+ − N Y Evening Post p18 D 4 ’20 170w
“A clever account is given of how he spoils his life by his experiment in evading the chains of matrimony. The end of the book is not quite so convincing.”
+ − Spec 125:439 O 2 ’20 40w
“Technically ‘The great leviathan’ is interesting as showing what Mr Wells’s technique may become in unskilful hands. But the book, though a failure, is an interesting failure. Mr Barker could not have written it without learning a good deal of the difficulties of novelwriting. He has things to say. His next book will probably be worth reading.”
− + The Times [London] Lit Sup p367 Je 10 ’20 560w
BARKER, MRS HELEN GRANVILLE (HELEN MANCHESTER HUNTINGTON). Songs in cities and gardens. *$1.25 Putnam 821
19–19881
The princess’s garden, The narrow glass, To snow, The garden on the hill, The wayfarer, The playmate, Lost gardens, On the river, Songs of the rain and the wind, are some of the titles from part 1 of this collection of poems. Part 2, containing the Songs in cities, is devoted to such themes as: The house; The portrait; Night, and the curtains drawn; Beyond knowledge; Old age; Twilight; To fire; The city; Harvest of dreams. A note says that some of the verses have been printed in earlier books by the author, now out of print.
“Mrs Granville Barker’s great technical accomplishment is the source both of her triumphs and of her failures. Sometimes she is simply exercising her ingenuity in the void, creating bubble-shapes of a tenuous and fleeting prettiness. But at other times, when she has good material on which to employ her skill, she produces finished and distinguished work.”