Excerpt from George Meredith: Novelist, Poet, Reformer But Meredith is not an author only: he is also a critic, and a critic of an unusually penetrative kind. The Essay on Comedy is universally recognised as a lasting contribution to literature; but from his articles in the Fortmkktb' Review, for the year 1868 alone, the truth may be gleaned as to the quality and range of his literary judgment. He had suffered too acutely him self at the hands Of reviewers to be in any danger of dismissing young writers' work on the grounds of mere personal distaste. His criticism is singularly sympa thetic and appreciative, but it is more. It is related to the possibilities Of his art and its whole body Of achieve ment: it abounds in illustrations drawn from the masters of literature. From these writings it is obvious that Meredith possesses a very delicate power Of literary discrimination, and any consideration Of his achievement must be based on a recognition of this, in spite Of the fact that he has laid himself open to the charge of being prolix and uneclectic in his work. The truth is that his great and multiform activity has obscured the single-mindedness Of his impulse, and it is this single-mindedness which needs to be recognised afresh by those who would estimate his power. Inter mittently, Meredith is a great artist; primarily and consistently, he is a moralist - a teacher. He has pondered on man and his destiny till his insight has perceived whole regions and vistas Of human possibility that as yet are untenanted, and he has made it the object of his existence to nerve his fellows to seize and enter on the fulness Of their inheritance. It may ap pear paradoxical that pages which would not have been published by lesser writers, should have found favour with an artist towering head and shoulders above any but the masters, but the explanation is simple enough. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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In this volume of selected letters of the novelist and poet George Meredith (1828-1909), the editor has included letters with such figures as Virginia Woolf (Stephen at the time), Paul Valery, Thomas Carlyle, Madame Daudet, Edmund Gosse, Alfred Tennyson, James Thomson and many others. The letters, most of them previously unpublished, reveal the myriad world of Meredith's life and thought. The selection includes the two earliest letters extant written by Meredith just after he had left Neuwied, his school in Germany. It also includes Meredith's first letter to Chapman & Hall concerning his project for the publication of his first volume of verse, and another Meredith wrote to the same publisher in connection with a cookery book which his first wife, Mary Ellen Peacock, was preparing for publication.