BOOKS AND HABITS _from the lectures of_ LAFCADIO HEARN _Selected and Edited with an Introduction by_ JOHN ERSKINE _Professor of English Columbia University_ 1922 London: William Heinemann [Transcriber's note: Contents moved to precede the Introduction.] CONTENTS INTRODUCTION I THE INSUPERABLE DIFFICULTY II ON LOVE IN ENGLISH POETRY III THE IDEAL WOMAN IN ENGLISH POETRY IV NOTE UPON THE SHORTEST FORMS OF ENGLISH POETRY V SOME FOREIGN POEMS ON JAPANESE SUBJECTS VI THE BIBLE IN ENGLISH LITERATURE VII THE "HAVAMAL" VIII BEYOND MAN IX THE NEW ETHICS X SOME POEMS ABOUT INSECTS XI SOME FRENCH POEMS ABOUT INSECTS XII NOTE ON THE INFLUENCE OF FINNISH POETRY IN ENGLISH LITERATURE XIII THE MOST BEAUTIFUL ROMANCE OF THE MIDDLE AGES XIV "IONICA" XV OLD GREEK FRAGMENTS INDEX INTRODUCTION These chapters, for the most part, are reprinted from Lafcadio Hearn's "Interpretations of Literature," 1915, from his "Life and Literature," 1916, and from his "Appreciations of Poetry," 1917. Three chapters appear here for the first time. They are all taken from the student notes of Hearn's lectures at the University of Tokyo, 1896-1902, sufficiently described in the earlier volumes just mentioned. They are now published in this regrouping in response to a demand for a further selection of the lectures, in a less expensive volume and with emphasis upon those papers which illustrate Hearn's extraordinary ability to interpret the exotic in life and in books. It should be remembered that these lectures were delivered to Japanese students, and that Hearn's purpose was not only to impart the information about Western literature usually to be found in our histories and text-books, but much more to explain to the Oriental mind those peculiarities of our civilization which might be hard to understand on the further side of the Pacific Ocean. The lectures are therefore unique, in that they are the first large attempt by a Western critic to interpret us to the East. That we shall be deeply concerned in the near future to continue this interpretation on an even larger scale, no one of us doubts. We wish we might hope for another genius like Hearn to carry on the work.