PROF. KITTREDGE'S WORK PRAISED

In a review of recent books by noted English professors throughout the country. Professor Thomas M. Parrott, of the English Department at Princeton University, speaks most highly of Professor G. L. Kittredge '82, and his work on "Chaucer and His Poetry."

"The First book that occurs to me to mention is by the Harvard professor who is generally recognized as the Dean of American students of English, Professor Kittredge. His six lectures on Chaucer, delivered at Johns Hopkins University in 1914, have recently been published under the title of "Chaucer and His Poetry." It is, I think, hardly too much to say that this is one of the most interesting books on Chaucer that has ever appeared. Based upon profound and exact knowledge, it is as far as possible removed from pedantic scholarship. It is instinct throughout, with the liveliest enjoyment of Chaucer's art and its purpose is to impart to the reader something of the author's conception of Chaucer as 'the most modern of English poets and one of the most popular.' The style is that of a lecturer, lively at times almost colloquial, but always full of matter, fresh and stimulating. In the preface, Professor Kittredge acknowledges his debt to the work of other Chaucerian scholars 'in both hemispheres,' but there is perhaps no book on Chaucer which owes so little to the labors of other men. It has the true originality of the scholar who has so thoroughly assimilated all that has been done before him as to make it in the best sense a part of himself. The chapters deal with The Man and his Times; The Book of the Duchess; The House of Fame; Troilus; and The Canterbury Tales."