| + | Reader. 6: 477. S. ‘05. 170w. |
Catherine of Siena, St., tr. by Vida D. Scudder. [*]$2.50. Dutton.
Selections from the letters of Catherine for long counted among Italian classics. “Mystics are not good letter writers, for mystics are bound to be without humor, and Catherine’s are all religious letters, full of obscure and jarring medieval imagery. But they are human documents. She only learned to write by miracle three years before her death, and until then she employed young aristocrats as secretaries. Her correspondence was wonderfully varied. ‘She wrote to prisoners and outcasts; to great nobles and plain business men; to physicians, lawyers, soldiers of fortune; to kings and queens, and cardinals and popes; to recluses ... and to men and women of the world.’” (Lond. Times.)
“Excellent, too, are the small forewords to the various letters, giving vivid glimpses of the young saint’s various correspondents, and incidentally of the composite society of that time.”
| + + | Acad. 68: 681. Jl. 1, ‘05. 1880w. |
“For once we are in the pleasant position of finding nothing to blame; and this because the editor has not only done what was needful, but also (a rarer thing in editors) refrained from doing what was unneedful.”
| + + + | Ath. 1905, 2: 430. S. 30. 1390w. |
“Miss Scudder’s translation is finely made; and, in the passages we have compared with the original, is perfectly faithful. A more readable version could hardly have been attempted.”
| + + + | Cath. World. 82: 112. O. ‘05. 1430w. | |
| + + | Dial. 39: 278. N. 1, ‘05. 360w. |
“Miss Scudder has done her task admirably both as translator and as editor.”