of the blue closet. *$1.40. Dodd.
W 7–54.
W 7–54.
W 7–54.
W 7–54.
Descriptive note in Annual, 1906.
“So wholesome and enjoyable a book as this little volume of essays should find many readers.”
“It ought to be a compliment to say that this book is thoroughly sound, genial and interesting, without being in the least clever, and without any of the little tricks of paradox and epigram that appeal to our decade.”
Nicoll, William Robertson (Claudius Clear, pseud.).Lamp of sacrifice; sermons preached on special occasions. *$1.50. Armstrong.
“The keynote of Dr. Nicoll’s sermons is religious optimism.... The preacher does not reckon without the sorrows of life ... but the book, as a whole, and each chapter in particular, impresses upon the reader the convictionof the writer that they are none of them incurable, and are in some sense discounted by religious faith.”—Spec.
“The pen of a ready and vigorous writer is easily recognizable in his pages. Equally so is an intensely evangelical spirit.”
Nielsen, Fredrik Kristian.History of the papacy in the XIXth century. *$7.50. Dutton.
7–2580.
7–2580.
7–2580.
7–2580.
Descriptive note in Annual, 1906.
“The weakness of the book is to be found ... in its narrowness of treatment and in its lack of precision of detail. The book sins most of all by its lack of breadth and of historical proportion.” R. M. Johnston.
“The reader is never pulled up by the difficulty of understanding some obviously foreign construction, and is not often repelled by ugly English. The work of a learned Lutheran bishop of broad sympathies and massive erudition.”
“In all this Dr. Nielson gives evidence of wide reading and a sane historical judgment. The book is a mine of interesting matter collected from innumerable scattered memoirs, collections of documents, and other works. But though these are presented with a sufficient impartiality, little attempt is made to interpret their deeper significance. His narrative is overloaded with detail and obscured by digressions, which, however interesting in themselves, would have been better relegated to notes or appendices. Certain criticisms in detail remain to be made which may prove useful in the event of a new edition of the book.”
“Timely in the best sense of the word.”
“His two volumes make not only an interesting and careful narrative, they are also a significant and important contribution to the history of the past hundred years.” Christian Gauss.
“We have to thank the Master of Pembroke college, Cambridge for his excellent editorship of the English translation.”
“Readers who are acquainted with the language of Holberg, Hans Christian Andersen, and the Brandes of to-day, with its delightful post-articles, passive verbs, and amusing numerals, will be well satisfied with the present version of the Danish text.”
Noble, Edward.The issue: a story of the river Thames (or Fisherman’s Gat). †$1.50. Doubleday.
7–5686.
7–5686.
7–5686.
7–5686.
(2d ed. with title. Fisherman’s Gat.
7–13441.)
7–13441.)
7–13441.)
7–13441.)
“A story of the Thames estuary, a drama of London’s great river, a romance of lives of those who come and go in the lesser crafts in which deep-sea certificates are not required of a man.... Love, treachery, passion, crime, the stress and strain of dangers afloat and labour complications ashore; owners, sailors, good simple folk and smug hypocrites, evil livers and honest dealers—all figure in this story.”—Ath.
“Horror is piled upon horror a little clumsily, so that strength gives way at times to brute force, and brute force is never convincing. But the book is essentially one to read. It grips, and its grip is rough as a sailor’s grip may be.”
“A drama of real interest, strong in atmosphere, characterization, and first-hand observation.”
“A strong and unusual story.” Frederic Taber Cooper.
“He has the rare gift of verbal dry-point which fixes a picture indelibly upon both memory and imagination.”
“His drawings, which illustrate the book, give their messages better than his words. But the whole is rich, vivid, comprehensive, and like his picture of the lives and characters of his sailors, it has the sharp realization that comes of knowledge.”
“His chief character, ‘Windbag’ Saunderson, just misses being a remarkable achievement. But only a few telling artistic touches, a little more here, and a little less there, would have made it a much more striking figure and the book much more significant.”
“It needs compression and it lacks brightness, but it is ambitious in its dissection of motives and character.”
Noble, W. Arthur.Ewa; a tale of Korea.
$1.25. Meth. bk.
6–36433.
6–36433.
6–36433.
6–36433.
“Mr. Noble shows two Korean heroes with their Asiatic prejudices and beliefs crumbling away under the influence of western ideas. Both Sung-Yo, a son of rank, whose chief duty had hitherto been idleness and incapacity, and his friend, Tong-Siki, of a lower class but. greater ability, devote their lives to their country and their hopes of seeing it free.... This little story, with its love interest woven about a slave girl who becomes a convert to Christianity and suffers for her faith, may be relied on to find many eager readers.”—N. Y. Times.
“The book is fairly readable.”
Nolhac, Pierre de.Versailles and the Trianons; with 60 full-page il. in col. by Rene Binet. *$3.50. Dodd.
6–40558.
6–40558.
6–40558.
6–40558.
M. de Nolhac is the keeper of the Versailles museum and writes out of the fulness of his historical information. “He has recorded in connexion with various portions of the palace the remarkable events they have witnessed, and in the course of this volume manages to tell the whole story of the locality.” (Sat. R.) “M. de Nolhac indicates, in a large and poetic description, how much artistic stimulus the place contains and will increasingly disengage as ‘the art of Versailles’ recedes into a softened perspective.” (Nation.)
“There is ample guaranty of the historical correctness of the information he imparts. He writes also with sympathy and enthusiasm.”
“It is a pity that no credit is given to the painstaking and able translator.”
“An extremely interesting monograph, which might well be a model for this kind of book.”
*Nordau, Max Simon.On art and artists; tr. by W. F. Harvey. **$2. Jacobs.
7–28523.
7–28523.
7–28523.
7–28523.
A series of detached essays thru which may be traced the development of modern art as represented by the following painters and sculptors: Whistler, Frank Brangwyn, Rodin, Puvis de Chavannes, Mounier, Bartholomé, Carriès, Gustave Moreau, Carrière, Zorn, Zuloaga, Bouguereau. Problems of art are illustrated thruout the treatment of the classic school of David, the romantic school, the Barbizon clan, and therealists, to the recent school of symbolism and impressionism.
“There is much that is instructive, much that irritates by its bumptiousness, and not a little that seems tedious, in his book.”
“Despite its faults as a purely critical work, the book throughout has one quality which ranks it with the most valuable art criticism, and that is its author’s skill in stripping from his subjects those pretensions to literary motive, which in so many cases obscure the minds of thinking people as to the real issues in discussion of the plastic arts and the nature of the motives which alone are responsible for artistic success,”
“Mr. Nordau has not made up his mind, which seems to vary with the state of the weather, and he contradicts himself again and again. Yet there is in the book a great deal of wisdom and not a little acute criticism.”
“We may note also that Dr. Nordau has a keen nose for indecency, and finds it both where it is and where no one else perceives it. There are many bits of shrewd criticism and many remarks the soundness of which leads one, temporarily, to think of the author as of a person really equipped with some judgment and knowledge of his subject, until the next incredible caprice upsets the notion and leaves one wondering what Nordau would be at and what is the real basis of his confidently pronounced opinions. The translator is to be congratulated on his success in avoiding foreign idiom and in making his translation read like a piece of original and only too vigorous English.”
Nordau, Max Simon.Question of honor; authorized translation by Mary J. Safford. *$1. Luce, J: W.
7–18817.
7–18817.
7–18817.
7–18817.
A tragedy of present-day Germany in four acts, which deals with the strong anti-Semite feeling of the Germans by presenting the case of a young Jewish mathematician, and by showing the odds against which he fights in his efforts to win a professorship, and finally the insults to which he is subjected when he asks for the hand of the German fräulein who loves him. It is a dramatic plea for the man who is denied position, love, and even life itself because he is a Jew.
“Though the translator has done well, in a few places she might have done better. The play is excellent reading, and offers food for thought.”
“It is not at all likely that any manager here would dream of producing anything at once so undramatic and contentious. But as a study of one of the problems in European politics it is both illuminating and interesting.”
Norris, Mary Harriott.Story of Christina. $1.50. Neale.
7–21537.
7–21537.
7–21537.
7–21537.
A western girl as unconscious of her beauty as of her great wealth practices rigid economy during her four years at an Illinois college. The serenity of her wholly satisfactory life is interrupted by the co-executors of her estate, one a Chicago lawyer who wishes to marry her, the other a New York cousin who plans to take her east to be properly trained by wealthy relatives. She accepts the latter proposition, becomes plastic to the touch of a skilled social artist, is led into an engagement with an English duke, breaks it and weds the man of her old college days who had devoted his life to becoming worthy of her.
Norton, Charles Eliot.Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: a sketch of his life, together with Longfellow’s chief autobiographical poems. **75c. Houghton.
7–1293.
7–1293.
7–1293.
7–1293.
Written for the Longfellow centenary. The book “can be read through in less than two hours, and can be bought for less than a dollar; but neither of these facts should be of use in measuring the amount and duration of the impression it ought to make upon a receptive reader. The poems chosen number thirty, and include ‘A psalm of life,’ ‘The wreck of the Hesperus,’ ‘The bridge,’ ‘The cross of snow,’ and other favorites, concluding with ‘Morituri salutamus.’... Perhaps the most valuable point made by Mr. Norton is to be found in the paragraphs in which he shows how completely Longfellow was the product of a simple and refined New England, which had gently broken with the Puritan régime and was filled with an optimistic belief in the orderly evolution of men to individual and national felicity in a new and favored world. Purity, naturalness and kindness were the fundamental characteristics of Longfellow, and these were in the main, the fundamental characteristics of the people who first welcomed his self-revealing poems.” (Forum.)
“He has honored other friends in a more elaborate and impressive fashion, but none, I think, with more true sympathy and reverent poise ... than he has displayed in this brief memoir of Longfellow. The essential facts are given, the right note of praise is struck, there is no meaningless and confusing parade of literary references and allusions.” W. P. Trent.
“Mr. Norton’s centenary memorial of Longfellow is perfect in its kind.” H. W. Boynton.
“This is a most pleading little book, and worthy of its author,—an author whom we may fitly describe as one of the most cultivated men who speak and write the English language, whether on his or our own side of the Atlantic.”
Noyes, Alfred.Flower of old Japan, and other poems. **$1.25. Macmillan.
7–21391.
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Poems in which “the feet of children are set dancing.” They deal with the Kingdom of dreams in which a journey is made to old Japan. Back of the fantasy are serious lessons and vivid pictures of Japan with kaleidoscopic glimpses of pirates, mandarins, bonzes, priests, jugglers, merchants, ghastroi, etc.
“There is a proficiency in the workmanship that, coupled with Mr. Noyes’s humorous tenderness in approaching his theme, all but disarms criticism. Yet if we look at the matter in a cool objective light, it must be said that the attempt is only partially successful.” Ferris Greenslet.
“In ‘The flower of old Japan’ ... it is possible to see little but futile ingenuity in the misdirection of poetic energy.” Wm. Aspenwall Bradley.
“Mr. Noyes has the instrument, the lute, in tune, but has not met the revealing hour which shall give him a message for its strings.” Jessie B. Rittenhouse.
Noyes, Alfred.Poems: with an introd. by Hamilton Wright Mabie. **$1.25. Macmillan.
6–38994.
6–38994.
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6–38994.
The poems of an Oxford man, only twenty-sixyears of age, who is looked upon in England as destined to “be of the greatest service in the re-establishment of the great traditions of English song.” “Mr. Noyes has ‘drawn inspiration from a rather exceptional range of literature—classic poets, Celtic legends, travellers’ tales, English ballads, Holy Writ, tales of the road, and Lord Rosebery on Napoleon; but he has digested this heterogeneous beebread with the eupepsy of vigorous poetic youth.” (Nation.)
“Acquaints us with a singer whose note is both fresh and vital.” Wm. M. Payne.
“There is a gusto in his work, a savor of opulence, variety and ease that is full of hope. As yet Mr. Noyes is a little too adventurous in his quest of the striking subject, too proud of the mere muscles of his verse.”
“Mr. Noyes does not show the faults usual in a young poet. You will never be in any doubt about his meaning, but neither will you be carried out of yourself by any exaltation of words, any intensity of passion, any abandon of beauty.” Bliss Carman.
“I am sure that [the reader] will not need me to point out their spontaneous power and freshness, their imaginative vision, their lyrical magic.” Richard Le Gallienne.
“He is ... a singer and not a thinly disguised philosopher or a reformer who has possessed himself of a musical instrument. He has a voice of compass and sweetness, and his tones flow clear and sweet, with the courage of a real talent and the richness of a full nature.”
Noyes, Carleton Eldredge.Gate of appreciation: studies in the relation of art to life.**$2. Houghton.
7–15336.
7–15336.
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A personal record of the author’s “adventures with the problem of art.” He wishes “to suggest the possible meaning of art to the ordinary man, to indicate methods of approach to art, and to trace the way of appreciation.” He believes that the final meaning of art to the appreciator lies in his sense of its relation to his own experience.
“The book is not a mere summary of art history and criticism, but the outcome of original study and possesses real value.”
Nugent, Maria, lady. (Mrs. George Nugent).Lady Nugent’s journal: Jamaica one hundred years ago; ed. by Frank Cundall. *$2. Macmillan.
W 7–122.
W 7–122.
W 7–122.
W 7–122.
Lady Nugent was the wife of the Governor of Jamaica a hundred years ago and this journal was intended only for her children and friends. “A great part of the journal is devoted to things personal and domestic; hence the propriety of its private circulation when, five years after the writer’s death, it first saw the light in a modest way.... Historical, biographical, and bibliographical matter is furnished in abundance.”—Dial.
“All that editorial skill could do to render attractive her sometimes monotonous chronicling of unimportant details—for she had few others to record—has been done.”
“The intrinsic interest of what she has to tell us is not a little enhanced by the skilful and scholarly editing of Mr. Cundall.”
“This journal [contains] ... pictures of social life drawn by a close and delicate observer; shrewd comments upon the usages of a civilization quite alien to everything in the writer’s former experience; an elaborate account of the process of making sugar; amusing stories of the ups and downs of diplomatic life; suggestive sketches of character.”
“We think [Mr. Cundall] might have omitted far more than he has done. But there are a good many passages ... which are informing and of value.”
Nunez Cabeza de Vaca.Journey of Cabeza de Vaca, tr. by Fanny Bandelier. **$1. Barnes.