The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 4, April, 1852 — John Shaqi
The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 4, April, 1852Various
History
The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 4, April, 1852
Various
Art, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Science -- History -- Periodicals
As a prose writer, his vigorous, copious, and original ideas are clothed
in a manly, flexible, pure, and lucid style. His first production,
Martin Faber, succeeded Atalantis. It was the initial of a series of
tales, which we may describe as of the metaphysical and passionate or
moral imaginative class. These, with two or more volumes of shorter
tales, are numerous, and perhaps among the most original of his
writings. They comprise Martin Faber and other Tales, Castle Dismal,
Confessions, or the Blind Heart, Carle Werner and other Tales, and the
Wigwam and Cabin. There are other compositions belonging to this
category, and, it may be, not inferior in merit to any of these, which
have appeared in periodicals and annuals, but have not yet been
collected by their author.
The first novel of Mr. Simms belonged to our border and domestic
history. This was Guy Rivers; and to the same class he has contributed
largely, in Richard Hurdis, Border Beagles, Beauchampe, Helen Halsey,
and other productions. In historical romance, he has written The
Yemassee, the Damsel of Darien, Pelayo, and Count Julian, each in two
volumes. The scenes of the two last are laid in Europe. His romances
founded on our revolutionary history, are The Partisan, Mellichampe, and
The Kinsmen. In biography and history, he is the author of The Life of
Marion; The Life of Captain John Smith, founder of Virginia; a History
of South Carolina; a Geography of the same State; a Life of Bayard; and
a Life of General Greene.
It is impossible to enumerate accurately his poetical productions, as
many, published in periodicals, have never been printed together; but
the collection of his poems now in course of publication at Charleston,
will supply a desideratum to the lovers of genuine American letters and
art. Atalantis, Southern Passages and Pictures, Donna Florida, Grouped
Thoughts and Scattered Fancies, Areytos, Lays of the Palmetto, The
Cassique of Accube and other Poems, Norman Maurice, and The City of the
Silent, constituting distinct volumes, are, however, well known.
The orations of Mr. Simms, which have been published, comprise one
delivered before the Erosophic Society of the Alabama University,
entitled, The Social Principle--the true source of National Permanence;
another before the town council and citizens of Aiken, South Carolina,
on the Fourth of July, 1844, entitled, The Sources of American
Independence; and one delivered before literary societies in Georgia,
entitled Self-development.
As a writer of criticism, Mr. Simms is known by numerous articles
contributed to periodicals; by a review of Mrs. Trolloppe, in the
American Quarterly, and of Miss Martineau in the Southern Literary
Messenger (both subsequently republished in pamphlets, and received with
general approval), as well as by many others of equal merit--a selection
from which, wholly devoted to American topics, has been published in two
volumes, under the title of Views and Reviews in American History and
Fiction.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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