_A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man_ was so well reviewed in the April number of this paper that I might perhaps refrain from further comment. I have indeed little to add, but I would reaffirm all that I have yet said or written of the book, beginning in _The Egoist_, continuing in _The Drama_, etc. Joyce is the best prose writer of my decade. Wyndham Lewis’s _Tarr_ is the only contemporary novel that can compare with _A Portrait_; _Tarr_ being more inventive, more volcanic, and “not so well written.” And that last comparison is perhaps vicious. It would be ridiculous to measure Dostoevsky with the T-Square of Flaubert. Equally with Joyce and Lewis, the two men are so different, the two methods are so different that it is rash to attempt comparisons. Neither can I attempt to predict which will find the greater number of readers; all the readers who matter will certainly read both of the books. As for Joyce, perhaps Jean de Bosschère will pardon me if I quote from a post card which he wrote me on beginning _A Portrait_. It was, naturally, not intended for publication, but it is interesting to see how a fine piece of English first strikes the critic from the continent. “Charles Louis Philippe n’a pas fait mieux. Joyce le dépasse par le style qui n’est plus _le_ style. Cette nudité de tout ornement rhétorique, de toute forme idiomatique (malgré la plus stricte sévérité contre le détour ou l’esthétique) et beaucoup d’autres qualités fondamentales font de ce livre la plus sérieuse oeuvre anglaise que j’aie lue. Les soixante premières pages sont incomparables, ...” The “most serious”, or to translate it more colloquially: “It matters more than any other English book I have read”. De Bosschère has not yet published any criticism of Joyce, but he is not the only established critic who has written to me in praise of _A Portrait ..._ Joyce has had a remarkable “press,” but back of that and much more important is the fact that the critics have praised with conviction, a personal and vital conviction. 3 Certain Noble Plays of Japan. _Cuala Press, Dublin. 12 shillings._ Noh, or Accomplishment. _Knopf, New York, $2.75. Macmillan, London._