FRENCH NOVELISTS OF TO-DAY.
THERE is no doubt that M. Anatole France is the most brilliant French writer of the present day, and that he well deserves his place at the head of such a gallery of portrait. studies as Miss Stephens here gives us. But, though yielding to no one in admiration for the classic quality of his work, we must own that we should not much care for a greater general familiarity with it in England. M. France, with all his undeniable charm, is a pagan philosopher, a Voltaire with a difference, and that, perhaps, to Voltaire's advantage. His habitually ironical treatment of religious subjects may suit the spirit of his own country, though even there more serious and spiritual writers are every day gaining a more attentive hearing. But in England we believe or hope that it is still considered bad taste to scoff, with an irreverence ever so exquisite, at the beliefs and living convictions of others.
All Miss Stephens's', studies are more or less interesting. Her own ideas are not, perhaps wisely, very precisely defined, for while writing with enthusiasm of M. Anatole France, she cannot help heartily admiring the true and pathetic pictures, full of earnest religious faith, of M. Rene Bazin. Her lack of sympathy with M. Bourget may be accounted for by her regarding him as a thorough reactionary, who ventures to regret the form that French progress has taken during recent years, and who does his very best, with real power and distinguished success, to preserve those treasures which our fathers have left us and which their sons are throwing overboard.
Madame Pierre de Coulevain, it seems to us, is rather highly honoured by being placed on a list of writers every one of whom has some peculiar distinction of his own, and may in one way or another be called a great novelist. English readers, however, may not agree with us here, for Miss Stephens is right in saying that this agreeable writer is more popular in England than in France.
The article on M. Maurice Barnes is singularly interesting, and will appeal to many whose knowledge of his original and remarkable work is rather vague and perfunctory. That on M. Edouard Rod is also well worth reading.
We have noticed one or two slips which may be corrected in another edition. P&heur d'Islande is always printed in the plural, and this seems an odd mistake in a writer who appreciates Yann and his story. But it sometimes happens that an intelligent printer knows better than the author, even after proofs have been returned. He, perhaps, is responsible for " Maximien" instead of " Meximieu" as the name of the landlord in Le Ble qui Thee.
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