To the heroines who are most truly women the author's loyalty is pure and intense. Imogen, the "chaste, ardent, devoted, beautiful" wife,—Juliet, whose "ingenuousness and almost infantile simplicity" endear her to all hearts,—Miranda, that most ethereal creation, type of virgin innocence,—Cordelia, with her pure, filial devotion,—are painted with loving, sympathetic tenderness.
Altogether, this is a book which any admirer of the poet may read with pleasure; and especially to those who have not ventured to think wholly for themselves it will prove a most useful and agreeable companion.
It is a matter of regret that the characters of the greatest of dramatists should not have been embodied by the greatest of painters. But no Michel Angelo, or Raphael, or Correggio, has illustrated these wonderful creations; and the man who is capable of appreciating Miranda, or Ophelia, or Desdemona, finds the ideal heads of the painters, of our day at least, tame, vapid, and unsatisfactory. The heroine, as imaged in his mind, is arrayed in a loveliness which limner never compassed. We cannot promise our readers that the engravings in this beautifully printed and richly bound volume will prove to be exceptions to the usual rule. They are from designs by English artists,—"Eminent Hands," in the popular phrase; the faces are often quite striking and expressive, and, up to a certain point, characteristic; moreover, they are smoothly finished, and will compare favorably with those in fashionable gift-books. Without being in the least degree examples of a high style of Art in its absolute sense, they answer well the purpose for which they were designed. Indeed, if they were more truly ideal, and, at the same time, more truly human, they would doubtless be far less popular.
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Ernest Carroll, or Artist-Life in Italy. A Novel, in Three Parts. Boston; Ticknor & Fields. 1858.
This book is not strictly of the kind which the Germans call the Art-Novel, and yet we know not how else to class it. The author has spun a somewhat improbable story as the thread for his reflections on Art and his reminiscences of artists and travel. We confess that we should have liked it better, had he made his book simply a record of experience and reflection. But there are many admirable things in this little volume, which is evidently the work of a person of refined artistic culture and clear intelligence. Of especial value we reckon the reminiscences of Allston and his methods; and it seems a little singular, since the scene is laid chiefly in Florence and in 1847, that we get nothing more satisfactory than a single anecdote about the elder Greenough, whose life and works and thoroughly emancipated style of thought have done more to honor American Art than those of any other man, except Allston.
We rather regret that the author had not made his book more of a journal, and recorded directly his own impressions, because he shows a decided ability in bringing scenes before the eye of the reader. The sketches of Doney's Caffè and the Venetian improvvisatore are especially vivid; so is that of the old picture-dealer; though in all we think some of the phrases might have been softened with advantage. We enter our earnest protest also against the Ruskin chapter. The scenes at Graefenberg are fresh, lively, and interesting. The book is also enlivened by many entertaining anecdotes of living American artists and savans, which are told with the skill of a practised raconteur. We hope to hear from the author again, and in a form which shall enable his knowledge and experience in matters of Art to have freer play than the exigencies of a novel allow them, and in which his abilities in the discussion of aesthetics shall have more scope given them than that of the obiter dicta in a story.
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Hymns of the Ages. Being Selections from the Lyra Catholica, Apostolica, Germanica, and other Sources, with an Introduction by PROF. F.D. HUNTINGTON. Boston: Phillips, Sampson, & Co. 1859. Square 8vo. pp. 300.
In this exquisitely-printed volume the editors have collected specimens of the devotional poetry of the Christian Church, including translations from the Roman Breviary, as well as from German hymns, with a few from English sources. There has been no attempt, evidently, to conform to the requirements of any creed; the devout Catholic, as well as the Episcopalian Churchman, will find here the favorite aspirations, penitential strains, and ascriptions of praise, which have been consecrated by generations of worshippers. To American readers the collection will be substantially new, since hardly a dozen of the hymns are to be found in the volumes in use in our churches. If it had been the purpose of the editors to gather all the classic religious poetry, to form a sacred anthology, it would have been necessary to print a great number of the hymns in modern collections; and the volume would in that case have lost in novelty what it gained in completeness.