Wisdom on Mere Intelligence

One of the keenest critics and deadliest satirists this country has ever had was Frank Moore Colby (1865-1925). He was never, by the very nature of things, a popular writer. He was not even very well known to the supposedly discriminating readers or to the supposedly leading thinkers of his day. Besides teaching history and economics at a number of Eastern universities, and serving on the staffs of Harper’s, the Bookman, and the North American Review, he was editor-in-chief of The New International Encyclopedia and Year-Book. But his claim to my admiration and gratitude rests on three volumes of essays, criticisms, and satires—Imaginary Obligations (1904), Constrained Attitudes (1910), and The Margin of Hesitation (1921). And it is my considered hunch that these essays will continue to be cherished long after certain “major” bores of American literature are forgotten, or, if not forgotten, merely read out of a grim sense of academic duty.

Colby’s books (including the two-volume collection of his writings made by Clarence Day) have been my constant bedside companions ever since I stumbled on a dog-eared copy of Imaginary Obligations longer ago than I care to think about. And on several occasions during the past twenty years, I have had my feeble little say on Colby. But what brings him to mind at the moment is the recent celebration (or should I say cerebration?) of the 100th anniversary of Bernard Shaw’s birth—so portentously quiet in London, so galvanically loud in Chicago.

JC

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John Abbot Clark

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One of the keenest critics and deadliest satirists this country has ever had was Frank Moore Colby (1865-1925). He was never, by the very nature of things, a popular writer. He was not even very well known to the supposedly discriminating readers or to the supposedly leading thinkers of his day. Besides teaching history and economics at a number of Eastern universities, and serving on the staffs of Harper’s, the Bookman, and the North American Review, he was editor-in-chief of The New International Encyclopedia and Year-Book. But his claim to my admiration and gratitude rests on three volumes of essays, criticisms, and satires—Imaginary Obligations (1904), Constrained Attitudes (1910), and The Margin of Hesitation (1921). And it is my considered hunch that these essays will continue to be cherished long after certain “major” bores of American literature are forgotten, or, if not forgotten, merely read out of a grim sense of academic duty.

Colby’s books (including the two-volume collection of his writings made by Clarence Day) have been my constant bedside companions ever since I stumbled on a dog-eared copy of Imaginary Obligations longer ago than I care to think about. And on several occasions during the past twenty years, I have had my feeble little say on Colby. But what brings him to mind at the moment is the recent celebration (or should I say cerebration?) of the 100th anniversary of Bernard Shaw’s birth—so portentously quiet in London, so galvanically loud in Chicago.