SARA B. LAWTON WIGGINS ARAH BARNWELL ELLIOTT is a South Carolinian by descent, a Georgian by birth and a Tennessean by adoption. She is a daughter of the late Right Reverend Stephen Elliott, the first Bishop of Georgia, and a sister of the late Right Reverend Robert W. B. Elliott, the first Bishop of Western Texas. Her mother was Charlotte Bull Barnwell of South Carolina. Early in the seventies the family moved to Sewanee, Tennessee, where is located the University of the South, which her father helped to found. Miss Elliott was educated at home, studying occasionally under the professors at Sewanee. In 1886 she spent some time in Baltimore, studying under Dr. Bright of Johns Hopkins University. In 1887 Miss Elliott went abroad, where she spent a year traveling on the Continent, in England and in the East. In the autumn of 1895 she moved to New York, where she continued to live until 1902, usually returning to Sewanee for the summer months. With the exception of these years, Sewanee has always been her home. No one more than she has helped to create here an environment and atmosphere for the cultivation of the refined art of writing. A little log cabin, to the rear of her residence, has been her workshop for many years. Long ago it was dedicated to and named after 'Jerry,' the novel which brought her greatest fame. Miss Elliott is a member of the Colonial Dames, of the United Daughters of the Confederacy and of the Historical Society of South Carolina; also of the following clubs: Barnard and Wednesday Afternoon, in New York; and Lyceum, in London. Although Miss Elliott began writing as a child, before she was twelve years old, writing because she loved it, she published nothing until "The Felmeres,' which came out in 1880 (D. Appleton and Company). In this book the motif was faith; whether religious faith has to be cultivated as we cultivate the memory or imagination. It is one of the finest protests against narrow views of God and His Word. It is a strong, logical, touching, dramatic story-full of real, though slightly morbid power. The conclusion shows a little lack of art and some lack of truth to human nature. The resort to violence to solve a moral problem is not justifiable-nor is it necessary to the moral or the effect of the story. The religious argument, which would not have been misplaced earlier, rather interrupts the flow of the story and hurts its artistic effect, introduced where it is. It furthermore is too much on the order of a thesis, with an academic flavor. 'A Simple Heart,' which was published in 1886 (G. P. Putnam's Sons), is a valuable study as well as a beautiful and touching story-the story of a man who failed, always a pathetic subject, and made more pathetic because it was the man's success which wrought his failure. A simple-hearted carpenter in one of the rough towns of Texas, he became a preacher, till he raised the people to a level above his own, and then they cried out for finer manners, a handsome church and all which goes therewith. The humor in the little tale is as marked as the pathos, and while the whole is told realistically with no attempt at rhetoric or analysis, it forms an imaginative bit of insight into character and life which raises it far above the level of the commonplace. 'Jerry' was brought out as a serial in Scribner's in 1890-91, and at the end of the latter year was published by Henry Holt and Company. It was republished in England and Australia (James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Company), and translated into German. 'Jerry' was a rare success, satisfying expectations of author and publisher. It is a unique production, strong, masculine, with a deep purpose, a most remarkable grasp of affairs, a wide sweep, of great dramatic interest and power of characterization, with a rhythmical sequence which ends as a poem should end, righteously and in exact effect from such cause. It is conceived and constructed on the lines of a Greek tragedy with Jerry as the protagonist, all the other characters subordinated, an irresistible fate sweeping him on to his doom. As a story of life and customs in the regions where the scenes are laid it is excellent. It is as true as life, and as sad. It expresses two great truths in different ways: the deadening effect of money-getting, or of any mere petty ambition, to the moral nature; and the fact that in a man's development the passion of love does not necessarily play an important part. Political economy is substituted for love in guiding the man to his destiny. There are scenes which deserve to live forever, especially all the first part which deals with Jerry's childhood, the description of his finding old Joe's hoardings, and Joe's wanderings in the mine. The dialect is good, the English vigorous, the characters strong. The book could have been improved by condensation. The same year that 'Jerry' was published 'John Paget' was written. It was published in 1893 (Henry Holt and Company). This story. embodies the author's theology-the story of two brothers, the one brought up a Christian, the other an atheist. The development of these two characters and the play of each upon the other makes the story, which is laid in New York because it is the center of the American world, and of the Church's work. The growth of worldliness in the Church and the growth of unbelief are treated perhaps too didactically—perhaps with too much realism and pessimism. Too much sadness in art is not justifiable-there being too much in real life. Unbelief and worldliness are indeed evident facts, but the author's pictures are too dark; she should have let in more gleams of light, and not have left the saint discredited and discouraged and the sinner hopeless and triumphant. A year or two after this 'The Durket Sperret' came out in Scribner's as a serial and in 1897 was published in book form (Henry Holt and Company). 'As Others See Us' was the first name given by the author but it was changed to 'The Durket Sperret' upon the suggestion of the publishers. It is a powerful and pathetic mountain tragedy, marked by a freedom from the melodrama which occasionally mars the author's work. It is one of her strongest and best character sketches. In fact the characters seem to stand out until one can see them-leaving a very vivid impress on the mental vision. Especially noteworthy are the pictured scenes in the cove and on the mountain, in which one recognizes Sewanee, the seat of the University of the South, and one of the valleys below known as "Lost Cove." The charge of realism cannot with justice be brought against this book. The average human being has not the high ideals, ambitions and feelings of Hannah, who is in every sense of the word a true heroine, a noble and strenuous soul. And how often does one find a Dudley in the real world! The "sperret" of the Durkets and the nobility of Dock Wilson's character are happily portrayed. A clever short story entitled "An Idle Man" is included in this volume. 'An Incident and Other Happenings' is the title given to a collection of eight charming stories, published by Harper and Brothers in 1899, having previously appeared as short stories in Harper's and Scribner's-under the following titles: "An Incident," "Miss Maria's Revival," "Faith and Faithfulness," "An Ex-Brigadier," "Squire Kayley's Conclusions," "Without the Courts," "Mrs. Gollyhaw's Candy-stew," "Baldy." The volume created wide interest upon its publication by reason of the impressive way in which the author treated racial and social problems in the South since the war, and especially the subject of lynching. The artistic handling, the reticence, the condensation, the delicate pathos, the clear vision of character revealed in these stories give evidence not only of unusual talent but of genius. "An Incident" is on the whole the best piece of work the author has yet done. 'Sam Houston' was written for the Beacon Biography Series and was published in 1900 (Small, Maynard and Company). The little volume which the author dedicates to her brother, the late Right Reverend Robert W. B. Elliott, first Bishop of Western Texas, is just short of one hundred and fifty pages. To compress in so small a space the career and character of so unique a personage as Sam Houston was a difficult task. As the author says in the preface: "The life of General Houston was so full, so varied, so interwoven with public affairs that it has been exceedingly difficult to give in such small space even an outline of his career." It is evident that Miss Elliott has a thorough sympathy for Houston's fine, manly character, as well as a full understanding of the State and people he served so splendidly. She had posted herself on the history of the period and had made use of fresh manuscript materials bearing upon her hero's life, touching as it does on the questions of territorial expansion, of silver, and of the secession of the Southern States. Houston had spent the first part of his public life in Tennessee and the latter part in Texas, the State that he founded. Miss Elliott's long residence in Tennessee and frequent visits to her brother in Texas had afforded her exceptional opportunities for giving us an interesting account of Houston's life and activities, military, political, social and personal, and also a suggestive picture of the early days of Texas. She did her work well. The book is written in a very entertaining style and her narrative of Houston's part in the winning of Texas is most spirited. In 1901, just a year before Miss Elliott returned to Sewanee from New York, she wrote and published 'The Making of Jane' (Charles Scribner's Sons, In this she tries to work out in the person of Mrs. Saunders a perfectly self-centered character, whom many a reader will recall in real life. There are only four persons concerned in the working out of the plot; First, the heroine, Jane Ormonde, who is adopted into her cousin's family; second, Mrs. Saunders, the wife of this cousin, who thus becomes Jane's foster-mother; and finally, two young men, Mark Witting and Lawrence Creswick, both of whom are in love with Jane. In order to escape from under the thumb of a cold-hearted worldly woman who loves "society" better than anything else and who is scheming to marry her to the man whom she does not love, Jane leaves a wealthy home in New York and voluntarily returns to poverty and independence to find her lost self again. She goes to a little town away down South and teaches a private school; after a time she engages in business with great success-then returns to New York and marries the one whom she does love. A greater part of the story is worked out through dramatic incidents and there is presented a series of character studies of extraordinary human interest. The keen, subtle analysis of the character of Jane in childhood and wom anhood and of the dominating, tyrannical personality of Mrs. Saunders is a marked feature of a book which is admirably writtenwith many flashes of wit and humor, and with a deep note of sincerity running through it all. 'Jerry' and 'The Making of Jane' are Miss Elliott's two strongest novels-and yet, how different! The former is a man's story, the latter a woman's: the scene of the one is laid in a mountain and mining town and of the other in New York and Newport. About this time Miss Elliott made her first essay in the dramatic field, associating with her Miss Maud Hosford. Her play, "His Majesty's Servant," was presented by Mr. Lewis Waller at the Imperial Theater, London, October 6, 1904, was enthusiastically received and ran successfully for one hundred nights. The scene is laid in England in the last days of the Commonwealth, and the plots and intrigues which foreshadowed the restoration of Charles II give opportunities for some sensational scenes. It is a wholesome and hearty melodrama flavored with historical romance. Among the many short stories which Miss Elliott has contributed to various publications but which have never been collected and published in book form may be mentioned the following: In The Independent: "Stephen's Margaret," "Miss Eliza," "As a Little Child," "A Florentine Idyl." In Youth's Companion: "Beside Still Waters," "A Little Child Shall Lead Them," "The Opening of the Southwestern Door," "The Wreck." In Harper's Bazar: "Miss Ann's Victory." In The Smart Set: "What Polly Knew." In Book News: "Hands All Round," "Jim's Victory.” In The Current: "Jack Watson, a Character Study." In The Pilgrim: "Rest Remaineth." In Lippincott's: "Fortune's Vassals." In Harper's Magazine: "Hybrid Roses." In The Sewanee Review: "Ibsen." In The Outlook: "Spirit of the Nineteenth Century in Literature." Clever bits of verse have also appeared from her pen from time to time. Miss Elliott's foreign letters to the Louisville Courier-Journal were marked by a freshness of expression, an artistic catching of salient features, an utter absence of guide-bookishness which would entitle them to be considered as models of their kind. B. Lawson Wiggies. |