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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Masterpieces
of the masters of fiction
 This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away
or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License
included with this ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the
laws of the country where you are located before using this
eBook.

Title: Masterpieces of the masters of fiction

Author: William Dudley Foulke

Release date: February 1, 2024 [eBook #72848]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: The Cosmopolitan press, 1912

Credits: Andrés V. Galia and the Online Distributed Proofreading

Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced
from images generously made available by The
Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MASTERPIECES

OF THE MASTERS OF FICTION ***
 TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:
In the unformated text version Italic text is
denoted by _underscores_ and Small Caps are
represented by UPPERCASE words.

A number of words in this book have both

hyphenated and non-hyphenated variants. For the
words with both variants present the one more
used has been kept.

Obvious punctuation and other printing errors

have been corrected.

The original art cover has been modified and is

granted to the public domain.
MASTERPIECES OF THE
MASTERS OF FICTION
 OTHER BOOKS
BY

WILLIAM DUDLEY FOULKE

SLAV OR SAXON

LIFE OF OLIVER P. MORTON

MAYA (A Romance in Prose)

PROTEAN PAPERS

ANNOTATED TRANSLATION OF HISTORY

OF THE LANGOBARDS BY PAUL THE
DEACON

MAYA (A Dramatic Poem)

DOROTHY DAY
MASTERPIECES OF THE
MASTERS OF FICTION

BY

WILLIAM DUDLEY FOULKE

NEW YORK
THE COSMOPOLITAN PRESS
1912
 Copyright, 1912, by
William Dudley Foulke
MASTERPIECES OF THE
MASTERS OF FICTION
 PREFACE

A short time ago I determined that instead of taking up any new

works of fiction I would go over the masterpieces which I had read
long since and see what changes time had made in my impressions
of them. To do this I chose some forty of the most distinguished
authors and decided to select one story from each,—the best one, if
I could make up my mind which that was—at all events, one which
stood in the first rank of his productions. I determined to read these
in succession, one after another, in the shortest time possible, and
thus get a comprehensive notion of the whole. Of course under such
conditions exhaustive criticism would be out of the question, but I
thought that the general perspective and the comparative merits and
faults of each work would appear more vividly in this manner than in
any other way.

The productions of living authors were discarded, as well as all

fiction in verse.

Arranged chronologically, the selections I made were as follows:

1535 Rabelais “Gargantua”

1605-
Cervantes “Don Quixote”
1615
1715- Le Sage “Gil Blas”
1735
1719 Defoe “Robinson Crusoe”
1726 Swift “Gulliver’s Travels”
1733 Prévost “Manon Lescaut”
1749 Fielding “Tom Jones”
1759 Johnson “Rasselas”
1759 Voltaire “Candide”
1759-
Sterne “Tristram Shandy”
1767
“The Vicar of
1766 Goldsmith
Wakefield”
“The Sorrows of Young
1774 Goethe
Werther”
1787 Saint Pierre “Paul and Virginia”
1807 Chateaubriand “Atala”
1813 Austen “Pride and Prejudice”
1813 Fouqué “Undine”
1814 Chamisso “Peter Schlemihl”
“The Legend of Sleepy
1820 Irving
Hollow”
1820 Scott “Ivanhoe”
1827 Manzoni “The Betrothed”
1835 Balzac “Eugenie Grandet”
1841 Gogol “Dead Souls”
1845 Dumas “The Three Guardsmen”
1847 Brontë “Jane Eyre”
 1847 Merimée “Carmen”
1850 Dickens “David Copperfield”
1850 Hawthorne “The Scarlet Letter”
1852 Thackeray “Henry Esmond”
1852 Stowe “Uncle Tom’s Cabin”
1853 Gaskell “Cranford”
1856 Auerbach “Barfüssele”
1857 Von Scheffel “Ekkehard”
“The Romance of a
1857 Feuillet
Poor Young Man”
1857 Flaubert “Madame Bovary”
“The Ordeal of Richard
1859 Meredith
Feverel”
“The Cloister and the
1861 Reade
Hearth”
1862 Hugo “Les Misérables”
1863 Eliot “Romola”
“Crime and
1866 Dostoyevsky
Punishment”
1868 Turgenieff “Smoke”
1869 Blackmore “Lorna Doone”
1878 Tolstoi “Anna Karenina”
1883 Stevenson “Treasure Island”

I think I see many picking out here and there a name, and hear
them saying, “What a bad selection! Wilkie Collins ought to be in the
list rather than Charles Reade; ‘Vanity Fair’ ought to be in the place
of ‘Henry Esmond,’ ‘Waverly’ in the place of ‘Ivanhoe’,” etc., etc. But
if we except two or three names like Manzoni and Gogol, who are
not yet estimated at their full value by English and American
readers, I think common opinion will justify, in a general way, my
catalogue of authors, and I feel sure that the works chosen, if not
the masterpieces, are at least fairly typical of each.
 CONTENTS

PAGE

Preface 5
Rabelais “Gargantua” 11
Cervantes “Don Quixote” 16
Le Sage “Gil Blas” 25
Defoe “Robinson Crusoe” 36
Swift “Gulliver’s Travels” 39
Prévost “Manon Lescaut” 43
Fielding “Tom Jones” 45
Johnson “Rasselas” 49
Voltaire “Candide” 55
Sterne “Tristram Shandy” 60
Goldsmith “The Vicar of Wakefield” 64
“The Sorrows of Young
Goethe 72
Werther”
Saint Pierre “Paul and Virginia” 76
Chateaubriand “Atala” 79
Austen “Pride and Prejudice” 82
Fouqué “Undine” 93
Chamisso “Peter Schlemihl” 95
 “The Legend of Sleepy
Irving 99
Hollow”
Scott “Ivanhoe” 101
Manzoni “The Betrothed” 107
Balzac “Eugenie Grandet” 125
Gogol “Dead Souls” 130
Dumas “The Three Guardsmen” 132
Brontë “Jane Eyre” 134
Merimée “Carmen” 138
Dickens “David Copperfield” 141
Hawthorne “The Scarlet Letter” 150
Thackeray “Henry Esmond” 158
Stowe “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” 176
Gaskell “Cranford” 180
Auerbach “Barfüssele” 183
Von Scheffel “Ekkehard” 189
“The Romance of a Poor
Feuillet 192
Young Man”
Flaubert “Madame Bovary” 194
“The Ordeal of Richard
Meredith 196
Feverel”
“The Cloister and the
Reade 200
Hearth”
Hugo “Les Misérables” 209
Eliot “Romola” 215
Dostoyevsky “Crime and Punishment” 228
Turgenieff “Smoke” 231
Blackmore “Lorna Doone” 237
Tolstoi “Anna Karenina” 240
Stevenson “Treasure Island” 267
 GARGANTUA
FRANÇOIS RABELAIS

Coleridge classed Rabelais among the greatest creative minds of the

world, with Shakespeare, Dante, Cervantes, etc. Not many will be
found to-day who will agree with such an estimate. Rabelais himself
would perhaps laugh at it as heartily as he laughed at the vices and
foibles of his time.

“Gargantua,” a burlesque romance, is the biography of a good-

natured giant of that name, the son of King Grangousier, who is born
in a remarkable manner out of the left ear of Gargamelle, his
mother. The author expresses a doubt whether his readers will
thoroughly believe the truth of this strange nativity, but says that it
is not impossible with God, and that there is nothing in the Bible
against it. He cites the examples of other prodigies and declares that
he is not so impudent a liar as Pliny was in treating of strange births.
Then follow many absurd and farcical descriptions of the conduct
and apparel of the infant giant, his colors and liveries, his wooden
horses, and the silly instruction given to him by foolish sophisters. In
Paris he steals the bells of Notre Dame to adorn the neck of the
hideous great mare upon whose back he has travelled thither, and
Master Janotus is sent to him to pronounce a great oration,
imploring the return of the bells. This nonsensical speech is a
laughable potpourri of French, Latin, and gibberish. The bells are
returned, and now Gargantua submits himself to the government of
his new tutor, Ponocrates, who establishes a novel system of
instruction for his big pupil.

The book gives a detailed description of the ingenious division of

time made by this wise preceptor, so that every moment of the day
might be devoted to the acquisition of some useful branch of
knowledge.

A strife arises between the shepherds of the country and some cake-
bakers of the neighboring kingdom of Lerne. The cake-bakers, being
worsted, complain to Picrochole, their king, who collects an army
and invades the country of Grangousier, pillaging and ravaging
everywhere. But when the invaders come to steal the grapes of the
convent of Seville, the stout Friar John with his “staff of the cross”
lays about him energetically dealing death and destruction on every
side. Picrochole storms the rock and castle of Clermond, and news is
brought to Grangousier of the invasion. The good old king at first
tries to conciliate his neighbor, and sends him a great abundance of
cakes and other gifts, but the choleric Picrochole will not retire,
though he keeps everything that is sent to him. The Duke of
Smalltrash, the Earl of Swashbuckler, and Captain Durtaille persuade
him that he is about to conquer the world, and there is a long
burlesque catalogue of all the countries they are to subdue, after
which they will return, sit down, rest and be merry. But the wise
Echephron, another of the king’s counsellors, tells him that it will be
more prudent to take their rest and enjoyment at once and not wait
till they have conquered the world. Meanwhile Gargantua is sent
forth against Picrochole. The enemy’s artillery has so little power
against him that he combs the cannonballs out of his hair. Among
other episodes, he unwittingly eats up six pilgrims in a salad, but
one of them strikes the nerve of a hollow tooth in his mouth, upon
which he takes them all out again. They escape, and then one of
them shows the others how their adventure had been foretold by
the Prophet David in the Psalms.
There is much droll conversation at a feast given by Gargantua to
Friar John. The stout friar has many adventures, and plays an
important part in the attack upon Picrochole’s army, when the poor
choleric king flees in disguise and at last becomes a porter at Lyons.
Here he is as testy and pettish as ever, and hopes for the fulfillment
of a prophecy that he should be restored to his kingdom “at the
coming of the Cocklicranes,” who it seems could never come at all.

Gargantua proclaims amnesty to the vanquished, the spoil is divided

and Friar John rewarded by the establishment of the Abbey of
Theleme, which is filled with all beautiful things and inhabited by fair
knights and ladies who keep no hours nor vigils, take no vows, but
enjoy the delights of liberty under the rule, “Do what thou wilt,”
spurred by their own instincts to virtuous actions and with no
temptation to transgress the laws.

In a very attractive prologue to this strange medley, the author sets

our curiosity agog with the simile of a philosophical dog and a
marrow bone, telling his readers to break the bone and suck out the
allegorical sense “or the things proposed to be signified by these
Pythagorical symbols.” So the world has been trying very hard ever
since to guess whether Gargantua was Francis I of France or Henry
d’Albret of Navarre; whether Friar John was Cardinal Chatillon or
Martin Luther, or both together; whether Picrochole was Charles V or
someone else; whether the cake-bakers were Popish priests or
anyone in particular; and so on to the end of a very long chapter.
Certainly the personages described in this burlesque had to be
obscurely drawn in order to protect the author from the dungeon or
the stake. In one place Rabelais intimates that he did not mean
anything at all by his absurdities. “When I did dictate them I thought
thereon no more than you who possibly were drinking the whilst I
was. For in the composing of this very lordly book I never lost nor
bestowed any more nor any other time than what was appointed to
serve me for taking my bodily refection, that is, whilst I was eating
and drinking.” And indeed “Gargantua” is a work that, like the verses
of Ennius to which he alludes, smells much more of the wine than
the oil; for, with all its drollery, and occasional wisdom, there are
chapters which seem little less than the products of inebriety.
Moreover, the work is defaced, especially the earlier part of it, by a
mass of obscenity which is not to be excused either by the manners
of the time nor by the exigencies of the story.
 DON QUIXOTE
MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

Among works of prose fiction “Don Quixote” has undoubtedly the

most universal reputation. Mr. Henry Edward Watts, the latest and
best translator, considers it “the finest book,” and Justin McCarthy,
the recent editor of Shelton’s version, calls it “the noblest novel” in
the world. Probably this would be the verdict of a majority of the
best literary critics.

The Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance is more widely known and

recognized among mankind everywhere than any other single
character in fiction. And indeed there has never been any other
character more elaborately developed.

In the matter of plot, as well as personages, the scope of this work

is rather narrow. It is merely a series of adventures, and while the
priest, the barber, the bachelor, the duke, the duchess, and many
other persons appear incidentally, and while all of these are well
sketched, the work would be nothing except for the wonderful
sayings and doings of the mad knight and his squire. And the
contrast between the two sets forth in the strongest possible relief
the characteristics of each. Don Quixote, solemn, tall, lank, “with
cheeks that kissed each other on the inside,” and Sancho, short, fat,
round-bellied,—the knight filled with fine spiritual fire, his madness
enhanced by endless fasts and vigils; the squire sleeping, eating,
thinking of nothing but the facts of physical existence,—Don
Quixote, the dreamer, the idealist, the gentleman—for there is no
one trait which shines through all his madness as unmistakably as
his gentility; Sancho, a coarse, sensuous clod, an odd mixture of
simplicity and shrewdness, garrulous, full of proverbs, with a rustic
and very fleshly philosophy of his own, a squire who sometimes
cheats his master with false tales.

Don Quixote goes forth upon his battered Rocinante, to redress all
wrongs, actual or imaginary, to fight windmills, to engage in
desperate battles with flocks of sheep; to sail upon enchanted barks;
to fly through the air on a wooden horse; and perform a thousand
extravagances, travesties of the impossible prodigies recorded in
books of chivalry and enchantment.

The description of Don Quixote’s madness is masterly. His inability to

separate actual occurrences from the figments of his imagination
appears with wonderful power; for instance, in the scene of the
puppets, where he demolishes the apparatus of the show, and then
agrees to pay for the damage, and again refuses when the lady for
whom compensation is demanded has been already rescued, fact
and fancy contending with each other inextricably in his soul. As a
study in psychology, no character of fiction or drama outside of
Shakespeare is at all comparable to “Don Quixote.” Yet through all
his grotesque hallucinations appears his essential nobility. As Sancho
says of him, “He has a soul as clean as a pitcher. He can do no harm
to anyone, but good to all. He has no malice at all. A child might
persuade him it is night at noonday. And it is for this simplicity I love
him like my heartstrings, and cannot be handy at leaving him for all
the pranks he plays.” Thus do we love the simple-minded, even in
madness.

One of the clearest evidences of Cervantes’ genius is his power to

make even the vagaries of a madman so laughable. In any other
hands the adventures of Don Quixote would not be funny. I
remember once seeing a dramatic representation of the story, in
which Henry Irving impersonated the hero. It was well done, but it
was not amusing. The poor knight was so utterly wrapped in his
hallucinations that he was an object of pity rather than of laughter.
But in the novel itself the humor of Cervantes overcomes even our
sympathy. The wild reasoning of Don Quixote is often so irresistibly
absurd that his madness is forgotten. For instance, he does penance
in the Sierra Morena in honor of his Dulcinea, and proposes to
imitate Amadis and Orlando, who tore up trees by the roots, slew
shepherds, demolished houses, and performed a thousand other
extravagances. Sancho remarks that these knights of old had a
reason for their follies and penances, but that Don Quixote had
none, to which his master replies, “In this consists the refinement of
my plan. A knight errant that runs mad with cause deserves no
thanks, but to do so without reason is the point, giving my lady to
understand what I should perform in the wet, if I do this in the dry.”

The Spaniards say that “Don Quixote” is untranslatable. Of course a

masterpiece of this kind can not be enjoyed to the full, with all its
delicate aroma, in any other tongue, and in one sense it can not be
fully understood by any one who is not himself a Spaniard, who has
not the feelings, the surroundings, and perhaps the prejudices to
which the great book was addressed. But, judged by such a
standard, what masterpiece of past times can any of us fully enjoy?
In another sense, however, a foreigner can enjoy “Don Quixote”
better than a Spaniard; for some of its most characteristic features
are those which to one who lives amid the same surroundings will
pass unobserved. No one can judge of the perspective of a great
work unless he be far enough away to see it in its relations to the
rest of the world. In this larger sense, I think that Don Quixote can
be understood by an American of our century as well as by a
Spaniard of the time in which it was written. Something of the
details will escape him, but the beauty of the whole may be even
more apparent. The things that we lose in translation,—for instance,
the sonorous solemnity of the magniloquent diction of Don Quixote,
—are atoned for by the fact that Don Quixote himself is a more
distinctive type to us than he could have been to the people of his
own age and country.

I am not sure but that the Englishman or the American can grasp
the sum total of his qualities better through a good translation than
even in the original. The Spanish of “Don Quixote” is somewhat
archaic, and in places a little obscure, even to the most proficient in
the living tongue. So elusive is the pleasure which comes with the
dry humor of such a book that it must offer itself spontaneously, it
must fit the mood of the reader, it must be the luxury of an idle
hour, or much of the charm of it will escape. Therefore it is that I
have found in Shelton’s translation, and still more in the recent
rendering of Mr. Watts, a keener pleasure than I have ever been able
to dig out of the original mine.

“Don Quixote” is not without great faults. It was written carelessly.

This indeed often adds to the naturalness of the descriptions and the
situations, but the blemishes are sometimes self-evident and glaring.
For instance, after Sancho’s ass has been stolen by Ginés de
Pasamonte, the squire is represented, sometimes as walking,
sometimes as riding on the very animal he has lost. Some of
Cervantes’s commentators, like Clemencin, who are mathematical
rather than artistic in their criticisms, call our attention to the
numerous incongruities of this sort. But the greatest masters of
literature, even Homer and Shakespeare—have been guilty in the
same way.

Indeed, there is a good deal in “Don Quixote” which reminds one of

Shakespeare. Take for instance the following discourse between Don
Quixote and Sancho Panza:

“Prithee, tell me, hast thou not seen some comedy played
wherein are introduced kings, emperors, pontiffs, knights, ladies
and divers other personages? One plays the bully, another the
knave; one the merchant, one the soldier; others the witty fool
and the foolish lover; and, the comedy ended and their apparel
put off, all the players remain equal.”
 “Yes, marry have I,” answered Sancho.

“But the same,” pursued Don Quixote, “happens in the comedy

and commerce of this world, wherein some play the emperors,
others the pontiffs; in short all the parts that can be introduced
into a drama; but on reaching the end, which is when life is done,
Death strips all of the robes which distinguished them, and they
remain equal in the grave.”

“A brave comparison!” cried Sancho, “though not so new but that

I have heard it many and divers times, like that of the game of
chess,—how, so long as the game lasts, each piece has its
particular office, and the game being finished, they are all mixed,
shuffled, and jumbled, and put away into a bag, which is much
like putting away life in the grave.”

“Every day, Sancho,” quoth Don Quixote, “thou becomest less

simple and more wise.”

The passages in “Macbeth,” “Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve

of care,” and “The sleeping and the dead are but as pictures,” find
their counterparts in the following dialogue, in which Sancho says to
his master:

“I only know that while I sleep I have no fear, nor hope, nor
trouble, nor glory; and good luck to him who invented sleep, a
cloak which covers all a man’s thoughts, the meat which takes
away hunger, the water which quenches thirst, the fire which
warms the cold, the cold which tempers the heat; to end up, the
general coin with which all things are bought, the balance and
weight which levels the shepherd with the king and the fool with
the wise man. There is only one thing, as I have heard say, is bad
about sleep, and it is that it looks like death, for between the
sleeping and the dead there is very little difference.”

The great fault of “Don Quixote” is its excessive prolixity. Provided

the best parts might be selected, it would be a better novel if it filled
only half the space. The same moralizing by the knight and his
squire is too often repeated; the same proverbs come forth again
and again. This is the reason why the work is read far less at the
present time than it used to be. In these busy days there is not
much place for the four volume novel.

Then, too, the long episodes, the story of Cardenio, the tale of the
captive and of Impertinent Curiosity, would be better told as
separate narratives rather than as parts of a book with which they
have no proper connection. The introduction of such stories was one
of the tricks of the time, but it is an artistic blemish. On the other
hand, Cervantes’s use of the Moorish historian, Ben Engeli, is a
literary device admirably employed, and the point at which he first
introduces Ben Engeli’s narrative is a delicious satire upon a literary
trick common to novelists even of the present time. For it will be
remembered that the terrible conflict between Don Quixote and the
Biscayan was left suspended, as it were, in mid-air, each of the
mighty combatants having raised his sword and being prepared to
dash at the other, at which point the narrative was interrupted, the
author being unable to learn anything of the outcome of the fray
until he discovered in the Alcazar of Toledo the manuscript of the
Arabian historiographer.

“Don Quixote” has been the model upon which many of the best
works of fiction have been based. One can see distinct traces of
Cervantes’s methods in “Pickwick Papers.” There are undoubtedly
many points of difference between Mr. Pickwick and Don Quixote,
yet the points of resemblance are very clear; and Sam Weller
corresponds more nearly to Sancho than any character in modern
fiction. The lugubrious episodes in the “Pickwick Papers” are not
wholly unlike those in “Don Quixote,” and the solemnity of these
episodes furnishes the same contrast to the merry absurdities of the
narrative itself.

Ichabod Crane is in some respects a Yankee “Knight of the Sorrowful

Figure,” though devoid of the madness and of the high spiritual aims
of his Castilian prototype.
“Don Quixote,” like many other masterpieces, like the “Odyssey,”
“Hamlet,” “Paradise Lost,” and the “Divine Comedy,” falters a little at
the end. Cervantes was evidently in a hurry to finish it, and the
conversion of the knight upon his death-bed is somewhat sudden.
But the defects in this great work are (to use a very hackneyed
simile) like the spots upon the sun. It will always remain one of the
world’s greatest masterpieces.
 GIL BLAS
ALAIN RENÉ LE SAGE

If, as some say, the object of fiction is simply to amuse, no work of

fiction has better attained that object than “Gil Blas.” It is the
greatest and the most celebrated of that class of novels called the
novela picaresca, or rogue story, and consists of a succession of the
liveliest and merriest incidents, slenderly connected as parts of the
autobiography of a Spanish lackey, and narrated in a style that is a
model of luminous simplicity. The hero encounters every variety of
good and evil fortune, each following the other like the figures of a
kaleidoscope. From the moment when, as a simple youth, he is sent
forth into the world with a mule and forty ducats, he plunges into
the midst of ludicrous adventures. At the first town he entertains at
supper a parasite who calls him “the ornament of Oviedo,” “the torch
of philosophy,” “the eighth wonder of the world,” and who, after
gorging himself at the expense of the young student, laughs in his
face at his credulity. He is next decoyed into a cave of robbers,
where he is locked in and made to serve as the Ganymede of the
band, but before long he escapes and rescues a fair lady, Doña
Mencia, who gratefully gives him a thousand ducats and a valuable
ring. But he tells of his good fortune, and is fleeced of his money
and his ring in a confidence game skillfully played by one Camilla
and by Don Rafael, her pretended brother, acting in concert with his
own valet, Ambrose. In his misfortune he meets Fabricio, an old