The Vagabond in Literature

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION the vagabond element in modern literature
I	Explanation of the term Vagabond	3
	First note of the Vagabond temperament—restlessness
II	Second note of the Vagabond temperament—a passion for the Earth	4
	Compare this with a passion for Nature
	Browning—William Morris—George Meredith
III	Third note of the Vagabond temperament—the note of aloofness	6
	Illustrate from Borrow, Thoreau, Walt Whitman
IV	Bohemianism—its relation to Vagabondage	8
	Charles Lamb—a Bohemian rather than a Vagabond
	The decadent movement in Verlaine, Baudelaire
	The Russian Vagabond—Tolstoy, Gorky
V	The Gothic Revival and Vagabondage	12
VI	Robert Browning and his “Vagabond moods”	13
	Tennyson and William Morris compared
VII	Effect of the Vagabond temperament upon Literature	15
I WILLIAM HAZLITT
I	Discussion of the term “complexity”	19
	Illustration from Herbert Spencer, showing that complexity is of two kinds: (1) Complexity—the result of degeneration, e.g. cancer in the body; (2) Complexity—the consequent of a higher organism, e.g. dog more complex than dog-fish
	Complexity and the Vagabond—Neuroticism and Genius
	Genius not necessarily morbid because it may have sprung from a morbid soil. Illustrate from Hazlitt
II	Two opposing tendencies in Hazlitt’s temperament:	24
	(1) The austere, individualistic, Puritan strain;
	(2) The sensuous, voluptuous strain. Illustrations of each
III	The Inquisitiveness of Hazlitt	28
	No patience with readers who will not quit their own small back gardens. He is for ranging “over the hills and far away”
	Hazlitt and the Country—Country people—Walking tours
IV	The joyfulness of Hazlitt	31
	The joyfulness of the Vagabond a fundamental quality
V	The styles of Hazlitt and De Quincey compared	32
	The tonic wisdom of Hazlitt
II THOMAS DE QUINCEY
I	The call of the Earth and the call of the Town	37
	Compare De Quincey, Charles Dickens, and Elia
	The veil of phantasy in De Quincey’s writings seemed to shut him off from the outside world
II	Merits and defects of his style. Not a plastic style, but in the delineation of certain moods supremely excellent	40
	Compare De Quincey and Oscar Wilde
	Our Ladies of Sorrow and De Profundis
III	The intellectual grip behind the shifting phantasies	45
	De Quincey as critic and historian
IV	The humour of De Quincey—not very genuine page	48
	Witty rather than humorous
	Humour not characteristic of the Vagabond
V	De Quincey—Mystic and Logician	52
	The fascination of his personality
III GEORGE BORROW
I	Dreamers in Literature	57
	Romantic autobiography and Lavengro
	Borrow on the subject of autobiography
	The Celt and the Saxon in Borrow
	His egotism
	Little objective feeling in his friendships
	A self-absorbed and self-contained nature
	The Isopel Berners episode discussed
	The coldness of Borrow
II	His faculty for seizing on the picturesque and picaresque elements in the world about him	66
	Illustrations from The Bible in Spain
	Illustrations from Lavengro
III	Borrow and the Gypsies	75
	Mr. Watts-Dunton’s tribute to Borrow
	Petulengro
	Borrow’s faculty for characterization
	“How to manage a horse on a journey”
IV	Borrow and Thomas Hardy compared	82
	Both drawn to characters not “screened by convention”
	Differences in method of presentment
	Borrow’s greater affinity with Charles Reade
	His distinctive originality
	The spacious freshness of his writings
	In his company always “a wind on the heath”
IV HENRY D. THOREAU
I	Thoreau and his critics	89
	The Saxon attitude towards him
	The Walden episode
	Too much has been made of it
	He went to Walden not to escape ordinary life, but to fit himself for ordinary life
II	His indebtedness to Emerson	93
	His poetic appreciation of Nature
	Thoreau on “Walking”—compare with Hazlitt
	“Emersonitis”—examples
III	Thoreau and the Indians	97
	The Indians were to Thoreau what the Gypsies were to Borrow. But he lacked the picturesque vigour of Borrow
	His utterances on the Indian character considered
	Thoreau and civilization
	Swagger and Vagabondage
IV	Thoreau as a thinker	104
	His Orientalism
	“Donatello” (?)
	His power over animals
	Thoreau and children—his fondness for them
	This not an argument in favour of sociability
	Lewis Carroll
	The “unsociability” of the Vagabond in general, and Thoreau in particular
	Thoreau and George Meredith
	Similarity in attitude towards the Earth
V ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON
I	Romance—what is it?	117
	Its twofold character
	Romanticism analysed
	The elfish character of Stevenson’s work
II	The “Ariel” element in Stevenson predominant	120
	The “unreality” of his fiction
	Light but little heat
III	The Romantic and the Artist	123
	Blake—Shelley—Keats—Tennyson
	His ideal as an artist
	His courageous gaiety
IV	His captivating grace	126
	The essays discussed—their merits and defects
	His indebtedness to Hazlitt, Lamb, Montaigne
	His “private bravado”
V	The artist exemplified in three ways: (1) The maker of phrases; (2) The limner of pictures; (3) The painter of character. Illustrations	130
	Dickens, Browning, and Stevenson—their love of the grotesque
	Treatment of Nature in fiction from the days of Mrs. Radcliffe to the present day
	Scott—the BrontËs—Kingsley—Thomas Hardy
	Stevenson moralizes
VI	Is the “Shorter Catechist” element a weakness?	137
	Edgar Allan Poe and Stevenson
VI RICHARD JEFFERIES
I	Jefferies, Borrow, and Thoreau	141
	The neuroticism of Jefferies
	Distinction between susceptibility and passion
II	Jefferies as an artist	143
	He loved the Earth with every nerve of his body
	His acute sense of touch
	Compare with Keats
	Illustrations
	His writings, studies, and tactile sensation
	Their sensuous charm
III	His mysticism	148
	Illustration
	Compare with Tennyson
	Mysticism and hysteria
	The psychology of hysteria
	“Yoga” and the Sufis
	Oriental ecstasies and the trances of Jefferies
	Max Nordau—Professor William James
	De Quincey and Jefferies compared
IV	Differences between Thoreau and Jefferies	156
	Praise and desire alternate in Jefferies’ writings
	His joy in the beauty and in the plenitude of the Earth
V	Jefferies as a thinker	158
	“All things seem possible in the open air”
	Defect in his Nature creed
	His attitude towards the animal creation
	“Good sport”
	His democratic sympathies—influence of Ruskin
	His stoicism
	His pride and reserve
	Our indebtedness to him
VII WALT WHITMAN
I	The supreme example of the Vagabond in Literature	169
	Mr. Swinburne’s verdict
	Whitman the pioneer of a new order
	No question about a “Return to Nature” with Whitman
	He never left it. A spiritual native of the woods and heath
	Yet wild only so far as he is cosmic
	His songs no mere pÆans of rustic solitudes; they are songs of the crowded streets as well as of the country roads; of the men and women of every type, no less than of the fields and streams
	No quarrel with civilisation as such
	His “rainproof coat” and “good shoes”
	Compare with Borrow’s big green gamp
II	Whitman’s attitude towards Art	173
	Two essentials of Art—Sincerity and Beauty
	Whitman’s allegiance to Sincerity
	Why he has chosen the better part
	His occasional failure to seize essentials
	Illustrations of his powers as an artist
	“On the Beach at Night”—“Reconciliation”—“When lilacs last on the dooryard bloomed”
	Whitman’s utterances on Death
	Whitman’s rude nonchalance deliberate, not due to carelessness
	“I furnish no specimens”
	Whitman’s treatment of sea
	The question of outspokenness in Literature
	Mr. Swinburne’s dictum
	Stevenson’s criticism—“A Bull in a China Shop”
	“The Children of Adam”
	Merits and defects of his Sex Cycle
	Whitman and Browning
	The poetry of animalism
	Whitman, William Morris, and Byron
	Mr. Burroughs’ eulogy of Whitman discussed
	The treatment of love in modern poetry
	On the whole the defects of Whitman’s sex poems typical of his defects as a writer generally
	Characteristics of Whitman’s style
III	Whitman’s attitude towards Humanity	187
	His faith in the “powerful uneducated person”
	The Poet of Democracy
	Whitman and Victor Hugo
	His affection comprehensive rather than deep
	Mr. William Clarke’s eulogy discussed
	The psychology of the social reformer
	Whitman and the average man
	His egotism—emptied of condescension
	Whitman no demagogue—his plain speaking
	The Conservatism and conventionality of the masses
	Illustration from Mr. Barrie’s Admirable Crichton
	Democratic poets other than Whitman—Ebenezer Elliott, Thomas Hood, and Mrs. Browning
	Whitman’s larger utterance
	Whitman and William Morris compared
	Affinity with Tolstoy
IV	Whitman’s attitude towards Life	198
	No moralist—but a philosophy of a kind
	The value of “messages” in Literature
	Whitman and Browning compared
	Whitman and culture
	Whitman and science
	Compares here with Tennyson and Browning
	Tonic influence of his writings
	“I shall be good health to you”
	His big, genial sanity

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