SUGGESTED READINGS WITH QUESTIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
Essays.—From A.C. Benson, read one of these collections of essays: The Altar Fire, Beside Still Waters, Thy Rod and Thy Staff, and one or more of these biographies: Tennyson, John Ruskin, Rossetti (E.M.L.), Walter Pater (E.M.L.); from Chesterton, one of these collections of essays: Varied Types, Heretics, Orthodoxy, and one or more of these biographies: George Bernard Shaw, Charles Dickens, Robert Browning (E.M.L.). For other twentieth-century essays, see the preceding bibliography and the paragraph following this.
The Novel.—From Conrad, read Youth, Typhoon, Lord Jim; from
Bennett, The Old Wives' Tale, Clayhanger; from Galsworthy, The Man
of Property, The Patrician; from Wells, The Time Machine,
Kipps, The Future in America (essay); from Phillpotts, Children of
the Mist, Demeter's Daughter; from Hewlett, Life and Death of
Richard Yea and Nay, The Stooping Lady; from Quiller-Couch, The
Splendid Spur, The Delectable Duchy; from De Morgan, Joseph Vance,
Somehow Good; from Locke, The Beloved Vagabond, The Adventures of
Aristide Pujol; from Zangwill, The Children of the Ghetto, The
Melting Pot (play).
Poetry.—From The Poetical Works of William B. Yeats (Macmillan), read The Wanderings of Oisin, The Lake Isle of Innisfree, The Hosting of the Sidhe, The Voice of the Waters; from Fiona Macleod's Poems and Dramas (Duffield), The Vision, The Lonely Hunter, The Rose of Flame; from Masefield, the part of Dauber describing the rounding of Cape Horn, beginning p. 119, in The Story of a Round-House (Macmillan); from Gibson's Fires (Macmillan), The Crane, The Machine; from Noyes's Poems (Macmillan, 1906), The Song of Re-Birth, The Barrel Organ, Forty Singing Seamen, The Highwayman; Book II from his Drake: An English Epic (Stokes).
The Drama.—From Jones, read The Manoeuvers of Jane, Mrs. Dane's
Defence (Samuel French); from Pinero, The Amazons, The School
Mistress, or Sweet Lavender (W.H. Baker); from Shaw's Plays
Pleasant and Unpleasant (Brentano), Candida, You Never Can Tell,
Arms and the Man from Barrie, Peter Pan, What Every Woman Knows;
from Galsworthy, Strife, Joy, The Little Dream; from Phillips,
Marpessa (poem), Ulysses (Macmillan), Herod; from Lady
Gregory's, Seven Short Plays (Putnam), The Gaol Gate, Spreading the
News; from her New Comedies (Putnam, 1913), McDonough's Wife, The
Bogie Men; from Yeats's Poetical Works, Vol. II. (Macmillan), The
Land of Heart's Desire, Countess Cathleen; from Synge, Riders to the
Sea, The Playboy of the Western World, Deirdre of the Sorrows (John
W. Luce).
Questions and Suggestions.—Stevenson's The Home Book of Verse and The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse contain selections from a number of the poets. McCarthy's Irish Literature, 10 vols., gives selections from work written prior to 1904. The majority of the indicated readings can be found only in the original works of the authors.
Give an outline of the most important thoughts from one essay and one biography, by both Benson and Chesterton.
What distinctive subject matter do you find in each of the novelists?
How do same reflect the spirit of the age?
What are the chief characteristics of each of the poets? What does the phrase "Celtic Renaissance" signify?
In brief, what had the drama accomplished from the time of the closing of the theaters in 1642 to 1890? What distinctive contributions to the modern drama have Pinero, Shaw, and Barrie made? Describe the work of Lady Gregory, Yeats, and Synge. In what does Synge's special power consist?