MEREDITH.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 615, 18 September 1909, Page 9

MEREDITH.

lir. William Meredith has sent an "identic noto" to th 6 chief newspapers requesting tho loan-of all such letters, , with.a viow to their publication under the; editorship of Lord .Morlev Those'who refuse i to'respond to such npDeals (cbinuicnts aiuEuglish,ico>tcmpbrory) an a, negligible minority,, and the'resultant voluidt ou"ht to'b'e a" valuable one. 'Ono would expect it °to bo something liko .literature, though nc letter; indeed)/that 'has .yet appeared 'justify! tho expectation that Meredith, will rank with Walpole Cowpnr, and FitzGcrald osone of tht great English ictteiMvriters. It should tlirow light too; on . the interminable problem

whether tho -novelist's stylo was natural to himself or acquired. In tho meantime Mr. Meredith's appeal is virtually an intimation that thero is to bo no official "Life and Letters,"'.and creates the hope, that tho "Lettejs," when ■ they- appear, will be' a near equivalent. That ■ letters nioy-'bo* ; niado " so: the "Family Letters" : 'df .-Christina .Kpssctti. show. Ihcro tho lottorVtherasilves are, , tnkeh singly,'gener : ally'not; : important, ,-a'nd tho' supplementary matter merely* explanatory, yet the total result of the book on'the readers mind is ono of groat reality and vividness. * The desire ■to havo a vivid picture of a great writer is a natural' ouc. Addisou himself admits that, though ho. speaks in language prettily sparkling with brine. "I * havo observed," ;he writes in the first sentence of the first essay of the "Spectator," "that a Eeader seldom peruses a book' with- Pleasure till he knows whether the "Writer of it be: a black or. a fair man, of, a mild or, choleric Disposition. Married or a Bachelor, with other Particulars of the like nature, that conducovery much to ;tho right • Understanding of an Author." ,-In Meredith's case the persistent strain, of personal, fantasy, provokes the transition of a reader's interest in the writing to curiosity regarding the writer, and itiis.an act of i charity to gratify it. , ..-.-■ ; . .: Meredith is .not, of course, the only anthor who has disliked "the idea, of a biography," and ho. may.have.had other reasons besides a reticence as to certain periods of his life concerning which the ordinary eye can see-no need.of mystery. • One inay havo been the clear" perception -that—ns Renan declares we.'do iin history—in. biography we* ".."surfaces" known to many, while the' hidden'.from.most. .This duality in'aman-has, been recognised in poetry.. It is subaudible in some of tho work of Matthew Arnold, and it finds articulate expression in "William Wateon's "Walt Whitman has expressed the difficulty in his "Leaves of Grass":— When I Tead" the -bookj the biography famous, And is this, then (said I),' what the author calls-a man's life? • And so will someone, , when I am dead and gone, write my life?'. '.''., (As if any man really knew, aught of my .life. Why!even""l myself, I often think, know little ' or nothing of my real life, Only a few hints, a few diffused faint clews and indirections ;. '~ . : I seek for my own ,use to trace out here.) '.The fact that, one cannot be really known to posterity wonld not with a mind less subtle than Meredith's seem any reason ~,.why ho should not be known to them in the samo way as he,is to his contemporaries. But with Meredith all the, importance lay with the inner man. .His; method -was to push his inquiry ever'further-and further, back into the secret of.'his: people's' personalities, and so ho-pro*, occupied lliaiself with".the soul behind the body, .and; with the .thoughts' and, feelings' and motives], :behihd : jthp." .visible"'...conduct.- A- -.biography could not. lie "iin. authentic Jnap- of 1 -his" soul, and so he.may. have deprecated^one.' "