| + | N. Y. Times. 10: 783. N. 18, ‘05. 400w. |
[*] “It has passages which may be distasteful to some readers.”
| + — | Outlook. 81: 684. N. 18, ‘05. 50w. |
Watson, Thomas Edward. Bethany: a story of the old South. $1.50. Appleton.
Bethany, a village in middle Georgia, is the scene of a novel which describes southern life during the period immediately preceding and during the earlier years of the Civil war. The author is a well-known writer of both biography and history and his present work is almost an autobiography, for he tells of the old South as he knew it in his boyhood. The greater part of the book is taken up with the comparison of Toombs and Stephens, their characters and the issues for which they stood. The slavery question is discussed freely, but while showing a burning loyalty to the South, there is no bitterness toward the North.
“A novel of a rambling sort, although the element of truth is much larger than the element of invention. The fire-eating southerner has not often been exhibited, in either history or fiction, more truthfully and vividly than in the present work. We fear that Mr. Watson is still sadly in need of reconstruction.” W. M. Payne.
| + — | Dial. 38: 127. F. 16, ‘05. 480w. |
“Is scarcely a novel at all. It is history localized and presented from the deliberately provincial point of view. Is probably more nearly veracious than any picture of southern life ever given by a southern author. It is a brilliant interpretation, based upon impressions received with the vividness of adoring youth, and written out with the restraint and judgment of a mature mind. Mr. Watson’s literary style is not always good, is often too insolently local in phrasing, but it is always graphic and honest.”
| + — | Ind. 58: 209. Ja. 26, ‘05. 600w. |
Watson, William. [Poems]; ed. by J. A. Spender. 2v. [*]$2.50. Lane.