All representative art, which can be said to
live, is both realistic and ideal; and the realism about
which we quarrel is a matter purely of externals. It is no
especial cultus of nature and veracity, but a mere whim of
veering fashion, that has made us turn our back upon the
larger, more various, and more romantic art of yore. A
photographic exactitude in dialogue is now the exclusive
fashion; but even in the ablest hands it tells us no more - I
think it even tells us less - than Moliere, wielding his
artificial medium, has told to us and to all time of Alceste
or Orgon, Dorine or Chrysale. The historical novel is
forgotten. Yet truth to the conditions of man's nature and
the conditions of man's life, the truth of literary art, is
free of the ages. It may be told us in a carpet comedy, in a
novel of adventure, or a fairy tale. The scene may be
pitched in London, on the sea-coast of Bohemia, or away on
the mountains of Beulah. And by an odd and luminous
accident, if there is any page of literature calculated to
awake the envy of M. Zola, it must be that TROILUS AND
CRESSIDA which Shakespeare, in a spasm of unmanly anger with
the world, grafted on the heroic story of the siege of Troy.
This question of realism, let it then be clearly understood,
regards not in the least degree the fundamental truth, but
only the technical method, of a work of art. Be as ideal or
as abstract as you please, you will be none the less
veracious; but if you be weak, you run the risk of being
tedious and inexpressive; and if you be very strong and
honest, you may chance upon a masterpiece.
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