酷兔英语
    当前位置:
  1. 首页
  2. 文章
  3. 娱乐英语
  4. 原版小说
  5. 正文

Robert Louis Stevenson-Part28_Alexander H.Japp(1839-1905)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

0 收藏 0 分享 0 赞

章节正文
文章总共2页


interest as exactly his book - attractive though it is in much -

yet specially lacks. It is to be hoped that Mr Sidney Colvin will



not once more miss the chance which is thus still left open to him

to perfect his LIFE OF STEVENSON, and make it more interpretive



than anything yet published. If he does this, then, a dreadful

LACUNA in the EDINBURGH EDITION will also be supplied.



Carefully reading over again Mr Arthur Symons' STUDIES IN TWO

LITERATURES - published some years ago - I have come across



instances of apparentcontradiction which, so far as I can see, he

does not critically altogetherreconcile, despite his ingenuity and



great charm of style. One relates to Thoreau, who, while still

"sturdy" as Emerson says, "and like an elm tree," as his sister



Sophia says, showed exactly the same love of nature and power of

interpreting her as he did after in his later comparatively short



period of "invalidity," while Mr Symons says his view of Nature

absolutely was that of the invalid, classing him unqualifiedly with



Jefferies and Stevenson, as invalid. Thoreau's mark even in the

short later period of "invalidity" was complete and robust



independence and triumph over it - a thing which I have no doubt

wholly captivated Stevenson, as scarce anything else would have



done, as a victory in the exact ROLE he himself was most ambitious

to fill. For did not he too wrestle well with the "wolverine" he



carried on his back - in this like Addington Symonds and Alexander

Pope? Surely I cannot be wrong here to reinforce my statement by a



passage from a letter written by Sophia Thoreau to her good friend

Daniel Ricketson, after her brother's death, the more that R. L.



Stevenson would have greatly exulted too in its cheery and

invincible stoicism:



"Profound joy mingles with my grief. I feel as if something very

beautiful had happened - not death; although Henry is with us no



longer, yet the memory of his sweet and virtuous soul must ever

cheer and comfort me. My heart is filled with praise to God for



the gift of such a brother, and may I never distrust the love and

wisdom of Him who made him and who has now called him to labour in



more glorious fields than earth affords. You ask for some

particulars relating to Henry's illness. I feel like saying that



Henry was never affected, never reached by it. I never before saw

such a manifestation of the power of spirit over matter. Very



often I heard him tell his visitors that he enjoyed existence as

well as ever. The thought of death, he said, did not trouble him.



His thoughts had entertained him all his life and did still.... He

considered occupation as necessary for the sick as for those in



health, and accomplished a vast amount of labour in those last few

months."



A rare "invalidity" this - a little confusing easy classifications.

I think Stevenson would have felt and said that brother and sister



were well worthy of each other; and that the sister was almost as

grand and cheery a stoic, with no literaryprofession of it, as was



the brother.

The other thing relates to Stevenson's HUMAN SOUL. I find Mr



Symons says, at p. 243, that Stevenson "had something a trifle

elfish and uncanny about him, as of a bewitched being who was not



actually" target="_blank" title="ad.事实上；实际上">actually human - had not actually" target="_blank" title="ad.事实上；实际上">actually a human soul" - in which there

may be a glimmer of truth viewed from his revelation of artistic



curiosities in some aspects, but is hardly true of him otherwise;

and this Mr Symons himself seems to have felt, when, at p. 246, he



writes: "He is one of those writers who speak TO US ON EASY TERMS,

with whom we MAY EXCHANGE AFFECTIONS." How "affections" could be



exchanged on easy terms between the normal human being and an

elfish creature actually" target="_blank" title="ad.事实上；实际上">actually WITHOUT A HUMAN SOUL (seeing that



affections are, as Mr Matthew Arnold might have said, at least,

three-fourths of soul) is more, I confess, than I can quite see at



present; but in this rather MALADROIT contradiction Mr Symons does

point at one phase of the problem of Stevenson - this, namely that



to all the ordinary happy or pleasure-endings he opposes, as it

were of set purpose, gloom, as though to certain things he was



quite indifferent, and though, as we have seen, his actual life and




文章总共2页
文章标签:名著  

章节正文
Copyright © 2023 Qeto All rights reserved.
商务合作 | 联系我们 | 关于我们 | 版权声明 | 隐私条款 | 如果智培

京ICP备05059198号-1 京公网安备 11011202003401号