Music, poetry and the plastic arts furnish the field in which Mr. Huneker lets his imagination soar. There are twenty stories in the group in which “he is merely diverting himself with his pen, letting his fancy do what it will with human beings—improvising, as it were.” (Pub. Opin.)
“The author’s style is sometimes grotesque in its desire both to startle and to find true expression. In nearly every story the reader is arrested by the idea, and only a little troubled now and then by an over-elaborate style.”
+ – Acad. 70: 116. F. 3, ’06. 700w.
“With all this straining after the repellent and lawless, the tales for the most part miss their designed effect. They are cleverly executed, with no insignificant portion of imagination; yet with two or three exceptions they fail to be uncanny.”
+ – Ath. 1906, 1: 228. F. 24. 870w.
“These are pictures, thoughtful, intricate pictures, with a tinge of morbid mysticism, better to be enjoyed by reading one, at intervals, than devoured wholesale at a sitting.” Mary Moss.
+ Atlan. 97: 47. Ja. ’06. 150w.
“With every limitation of Mr. Huneker’s creative faculty recognised and even exaggerated, the conviction remains that his is an artistic individuality of rare potency and of welcome value to American letters.” Edward Clark Marsh.
+ + – Bookm. 22: 360. D. ’05. 1090w.