British Writers on French Authors
British Writers on French Authors is an article published in The St. James's Gazette on 11 february 1899.
The original article was published by The Morning Post (11 february 1899) as British Authors on French Literature. Same quote.
British Writers on French Authors
SOME INTERESTING OPINIONS.
The "Morning Post" to-day publishes some interesting opinions of French authors by British writers which the Paris correspondent of that paper has collected.
Mr. George Meredith says:— "In reply to your request that I should name the French writers now dead who are, in my opinion, most characteristic of the genius of France they are: For human philosophy, Montaigne; for the comic appreciation of society, Molière; for the observation of life and condensed expression, La Bruyère; for a most delicate irony scarcely distinguishable from tenderness, Renan; for high pitch of impassioned sentiment, Racine. Add to these your innumerable writers of Mémoires and Pensées, in which France has never had a rival."
WHAT THE AUTHOR OF TESS SAYS.
Mr. Thomas Hardy expresses himself as follows:— "Your question is a difficult one to answer in a brief letter owing to the many sidedness of that genius, the variety of lights given out by the innumerable facets into which French genius has shaped itself. My reading in your literature, moreover, has not been extensive. But I should say that the fewest names it would be possible to include in the list of these immortals are those of Rabelais, Descartes, Corneille, Pascal, Molière, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Diderot, J. J. Rousseau, Béranger, Victor Hugo, Auguste Comte, George Sand, and H. de Balzac. I should also like to add Gautier and Dumas, father and son. Not one of those typical writers could have been born of another nation, and not one of them can be regarded as the echo of a predecessor. And why not also add Villon, Racine, La Fontaine, Madame de Sévigné, Bossuet, Le Sage, Chateaubriand, De Musset, and Baudelaire? Each is characteristic. But one might go too far, and I send my selection for what it may be worth."
MR. LANG'S FAVOURITES.
Mr. Andrew Lang says:— "In my opinion all the works of all the great French authors, from the 'Chanson de Roland' to M. Anatole France, are highly characteristic of the genius of France in different aspects. To name them would only be to name my favourites, but I may mention the 'Chanson de Roland,' Joinville, Froissart, Ronsard, Villon, Montaigne, Molière, Pascal, Dumas père, Théophile Gautier, Hugo, the Abbé Prévost, André Chénier, Racine, Rabelais, Lamartine, Corneille, Renan, La Bruyère, Balzac, and all the rest, including the author of 'Aucassin and Nicoleta.'"
SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE PRISONER OF ZENDA.
Dr. A. Conan Doyle remarks:— "When I was ten years of age I liked Gustave Aimard best. At fifteen I preferred Jules Verne. At twenty it was Dumas père and Erckmann-Chatrian. Now I should choose Maupassant. He has the most natural instinct for telling a story in the right way of any writer I know."
Mr. Anthony Hope Hawkins says:— "I am, alas! so badly read, and so poor a French scholar, that I dare not venture on any such judgment as you invite me to, or try to find any three writers, however great, who can claim in themselves to express the genius of France. I myself, I think, thank France most for Montaigne and much for Rabelais. Among modern names and modern work — of which we moderns also have need — I am most indebted for pleasure, and, if I am able to learn, for instruction, to Guy de Maupassant."
