File:Bret Harte, c. 1900.jpg

Identifier: internationallib15garn (find matches)
Title: The International library of famous literature, selections from the world's great writers, ancient, mediaeval, and modern with biographical and explanatory notes and critical essays by many eminent writers
Year: 1900 (1900s)
Authors: Garnett, Richard, 1835-1906 Vallée, Léon, 1850-1919 Brandl, Alois, 1855-1940 Mitchell, Donald Grant, 1822-1908
Subjects: Literature
Publisher: London : The Standard
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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derstand the American character. The literary manhad little sympathy with the rough and half-civilised masses whowere making his countrys history; if he used them at all it wasas a foil to bring into greater relief his hero of the unmistakableEnglish pattern. In his sla\dsh imitation of the foreigner, he didnot, however, succeed in retaining the foreigners quick appreciationof novelty. It took an Englishman to first develop the humourand picturesqueness of American or Yankee dialect, but JudgeIlaUburton succeeded better in reproducing Sam Slicks speechthan his character. Dr. Judds Margaret,—one of the earlierAmerican stories,—although a vivid picture of ^Tew England farm-life and strongly marked with local colour, was in incident andtreatment a mere imitation of English rural tragedy. It would,indeed, seem that while the American people had shaken off theEnglish yoke in Government, politics, and national progression,while they liad already startled the Old World with invention and
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BRET HARTE THE RISE OF THE SHORT STORY xiii originality in practical ideas, they had never freed themselvesfrom the trammels of English literary precedent. The old sneer: Who reads an American book ? might have been answered byanother: There are no American books. But while the American literary imagination was still underthe influence of English tradition, an unexpected factor wasdeveloping to diminish its power. It was Humour—of a qualityas distinct and original as the country and civilisation in which itwas developed. It was at first noticeable in the anecdote or story, and, after the fashion of such beginnings, was orallytransmitted. It was common in the bar-rooms, the gatherings inthe country store, and finally at public meetings in the mouthsof stump orators. Arguments were clinched, and politicalprinciples illustrated by a funny story. It invaded even thecamp meeting and pulpit. It at last received the currency of thepublic press. But wherever met it was so distinctly origina

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