LIBER'S NOTEBOOK.

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2175, 13 June 1914, Page 11

LIBER'S NOTEBOOK.

From Mr. T. C. Lothian, of Melbourne, a publisher who seems to specialist) in poetry and belles lettres, I Jiavo to ucknowledgo copies of "Platform Monologues," by Professor Tucker, well-known in Victorian University and literary circles, and "Sappho," a lecture delivered before the Classical Association of Victoria, lleviows will follow later.

The death of Mr. Theodore WattsDunton, at tho fine old age of 82, removes a much venerated figure from the,.world of English letters, l/'or many years ho was prominent as a leading critic, and contributed regularly to tho "Athenaoum," in the columns of which and other journals ho published many, beautiful sonnets. Ho was a personal friend of Dante Gabriel .Rossetti, and of Algernon Charles Swinburne. - With tho latter ho lived for many yoarsat "The Pines," a beautiful old Georgian houso at Putney. Rossetti dedicated his "Ballads and Sonnets" to WattsDunton, as his "most intimate friend," and tho critic was also a personal friend of Tennyson. 111 earlier life WattsDunton "took a great interest in gypyItire. This led him, 110. doubt, to write much on George Borrow, to editions of whoso "Lavcngro" and "Tho Romany Rye" he contributed introductions, in which tliero is much curious information on the great George, of whom, in tho later years of his life, the critic was an intimate friendj In 1898 WattsDunton published a "poetic romance," "Aylwm,'' in which there.is a perceptible a strong Bbrrovian influence. Ho was a frequent contributor to leading magazines and reviews, and must have been a most industrious as well as being a most versatile writer.

Mr. J. Herbert Slater, tho well-known bibliographer,' who edits that useful publication, l "Book Prices Current," and gossips so agreeably every month in the columns of "Tho Connoisseur" about notable book sales at Sotheby's, Christie's, Hodgson's, and other London auction rooms where collectors congregate to do battle with "the trade" for the possession of rare and curious volumes, has compiled a "Bibliography of tho Completo Works of -Robert Louis Stevenson" (G. Bell and Sons; per AVhitcombe and Tombs). Mr. Slater adopts an alphabetical, in preferenco to the chronological order favoured as a rule by bibliographers. Prices of early "Stevensons" still rule high, For instance, if you possess a copy of "Familiar Studies of Men and Books," published by Chatto and Windus, in 1882, at Gs., it is pleasant to note that tho value of tho volumo to-day as three guineas.

"An Inland Voyage," published, at first, by Kegan Paul and Co. *.1878), at 7s. 6d., is valued by Mr. Slater—if in tho original "slate-coloured, or bluo cloth, lettered in. gilt"—at from £9 to £10. Curiously enough, tat least so it will seem to thoso who 'do not know the peculiar fads and fancies of the "collector" species, tho same edition, bound in half-calf, i? valued at two guineas only. First editions, be it remembered, are only valuable if in their original covers. Clothe them ever so gorgeously in polished calf, levant morocco, or the finest of vellum —and, behold, much of their value disappears.

The collected editions of Stevenson, so I notice, continue to rise steadily in value. "The Edinburgh" edition (28 volumes), published at 12s. 6d. a volume,' is now worth anything between £50. and £60, and yet 1 can well remember a Wellington bookseller, now out of business, offering me a set for £12. "Tho Pentland Edition," too (20 volumes at 10s.) is now valued at £20. A nico set, once belonging to a wellknown Wellington lawyer, was sold last year in a Wellington auction-room for £14. The "Swanston Edition" (the latest-of tho collected editions), in 25 volumes at (is. each, the publication of which was completed.a year or so SSO, is now worth, I see, £9 to £10. Mr. Slater's little book, which costs 3s. (New Zealand price), contains much curious and out-of-the-way information concerning Stevenson's works. It is the first of a scries of similar handbooks for tho use of collectors, librarians, and other booky folks.

Two or three weeks ago I devoted' a column and a half of space to one of the earlier issues of "The Essex Library" (Stanley Paul and Co.), a now and quite important series of works—other than outstanding merit, and published at tho very reasonable price (New Zealand) of six shillings. A more recent addition to the Essex Library" is "Honors do Balzac —His Life and Writings," by Mary F. Sanders, a work which, when published a year or too ago, in a much more expensive, but in noways mora attractiro form, was tho subject of. many laudatory reviews, not only in tho British and American, but tho French i'ress. ' Time was when Balzac's splendid aohicvement, ''Tho Human Comedy"—th'e most brilliant series of novels ever published in any language, was little known in England. To-day, not to bo acquainted with a least a lew of Balzac's masterpieces,'say "Lo Pore Goriot," "Cousino Bctte," ''I/Illustro Gaudissart," "Eugenic Granet" —just to mention, at hazard, four''* only of Balzac's novels—is to admit a quite deplorable ignorance of influences which Bare meant ao much in modern fiction, not only French, hut English fiction. Balzac always loses less in translation than doe.s Dumas, for in more literary slvlo his novels aro almost commonplace, and now that Messrs. Dent and other publishers havo issued good translations of his works thov aro available to the still great majority of English readers to whom a French novel, in its original form, is it closed booli.

To road Balzac is good, cither w * Freuch or JOiiglish, but yov.i ivil! vnw«r- ' stand his books better alid inoro ade- ! cpiatoly grasp his point of view on Utfc > if you know something of his personal- J ity. Miss Sanders's book is thcrctoro t welcome. It traces Balzac's roßjantio i career, and contains much comparatively ; now material, gathered from the recent-ly-translated "Lettres a I'Strangere, i which the* great I'rcnch novelist wrote to his almost life-long friend, Madanw Banska, tho beautiful and talented Polish lady whom he- married in tho last year of his life, but who so many years previously had exoroi-w<J 3B all-dominant influence' upon his literary achievements. Miss Sanders not ooJ? gives a more detailed and more acourato biography qf Balzac than over wo have had before —and ste is the last of a long series of ■writers on that- brilliant .but eccentric genius—4>ut she aaalyses and criticises each of Ms works in a most interesting and va.htaMy iitieraiativo manner. Anyone- who f->w "Balzacs" on his shelves—and tfie best of Balzac should be represented Hi overy public and private library n'ortn calling a library—would do well to plaeo alongside tho volumes a cosy or MtS3 Sanders's excellent biography., A well printed, well illustrated; and tastefully bound publication.