| + + + | Outlook. 79: 906. Ap. 8, ‘05. 190w. |
“Always Mr. Smith is the artist—not a photographer.”
| + + | Pub. Opin. 38: 633. Ap. 22, ‘05. 280w. | |
| + + | Reader. 6: 120. Je. ‘05. 320w. |
“The author, who writes tersely and well, shows that he has keen powers of observation, he is also endowed with a sense of humour and a capacity for sympathy, and he can in a measure touch, as it has been said, both the springs of laughter and the source of tears.”
| + + + | Sat. R. 100: 186. Ag. 5, ‘05. 250w. |
“The problems contained in the book are not very subtle, but almost all the stories are pleasant reading.”
| + + | Spec. 95: 228. Ag. 12, ‘05. 140w. |
Smith, Francis Hopkinson. [Wood fire in no. 3.] [†]$1.50. Scribner.
F. Hopkinson Smith invites his readers to join a circle in Bohemia about a log fire “that can sparkle with merriment, or glow with humor, or roar with laughter, dependent on your mood.” The “High priest of the Temple of jollity” is Sandy MacWhirter whose “wide personal experience, his many adventures by land and sea make him the most delightful of conversationalists ... talking as a painter talks, one who sees, and therefore can make you see.” He and his group of friends draw up around the fire and swap stories, impressions and terse convictions. “Mac” on studio teas is especially convincing; “Art is a religion not a Punch and Judy show. Whole thing is vulgar. Imagine Rembrandt showing his ‘Night watch’ for the first time to the rag-tag and bob-tail of Amsterdam.... Sacrilege, I tell you, this mixing up of ice-cream and paint; makes a farce of a high calling and a mountebank of the artist.”
| * | + | Critic. 47: 579. D. ‘05. 80w. |