"Greatest Bookman Of His Time"

New Zealand Listener, Volume 10, Issue 249, 31 March 1944, Page 13

"Greatest Bookman Of His Time"

Tribute to Andrew Lang | EF ORTY years ago there was a literary man in London who was so versatile and did such a_ vast amount of work of high quality that someone said of him that he must be a syndicate. As a serious poet he wrote one of the best of modern sonnets; as a writer of graceful verse he was in the front rank, and could turn lines upon anything from cricket to higher education for women. As an essayist he was scholarly and witty and touched nothing that he did not adorn. As an anthropologist he revolutionised the science and his work was a forerunner. of Frazer’s famous Golden Bough. A fine classical scholar, he collaborated in the most popular translation of the Odyssey. He wrote a fourvolume history of his native country, Scotland, and biographies of several of her great figures. He also wrote novels. He was a Jacobite, but with no illusions about the Young Pretender. When Anatole France put out a study of Joan of Arc, he was so incensed that he sat down and wrote a book to defend her. Every year he issued a book of fairy stories for children, and these are stiJl read. The greatest bookman of his time, he has been called. Yet if you had gone to Lord’s to an important match, you would probably have seen him there, as if time did not matter. Have you guessed who he was? Andrew Lang, Stevenson’s "Dear Andrew with the brindled hair." Andrew Lang was born in 1844, this month, and this Sunday afternoon, April 2, Station 2YA is going to pay him a centennial tribute. ra ae ne a eS ene rene eine nema ee eS ar