﻿* JAN 2 3 1921 * 



William De Morgan and the Gi 



Victorians 



By Will T. Hale, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of English, 

 Indiana "University 



As soon as the critics began their work on William De Morgan, 

 they discovered at once that he was a "belated Early Victorian". 

 "The most interesting phenomenon in recent fiction", observed 

 one of these, "is the recrudescence of the old-fashioned novel of 

 the Dickens and Thackeray type thru the single-handed efforts of 

 William De Morgan". 1 And another, speaking of him as if he 

 were a counterfeiter, declared, "He needs defenders. He writes 

 a novel according to the Victorian tradition, hardly as a master, 

 but as the cleverest of disciples." 2 



It cannot be. denied that in some important respects De Morgan 

 resembles the Early Victorians more closely than the writers of 

 today. 3 His novels have more pages than the general run of the 

 best-sellers — and this fact has proved a stumbling-block to most 

 of the reviewers. After some favorable criticism of Alice-f or- Short, 

 one of them has objected, "But the book contains five hundred 

 and sixty pages" 4 — as if the Supreme Court had definitely de- 

 cided the exact number of pages a book should contain. Another 

 has designated Somehow Good as "a long, leisurely, and garrulous 

 novel", and added that the author "does not seem to be aware 

 of the custom prevailing among the patrons of -free libraries of 

 selecting a book according to the number of quotation marks 

 seen on a page". 5 



Indeed, it must be confessed that none of this novelist's works 

 are suitable for those persons who must finish a book at one 

 sitting, and more appropriate literature could be suggested for 

 reading on the street cars or Pullmans. These wonderful books 



i Independent, Feb. 13, 1908, p. 369. 

 ^Literary Digest, Aug. 24, 1907, p. 272. 



3 This is not true in the case of An Affair of Dishonor, which, being a historical 

 romance, is essentially different from the rest of De Morgan's works. In this paper 

 this novel will not be considered except in those cases where it conforms to the rest 

 of the author's novels. 



*Athenoeuin, July 6, 1907, p. 10. 



^Independent, Feb. 13, 1908, p. 370. 



