The latest issue of Robert Bridges' Collected Essays (VIII, IX,
and X : Oxford, 2s. 6d.) will complete the first volume of his Colleited Essays and Papers. Dante in English Literature was a review written in 1909, when, as he said, " There is almost a cult of Dante. Translations are multiplied, with maps of Hell and Italy, itineraries, genealogical tables, con- cordances, and epexegesis of every kind, by aid of which hun- dreds of young ladies are at this moment stocking their brains with the details of Ptolemaic astronomy, of mediaeval divinity, and of the political squabbles of Guelfs and Ghibellins." His conclusion, less applicable perhaps to-day, was that the Dante " cult " rested on two outstanding passages, the Francesca and Ugolino episodes, which were admired while other parts of the Commedia • were condemned or despised. The second essay, on The Poems of Emily Bronta, considers why her poems are praised but little read. " Technical incompetence " is Bridges' chief criticism. It is a natural one, from so great a craftsman, but it is just ; and after all criticism, he concludes : " It is a genius that is speaking, and in her speech the common words have regained their essential and primal significance, and, being the simplest, are therefore for her the best means of direct verbal touch with felt realities." Dryden on Milton shows a curious prejudice. The lines on Milton are easily censured, and the Chaucer " improvements " even more so : but these are not a fair choice to represent Dryden, who was at the very least a brilliant satirist, and able to rise to all occa- sions, " My puzzle about Dryden," says Bridges frankly, " has been to understand how, when he substituted !' epigram ' and wit in poetry for romance and imagination, he did not see how monstrously dull he was." These essays, brief as they are, are packed and stimulating : not least so by their vigorous censure, whether on Dryden, or on Cary's translation of Dante—a specimen of which is quoted with the laconic comment, " Could anything be more like broken crockery ? "
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