SWEDISH STUDIES IN ENGLISH LITERATURE.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1150, 10 June 1911, Page 9

SWEDISH STUDIES IN ENGLISH LITERATURE.

Swedish applicants for the academical degree of doctor (says an English paper) are required to publish a treatise representing original research, and it is not uncommon for this to bo directed on some point in English literature. Two of tho kind have been published by Messrs. Heifer and Sons, of Cambridge, and an explanatory note to this British edition of one of them indicates that a favourable reception would ensure more. Tho slighter of the two now published is a study by Mr. Olaf E. Bosson of the "Slang and "Cant in Jarome K. Jerome's Works," and it, like the rather more extensive work of r. *\\. Lceb-Lundberg on "Word-formation in Kipling," is very careful and systematic. Mr. Jerome is not chosen as "one of the masters of English or of fiction, but because he gives good specimens of the ordinary language of tho Victorian era. lie has had experience in many kinds of life and several social grades, and he does not* aim at peculiar or individual expression. Ilis customary fncctiousness is in his favour for Jlr. Bosson's purpose, because this quality is largely expressed in slang and cant. With no Academy to purify .or petrify, the English language has been very much at' the mercy of innovators, anil men of strong individuality have sometimes spumed its formal limitations. We all know, too, that the good talker will sometimes qualify a touch of pedantry by an apt condescension; ho may even go to the extreme of reject, ing the right word for a sling 0110 which merely advertises the colloquial spirit. It is fitting that Jlr. Jerome should make a claim for t'lie use and significance, of slang even by means of such an inelegant phrase as "Tommy rot. ons of his characters reproaches another with it's use, and is challenged to find an adequate equivalent, but, as Jlr. Bosson says, though there may be many words which nearly convey the same meaning there is not another which would have done exactly what' the speaker wanted. Jfr. Bosson complains of the insufficiency of philological aids in English, but he, and those who are working on similar lines, may do something towards supplying tho deficiency. Ilis methods ate scientific and statistical, and his book, of course, i? not adapted for ordinary recreative reading. But it has its attractions, and to the sympathetic such a word as "rorl'y-tofi" may ■ bring something of the joy that Stevenson found in the combination of "crimson-lake." Mr. Lceb-Lundbt-rg's monograph on Jlr. Kipling should be useful to the student of style, end it represents a great, deal of labour and ingenuity. Jlr. Kipling, too, has had a very wide experience of men and dictions, but ho has never been content merely to assimilate and report. He knows all sorts of-slangs and cants, but they catetot'limit so, inve.tMi-.fo a word-coiner. On the whole, ho -does not make groat contributions to t.ic language; his phrases arc improvised for his own also rather than invented for ours, lie may be following the lines of least resistance, but there is a masterful pi nation, behind his _ innovations. Mr. Kipling, is not generally respectful to language, and likes to make short cuts to ins meaning, so in tho hyphen he has found an instrument to his mind. He uses it for a beautiful word like "tree-roads, ) invented for the course of the monkeys flight with Mowgli, and for such compositions as "aooo-whoooo-whuup/ which is supposed t'o reproduce tho note of the steam siren, ami 'even such ugly specimens as "to-be-taken-seriously-ness. Mr. Lceb-Lundberg B'ves a highly detailed classification of blends and compounds, onomatopes and parasynthctics, and perhaps Jlr. Kipling himself would be astonished to find how many divisions can bo made of his abbreviations. It is an interesting point that Jlr. Kipling has been attracted to technical terms by their brevity and expressiveness; ho is himself a manufactory of'technical terms for the special purpose of his art, and he appreciates those in use in tho sciences. Jlr. Leeb-Lundberg's book may not be at all smooth reading, but is a serious piece. of scientific investigation of a idnil that is not very common in England. We may express some gratification at theie essays of Swedish scholars to repair our omissions.