Modern Language Notes, Vol. 29: January, 1914 (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

Inhaltsangabe

Excerpt from Modern Language Notes<br/><br/>Then again, one may question the wisdom of so high-pitched a commentary applied to a linguistically easy work. Is not the standard of the former too high for students who have been carefully trained in simpler French dur ing one year at least? And if not, it might have been advisable to choose a work more ditti cult in character and of a higher esthetic value; in other words, one worthy of such admirable efforts. The foregoing remarks do not apply to the second story, J esas-christ en Flandre, one of Balzac's best shorter works. Two-thirds at least of it are excellent. The last third is open to criticism as having hardly any connection with the plot and as being full of obscure alle gory. Whatever one may think of the stories, there can be no doubt that the study of the notes will constitute a most salutary tonic to students of French, and a most wholesome stimulant to teachers using the book. Some will no doubt call these notes unduly full: 68 pages of small print for 115 of large  almost as much commentary as text. To be sure, the editor remarks in his preface that it will be an easy matter to advise the students what to study and what to omit, which, of course, dis arms the critic. Personally I do not like the practice, followed in both introduction and commentary, of quo ting in French, from critics, biographers, or the author himself, lengthy passages which are often more difficult than the story in hand. If they are intended as a help to the students, there is every reason to add explanations of the linguistic difficulties occurring in the passages. But a simpler way and one which would save time is to give such quotations in English.

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