Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848Various
General
Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 6 June 1848
Various
Literature -- Periodicals; Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals
It would be impossible in the space to which we are necessarily
confined, to do justice to Mr. Hudson's powers of analysis and
representation, as exercised through the wide variety of the
Shaksperian drama. The volumes swarm with strong and striking thoughts
on so many suggested topics, that it is difficult to fix upon any
particular excellence for especial praise. The first quality which
will strike the reader will be the author's opulence of expression and
profusion of wit. Analogies with him are as cheap as commonplaces are
to other men. He has no hesitation in announcing his analysis in a
witticism, and condensing a principle into an epigram. His page often
blazes and burns with wit. South, Congreve, and Sheridan are hardly
richer in the precious article. In Mr. Hudson, also, the quality has
an individual character, and is the racier from its genuineness and
from its root in his intellectual constitution. This wit is, perhaps,
the leading characteristic of his style, though his diction varies
sufficiently with the varying demands of his subjects, and often
glides from the tingling concussion of antithesis into the softest
music, or rises from sarcastic brevity and stinging emphasis into rich
and sonorous amplification. The analysis of Iago, and the analysis of
the Weird Sisters, indicate, perhaps, the extremes of his manner.
Throughout the volumes, whether the subject be comic or tragic,
humorous or sublime, there is never any lack of verbal felicities.
These seem to grow spontaneously in the soil of his mind; and there is
no American writer whose style is more wholly free from worn and
wasted images, phrases, and forms of expression. He is neither
mediocre in thought nor expression.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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