The Best Short Stories of 1920 Part 77

The stories have no plot, no climax, no direct characterization, and at first sight no plan. Presently it appears that the author's apparent episodic treatment of his substance has a special unity of its own woven around the spiritual relations of his heroes. It is hard to judge of an author's style in translation, but the brilliant coloring of his pictures is apparent from this English version. The nearest a.n.a.logue in English are the fantasies of Norman Douglas, but Perez de Ayala has a much more profoundly realized philosophy of life. The poems which serve as interludes in these stories, curiously enough, add to the unity of the action.

#The Last Lion, and Other Tales#, by _Vicente Blasco Ibanez_, with an Introduction by _Mariano Joaquin Lorente_ (The Four Seas Company). The present vogue of Senor Blasco Ibanez is more sentimental than justified, but in "Luxury" he has written an admirable story, and the other five stories have a certain distinction of coloring.

#The Bishop, and Other Stories#, and #The Chorus Girl, and Other Stories#, by _Anton Chekhov_; translated from the Russian by _Constance Garnett_ (The Macmillan Company). I have called attention to previous volumes in this edition of Chekhov from time to time. These two new additions to the series carry the English version of the complete tales two-thirds of the way toward completion. Chekhov is one of the three short story writers of the world indispensable to every fellow craftsman, and these nineteen stories are drawn for the most part from the later and more mature period of his work.

#The Surprises of Life#, by _Georges Clemenceau_; translated by _Grace Hall_ (Doubleday, Page & Company). Although this volume shows a gift of crisp narrative and sharply etched portraiture, it is chiefly important as a revelation of M. Clemenceau's state of mind. Had it been called to the attention of Mr. Wilson before he went to Paris, the course of international diplomacy might have been rather different. These twenty-five stories and sketches one and all reveal a sneering scepticism about human nature and an utter denial of moral values. From a technical point of view, "The Adventure of My Cure" is a successful story.

#Tales of My Native Town#, by _Gabriele D'Annunzio_; translated by _G.

Mantellini_, with an Introduction by _Joseph Hergesheimer_ (Doubleday, Page & Company). This anthology drawn from various volumes of Signor D'Annunzio's stories gives the American a fair bird's-eye view of the various aspects of his work. These twelve portraits by the Turner of corruption have a severe logic of their own which may pa.s.s for being cla.s.sical. As diploma pieces they are incomparable, but as renderings of life they carry no sense of conviction. Mr. Hergesheimer's introduction is a more or less unsuccessful special plea. While it is perfectly true that the author has achieved what he set out to do, these stories already seem old-fas.h.i.+oned, and as years go on will be read, if at all, for their landscapes only.

#Military Servitude and Grandeur#, by _Alfred de Vigny_; translated by _Frances Wilson Huard_ (George H. Doran Company). It is curious that this volume should have waited so long for a translator. Alfred de Vigny was an early nineteenth century forerunner of Barbusse and Duhamel, and this record of the Napoleonic wars is curiously a.n.a.logous to the books of these later men. I call attention to it here because it includes "Laurette," which is one of the great French short stories.

#An Honest Thief, and Other Stories#, by _Fyodor Dostoevsky_; translated from the Russian by _Constance Garnett_ (The Macmillan Company). This is the eleventh volume in the first collected English edition of Dostoevsky's works. The great Russian novelist was not a consummate technician when he wrote short stories, but the ma.s.sive epic sweep of his genius clothed the somewhat inorganic substance of his tales with a reality which is masterly in the t.i.tle story, in "An Unpleasant Predicament," and in "Another Man's Wife." The volume includes among other stories "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man," which, though little known, is the key to the philosophy of his greater novels.

#Civilization#, 1914-1917, by _Georges Duhamel_; translated by _E. S.

Brooks_ (The Century Co.). This volume shares with ?lie Faure's "La Sainte Face" first place among the volumes of permanent literature produced in France during the war. With more subtle and restrained artistry than M. Barbusse, the author has portrayed the simple chronicles of many of his comrades. He employs only the plainest notation of speech, with an economy not unlike that of Maupa.s.sant, and the indictment is the more terrible because of this emphasis of understatement. Before the war, M. Duhamel was known as a competent and somewhat promising poet and dramatist, and he was one of the few to whom the war brought an ampler endowment rather than a numbing silence.

#Czecho-Slovak Stories#, translation by _?arka B. Hrbkova_ (Duffield and Company). I trust that this volume will prove a point of departure for a series of books each devoted to the work of a separate Czecho-Slovak master. Certainly the work of Jan Neruda, Svatopluk ?ech, and Caroline Sv?tla, to name no others, ranks with the best of the Russian masters, and the reader is compelled to speculate as to how many more equally fine writers remain unknown to him. For such stories as these can only come out of a long and conscious tradition of art, and the greater part of these stories are drawn from volumes published during the last half century. The volume contains an admirable historical and critical introduction, and adequate biographies and bibliographies of the authors included.

#Serenus, and Other Stories of the Past and Present#, by _Jules Lemaitre_; translated by "_Penguin_" (_A. W. Evans_) (London: Selwyn & Blount).

Although this volume has not yet been published in the United States, it is one of the few memorable short story books of the season, and should readily find a publisher over here. Anatole France has prophesied that it will stand out in the history of the thought of the nineteenth century, just as to-day "Candide" or "Zadig" stands out in that of the eighteenth. These fourteen stories are selected from about four times that number, and a complete Lemaitre would be as valuable in English as the new translation of Anatole France. The present version is faultlessly rendered by an English stylist who has sought to set down the exact shade of the critic's meaning.

#Tales of Mystery and Horror#, by _Maurice Level_; translated from the French by _Alys Eyre Macklin_, with an Introduction by _Henry B. Irving_ (Robert M. McBride & Co.). Mr. Irving's introduction rather overstates M. Level's case. These stories are not literature, but their hard polished technique is as competent as that of Melville Davisson Post, and I suppose that these two men have carried Poe's technique as far as it can be carried with talent. The stories are frankly melodramatic, and wring the last drop of emotion and sentiment out of each situation presented. I think the volume will prove valuable to students of short story construction, and there is no story which does not arrest the attention of the reader.

#The Story of Gotton Connixloo#, followed by #Forgotten#, by _Camille Mayran_; translated by _Van Wyck Brooks_ (E.P. Dutton & Company). Mr.

Brooks' translation of these two stories in the tradition of Flaubert have been a labor of love. They will not attract a large public, but the art of this Belgian writer is flawless, and worthy of his master. Out of the simplest material he has extracted an exquisite spiritual essence, and held it up quietly so as to reflect every aspect of its value. If the first of these two stories is the most completely rounded from a technical point of view, I think that the second points the way toward his future development. He presents his characters more directly, and achieves his revelation through dialogue rather than personal statement.

#Short Stories from the Spanish#; Englished by _Charles B. McMichael_ (Boni and Liveright, Inc.). The present volume contains seven short stories by Ruben Dario, Jacinto Octavio Picon, and Leopoldo Alas. They are wretchedly translated, but even in their present form one can divine the art of "The Death of the Empress of China" by the Nicaraguan Ruben Dario, and "After the Battle" by the Spaniard Jacinto Octavio Picon. The other stories are of unequal value, so far as we can judge from Mr.

McMichael's translation.

#The Fairy Spinning Wheel, and the Tales It Spun#, by _Catulle Mendes_; translated by _Thomas J. Vivian_ (The Four Seas Company). It was a happy thought to reprint this translation of M. Mendes' fairy tales which has been out of print for many years. It is probably the only work of its once renowned author which survives the pa.s.sage of time. Here he has entered the child's mind and deftly presented a series of legends which suggest more than they state. Their substance is slight enough, but each has a certain symbolic value, and the poetry of M. Mendes' style has been successfully transferred to the English version.

#Temptations#, by _David Pinski_; translated by _Isaac Goldberg_ (Brentano's). We have already come to know what a keen a.n.a.lyst America has in Mr. Pinski from the translations of his plays which have been published. Here he is much less interested in the surface movement of plot than in the relentless search for motive. To his Yiddish public he seems perhaps the best of short story writers who write in his tongue, and certainly he can hold his own with the best of his contemporaries in all countries. He has the universal note as few English writers may claim it, and he stands apart from his creation with absolute detachment. His work, together with that of Asch, Aleichem, Perez, and one or two others establishes Yiddish as a great literary tongue. A further series of these tales are promised if the present volume meets with the response which it deserves.

#Russian Short Stories#, edited by _Harry C. Schweikert_ (Scott, Foresman and Company). This is a companion volume to Mr. Schweikert's excellent collection of French short stories, and ranges over a wide field. From Pushkin to Kuprin his selection gives a fair view of most of the Russian masters, and the collection includes a valuable historical and critical introduction, with biographical notes, and a critical apparatus for the student of short story technique. It is of special educational importance as the only volume in the field. In the next edition I suggest that Sologub should be represented for the sake of completeness.

#Iolanthe's Wedding#, by _Hermann Sudermann_; translated by _Adele S.

Seltzer_ (Boni and Liveright, Inc.). This collection of four minor works by Sudermann contains two excellent stories, one of which is full of folk quality and a kindly irony, and the other more akin to the nervous art of Arthur Schnitzler. "The Woman Who Was His Friend" and "The Gooseherd" are less important, but of considerable technical interest.

#Short Stories from the Balkans#; translated by _Edna Worthley Underwood_ (Marshall Jones Company). This volume should be set beside the collection of "Czecho-Slovak Stories," which I have mentioned on an earlier page. Here will be found further stories by Jan Neruda and Svatopluk ?ech, together with a remarkable group of stories by Rumanian, Serbian, Croatian, and Hungarian authors. Neruda emerges as the greatest artist of them all, and one of the greatest artists in Europe, but special attention should be called also to the Czech writer Vrchlick, the Rumanian Caragiale, and the Hungarian Mikszath. The translation seems competently done.

#Modern Greek Stories#; translated by _Demetra Vaka_ and _Aristides Phoutrides_ (Duffield and Company). While this collection reveals no such undoubted master as Jan Neruda, it is an extremely interesting introduction to an equally unknown literature. Seven of the nine stories are of great literary value, and perhaps the best of these is "Sea" by A. Karkavitsas. Romaic fiction still bears the marks of a young tradition, and each new writer would seem to be compelled to strike out more or less completely for himself. Consequently it is necessary to allow more than usual for technical inadequacy, but the substance of most of these stories is sufficiently remarkable to justify us in wis.h.i.+ng a further introduction to Romaic literature.

VOLUMES OF SHORT STORIES PUBLISHED IN THE UNITED STATES

OCTOBER, 1919, TO SEPTEMBER, 1920: AN INDEX

#Note.# _An asterisk before a t.i.tle indicates distinction. This list includes single short stories, collections of short stories, and a few continuous narratives based on short stories previously published in magazines. Volumes announced for publication in the autumn of 1920 are listed here, though in some cases they had not yet appeared at the time this book went to press._

I. #American Authors#

#Abdullah, Achmed.# *Wings. McCann.

#Abdullah, Achmed#, _and others._ Ten Foot Chain. Reynolds.

#Ade, George.# Home Made Fables. Doubleday, Page.

#Anderson, Emma Maria Thompson.# A 'Chu. Review and Herald Pub. a.s.sn.

#Anderson, Robert Gordon.# Seven O'clock Stories. Putnam.

#Barbour, Ralph Henry.# Play That Won. Appleton.

#Benneville, James Seguin De.# Tales of the Tokugawa. Reilly.

#Bishop, William Henry.# Anti-Babel. Neale.

#Boyer, Wilbur S.# Johnnie Kelly. Houghton Mifflin.

#Bridges, Victor.# Cruise of the "Scandal." Putnam.

#Brown, Alice.# *Homespun and Gold. Macmillan.

#Butler, Ellis Parker.# Swatty. Houghton Mifflin.

#Carroll, P. J.# Memory Sketches. School Plays Pub. Co.

#Cather, Willa Sibert.# *Youth and the Bright Medusa. Knopf.

#Chambers, Robert W.# Slayer of Souls. Doran.

#Cohen, Octavus Roy.# Come Seven. Dodd, Mead.

#Comfort, Will Levington#, and #Dost, Zamin Ki.# Son of Power. Doubleday, Page.

#Connolly, James B.# *Hiker Joy. Scribner.

"#Crabb, Arthur.#" Samuel Lyle, Criminologist. Century Co.

#Cram, Mildred.# Lotus Salad. Dodd, Mead.

#Cutting, Mary Stewart.# Some of Us Are Married. Doubleday, Page.

#Davies, Ellen Chivers.# Ward Tales. Lane.