Synthesized answer
The assertion that understanding a nation’s “highest life” and “manners of thinking” requires knowing its great writers is explained by the text as follows: foreign travel “enlarges the mind” and “disperses its prejudices,” but it cannot alone make one acquainted with a nation’s inner character. For example, the text states that “no amount of travel can make us acquainted with Italy, while Dante, Tasso, and her great historians remain unknown to us” [1]. Similarly, “the upheavings of French Society and the mental characteristics of the nation cannot be comprehended without Voltaire, Molière, Rousseau” [1]. Thus, travel provides external observation, but great writers reveal the internal “national mind and its capabilities” [1].
The nature of the knowledge gained from writers is deeper than surface impressions. The text argues that a person who claims to know England “without knowing something of Shakespeare, Bacon, Milton” would have “but an imperfect idea of the national mind” [1]. Likewise, Spain is “not recognisable deprived of that noble figure of Cervantes, in whom lives the very genius of the nation” [2]. These writers have “expressed their highest life” and “formed” the…
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From the book
uaintance with their names, without much knowledge of their works, or their place in the literature of the modern world. The Classics of Italy, France, Germany, and Spain are nearer to us in time, and less separated in sentiment, than the still more famous Classics of antiquity; and if foreign travel is, as everybody allows, a great means of enlarging the mind, and dispersing its prejudices, an acquaintance with those works in which the great nations who are our neighbours have expressed their highest life, and by which their manners of thinking have been formed, cannot but possess equal…
ntal characteristics of the nation be comprehended without Voltaire , Molière , Rousseau , and other great names beside. Neither is Germany herself without Goethe and Schiller : nor Spain recognisable deprived of that noble figure of Cervantes , in whom lives the very genius of the nation. This great band it is our design to give such an account of as may bring them within the acquaintance of the English reader, whose zeal may not carry him the length of the often thankless study of translations, and whose readings in a foreign language are not easy enough to be pleasant.
the often thankless study of translations, and whose readings in a foreign language are not easy enough to be pleasant. We are aware that there are difficulties in our way in this attempt which did not lie in the path of the former Series, since in the section of the world for which we write there are many more readers of French and German than of Greek and Latin; but, on the other hand, there is no educated class supremely devoted to the study of Continental Classics, as is the case in respect to the Ancient; and even the greatest authority in the learned matter of a Greek text might be…
ote, something of how they lived, and more or less of their position and influence upon the literature of their country. The following volumes are in preparation for the Series of Foreign Classics for English Readers, and will be published at short intervals:— VOLTAIRE, by Col. E. B. Hamley, C.B. PASCAL , by Rev. Principal Tulloch . GOETHE , by A. Hayward , Esq., Q.C. PETRARCH , by H. Reeve , Esq., C.B. CERVANTES , by the Editor. MONTAIGNE , by the Rev. W. Lucas Collins , M.A. Foreign Classics for English Readers EDITED BY MRS OLIPHANT VOLTAIRE VOLTAIRE BY COLONEL HAMLEY PHILADELPHIA J.…
nchman only what he can; the one travels in a vast highway—the other marches in shackles, in a narrow and slippery path. "But we can never shake off the yoke of rhyme—it is essential to French poetry. Our language does not agree with inversions; our verses do not suffer the running of one into another—at least this liberty is very rare; our syllables cannot produce a sensible harmony by their long or short measures; our cæsuras and a certain number of feet would not suffice to distinguish verse from prose. Besides, so many great masters— Corneille , Racine , Boileau—have so accustomed our…
More questions about this book
- The editors distinguish between Ancient and Continental Classics, stating the latter are "nearer to us in time, and less separated in sentiment." How might this perceived proximity influence the *kind* of "enlarging the mind" and "dispersing prejudices" that the series aims to achieve for English readers, compared to the Ancient Classics series?
- The prospectus identifies a key challenge: the absence of an "educated class supremely devoted to the study of Continental Classics." How does the series' approach—targeting readers who find foreign languages difficult and translations "thankless"—attempt to overcome this obstacle, and what are the potential implications for the *depth* of understanding it can foster?
- Choose one author mentioned (e.g., Voltaire, Dante, Cervantes) and explain, as if to a peer, *how* their literary contributions specifically illuminate the "national mind and its capabilities" or "mental characteristics of the nation" in a way that simply knowing *about* the country would not.
- Beyond simply introducing names and works, what underlying belief about the role of literature in fostering international understanding or shaping collective identity is implicitly expressed by the editors' endeavor to connect English readers with the "great nations who are our neighbours"?