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William Dean Howells’ Debt to Tolstoy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Louis J. Budd
Louis J. Budd*
Affiliation:
University of Kentucky
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Extract

Most present-day American readers of Leo Tolstoy, though profoundly impressed by his works of fiction, are likely to ignore his religious and social treatises. They forget that Tolstoy's social ideas contributed to the stream of serious thought in the United States and impressed deeply such moulders of public opinion as Edward Everett Hale, Ernest Crosby, Brand Whitlock, and Clarence Darrow. The most eminent American admirer of Tolstoy was the novelist and essayist, William Dean Howells. Several writers have mentioned the intellectual bond between these two men. However, the profound impact and the lastingly detailed influence of Tolstoy's ideas on the thought of Howells have been seriously underestimated.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Slavic and East European Review , Volume 9 , Issue 4 , December 1950 , pp. 292 - 301
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies 1950

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References

1 See especially Althea Leah Bass, “The Social Consciousness of William Dean Howells,” New Republic, XXVI (April 13, 1921), 192, and Arms, George W., The Social Criticism of William Dean Howells (dissertation in manuscript, New York University, 1939), pp. 235–37 Google Scholar.

2 Howells, W. D., My Literary Passions (New York, 1895), p. 250 Google Scholar.

3 “Lyof N. Tolstoy,” North American Review, CLXXXVIII (December, 1908), 851–52. See also Howells’ letter to W. L. Phelps, dated March 4, 1910, which is reprinted in Phelps’ Autobiography with Letters (New York, 1939), p. 504.

4 “Lyof Tolstoi,” Harper's Weekly, XXXI (April 23, 1887), 299–300. See also “Notes,” Critic, n.s., IX (February 25, 1888), 96.

5 Quoted in “G.,” “Mr. Howells's Socialism,” American Fabian, IV (February, 1898), 2.

6 Quoted in Critic, n.s., XXX (October, 1898), 288.

7 [Kilmer, Joyce], “ ‘War Stops Literature,’ Says W. D.Howells,” New York Times, November 29, 1914, Section V, p. 8 Google Scholar.

8 Critic, n.s., XXIV (December 21, 1895), 426Google Scholar. See also Howells', Impressions and Experiences (New York, 1896), pp. 184–85Google Scholar.

9 Critic, n.s., XXX (October, 1898), 289.

10 Letter from Crosby, dated November 18, 1895, in the Houghton Library of Harvard University.

11 Critic, n.s., XXXI (January, 1899), 25. See also Aylmer, Maude, A Peculiar People: the Doukhobors (New York, 1904), p. 69 Google Scholar.

12 See Maude, Aylmer, The Life of Tolstoy (New York, 1910), II, 560 Google Scholar; White, Andrew D., Autobiography (New York, 1907), II, 82 Google Scholar; Lloyd, Caro, Henry Deniarest Lloyd (New York, 1912), I, 198–99Google Scholar.

13 [Kilmer, Joyce], “ ‘War Stops Literature,’ Says W. D. Howells,” New York Times, November 29, 1914, Section V, p. 8 Google Scholar.

14 Howells, Mildred, ed., Life in Letters of William Dean Howells (New York, 1928), I, 372 Google Scholar–73. Howells read Anna Karenina in a French translation.

15 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXII (February, March, 1886), 486, 808–9.

16 Williams, Charles R., ed., Diary and Letters of Hayes (Columbus, Ohio, 1922–26), IV, 327 Google Scholar. See Paine, A. B., ed., Mark Twain's Letters (New York, 1917), II, 491 Google Scholar.

17 “Lyof Tolstoi,” Harper's Weekly, XXXI (April 23, 1887), 299–300; “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 316–17.

18 Hale, Edward E., Jr., The Life and Letters of E. E. Hale (Boston, 1917), II, 327–28Google Scholar.

19 Ibid. See also Life in Letters of William Dean Howells, I, 416, 425, and II, 2, 48. When, in 1888, Hale wrote to Howells about a Tolstoy Club, the latter recommended his son John as one who had “read a great deal of Tolstoi, and has had much talked into him.“

20 Letter, dated November 2 1, 1887, in the H. D. Lloyd Papers in the library of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. For John Greenleaf Whittier's similar remark, see Mordell, Albert, Quaker Militant (Boston and New York, 1933), pp. 262–63Google Scholar.

21 See, for example, his unsigned review of Goldwin Smith's The Civil War in America in Atlantic Monthly, XVIII (August, 1866), 253

22 See Hale, Life and Letters of E. E. Hale, II, 327–28. See also “Editor's Study,“ Harper's Monthly, LXXV (August, 1887), 477–78.

23 Hellman, George S., ed., “The Letters of Howells to Higginson,” Twenty-Seventh Annual Report of the Bibliophile Society (Boston, 1929), p. 47 Google Scholar; letter dated September 28, 1888. See also “Lyof Tolstoi,” Harper's Weekly, XXXI (April 23, 1887), 299, and “Fxlitor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXII (April, 1886), 808–9; LXXVIII (May, 1889), 983; LXXXIV (March, 1892), 642.

24 My Literary Passions, p. 251; see also p. 257.

25 “Degeneration,” Harper's Weekly, XXXIX (April 13, 1895), 342. See also his “Lyof Tolstoy,” in Library of the World's Best IJterature (New York, 1897), XXV, 14986–88Google Scholar.

26 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXVIII (December, 1888), 159; see ibid., LXXIX (August, 1889), 479. See also My Literary Passions, pp. 226, 251, 257.

27 See Howells’ Introduction to Master and Man, A. Hulme Beaman, trans. (New York, 1895), pp. v-xv.

28 Ibid., p. xiv.

29 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 317; “Letters of an Altrurian Traveller,” Cosmopolitan, XVI (November, December, 1893), 115, 222, and XVII (September, 1894), 617.

30 A Traveler from Altruria (New York, 1895), pp. 287, 304Google Scholar.

31 “A Political Novelist and More,” North American Review, CXCII (July, 1910), 99. See also “Editor's Easy Chair,” Harper's Monthly, CXXX (March, 1915), 637.

32 Quoted in Critic, n.s., XXX (October, 1898), 288. See also “Editor's Study,“ Harper's Monthly, LXXVIII (May, 1889), 983.

33 “Editor's Easy Chair,” Harper's Monthly, CXXIX (November, 1914), 959 Google Scholar; see ibid., CXXII (March, 1910), 634. See also “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXVI (May, 1888), 966–67.

34 See the interview in Marrion, Wilcox, “W. D. Howelis's First Romance,” Harper's Bazar, XXXVII (June 16, 1894), 475 Google Scholar.

35 Hale, Life and Letters of E. E. Hale, II, 327–28. See Johnson, Clifton, “The Writer and the Rest of the World,” Outlook, XLIX (March 31, 1894), 580 Google Scholar. See also “Lyof Tolstoy,” Library of the World's Best Literature, XXV, 14985–86; A Traveler from Altruria, pp. 79–80.

36 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 316.

37 Ibid., LXXVIII (December, 1888), 158–59.

38 “Letters of an Altrurian Traveller,” Cosmopolitan, XVI (February, 1894), 425; “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 316; Introduction to Master and Man, p. x; The World of Chance (New York, 1893), p. 156.

39 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 316–17; LXXVIII (May, 1889), 983. See also My Literary Passions, p. 252Google Scholar.

40 My Literary Passions, p. 257; Van Wyck Brooks, “Mr. Howells at Work at Seventy- Two,” World's Work, XVIII (May, 1909), 11549.

41 See, for example, “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXIV (February, 1887), 485–86, and LXXV (July, 1887), 317; My Literary Passions, p. 256Google Scholar.

42 “Lyof N. Tolstoy,” North American Review, CLXXXVIII (December, 1908), 856. See also “Editor's Study,” Harpers Monthly, LXXVI (May, 1888), 966; My Literary Passions, p. 256Google Scholar.

43 Critic, n.s., XXX (October, 1898), 288; “Lyof Tolstoy,” Library of the World's Best Literature, XXV, 14988–89Google Scholar.

44 Tolstoy,”, “Lyof N. North American Review, CLXXXVIII (December, 1908), 851–52Google Scholar.

45 “ M y Favorite Novelist and His Book,” Munsefs, XVII (April, 1897), 21. See also his “ N e w York Low Life in Fiction,” New York World, July 26, 1896, Section II, p. 18.Google Scholar

46 Ibid., p. 19.

47 “Lyof Tolstoy,” Library oj the World's Best Literature, XXV, 14988–89. Arnold B. Fox, The Progress of Thought in Hoivells (dissertation in manuscript, New York University, 1947), pp. 84–87, argues in detail that Howells’ novels after 1886 showed a sharper and more positive moral tone.

48 “Lyof N. Tolstoy,” North American Review, CLXXXVIII (December, 1908), 851–52.

49 See the interview, “Mr. Howells on Realism,” New York Tribune, July 10, 1887, p. 2. See also Life in Letters of William Dean Howells, I, 405.

50 See “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXV (July, 1887), 316–17, and letter from Howells to E. L. Godkin, dated April 21, 1887, in the Houghton Library of Harvard UniversityGoogle Scholar.

51 Annie Kilbum (New York, 1888), pp. 65, 119, 164, 169–70, 233, 240–41, 283Google Scholar. For a full discussion of this novel, see Budd, Louis J., Hoivells's Relations with Political Parties (dissertation in manuscript, University of Wisconsin, 1949), pp. 367–74Google Scholar.

52 Life in Letters of William Dean Howells, I, 419.

53 “Editor's Study,” Harper s Monthly, LXXV (August, 1887), 478..

54 Ibid., LXXXI (October, 1890), 802; My Literary Passions, p. 252; “ Lyof Tolstoy,“ Library of the World's Best Literature, XXV, 14989–90.

55 “Lyof N. Tolstoi,” North American Review, CLXXXVIII (December, 1908), 851 Google Scholar. See also My Literary Passions, p. 252; The World of Chance, pp. 90–91, 306–7.

56 “Editor's Study,” Harper's Monthly, LXXVIII (December, 1888), 159–60. See ibid., LXXII (April, 1892), 806, for Howells’ review of Tolstoy's play which was translated as The Fruits of Culture.

57 “Editor's Easy Chair,” Harper's Monthly, CXXIV (January, 1912), 309.