ERS 404

ADVENTURES IN CRITICISM

CHAUCER

March 17, 1894. Professor Skeat's Chaucer.

After twenty-five years of close toil, Professor Skeat has completed
his great edition of Chaucer.[A] It is obviously easier to be
dithyrambic than critical in chronicling this event; to which indeed
dithyrambs are more appropriate than criticism. For when a man writes
_Opus vitae meae_ at the conclusion of such a task as this, and so lays
down his pen, he must be a churl (even if he be also a competent
critic) who will allow no pause for admiration. And where, churl or no
churl, is the competent critic to be found? The Professor has here
compiled an entirely new text of Chaucer, founded solely on the
manuscripts and the earliest printed editions that are accessible.
Where Chaucer has translated, the originals have been carefully
studied: "the requirements of metre and grammar have been carefully
considered throughout": and "the phonology and spelling of every word
have received particular attention." We may add that all the materials
for a Life of Chaucer have been sought out, examined, and pieced
together with exemplary care.

All this has taken Professor Skeat twenty-five years, and in order to
pass competent judgment on his conclusions the critic must follow him
step by step through his researches--which will take the critic (even
if we are charitable enough to suppose his mental equipment equal to
Professor Skeat's) another ten years at least. For our time, then, and
probably for many generations after, this edition of Chaucer will be
accepted as final.

* * * * *

And the Clarendon Press.

And I seem to see in this edition of Chaucer the beginning of the
realization of a dream which I have cherished since first I stood
within the quadrangle of the Clarendon Press--that fine combination of
the factory and the palace. The aspect of the Press itself repeats, as
it were, the characteristics of its government, which is conducted by
an elected body as an honorable trust. Its delegates are not intent
only on money-getting. And yet the Clarendon Press makes money, and
the University can depend upon it for handsome subsidies. It may well
depend upon it for much more. As the Bank of England--to which in its
system of government it may be likened--is the focus of all the other
banks, private or joint-stock, in the kingdom, and the treasure-house,
not only of the nation's g