Moved one broken anchor, deleted other broken anchor's link as points to same page as previous link and doesn't seem to have a good section to link to← Previous revisionRevision as of 02:48, 20 October 2026 Line 34: Line 34: ''[[Kirkus Reviews]]'' asserted in 1935, "L. A. G. Strong can be counted on for a nostalgic picture of the call of the wild, and spins a good yarn as well." Garrett Mattingly, in ''[[Saturday Review (U.S. magazine)|The Saturday Review]]'', praises Strong's "clean, muscular prose" and the "astonishing variety of mood and incident" in a review of ''The Seven Arms'', saying that he "treats material which has become familiar, almost conventional, in the literature of the Celtic renascence with a freshness and power which makes it seem completely new and completely his own. ... He has been possessed by his material, and he has, in turn, completely possessed and mastered it." (The review includes a photograph of Strong.) ''[[Kirkus Reviews]]'' asserted in 1935, "L. A. G. Strong can be counted on for a nostalgic picture of the call of the wild, and spins a good yarn as well." Garrett Mattingly, in ''[[Saturday Review (U.S. magazine)|The Saturday Review]]'', praises Strong's "clean, muscular prose" and the "astonishing variety of mood and incident" in a review of ''The Seven Arms'', saying that he "treats material which has become familiar, almost conventional, in the literature of the Celtic renascence with a freshness and power which makes it seem completely new and completely his own. ... He has been possessed by his material, and he has, in turn, completely possessed and mastered it." (The review includes a photograph of Strong.) Strong enjoyed describing countrysides. He often dramatized the beginning and flourishing (and at times tragic ending) of romance between young people. For these reasons, among others, his fiction writing was sometimes considered [[Sentimentality|sentimental]]. This was a quality popular among readers, though not always among those critics who embraced [[Modernism|Modernist attitudes]], which could be [[Modernism#Counter consumerism and mass culture|contemptuous]] of popular literature and which was a forceful influence at the time. For example, a reviewer of an early novel, ''The Jealous Ghost'' (1930), the "story of an American who goes to visit for the first time his English cousins in the West Highland house where his ancestors had lived," judges that Strong's "feeling for 'the land' seems to be that of a tourist whose sensibilities are fluttered by views and sunsets," but who also concluded that in his talent "lies the possibility of a delicate comedy akin to that of [[Jane Austen]] or [[Henry James]]."{{cite journal |title= The Jealous Ghost |date= March 1931 |journal= [[The Bookman (New York)|The Bookman]] |pages= 83–84 |location= New York }} Mattingly shows hostility to sentimentalism twice in his review of ''The Seven Arms'' (as his own writing can wax sentimental, perhaps he slightly [[The lady doth protest too much, methinks|protests too much]], given the romantic qualities he admires), declaring of the heroine, "the splendor of her legend is a romantic figure out of a romantic time but a figure too robust for sentimental tenderness, too vital to be the focus of nostalgic revery" and adding that she is drawn "with sympathy and understanding but without sentimentality or exaggeration." Richard Cordell, reviewing ''The Open Sky'', likewise calls it "an exciting, unsentimental adventure." Strong enjoyed describing countrysides. He often dramatized the beginning and flourishing (and at times tragic ending) of romance between young people. For these reasons, among others, his fiction writing was sometimes considered [[Sentimentality|sentimental]]. This was a quality popular among readers, though not always among those critics who embraced [[Modernism|Modernist attitudes]], which could be contemptuous of popular literature and which was a forceful influence at the time. For example, a reviewer of an early novel, ''The Jealous Ghost'' (1930), the "story of an American who goes to visit for the first time his English cousins in the West Highland house where his ancestors had lived," judges that Strong's "feeling for 'the land' seems to be that of a tourist whose sensibilities are fluttered by views and sunsets," but who also concluded that in his talent "lies the possibility of a delicate comedy akin to that of [[Jane Austen]] or [[Henry James]]."{{cite journal |title= The Jealous Ghost |date= March 1931 |journal= [[The Bookman (New York)|The Bookman]] |pages= 83–84 |location= New York }} Mattingly shows hostility to sentimentalism twice in his review of ''The Seven Arms'' (as his own writing can wax sentimental, perhaps he slightly [[The lady doth protest too much, methinks|protests too much]], given the romantic qualities he admires), declaring of the heroine, "the splendor of her legend is a romantic figure out of a romantic time but a figure too robust for sentimental tenderness, too vital to be the focus of nostalgic revery" and adding that she is drawn "with sympathy and understanding but without sentimentality or exaggeration." Richard Cordell, reviewing ''The Open Sky'', likewise calls it "an exciting, unsentimental adventure." However, a critic who did care for this quality in Strong's fiction wrote of the 1931 collection ''The English Captain and Other Stories'' that "there is nothing ingenious or fanciful in his writing—which means that the emotion is always preferred before the form, not the form before the emotion; and that, I fear, is uncommon enough in the short stories of today. There is one piece in particular—Mr. Kennedy in Charge—which contains the virtues of all the rest; delicate perception of character, tenderness, vigour, and a sublimation of brute pain. It is a stupendous piece of imaginative writing."{{cite journal |date= September 1931 |title= The English Captain |journal= [[The Bookman (New York)|The Bookman]] |location= New York |page= 77 }} However, a critic who did care for this quality in Strong's fiction wrote of the 1931 collection ''The English Captain and Other Stories'' that "there is nothing ingenious or fanciful in his writing—which means that the emotion is always preferred before the form, not the form before the emotion; and that, I fear, is uncommon enough in the short stories of today. There is one piece in particular—Mr. Kennedy in Charge—which contains the virtues of all the rest; delicate perception of character, tenderness, vigour, and a sublimation of brute pain. It is a stupendous piece of imaginative writing."{{cite journal |date= September 1931 |title= The English Captain |journal= [[The Bookman (New York)|The Bookman]] |location= New York |page= 77 }} Line 103: Line 103: * "Don Juan and the Wheelbarrow," in ''John o' London's Weekly'', 11 July 1931; ''The Yale Review'', March 1932. Reprinted in: ''The Best British Short Stories of 1932'', edited by [[Edward Joseph Harrington O'Brien|Edward J. O'Brien]]. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1932. * "Don Juan and the Wheelbarrow," in ''John o' London's Weekly'', 11 July 1931; ''The Yale Review'', March 1932. Reprinted in: ''The Best British Short Stories of 1932'', edited by [[Edward Joseph Harrington O'Brien|Edward J. O'Brien]]. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1932. * "Harvest by the Sea, or Mr. Wacksparrow, Mr. Deebles and the Sea-Gull, a Story," in ''The [[Elizabeth II|Princess Elizabeth]] Gift Book, in aid of the [[Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children|Princess Elizabeth of York Hospital for Children]]'', edited by [[Cynthia Asquith]] & Eileen Bigland. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1935. * "Harvest by the Sea, or Mr. Wacksparrow, Mr. Deebles and the Sea-Gull, a Story," in ''The [[Elizabeth II|Princess Elizabeth]] Gift Book, in aid of the [[Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children|Princess Elizabeth of York Hospital for Children]]'', edited by [[Cynthia Asquith]] & Eileen Bigland. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1935. * "A Gift from Christy Keogh," in ''[[The Queen's Book of the Red Cross]]''. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1939. Reprinted in: ''[[Argosy (UK magazine)|Argosy]]'', vol. 3 No. 12 (New Series), January 1943. * "A Gift from Christy Keogh," in ''[[The Queen's Book of the Red Cross]]''. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1939. Reprinted in: ''[[Argosy (UK magazine)|1926]]'', vol. 3 No. 12 (New Series), January 1943. * ''The Doll''. Leeds, England: Salamander Press, 1946. (a tale of witchcraft) * ''The Doll''. Leeds, England: Salamander Press, 1946. (a tale of witchcraft) * "Let Me Go: A Christmas Ghost Story," in ''[[The Strand Magazine]]'', December 1946. Reprinted in: ''The Fireside Book of Ghost Stories'', edited by [[Edward Wagenknecht]]. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1947; ''Great Irish Stories of the Supernatural'', edited by [[Peter Haining (author)|Peter Haining]]. London: Souvenir Press, 1992 ({{ISBN|0-285-63107-1}}); and elsewhere. * "Let Me Go: A Christmas Ghost Story," in ''[[The Strand Magazine]]'', December 1946. Reprinted in: ''The Fireside Book of Ghost Stories'', edited by [[Edward Wagenknecht]]. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1947; ''Great Irish Stories of the Supernatural'', edited by [[Peter Haining (author)|Peter Haining]]. London: Souvenir Press, 1992 ({{ISBN|0-285-63107-1}}); and elsewhere.