Hergesheimer, Joseph: San Cristóbal de la Habana. N.Y., Knopf, 1920.
Mr. Hergesheimer, through his long years of literary apprenticeship and in his present period of remarkable popular success, has followed constantly the will-o'-the-wisp of style. Since his beginning twenty years ago, Mr. Hergesheimer's intention to supplement the world's supply of beautiful letters is something to be grateful for.
The writers of prose in America who have seriously and faithfully attempted to penetrate the mysteries of language with a view to the production of beauty can be numbered almost on one's nose. There are, perhaps, four or five. Mr. Cabell and Mr. Hergesheimer and Mr. Santayana (who, though not so much an inhabitant of the moon, writes beautifully) are among them.
"San Cristóbal de la Habana" is a departure from Mr. Hergesheimer's usual field of fiction. It is a study in style. Structurally and basically it is not narrative. It is a volume of emotional interpretation — of Mr. Hergesheimer and of Havana. He uses himself and the city as mannikins upon which to drape pages of English. And the book challenges consideration not so much for its content as for its intended manner. It is pretty surely a tour de force in beautiful letters. It is issued in a fancy cover from the press.
He almost proves his point. He almost proves that he is one of our best. But he has a long way to travel before he can arrive at an equivalent beauty to James Branch Cabell, George Moore, Lord Dunsany and even Hilaire Belloc. I am not at all sure that he will ever arrive at that. He certainly proves that he can write much better than most of his contemporaries. He shows a deliberate and intelligent artistry no less serious and high-intentioned than that of Hawthorne, James and Hearn. He shows extreme subtlety in the recording of sensation and of "San Cristóbal de la Habana," a consistent and conscious striving after beauty. If art is often successful. Lovers of words will find much to delight them in many a phrase, a picture, a sentence — in many places in this book. Remove Lafcadio Hearn, who is really not ours at all, and we have nothing in American literature in the same manner which surpasses it. If we have anything which equals it — I doubt it — in fact, as a "first edition," it leaves him at home.
And Mr. Hergesheimer is a master of language that is, as a study in style, in contemporary writing in America — a tremendous success.
But Mr. Hergesheimer, from the very nature of his approach to literature, particularly in this book, challenges comparison with the masters of the language — the stylists of all the golden ages, and in saying that "San Cristóbal de la Habana" is a thing of beauty, superior not only to a great many things that have been done recently and now being done in English — one is quite safe. Perhaps it is wanting. Perhaps it is a too careful and too meticulous attention to detail that mars the complete beauty which he desires. He is a better craftsman than Mr. Anderson or Miss Cather (who are apparently not interested in style at all). And the opening words of "San Cristóbal de la Habana" are words one cannot forget:
"There are certain cities, strange to the heart at the first view, nearer than —"
Note — This review of Pierre Louys' Aphrodite was submitted to the Editors by a gentleman locally connected with the turf. They consider it an adequate estimate of the discussed book.
My partner, Joe Goff, who also is a long follower of the sport for kings told me — "you pay good coin for what you call 'book reviews' — so I thought as I am with the dogs in New Orleans I could pick up a little extra jack by telling about a book I read called Aphrodite. And let me state right here and now it's some book; it takes the varnish off a hard-wood floor if ineptly applied. A Frog named Pierre Louys wrote it."
Well anyway, it seems there is this frail named Chrysis back in Alexandria, Egypt, when the world was yet a kid; she was known as a "priestess of Aphrodite," the God of Love. Nowadays there is no polite name for them, though about five years ago they were called white slaves. But Chrysis was no slave — she was a nifty little worker and all the high hats of Alex. would stroll by at a time ever what you might call lonesome, and pass the time of day as it were. Chrysis was not at the game a guy named Demetrios comes along.
Demetrios was the kind who has to beat 'em off with a stick. He was supposed to be brought to Alexandria from the way the women blocked his path, but at this stage of the time he had much to kick them away from the door-step — besides this he was the Queen's own special little man. This gives you an idea of what class Demmy ran in — and it was no wonder he had a swelled head, but he was loafing around looking like a million dollars. One night he was dolled up past her — she said there's nothing in her young life as long as Chrysis — so anxious; but a will steal three trinkets: a comb, a mirror and a pearl necklace — these had no value to Chrysis except as belonging to three other broads — and Demetrios, not too tickled over the idea but knowing you can't argue with a woman, said "All right."
Well, to make the story short, he cops the necklace and these two toilet articles, which the jane wears though she gets strung up by the authorities for her trouble, so the nearest Demetrios ever gets is to dream about it.
Of course, there is a lot more describing other "priestesses of Aphrodite" and the temple of the god and what went on inside, and this French stuff which seems to think as sweet a love story in The Ladies' Home Journal. I asked Joe what he thought about it. Joe was a rounder in his day but he didn't agree with this guy's line. "There is nothing beautiful about playing with those babies — all they want is your dough," he said.
I guess Joe is right; but whenever I hear one of those old dried-up "has-beens" that have long ago run their last race and should be put out to pasture, give advice to the young of the race, or put over one of those laws to enforce chemical purity the way they do, I think of what this Frenchman says in the preface:
"It seems that the genius of individuals is before races, like that of all sensual. All the cities which have reigned over the world — Babylon, Alexandria, Athens, Rome, Venice, Paris — have been the more powerful, the more licentious, as though their dissoluteness were necessary to their splendor. The legislator has attempted to plant artificially narrow and unproductive virtue — have been from the first condemned to absolute death."
This is a little past my speed; but in this Pierre Louys' dope, it don't look like America's nose in the cinch for the final sweepstakes.
One out of the several Southern poets whom Mr. H. L. Mencken overlooked, in his final estimate of the South's place in literature, is Mr. Maxwell Bodenheim. Under the caption "The Sahara of Bozart" in his "Prejudices; Second Series," Mr. Mencken says, referring to the South: "Down there a poet is almost as rare as an oboe player, a dry-point etcher or a metaphysician." We entirely concur with him. And he is as rare, likewise, "up there" and "out there" and "anywhere."
But Mr. Bodenheim, we insist, is one of these rarities despite the fact that he is so-called, newer experiments and other forms. In "Advice and Other Poems" (Alfred A. Knopf, 1920), he shows a decided advance over the craftsmanship of his first book, "Minna and Myself." Here we find him still evanescent, still fantastic, still bordering on preciosity, but beyond this something more, decidedly and distinctly the original artist. Observe the first poem in the book:
ADVICE TO A STREET PAVEMENT.
Lacerated grey has bitten Into your shapeless humility. Life has given you heavy stains Like an ointment growing stale. Endless roving feet Tap over you With a maniac insistence. Strew their hieroglyphics On your muteness. O unresisting street-pavement, Keep your passive insolence At the dwarfs who scorn you with their feet.
Note the crispness of the cadence, the lucidity of the picture. We lift this from page 30:
WHEN FOOLS DISPUTE.
A trickle of dawn insinuated itself Through the crevices of black satiation. The elderly trees coughed, lightly, hurriedly, In remonstrance against the invasion. Lean with a virginal poison, The grass blades shook, immune to light and time. A bird lost in a tree Shrilly flirted with its energy. One fool, in the garden, spoke to another.
In all, Mr. Bodenheim is a poet — not a singer, not a great poet, not exactly a satisfactory poet, but, nevertheless, a poet; and though we do not share the enthusiasm of his most ardent admirers, we do at least find in this little volume many strikingly symbolic passages.
Only one who lies upon his back Can disregard the stars.
Life — A whimsical jest At best. Death — Pardie, The ultimate drollery.
— Adapted from the Corsican