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Simeon |
Mosher, Thomas B. Foreword to A Vision of Love Revealed in Sleep by Simeon Solomon 1871. Portland, ME: T. B. Mosher Press, 1909, [i-ii], 64 pp.
We were, indeed, tempted to make use of an article by Mr. Robert Ross1 in this same tried and true expositor of literary excellence under date of Dec. 23, 1905, but with the Symonds causerie before us it was hardly worth while, seeing that Mr. Ross has no word which even remotely goes to explain the Vision. Other than a closing observation that it "ought to be republished along with Mr. Swinburne's noble eulogy"--we have now complied with the demand and await such reception as our British cousins sometimes extend to us--we are told nothing as to its history, if a privately printed volume of such obscurity and limited sale can be said to have had any history.
And for ourselves, having said what in brief the book means to us, we can do no more and no better than offer it untampered with, precisely as it came from the poet-artist's brain, in the hope that if admirers are few they are at least genuine; believing that those who truly care for rare and beautiful things will find in it far removed from the cark of commercialism such indubitable evidence of perfect loveliness as one seen abides forever.
T.B.M.
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In reprinting the entire text of Simeon Solomon's solitary contribution to literature we may well congratulate our readers that (in addition to Mr. Swinburne's essay given in The Bibelot, vol. xiv, pp. 291-316), we are able to append a contemporary review by John Addington Symonds, which for almost four decades has remained lying "out of sight out of mind" in the pages of the London Academy.
1 Inferentially, he does attempt to limn--some might maliciously say dislimb!--the artist. "Physically, he was a small, red man, with keen, laughing eyes." Again, "When I had the pleasure of seeing him last he was extremely cheerful and not aggressively alcoholic." It is to be hoped that Mrs. Ford who met and conversed with Solomon at a much later date will have something of more decided interest in her forthcoming Simeon Solomon: An Appreciation. By Julia Ellsworth Ford. With 21 illustrations. Quarto. ($3.50 net.) Edition limited to 300 copies. F. F. Sherman, 42 West 39th St., New York.