George Wahr
Ann Arbor
Michigan
1911
For a good many years I have used this essay of Green's with anadvanced class in the theory of prose fiction. It has worked well. Italways arouses discussion, and in doing so it has the great virtue thatit imperiously leads the argument away from superficialities and centersit upon fundamentals. Its service as a stimulus to high thinking cannoteasily be overestimated. For any student, and especially for one who hasknown only the unidea'd criticism of fiction so popular today, it is afine thing to come in contact with a high-minded, sturdy, anduncompromising thinker such as Green is. As Green says of the hearer oftragedy, "He bears about him, for a time at least, among the rankvapors of the earth, something of the freshness and fragrance of thehigher air." I trust that this reprint, by making the essay more easilyaccessible than it has been heretofore, will help to raise the grade ofstudent thought and taste and criticism.
F. N. S.
University of Michigan
December 1, 1910.