The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 17, 1898, Page 24

THE N FRANC ISCO CALL, SUNDAY, PRIL 17, 189S asseml , in Switzerland, a \d if possible which h been ations of From came notable meeting, Zionist Confer- ious as were the tongues v them they >ded not in solutions given to the great M : ¢ .?“"!1 esh .-l"i:““ ] an advocate or an opponent of the so- called Jewish state, but that concerns us not. He other claims on our at- tention. While yet a mere stripling he realized that the rose of romance can and does bloom in the raw air of ‘the poverty-stricken London Ghetto. He it was who recognized that the mere tear- ing down of the barriers of iron could not remove the restrictions placed around the Ghetto Hebrew by himself, and he even perceived & humorous side ISRAEL ZANGWILL, AUTHOR OF “DREAMERS OF THE GHETTO.” led by th 1aJ who called vish state t, these dre : younders of prob- othing. bated. The : v merely f the statement those of them among the ortho- 10t unto the s will, and | by | State study in pessim wrable only to the work of Henrik most depressing mood and 1 st note of despair at unattainable ideals and mbition: It is difficult to gather from Mr. nt work whether he is Eangwill's pres m, | to the dreary struggle for bread carried on daily within its confines. Nor was this all. With bitter irony he painted the Hebrew when he had grown gros! exhibiting the Jeshurun, waxed fat and kici merely aboration of the poor East Ender, and showed through him the fallacy of the theories advanced for the solution of the oft-mooted East End problem. Mr. Zangwill may or may not have intend- ed to act as an interpreter for his peo- ple in their variety; but unquestionably this is what he did in his first great book. As a result we were given a pic- ture of such lifelike fidelity and so full of the true spirit of humanity that the whole world was moved upon by it. “Dreamers of the Ghetto” is in the an | main a collection of sketches bio- graphically treated. They are written with all of Mr. Zangwill's descriptive power. Characters so different as Baruch, Spinoza, Heinrich Heine and | Zevi, the Turkish Messiah, are depicted | against_the back- round of the particu r environment that constituted th Ghetto of their periods and countries. Historical accuracy has been aimed at with considerable success, and, where possible, the sentiments expressed by the several characters hav: be | from their own writings. Some of the | stories, and those by no means of the | feelings and sentiments of his brethren | in faith. | fense he is well to the fore. tured her. Toward mid-day she rose and began mechanically preparing her hus- | band’s meal. At the precise minute of | fous e who had | 1 | least importarce, are pure fiction, but the one definite idea runs through them all, that the character of the Jew, whether he lived in the days of Ra- meses or in the days of Victoria, has | been influenced by practically the same forces and the same surroundings. Perhaps the most strikirg impression that will be gained by the Gentile reader of the work before us is that Mr. Zangwill has so much information, s0 many facts, so much lore touching Jewish matters, that he throws it out, spills it a perfect cataract with | foam and spray dashing .bout in the shape of description, analyses and dia- logue; till he is well nigh drenched in the torrent of his own eloquence. It has bee;. sald that no one can be- | come a capable biographer unless he have a great love or a great hate of his subject. Adapting this line of rea- soning to the author of “Dreamers Of | the Ghetto,” one is forced to conclude that there lives to-day no man better qualified to divine and transcribe the He possesses the great love of his race, tempered with due recogni- tion of its errors and shortcomings, and. when a voice should be raised in its de- | One of the most notable of the short stories in Mr. Zangwill's last volume is entitled “Joseph, the Dreamer,” and perhaps this is the one that has in- spired the prefatory pessimism, as well as the streak of that quality pervading the entire book. The scene is laid in the Ghetto of Rome at the time when | sufferance was. yet the badge of the Jew and its endurance was accompa- nied by the yellow outward mark. | Joseph, the son of Manasseh, has been to St. Peter's atttending the midnight His impressionable nature is aroused, and its restless cravings after spirituality are satisfied. He is anxious to imitate the Christ even to martyr- dom. His mother, good Jewess as she is, attempts reasoning without avail, and Joseph leaves to inform his father of his conversion. mass. 1 fro in an agony of apprehension. The den hours crept along. No one came, ther son nor husband. Terrible images of what was passing between them tor- ong habit he came. To her anx- e his stern face seemed more pallid than usual, but it revealed nothing. He washed his hands in ritual silence, made the blessing and drew a chair to the ta ble. A hundred times the question hov- ered about Rachel’s lips, but it was not year-| t{ll near the end of the meal that she ventured to say, ““Our son is back. Hast thou not seen him?"” “Son! What son? We have no son.” He finished his meal. Thus is Joseph sacrificed to what eventually proves to be a vision. Dis owned by his parents, it only remains for the inquisitorial Council of Sixty to render verdict and judgment, which it does swiftly. Joseph ben Manasseh was to suffer the last extremity of the Jewish law. All Israel was called together to the Templ An awful air of dread hung over the a: gemblage; In a silence as of the grave each man upheld a black torch that flared weirdly in the shadows of the | synagogue. A ram’s horn sounded shrill and terrible, and to its elemental music the anathema was launched, the ap- palling curse withdrawing every human right from the outlaw, living or dead, and the congregants, extinguishing their torches, cried “Amen And in a spirit- ual darkness as black, Manasseh tottered home to sit with his wife on the floor and bewail the death of their Joseph, while a death-light glimmering faintly swam on a bowl of oil, and the prayers for the | repose of the soul of the deceased rose passionately on the tainted Ghetto air. | And Miriam, her Madonna-like face wet with hot tears, burnt the praying-shawl she was weaving in secret love for the man who might some day have loved her, | ana went to condole with the mourners, | | holding Rachel's rugged hand in those | { o0 PRNnNNun be applied. beauty The most artistic thing is that RT should which, while being beautiful, is best fitted for its use. Too fre- juently the adjectives beautiful and ar- tistic are used as synonymous, where- as they have canings. The latter may include the former, but the form T without the latter. ay be very beautiful and yet of place, and therefore inar- For this reason decorative or that which adapts itself {o utility and considers its environ- ment—is more artistic than pictorial painting, which is absolutely individual and not relative to anything. All art fou its origin in utility. The t pict 1d sculptures were de- ed to tell stories, and at the same to decorate buildings, and while having a mission to perform were yet te to the structure of which A th out ting: subordi they were a part. A pictorial representation is apt to a solo port. Its reason for béing is its beauty, while a decoration be- longs to and acts as an accompaniment ul purpose. is designed to perform a ser- vi Its principal object is to adver- tise, and just so far as the method of advertising is subordinate to the ful- fillment of this purpose is it artistic. By advertising we wish to inform the world of the existence of a line of goods and herein set forth their good quali- i To do this it is necessary to at- ct attention, therefore the mode of ng must be attractive. word attractive the has also come to have the same meaning as beautiful, whereas it may mean just the rever for we are sometimes held by the of something very un- pleasan is as impossible to es- cay shrieking sound as it is from a shrieking color. The ear and the eye must r ive it, no matter how unwilling. In this great world of competition *h man f 5 it his business to use t such means of outwitting his com- petitors as will get him the attention ©* the public. and we thercfore are sub- ez nun every kind of advertising from the red or to monstrosity ranging vellow front of a building to the brutal jected and vulgar pos that cover the bill of questionable and unsightly goods in our shop windows. But there are some very beautiful means of advertising also, to many of the posters distributed about has exerted a wider influence In the di- rection of educational art than the pos- ter. It requires no mean ability to pro- duce a design that shall convey the de- sired idea in an attractive and beauti ful manner, and many of our very best artists have legitimately turned their attention to this new industry. The designs we see are varied in character, but, very much after the manner of the houses that are built or the bonnets that are constructed, they are apt-to be an expression of the thought of the patron rather than the idea of the artist, frequently resulting ucts. Now a design may be dignified or frivolous; it may be refined or the re- verse. It may attract by its beauty or through its appeal to the morbid and unhealthy qualities of thought. It may tell its story in good composition, skill- ful drawing and satisfying color, or it may viclate all principles of technique and be bizarre and gaudy. The poster of to-day generally aims to combine the language of words with that of form and color, and the suc- cessful poster is the one in which these two forms of expression supplement each other. To simply letter a crayon or oil por- trait, a landscape or flower study, when the picture used is unrelated to the let- fitness of design for a useful purpose and to degrade the art thus utilized. In looking over a collection of post- ers one naturally questions the artist’s motive in the use of certain elements, for very often the treatment of the sub- Ject may be allegorical and the forms involved symbolic. Much interest was manifested in the competitive designs exhibited at the Sketch Club a week ago. The board of managers of the Woman's Hospital offered a prize of $25 for the best and $15 for the second best design for a poster which should advertise the Por- IR AR AR R R AR A A AR PRIZE POSTERS for the ART EXHIBITION. PRRNRULUAURRIRRIIIRLINLLSR boards of our cities, and the display | which | our different stores testify, and there | is probably no factor of this time that | in very strange -~-d4 inconsistent prod- | tering, is but to evade the problem of | | LRBR | trait Loan Exhibition now Hopkins Institute of Art. " O ¢ the In studying these compositions one was forcibly impressed not only witn | the diversity of thought that one idea could suggest, but also with the di ferent styles of expression. | While some showed great imagination | on the part of the artist, others were | ;in)’ good examples of technical skill. | Some were decorative in conception and | handling, being simply rendered in flat | tones, in good color combinations, while | others did not quite reach this stand- | | ard of excellence. One fact was quite evident, and that was that the artist as a rule has little | | patience in mechanical work, such as is | required in lettering, and there were | i not a few cases where the spectator was permitted to supply deficiencies in this regard. The most beautiful design wa: | Miss. Louise Schwamm This vosms | woman has repeatedly given us exam- | ples of her ability, and it is gratifying | to see her produce something so excel- |lent. The two beautiful girlish faces profiled against a broken yellow back- ground are ably complimented in line and color in the violet irfs border above and in the olive-toned panel below. The decorative handling of the color scheme, which is that of contrasted harmony, and the thought suggested, make it well deserve the first prize which was awarded to it. The second-prize winner consisted of a sphinxlike portrait of a woman paint- ed in tones of blue green gray on a me- dallion, which made a pleasing contrast with the broken red background upon which was placed the lettering of the poster. The conception of the subject by which this talented young artist aimed to express womanly dignity, was handled with much feeling. Probably the most successful piece of applied design was a very interesting study in soft yellow grays, by Benja- min Armer, in which two figures repre- senting “Charity” were relieved against a pair of black wings and enclosed by some very pleasing conventional - mo- tives. Mr. Armer most surely has a feeling for breadth of line and symme- try of arrangement. His design was commended not only for its artistic qualities, but also for the excellence of its lettering. The choice of the designs among the members of the sketch club was one him, and lifting the head of the drawing a crucifix from cloak, the young mam announces him- self. hel sat on the floor and rocked to | | soft, sweet fingers that no lover would ever clasp. would not be comforted. But the dead Jew is resurrected in the living Christian. The oratory near the Ghetto. After his ac- ceptance of the monastic VOWs a Bnll‘, is Issued, making it incumbent upon the Jews to attend his sermons. Rows of the devout are painfully whipped toward the church door, and their SU\\?I‘| faces indicate the attention they are| giving to that strange institution, the Predica Coattiva. Alas! “Joseph the Dreamer” did not know that, adopting | **7 the whimsical device hit on by a droll, all these devout Hebrews had wadding stuffed deep into their ears! By and by carnival week arrives, and with it the Roman Hebrew touches the extreme of indignity, the Jews' race Six representative members of the He- brew community are compelled after a | pygrim hearty meal to run a race. To ac a squad of soldiers gallops at th heels. Noble sport, forsooth! specious pretext it is dec the runners to compete again, notwith- On a standing that a young Jew has been | tendered the pallio as winner of the contest. One of the runners has fallen of water, but no one stirs to give it to | old | Then | his | man, he finds that he is dead. beneath His self- It was the renegade. ) il ' EXH AN that received honorable 1 design of Miss Mabel J. W illiam: This beautiful product represents a well poised girlish figure standing rv;\uso(‘\-.l. ly in the middle of the picture, holding a portrait in her arms. The subject is decoratively treated in flat tones and the color scheme is much admired. Mrs. Arthur Mathews exhibited a very pleasing study in browns, repre- senting girl observing herself in a hand glass, while Mr. Joullin showed a head of woman worked in crayon, and Joseph Strong expressed his idea of what a poster should be in an oil portrait of a woman. Mr. Greenbaum exhibited two water color studies, one representing some people viewing an exhibition and the other the interior of a studio. Miss Helen Hyde contributed the study of a chubby little woman gowned in empire costume inspecting some pictures. This study W painted on vellum and was very pleasing in its monochrome color. Mr. Nappenback showed some very skillful drawing and some most excel- lent lettering in both of the studies he sent, while Robert McKee showed some very able pen and ink work in his two examples. Miss Nellie Treat contributed a very pleasing study of ‘an old-fashioned portrait, and Miss Kate Hall's pen and ink study of a woman looking through a lorgnette at some pictures is most excellent in its simple handling. Miss Mabel Downing’s black and white study called forth much favorable com- ment. Douglas McClees’ allegorical study had much in it to commend. The treatment of the background was es- pecially happy. The mass of rich blue most fittingly relieved a dainty line of white smoke that subtly wound its up- ward way. Mr. Raphael's design w.s much ad- mired and crnsiderable surpi..e was expressed that it did not receive some notice from the judges. It represents three beautiful figures grouped against a woodland background arranged in a series of three decorative panels. The design shows considerable conscien- tious thoug™t and effort. Probably the most artistic design was that entitled “The Town Crier,” by Edwin Arnold, a student at the art school. This is most “postery” inas- much as jt suggests the usual mode of advertising, printing, together with the consistent use of the materials from which a poster is made. It is modest, refined, dignified : nd excellent in technique. The color scheme is that of analogous harmony and is very sat- isfactory. In this design nothing of- fends and much pleases. Mr. Arnold’'s design was sufficiently appreciated by the judges to receive hounorable men- tion. K. M. B, | vain. But Rachel wept for her child and| scholarly | apostate is compelled to deliver ser-| mons during his novitiate n a large| ed to compel | un- | conscious. The young Hebrew who has | reached the goal first begs for a cup | 4 / BIT BENEFIT - CALIFRNIA sacrifice on two occasions has proved The Dominican Jew is tried and found guilty, and is condemned to the stake. We shall not quote Mr. Zangwill's powerful de stion of the Dreamer’s awful pun ., but we cannot for- bear reprinting at horrible drawing of Joseph’s father and mother celebrat- ing the execution. In the ho of Man Joseph, Musici. gmatic per- hand. And they n and woman with seh’ gravely handed fruits € to his guests, but the old motHer wrinkled face, the whole f from moment to moment by horrible laughter. peals Of a lighter kind, yet, having In its | composition a certain pathetic element, s the story entitled, “The Palestine Aaron, the peddler, a Russian celer- | exjle domiciled i 1 0 e o ed in Manchester, has by ate their pace, a mounted officer with | 2 dint of much self-denial ama pounds. He has no family, and deter- mines to spend the rest of his life in an attempt to establish a Jewish state in the Holy Land. He broaches the idea to his sociates, and he is laughed at. Nevertheless, he makes the journey. He is on the point of entering the port sed a few of Jaffa, and is in a transport of happi- ness at at last reaching the land of his fathers. Let the concluding para- graphs of the story tell what success this Dreamer of the Ghetto encoun- tered: He had one foot on the soil of the Holy Land, when a Turkish official in a shabby black uniform stopped him. FIRST PRIZE, BY MISS LOUISE SCHWAMM. rom a Sketch by Miss Louise Schwamm. The two beautiful girlish faces are profiled complemented in time and color in the violet iris border above and ground, ably in the olive-toned panel below, LESN 3 A sphinxlike portrait of a woman, painted in tones of blue-green gray //%%7//////////////7// ) / 7 PGRTRAIT EXHIBITION - CALIFGRNIA wo Lok Ry TR R SN A R “Your passport,” he said, in Arabic. | they my paren he mild 'n.:m of Aaron oould mot understand. Somebody | ness, the cicver, clear-headed, r interpreted. | disdaining Dut .\\'urzum. God bless ’f \T have nb passport,”” he answered, with [ No, my father was Germany, my mother a premonitory pang. was the Ghetto. “Where are vou going?” | The aut of “Dreamers of the +To live in Palestine.” | Ghetto”” has rafely shown his remark- Where do you come from?”’ A gland,” he replied, triumphar Rl o s Whosoever would know the throughout the worlc ANt 7 : ol Bt . ‘must ctudy this last w me—many )able :nterpreter. It is and a remark. lized said Aaron, when he Hebrew of the study of the attributes COUtIYIRan (aFe. ¥ ny la and under many con- SmAselen Those of the stories that can i?};‘dnn TR e sed under the head of pure fic- N | tion are the best of their kind. Russian Jews m: tine.” g Aaron was hustled back into the boat and restored safely to the steamer. | In another sketch Mr. Zangw | undertaken the responsible experiment of voicing the thoughts of Heine. Most ‘ of the monologye is striking, and shows | the remarkable power of Zangwill in| sympathetic imagination. We quote: | 1 am Spain, 1 am P . I am the North | Sea, 1 am the beautiful gods of old Greece, 1 am Brahma brooding over the sun lands, I am Egypt, I am the Sphinx. Ach, why was not 1 made four square HORT NOTES ABOUT AUTHORS. nRNRE S : out Stone & Co. r will have book th Herbert S. al” is its ti “A Realized Ic e. like Moses Mendels or sublimely | «gygene Field s Home,”” by ) one-sided, like Sav * * % Tofr3a Comstock Below, sister o! be Don Quixote and ho Panza IS | and member of the family for one, oh, what a traged * * * Ishould|pe published by E. P. Dutton & Co. this have loved to have been a Milton—like | month. one of your English cathedrals. * * =| Or one of your aristocrats with a stately home in the count: and dogs and hors Another volume from the indefatigable Andrew Lang! Mr. Lang said to have and a beautiful wife. In short,I should | Almost finished of . Seotjand, like to be your husband. Or, failing in | Which will be re P that, my own wife * * * whose idea of | time this autumn .. pa- | Mr. Rudvard Kipiing is credited with the completion of a new book to be called “The B the Sarah -Sands.” If present .ments hold good it will appear during the later spring. culture is cabbages. * My rents never understood me. Nay, were arran, Muller has been prepar- ing his writings for a uniform edit which Me: Longm: are to publish The v¢ nes will be ped monthly, be- ginning with the “Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion.” “The Chips From a German Wor "’ will run through four | volumes, while “The Science of Lan- gu ill fill two. | Thomas Wentworth Higginson has just corrected the final proofs of his “Tales | of the Enc s of the Atlan- | tie,” which will shortly be published by the Macmillan Company. The t will treat of the cycle of romance | wi the early and other tr: of the Wes of stamping distributin Apres: good writers tk Nine-tenths c select by me Is intere let a titla “it sticks impression be eu | better | The Com- n of W made by Miss F Jpropri- | ate Ina D. | work is « | of this St | the utilization | most e « issued t charming v 1s binding »m the publis oming Light pub- The objects of «.e 1 on its title page . woman and child, ally, to ed- mankind from animal- and to rais: ucate ism to Godhood, from limitation toliber 1d in € way to lividual a cial pment."” promoters The New Light" 2 ¢ against a broken yellow back- Mar rs to > int 1d illus ted nted ¢ BENIFIT MANS HOSPiTAL o AT THE 2 INSVITUTE »F ART Bl y £y ensne :'!4:‘":1.!5‘{" . 5 ‘ M EE T SUNERYS _ ’ SECOND PRIZE. Sketched by the Winner. on a medallion, which makes a pleasing contrast with the broken red background upon which is placed the lettering of the poster.