Abstract

Carl Van Doren

Ten years ago, when author Carl Van Doren set out to become a specialist in American literature, he seemed to many of his friends to be cutting off his future with an ignorant if not with a deliberate knife, much as if he were some improvident youth who had vowed, against all advice, to court Cinderella while she still huddled among her cinders. Commentators and interpreters being called for, Mr. Van Doren became one of them, and has ever since busily made hay under the unanticipated sun. The authors who mean enough to warrant criticism do not always reveal their meanings unmistakably. Their books have been conceived in passion and brought forth in enthusiasm, these at one period of growth and those at another, some successfully and some unsuccessfully.