Margaret Fuller Ossoli (Higginson)/American Men of Letters
American Men of Letters.
EDITED BY
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER.
A series of biographies of distinguished American authors, having all the special interest of biography, and the larger interest and value of illustrating the different phases of American literature, the social, political, and moral influences which have moulded these authors and the generations to which they belonged.
This series when completed will form an admirable survey of all that is important and of historical influence in American literature, and will itself be a creditable representation of the literary and critical ability of America to-day.
Washington Irving. By Charles Dudley Warner.
Noah Webster. By Horace E. Scudder.
Henry D. Thoreau. By Frank B. Sanborn.
George Ripley. By Octavius Brooks Frothingham.
J. Fenimore Cooper. By Prof. T. R. Lounsbury.
Margaret Fuller Ossoli. By T. W. Higginson.
IN PREPARATION.
Ralph Waldo Emerson. By Oliver Wendell Holmes.
Edgar Allan Poe. By George L. Woodberry.
Edmund Quincy. By Sidney Howard Gay.
Nathaniel Hawthorne. By James Russell Lowell.
William Cullen Bryant. By John Bigelow.
Bayard Taylor. By J. R. G. Hassard.
William Gilmore Simms. By George W. Cable.
Benjamin Franklin. By John Bach McMaster.
Others to be announced hereafter.
Each volume, with Portrait, 16mo, gilt top, $1.25.
“WASHINGTON IRVING.”
Mr. Warner has not only written with sympathy, minute knowledge of his subject, fine literary taste, and that easy, fascinating style which always puts him on such good terms with his readers, but he has shown a tact, critical sagacity, and sense of proportion full of promise for the rest of the series which is to pass under his supervision. — New York Tribune.
Mr. Charles Dudley Warner has made an admirable biography of Washington Irving, and his critical estimate of the man and the writer is unbiased, well weighed, and accurate. — Philadelphia Press.
It is a very charming piece of literary work, and presents the reader with an excellent picture of Irving as a man and of his methods as an author, together with an accurate and discriminating characterization of his works. — Boston Journal.
It would hardly be possible to produce a fairer or more candid book of its kind. — Literary World (London).
“NOAH WEBSTER.”
Mr. Scudder’s biography of Webster is alike honorable to himself and its subject. Finely discriminating in all that relates to personal and intellectual character, scholarly and just in its literary criticisms, analyses, and estimates, it is besides so kindly and manly in its tone, its narrative is so spirited and enthralling, its descriptions are so quaintly graphic, so varied and cheerful in their coloring, and its pictures so teem with the bustle, the movement, and the activities of the real life of a by-gone but most interesting age, that the attention of the reader is never tempted to wander, and he lays down the book with a sigh of regret for its brevity. — Harper's Monthly Magazine.
Mr. Scudder has done his work with characteristic thoroughness and fidelity to facts, and has not spared those fine, unobtrusive charms of style and humor which give him a place among our best writers. — Christian Union (New York).
This little volume is a scholarly, painstaking, and intelligent account of a singularly unique career. In a purely literary point of view it is a surprisingly good piece of work. — New York Times.
It fills completely its place in the purpose of this series of volumes. — The Critic (New York).
“HENRY D. THOREAU.”
Mr. Sanborn’s book is thoroughly American and truly fascinating. Its literary skill is exceptionally good, and there is a racy flavor in its pages and an amount of exact knowledge of interesting people that one seldom meets with in current literature. Mr. Sanborn has done Thoreau’s genius an imperishable service. —American Church Review (New York).
Mr. Sanborn has accomplished his difficult task with much ability. … He has told in an entertaining and luminous way the strange story of Thoreau’s remarkable career, and has expounded with much appreciative sympathy and analytical power the moral and intellectual idiosyncrasies of the most striking and original figure in American literature. — Philadelphia North American.
Mr. Sanborn has written a careful book about a curious man, whom he has studied as impartially as possible; whom he admires warmly but with discretion; and the story of whose life he has told with commendable frankness and simplicity. — New York Mail and Express.
It is undoubtedly the best life of Thoreau extant. — Christian Advocate (New York).
“GEORGE RIPLEY.”
Mr. Frothingham’s memoir is a calm and thoughtful and tender tribute. It is marked by rare discrimination, and good taste and simplicity. The biographer keeps himself in the background, and lets his subject speak. And the result is one of the best examples of personal portraiture that we have met with in a long time. — The Churchman (New York).
He has fulfilled his responsible task with admirable fidelity, frank earnestness, justice, fine feeling, balanced moderation, delicate taste, and finished literary skill. It is a beautiful tribute to the high-bred scholar and generous-hearted man, whose friend he has so worthily portrayed.— Rev. William H. Channing (London).
Mr. Frothingham has made a very interesting and valuable memoir, and one that can be read with profit by all aspirants for recognition in the world of letters. He writes affectionately and admiringly, though temperately. — Chicago Journal.
It is a valuable addition to our literature. The work was committed to a skilled hand, and it is executed with the delicacy of perception and treatment which the subject required. — Charleston News and Courier.
“JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.”
We have here a model biography. We venture to believe that the accuracy of its statements will not be challenged, its absolute impartiality will not be questioned, the sense of literary proportion in the use of material will be appreciated by all who are capable of judging, the critical acumen will be intensely relished, and to the mass of readers who care little for facts, or impartiality, or literary form, or criticism, the story of the life will have something of the fascination of one of the author’s own romances. For the book is charmingly written, with a felicity and vigor of diction that are notable, and with a humor sparkling, racy, and never obtrusive. — New York Tribune.
Prof. Lounsbury’s book is an admirable specimen of literary biography. … We can recall no recent addition to American biography in any department which is superior to it. It gives the reader not merely a full account of Cooper’s literary career, but there is mingled with this a sufficient account of the man himself apart from his books, and of the period in which he lived, to keep alive the interest from the first word to the last. — New York Evening Post.
Those who are not familiar with Prof. Lounsbury as an author will be surprised to find how well he writes. His style is admirable, — clear, pure, animated, and especially marked by the quality known best to the general reader as readable. He tells the story of Cooper’s life with an interest that never flags, and he invests it with an attraction that few would have supposed it to possess.— Boston Gazette.
*** For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by mail, post-paid, on receipt of price by the Publishers,
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., Boston, Mass.