THE EARLIER FICTION.
The characteristic literary form of the last two generations has been the
novel. After a certain interval Scott was followed zealously, and by
constantly increasing numbers; so that for every novelist who was writing
in the first decade of the century, there were probably ten in the fourth;
and, as the great increase of readers has been principally in the readers
of fiction, the growth has naturally continued down to the present day. No
one can believe that this immense preponderance of fiction has been
altogether wholesome. It is questionable whether the novel is capable of
producing the highest results in art; certainly we do not find in prose
fiction the equivalent of _Hamlet_ or of _Faust_, of the _Iliad_ or the
_Divine Comedy_. It may be that the Shakespeare of novelists has not yet
come; but it may also be that the form is inherently inferior to the drama
and the epic. The latter is the conclusion suggested by the fact that of
all kinds of imaginative art the novel is the one which has least
permanence. Novels are like light wine in respect that, while pleasant to
the taste, they do not keep long; they resemble it too in the fact that a
man may read much, as the disappointed toper found he could drink much,
without making great progress. Notwithstanding the hostility, avouched by
Horace, of gods and men and booksellers to the mediocre poet, the
versifier who has just a little of the poetic spirit is, after two or
three generations, far more readable than the merely competent novelist.
There are few literary experiences more melancholy than to turn to an old
novel, once famous, but not quite the work of genius. Moreover, the novel
has yielded more than any other form of literature to certain influences
of the time inimical to high art. It is in fiction above all that the
periodical system of publication has been adopted; and we can trace its
evil effects in the work even of men like Thackeray and Dickens. The novel
tends at the best to looseness of structure, and periodical publication
fosters the tendency.
In at least one other way the influence of the novel must have been partly
evil. The gains of literature have been to an altogether disproportionate
extent showered upon novelists; and the ordinary laws of human action
force us to believe that some talent must have been thus diverted to
fiction which would have been better employed otherwise. Theologians like
Newman and historians like Froude are tempted from their own domain into
the field of fiction. Yet on the other hand it must be said that the
greater writers have been on the whole remarkably faithful to their true
vocation. The leading novelists are those whose talents find freest scope
in fiction. Historians, philosophers, novelists, poets, the great men
everywhere remain what nature intended them to be. Still, the evil, though
not as great as it might have been expected to be, is real. Matthew
Arnold, it is said, ceased to write verse because he could not afford it.
But for the absorption of the mass of readers in fiction he probably could
have afforded it.
[Sidenote: William Maginn (1793-1842).]
In the year 1830 literature in general, but especially fiction and the
more fugitive forms both of verse and prose, received a notable stimulus
from the establishment of _Fraser's Magazine_. The idea of the magazine
originated with William Maginn and a Bohemian acquaintance of his, Hugh
Fraser, from whom, and not from the publisher James Fraser, it received
its name. Maginn had been a contributor to _Blackwood_, and partly through
his connexions with its staff he soon drew around him a band as brilliant
as that of _Blackwood_ itself. Coleridge, Carlyle, Lockhart, Thackeray and
Southey were among the early contributors. Theodore Hook, famous for his
somewhat coarse but copious and ready wit, also wrote for it. He was at
that time one of the most popular of the novelists; but though he could
tell a story well he could not draw a character, and it is for impromptu
jests and for the clever fun of his articles that he is now remembered.
Maginn himself was no mean contributor. He was never the editor of the
magazine, but he was one of the most energetic and effective of its staff.
Thackeray has immortalised him in Captain Shandon; but if he had the
weaknesses of that well-known character he had certainly all his
cleverness and more than all his accomplishments. For Maginn's more
serious articles show no inconsiderable learning; while his best humorous
articles are simply excellent. _Bob Burke's Duel with Ensign Brady_ is a
model of what the Irish story ought to be. Maginn was helped by others in
giving an Irish flavour to the early _Fraser_. Crofton Croker, author of
the _Fairy Legends and Traditions of the South of Ireland_, was one of his
colleagues; and the witty Francis Mahony was another. The famous _Reliques
of Father Prout_ first appeared in _Fraser_.
Men like Theodore Hook and Mahony were however merely the free lances of
fiction, and it was Scott who moulded the legitimate novel. It is strange
that his great success did not more speedily produce a crop of imitations.
A few appeared during the twenties, but Scott's life was near its close
before any writers came forward of calibre sufficient to be called his
successors. Of those who had begun to write before 1830, the chief were
Bulwer Lytton, Disraeli and Marryat. Two others, worthy of mention though
inferior to these, were the prolific but commonplace G. P. R. James and
Harrison Ainsworth. All of these men were stimulated by Scott, but the
greater ones were more than mere imitators.
[Sidenote: Lord Lytton (1803-1873).]
The first Lord Lytton was by baptism Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer. On
succeeding to his mother's estate of Knebworth he became Bulwer Lytton;
and in 1866 he was raised to the peerage as Viscount Lytton. The union of
politics with fiction is one of the points of contact between him and
Disraeli; but while in the case of Disraeli the politician is first and
the man of letters second, the order of importance is reversed in the case
of Lytton. In politics, Lytton was at the start a Whig, but afterwards
attached himself to the Conservative party, and became, under Lord Derby,
Colonial Secretary.
Lytton's literary career began in boyhood with _Ismail and other Poems_
(1820), and it ended only with his death. Perhaps fluency and versatility
were his most remarkable characteristics. He distinguished himself as a
novelist and as a dramatist, achieved a certain success as a lyric poet,
believed that his greatest work was an epic, and attempted criticism and
history. He had however the good sense and good taste to leave his
historical work, _Athens, its Rise and Fall_, unfinished on the appearance
of the histories of Thirlwall and Grote. It is only as a novelist and
dramatist that he demands serious consideration; and in these departments
he is the more worthy of attention because he is perhaps the best literary
weather-gauge of his time.
Lytton's first novel was _Falkland_ (1827), which he afterwards called
his Sorrows of Werther. It proves his literary affiliation to Byron, and
the proof is strengthened by subsequent works. Lytton, who was not proud
of the relationship, both thought and said that he had done much to put
Byron out of fashion. Possibly he was right, but the kinship is none the
less real. The posing and foppery of _Pelham_ are both like and unlike the
attitudinising of Byron; and the similarity of the sentimental and
romantic criminals, Eugene Aram and Paul Clifford, to the heroes of
Byron's tales is obvious. Moreover, as Lytton once at least, in _Pelham_,
sat for his own portrait, and Byron did so many times, the likeness was
recognised as a personal one, so that one of Lytton's early lady
correspondents nicknamed him Childe Harold. Lytton was too sensitive to
influences to escape the Byronic fever. But his Byronism is Byronism a
little damaged. 'The Hero as Criminal,' as presented by him, is a being
more sentimental and sickly, less violent and less forcible, but not a
whit less dangerous to society, than his Byronic prototype.
Lytton's excursions into the domains of dandyism and criminality drew down
upon him the satire of Carlyle and Thackeray, both sworn foes of
affectation, from which Lytton was never free. But in spite of hostile
criticism the new novelist had caught the popular taste; and he retained
it, perhaps because his own never remained long constant. Shortly after
the publication of _Eugene Aram_ (1832) he underwent a marked change, due
immediately to a journey to Italy, the influence of which is seen both in
the subject and the treatment of _The Last Days of Pompeii_ (1834), and of
_Rienzi_ (1835). These, with _The Last of the Barons_ (1843), form a group
of historical romances, glittering and clever, but destitute of charm.
The strength and the weakness of Lytton is nowhere more easily detected
than in these novels. They show abundance of talent, supported by
a quality not usually associated with such powers as those of Lord
Lytton--indefatigable industry. Yet they fall short of excellence. To
say that Lytton's treatment of history will not bear comparison with
Shakespeare's, or with Scott's, or with Thackeray's, is only to say that
he is not equal to the greatest masters. But there are other men, markedly
inferior to these, who yet overtop Lytton. Such, for instance, is Charles
Reade, in his _Cloister and the Hearth_. What Reade has in common with his
greater brethren, and Lytton has not, is the light and shade of life. In
Lytton all is polished glittering brilliance. The light is neither the
sunlight of common day nor 'the moonlight of romance,' but the glare of
innumerable gas lamps,--the rays from the footlights to which he was about
to betake himself. All the softer shades disappear, and quiet effects are
impossible. There is nowhere in these novels, and there is rarely in
Lytton's later works, that atmosphere of a home which we always breathe in
the novels of the greater writers.
After the Italian novels Lytton for a time turned his energies to dramatic
writing. The fantastic romance of _Zanoni_ (1842) and _The Last of the
Barons_, which followed it, are exceptions. With _The Caxtons_ (1849) we
find him entering upon a new period of prose fiction. _My Novel_ (1853)
was a sequel to it; and these two are generally ranked with _What will He
do with It?_ (1859) as a group devoted to contemporary life. Perhaps
_Kenelm Chillingly_ (1873) ought to be added. These novels are altogether
mellower than the historical romances, and wholesomer than what may be
called the criminal group. To a great extent the theatrical glare has
disappeared. It is clear that in writing these novels Lytton was catering
for the taste which had been partly indicated and partly created by
Dickens and Thackeray. The difference is that, whereas Dickens and
Thackeray are habitually in touch with nature, Lytton is so only in
moments of inspiration. His true field was not the natural, but rather the
fanciful and fantastic. Two of his most successful works are _Zanoni_,
which flings probability to the winds, and _The Coming Race_ (1871), in
which the faculty exercised is that of prophecy. In the latter Lytton
showed again his extraordinary sensitiveness. Forecasts like _The Coming
Race_ have been characteristic of recent literature, and he seems to have
divined their approach.
Lytton's dramas are remarkably like in tone to his novels, and the
popularity they have enjoyed has been due to much the same causes. But
whereas the novels are overshadowed, in critical opinion at least, and
largely even in popularity, the dramas remain what they were when they
were written, among the best plays of a non-dramatic age. Not that they
can compare in literary merit with even such semi-failures as Browning's
plays, still less with Tennyson's one great success, _Becket_. They are
melodramatic, and the striving for stage effect is evident; but yet they
are interesting and well adapted for representation, and the melodrama is
good of its kind. Lytton's first play, _The Duchess de la Valliere_, was a
failure; but _The Lady of Lyons_ (1838) speedily became, and still
remains, a favourite on the stage. It is the best specimen of Lytton's
dramatic work. Attempts have been made to put the prose comedy, _Money_
(1840) above it; but, though effective, _Money_ is very flimsy in
construction and characterisation. Lytton's third drama, _Cardinal
Richelieu_ (1838), is like one of the historical novels adapted to the
stage; though, curiously enough, it is less meretricious than they are.
The epic of _King Arthur_ is scarcely worthy of mention; but Lytton's
lyrics deserve a few words, if only because they are in danger of being
forgotten. They are not original; perhaps indeed it is as echoes that
they are most interesting. We have already seen how Lytton appears to veer
with every breath of popular taste; and it is curious to detect in a man
so different by nature the occasional echo of the pensive reflexion of
Arnold, and sometimes even a suggestion of the philosophy of Browning. It
will appear hereafter that this faculty proved hereditary and descended to
Owen Meredith. Two stanzas from _Is it all Vanity?_ deserve to be quoted,
because the modern note sounds so clear in them:
'Rise, then, my soul, take comfort from thy sorrow;
Thou feel'st thy treasure when thou feel'st thy load;
Life without thought, the day without the morrow,
God on the brute bestow'd;
'Longings obscure as for a native clime,
Flight from what is to live in what may be,
God gave the Soul;--thy discontent with time
Proves thine eternity.'
[Sidenote: Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield (1804-1881).]
Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, was the man of letters most
closely related in spirit and methods to Lytton; but even from the
beginning his ambition was for eminence in the state. Political interests
and a political purpose are features in his earlier works, and they are
the essence of the intermediate novels, _Coningsby_ and _Sybil_. Disraeli
began his career with _Vivian Grey_, the first part of which was published
in 1826, and the second in the following year. He next spent three years
in the south of Europe; after which, in the interval between his return
and his entrance into Parliament in 1837, came the period of his greatest
literary activity. Between 1831 and 1837 there appeared, besides some
minor works, five novels,--_The Young Duke_, _Contarini Fleming_, _The
Wondrous Tale of Alroy_, _Venetia_ and _Henrietta Temple_. Parliamentary
work checked his pen and profoundly influenced what he did write, as we
see in _Coningsby_ (1844), _Sybil_ (1845), and _Tancred_ (1847). After
_Tancred_ Disraeli wrote no fiction till _Lothair_ appeared in 1870,
followed by the disappointing _Endymion_ (1880).
As literature, Disraeli's novels are not great, because, using the word in
an artistic and not in a moral sense, they are not pure. They are
pretentious and unreal, and the rhetoric rings false. The impression of
insincerity, conveyed to so many by his statesmanship, is conveyed also by
his novels. But notwithstanding all defects, Disraeli's novels have that
interest which must belong to the works of a man who has played a great
part in history. They throw light upon his character, they mark the
development of his ambition, it may even be said that they have helped to
make English history. It is worth remembering that _Tancred_ foretells the
occupation of Cyprus; and it is quite consistent with the character of
Disraeli to believe that, when the opportunity came, the desire to make
his own prophecy come to pass influenced him to add to the British crown
one of its most worthless possessions, and to burden it with one of its
most intolerable responsibilities, the care of Armenia. Indeed, the most
remarkable feature in Disraeli's novels is the way in which they reflect
his life and interpret his statesmanship. The magniloquence, the flash and
the glitter of the early novels seem of a piece with the tales current
regarding the author's manners and character, his dress designed to
attract attention, and his opinions cut after the pattern of his dress. So
in the _Coningsby_ group we are struck with the forecast of the writer's
future political action. His later policy seems to be just the realisation
of his earlier dreams.
Impartially considered, these novels, notwithstanding their air of
unreality, tell in favour of Disraeli's sincerity. Many even of his own
party believed him to be cynically indifferent to the real effect of his
measures, and to aim only at party, and, above all, at personal success.
But it ought to be remembered that the originator of Tory democracy was
also the leader of Young England. _Coningsby_, and still more _Sybil_,
advocate the claims of the people to a more careful consideration than
they had hitherto received at the hands of government; and their advocacy
was no mere passing thought. In the case of _Sybil_, at least, Disraeli's
views were the outcome of personal observation during a tour in the north
of England. When he afterwards declared that sanitation and the social
improvement of the working classes were the real task of government, he
was only repeating what he had written many years before. Men who knew
Disraeli well have said that his most wonderful quality was an almost
portentous power of forecast. This is certainly confirmed by his literary
works. There are no writings of the century which so distinctly foreshadow
the actual course of politics and legislation as this group of Disraeli's
novels.
Of the other men selected as representative of this early period,
Ainsworth and James, though younger than Marryat, claim treatment first,
because their work is more closely connected with the novels of the
preceding period. They were direct imitators of Scott, as Scott himself
perceived in the case of Ainsworth at least;[2] and criticism of one side
of their work could not be better expressed than in his words. The great
novelist compares himself to Captain Bobadil, who trained up a hundred
gentlemen to fight very nearly, if not quite, as well as himself. He goes
on: 'One advantage, I think, I still have over all of them. They may do
their fooling with a better grace; but I, like Sir Andrew Aguecheek, do it
more natural. They have to read old books and consult antiquarian
collections to get their knowledge; I write because I have long since read
such works, and possess, thanks to a strong memory, the information they
have to seek for. This leads to a dragging-in of historical details by
head and shoulders, so that the interest of the main piece is lost in
minute descriptions of events which do not affect its progress.'
[Sidenote: William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882).]
Little or nothing need be added about the historical novels of William
Harrison Ainsworth. What Scott says is strictly true of _The Tower of
London_ (1840), reputed to be Ainsworth's masterpiece, of _Old St. Paul's_
(1841), and of _St. James's, or the Court of Queen Anne_ (1844). The
censure is indeed too mildly expressed.
Ainsworth had another side. Like Lytton, he showed a kind of perverse
regard for interesting criminals. _Rookwood_ (1834), with its famous
description of Turpin's ride to York, and _Jack Sheppard_ (1839), are
studies of the highwayman. The latter was severely criticised as
demoralising in tendency, and the censure induced Ainsworth to abandon
this species of story.
[Sidenote: George Paine Rainsford James (1801-1860).]
George Paine Rainsford James was even more prolific than Ainsworth. He is
said to have written more than one hundred novels, besides historical
books and poetry. No wonder therefore that the name of James became a
by-word for conventionality of opening and for diffuse weakness of style.
More perhaps than Ainsworth he has suffered from time, because he remains
more constantly on a dead level of mediocrity. James trusted, and in his
own day trusted not in vain, to adventure; but unless there is some saving
virtue of style, or of thought, or of character, each generation insists
on making its own adventures. James has sunk under the operation of this
law, and he is not likely to be revived.
[Sidenote: Frederick Marryat (1792-1848).]
Frederick Marryat was a man of altogether higher merit than these two.
Indeed there are several points, of vital moment for permanence of fame,
wherein he surpasses Disraeli and Lytton as well. He was by far the most
natural and genuine of the whole group. He was also, _qua_ novelist, the
most original. There is no affectation, no pretentiousness, in Marryat.
Through his breezy style there blows the freshness of an Atlantic gale,
rude and boisterous, but invigorating. He is moreover the best painter of
the naval life of that day, and the fact that it has passed away for ever,
by closing the subject to future writers, or condemning them to write at
second-hand, gives to his works a special promise of permanence.
Marryat's literary career reaches from _Frank Mildmay_ (1829) to the
posthumous _Valerie_ (1849). His stories embody many incidents of his own
life, and his characters are often reproductions of actual men. Thus, the
Captain Savage of Peter Simple is partly a picture of Marryat's first
commander, the great Cochrane, to whose adventurous spirit he owed an
experience richer, though crowded within a few years, than a lifetime of
the 'weak piping time of peace.' This was his literary stock-in-trade. His
rattling adventure, his energetic description, his fun and liveliness, are
the charm of his best books--_Peter Simple_, _Jacob Faithful_, _Midshipman
Easy_, _Japhet in Search of a Father_. His plots are rough but sufficient;
his characters show little penetration; but the habit of drawing from the
life prevented him from going far wrong.
From the nature of his subjects and from his mode of treatment Marryat
invites comparison with his predecessors, Smollett and Fenimore Cooper, as
well as with his contemporary, Michael Scott, who, next to Marryat
himself, is the best of the naval story-tellers of that time. Marryat is
by no means the equal of Smollett in richness of humour. His is rather the
humour of boisterous spirits than that intellectual quality which gives so
fine a flavour to books. On the other hand, Marryat is much more humane
than Smollett. The life depicted by both is rough to the last degree. In
Smollett, the roughness frequently passes over into brutality; while
Marryat, though he depicts brutality, never seems to share it. As against
the American, Cooper, Marryat has the advantage, in his sea stories, of
greater familiarity with the life he paints; Cooper's strength is
elsewhere, and there he reaches higher than Marryat's highest point.
[Sidenote: Michael Scott (1789-1835).]
Michael Scott, one of the _Blackwood_ group of writers, would be not
unworthy to be bracketed with Marryat if a man could be judged by parts of
his books without regard to the whole; but unfortunately _Tom Cringle's
Log_ (1829-30) and _The Cruise of the Midge_ (1836) are little more than
scenes and incidents loosely strung together. Perhaps Scott was influenced
by the _genius loci_; at any rate his books resemble the _Noctes
Ambrosianae_ in so far as they are the outlet to every riotous fancy and
every lawless freak of the writer's humour.
Marryat had several imitators, the best of whom were Glascock and Chamier,
the latter still fairly well known by name as the author of _Ben Brace_
and _The Arethusa_. But though they had practical experience of sea life,
like Marryat, Glascock and Chamier had not his literary faculty. At a
later date, James Hannay, the essayist and critic, essayed the naval tale
with more literary skill, but without the practical knowledge possessed by
these men.
[Sidenote: Samuel Warren (1807-1877).]
To a wholly different class belonged the once famous Samuel Warren. He was
a barrister and the author of several legal works, but his literary career
was determined rather by a short period of medical study in Edinburgh,
before he resolved to be a barrister. His acquaintance with Christopher
North opened the pages of _Blackwood_ to him, and he utilised his medical
training in the _Diary of a Late Physician_, an unpleasantly realistic
book which first appeared in that magazine. _Ten Thousand a Year_ (1841),
though commonplace in substance, was interesting. Warren lived upon the
reputation of this book. His subsequent attempts were failures, and he was
known through life as the author of _Ten Thousand a Year_.