The Eighteen Nineties. A Review of Art and Ideas at the Close of the Nineteenth Century. By Holbrook Jackson. (Published by Alfred A. Knopf, 1922. $5.00.)
This fine volume, whose thrillingly beautiful format is alone enough to recommend it to any collector of unique books, is a reprint, with a few addenda, of a work of the same name issued in 1913. It is to be doubted whether the former copy could have been as effective as the present one which, with its clear, round type, and profuse illustrations, and magenta and purple covers, make up a volume that no true book-lover can afford not to own.
Mr. Jackson, intimately connected with British periodicals of note since 1897, the author himself of such noteworthy pieces as “The Eternal Now” and “Romance and Reality”, is admirably qualified to write on “The Eighteen Nineties”, a creative period in English literature, which for the quality as well as the quantity of its output, is second only to the Elizabethan era. He knew intimately the men about whom he writes, and whose work he appraises. In the admirable introduction he sets forth his aim as “interpretative rather than critical ... to interpret the various movements of the period not only in relation to one another, but in relation to their foreign influences and the main trend of our national art and life.” The following passage exemplifies as well as any the illuminating quality of mind that makes all Mr. Jackson’s comments valuable: “Anybody who studies the moods and thoughts of the Eighteen Nineties cannot fail to observe their central characteristic is a widespread concern for the correct—that is the most righteous, the most effective, the most powerful mode of living. For myself, however, the awakening of the nineties does not appear to be the realization of a purpose, but the realization of a possibility.”
The book deals in twenty-one chapters with every important phase of art and life that came into the crowded hour of the last decade of the last century. To the present reviewer, at least, the most substantial and most unusual interpretations are those in the cases of Francis Thomson, Rudyard Kipling, and George Bernard Shaw. “Consciously or unconsciously,” the author says, “men were experimenting with life, and it would seem also as if life were experimenting with men. It was a revolution precipitated by the Time Spirit. Francis Thomson represented the revolt against the world. He did not, as so many had done, defy the world; he denied it, and by placing his condition beneath contempt, he conquered it.” Of Shaw he says, “he strove to add to the heritage of the race a keener sense of reality.... To look at life until you see it clearly is Bernard Shaw’s announced aim.... His sense of reality does not take reason for its basis. The basis of the new realism is the will.”
The predominating trends of the decade are summed up under the discussion called “Fin de Siecle” under the three headings, “The So-called Decadence; the introduction of a Sense of Fact into life literature and art; and the development of a Transcendental View of Social Life”.
Each chapter, with its astounding collection of facts, never pedantically, often brilliantly, and always intelligently presented, are brightened by comment that is often epigrammatical: “Wilde was the playboy of the Nineties.” “Aubrey Beardsley’s art would have been untrue had it been imitable or universal.” “The decade began with a dash for life and ended with a retreat—but not a defeat.” Speaking of Shaw’s wit, the author says, “It was the sharp edge of the sword of purpose.... Although the majority of those who go to his plays go to laugh and remain to laugh (often beyond reason), many remain to laugh and pray.” It is a sane book, carefully written, and clamors to be read—and read again.
F. D. T.
Editor’s Table
The Egoist was engaged to, or at least with a Silent Woman, so of course he knows nothing about it. And anyway, according to Ahasuerus, he had resigned. So that’s that.