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Kansas University Weekly.
existing between the concentrated and lively quality of the short story and the peculiar temperament of the American people. The stories are mirrors which reflect the multitudinous phases of our natural life. The hopeless dullness of the stranded New England farmer and the wild reckless nature of the cowboy of the Southwest; the narrowness of provincialisms and the complexity of city life—all are held up to our view in the mirror of the short story.
Page gives us stately, full length portraits of plantation life in old Virgina, Joel Chandler Harris, Miss Rives, Maurice Thompson, Octave Thanet and Opie Reed have immortalized the cracker planter and negro lying between Arkansas and Florida. Bret Harte has written two hundred sketches depicting Western life all drawn from observations made during a short sojourn in the West in his early manhood. Miss Woolson also has made pioneer life the theme of many of her sketches.
The Yankee in city and country, in the interior and on the coast has been truthfully pictured by such well known writers as Sarah Orne Jewett, Rose Terry Cooke, Louise Chandler Moulton, Harriet Prescott Spofford, Mary E. Wilkins and Sophie Swett.
Mr. Fawcett, Mr. Bishop, Mr. Stimpson, Richard Harding Davis and Brander Matthews have given us glimpses of city life, and provincial life in the middle States has been treated by Frank Stockton.
The foreign element in our population furnished a great field for the writer of character studies. Boyesen has written of the Swedish American and Sidney Luska has given us some admirable word portraits of the American Jew. In character depicting Mary Hallock Foote, Margaret Deland, H.C.Bunner, John Kendrick Bangs and Owen Wister are all clever workers, and there is much thoughtful study of human nature shown in their work. The name of Mary Hartwell Catherwood belongs near the head of the list of successful American short story writers. Her touch is delicate and firm and her charm unfailing. The Illinois and St. Lawrence countries are her favorite backgrounds for tales.
Thomas Bailey Aldrich owes no small part of his literary fame to his skill as a short story writer. His style is one peculiarly his own for no one has ever been able to reproduce the delicate and subtle charm of his dainty sketches.
The Water Ghost, the Ghost Club, A Psyhcical Prank and the Spectre Cook of Bangletop
are the names of some weirdly funny stories by John Kendrick Bangs. Instead of using the ghost as a means of terrorizing his readers Mr. Bangs makes it the vehicle for fun of a kind which readers of Mr.Toppleton's Client will remember with great pleasure.
In reading a book review not long ago I was much amused to find a paragraph concerning some stories about Kansas City, which were published in the Fortnightly Review and written by the editor of that magazine. The stories evidently did not throw the best light imaginiable upon Kansas City society so the reviewer criticizes the author thus: "As transcripts of American life even in Kansas and other remote localities they are grotesquely inadequate." How very grateful we should feel toward the learned gentleman for his able and generous defense.
Translations of stories by the great Russian writer, Sienkiewicz, have been made by Jeremiah Curtain. Two of the sketches are of American life-one of Polish and the other of Spanish life. The author's powers of description of things American are not in touch with our national feeling and his abilities are shown at their best only in his Polish tales.
Mr. Opdycke has rendered into English a French translation of tales from the Aegean, written by a Greek—Demetrios Bikelas. They are interesting stories of simple motive and pure sentiment.
A most delightful fad in the last few years has been the popularity of collections of college stories, Waldron Kintzning Post stands at the head of the disciples of this movement as the author of Harvard stories. After reading his thoroughly charming and amusing sketches one feels so well acquainted with the characters in them that he misses their companionship for days after finishing the book. Yale Varns and Princeton Stories are not so eminently pleasing, though they by no means lack merit.
Chimmie Fadden stories by Edward W. Townsend furnished amusement for many people last summer. They are truthful pictures of Bowery life and give evidence of great keenness of perception on the part of the author.
Roswell Martin Field's collection of sunflower stories must be mentioned here for it is distinctly a Kansas book. Several of the stories are unique in plot and well worked up but others are rather tedious. On the whole however it is a bright book and one well worth owning.
Hamlin Garland's Main Traveled Roads is a