The Lover's Progress. Told by Himself. (Chatto and Windus. 6s.)—The
Lover's Progress is a book that evidently owes its existence to the not uncommon mistake by which simple-minded, yet complacent, people imagine that because a literary genius like that of Rousseau can make the most commonplace experiences interesting to all mankind, therefore the commonplace experiences of an obscure and nameless—perhaps non-existent—individual without genius will be equally interesting if only he has the patience and persistence to write them in a book. Whether we accept this book as a novel or a true story, we must pronounce it dull, rather morbid, and more than a little tedious. The hero has three love affairs. In the first he is jilted. In the second he is accepted, but not married—the lady, a heroic and saintly ballet-dancer, having scruples about the marriage rite. The ballet-dancer dies of diphtheria ; and finally Charles Letty finds a nice commonplace girl, and marries her just in time to be nursed comfortably through a fever. By this time he has seen a good deal of life, and, on the whole, seen it without going far wrong. But he takes himself too seriously, and moralises more than enough.
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