+ + + Lond. Times. 5: 137. Ap. 20, ’06. 2000w. (Review of v. 1–22.) N. Y. Times. 10: 709. O. 21, ’05. 480w. (Review of v. 8.) N. Y. Times. 11: 235. Ap. 7, ’06. 820w. (Review of v. 20.)
Russell, George William Erskine. Social silhouettes. **$3. Dutton.
“An essay in ‘character’ writing, the author passing in review most of the types that a clubman and Londoner meets with in the narrow confines of his life—the eldest son, the journalist, the Bishop, the don, the carpet-bagger, the invalid, the buck, and so forth.” (Lond. Times.) “They catch those fleeting aspects of things which, once let slip, are recovered with the utmost difficulty; and they establish suggestive standards of comparison between the present and a comparatively recent past. Mr. Russell knows Dickens, Thackeray, and Disraeli by heart, nor has he neglected that most faithful of writers Anthony Trollope.” (Ath.)
“‘Social silhouettes,’ it is not unfair to remark, are a little lacking in balance. Still, without attaining omniscience, Mr. Russell has succeeded in hitting off the polite and professional world in nearly every instance, and his stories are so cleverly handled that he avoids wounding the feelings even of the most susceptible.”
+ – Ath. 1906, 2: 440. O. 13. 800w.
“We lay the book aside with the conviction that Mr. Russell has not observed enough, has not lived enough, for this kind of work. He has met many men and heard many stories, but he lacks alike the seeing eye and the searching phrase. Also the sense of the moment for he seems to have stood still for many years.”
– Lond. Times. 5: 370. N. 2, ’06. 500w.
“The political portraits are drawn with a peculiarly expert hand.”
+ Nation. 83: 509. D. 13, ’06. 330w.