Margaret Sherwood, a singularly sincere and graceful writer, is
Professor of English Literature at Wellesley College.
The clear voice which here speaks under Miss Sherwood's guidance is the
voice of the absent. And, individually, as we read the story, we listen
sympathetically to the separate messages of those voices which have
entered sympathetically into our past experiences and wisely guided or
wisely thwarted our separate deeds.
A Harvard graduate who had taken Professor Charles Eliot Norton's course
in fine arts was years afterward selecting a cravat pin in a jeweler's
shop in Paris. As he finally decided upon one of plain, simple, and
silently impressive design, he said, 'I think Professor Norton would
have chosen this.' In decisions minor and in decisions major, we are
almost invariably influenced by the unconscious thought of those whose
counsel we value. This significant truth Miss Sherwood has impressively
revealed in _The Clearest Voice_.