The Story of My Life
pine needles, for it had not been used while my teacher was away. The
warm sun shone on the pine trees and drew out all their fragrance. The
air was balmy, with a tang of the sea in it. Before we began the story
Miss Sullivan explained to me the things that she knew I should not
understand, and as we read on she explained the unfamiliar words.
At first there were many words I did not know, and the reading was
constantly interrupted; but as soon as I thoroughly comprehended the
situation, I became too eagerly absorbed in the story to notice mere
words, and I am afraid I listened impatiently to the explanations that
Miss Sullivan felt to be necessary. When her fingers were too tired
to spell another word, I had for the first time a keen sense of my
deprivations. I took the book in my hands and tried to feel the letters
with an intensity of longing that I can never forget.
Afterward, at my eager request, Mr. Anagnos had this story embossed,
and I read it again and again, until I almost knew it by heart; and all
through my childhood "Little Lord Fauntleroy" was my sweet and gentle
companion. I have given these details at the risk of being tedious,
because they are in such vivid contrast with my vague, mutable and
confused memories of earlier reading.
From "Little Lord Fauntleroy" I date the beginning of my true interest
in books. During the next two years I read many books at my home and on
my visits to Boston. I cannot remember what they all were, or in what
order I read them; but I know that among them were "Greek Heroes," La
Fontaine's "Fables," Hawthorne's "Wonder Book," "Bible Stories," Lamb's
"Tales from Shakespeare," "A Child's History of England" by Dickens,
"The Arabian Nights," "The Swiss Family Robinson," "The Pilgrim's
Progress," "Robinson Crusoe," "Little Women," and "Heidi," a beautiful
little story which I afterward read in German. I read them in the
intervals between study and play with an ever-deepening sense of
pleasure. I did not study nor analyze them--I did not know whether they
were well written or not; I never thought about style or authorship.
They laid their treasures at my feet, and I accepted them as we accept
the sunshine and the love of our friends. I loved "Little Women" because
it gave me a sense of kinship with girls and boys who could see and
hear. Circumscribed as my life was in so many ways, I had to look
between the covers of books for news of the world that lay outside my
own.
I did not care especially for "The Pilgrim's Progress," which I think I
did not finish, or for the "Fables." I read La Fontaine's "Fables" first
in an English translation, and enjoyed them only after a half-hearted
fashion. Later I read the book again in French, and I found that, in
spite of the vivid word-pictures, and the wonderful mastery of language,
I liked it no better. I do not know why it is, but stories in which
animals are made to talk and act like human beings have never appealed
to me very strongly. The ludicrous caricatures of the animals occupy my
mind to the exclusion of the moral.
Then, again, La Fontaine seldom, if ever, appeals to our highest moral
sense. The highest chords he strikes are those of reason and self-love.
Through all the fables runs the thought that man's morality springs
wholly from self-love, and that if that self-love is directed and
restrained by reason, happiness must follow. Now, so far as I can judge,
self-love is the root of all evil; but, of course, I may be wrong, for
La Fontaine had greater opportunities of observing men than I am likely
ever to have. I do not object so much to the cynical and satirical
fables as to those in which momentous truths are taught by monkeys and
foxes.
But I love "The Jungle Book" and "Wild Animals I Have Known." I feel
a genuine interest in the animals themselves, because they are real
animals and not caricatures of men. One sympathizes with their loves and
hatreds, laughs over their comedies, and weeps over their tragedies. And
if they point a moral, it is so subtle that we are not conscious of it.
My mind opened naturally and joyously to a conception of antiquity.
Greece, ancient Greece, exercised a mysterious fascination over me. In
my fancy the pagan gods and goddesses still walked on earth and talked
face to face with men, and in my heart I secretly built shrines to those
I loved best. I knew and loved the whole tribe of nymphs and heroes
and demigods--no, not quite all, for the cruelty and greed of Medea and
Jason were too monstrous to be forgiven, and I used to wonder why
the gods permitted them to do wrong and then punished them for their
wickedness. And the mystery is still unsolved. I often wonder how
God can dumbness keep
While Sin creeps grinning through His house of Time.
It was the Iliad that made Greece my paradise. I was familiar with the
story of Troy before I read it in the original, and consequently I had
little difficulty in making the Greek words surrender their treasures
after I had passed the borderland of grammar. Great poetry, whether
written in Greek or in English, needs no other interpreter than a
responsive heart. Would that the host of those who make the great
works of the poets odious by their analysis, impositions and laborious
comments might learn this simple truth! It is not necessary that one
should be able to define every word and give it its principal parts
and its grammatical position in the sentence in order to understand and
appreciate a fine poem. I know my learned professors have found greater
riches in the Iliad than I shall ever find; but I am not avaricious. I
am content that others should be wiser than I. But with all their wide
and comprehensive knowledge, they cannot measure their enjoyment of that
splendid epic, nor can I. When I read the finest passages of the Iliad,
I am conscious of a soul-sense that lifts me above the narrow, cramping
circumstances of my life. My physical limitations are forgotten--my
world lies upward, the length and the breadth and the sweep of the
heavens are mine!
My admiration for the Aeneid is not so great, but it is none the
less real. I read it as much as possible without the help of notes or
dictionary, and I always like to translate the episodes that please me
especially. The word-painting of Virgil is wonderful sometimes; but his
gods and men move through the scenes of passion and strife and pity and
love like the graceful figures in an Elizabethan mask, whereas in the
Iliad they give three leaps and go on singing. Virgil is serene and
lovely like a marble Apollo in the moonlight; Homer is a beautiful,
animated youth in the full sunlight with the wind in his hair.
How easy it is to fly on paper wings! From "Greek Heroes" to the Iliad
was no day's journey, nor was it altogether pleasant. One could have
traveled round the world many times while I trudged my weary way through
the labyrinthine mazes of grammars and dictionaries, or fell into those
dreadful pitfalls called examinations, set by schools and colleges for
the confusion of those who seek after knowledge. I suppose this sort of
Pilgrim's Progress was justified by the end; but it seemed interminable
to me, in spite of the pleasant surprises that met me now and then at a
turn in the road.
I began to read the Bible long before I could understand it. Now it
seems strange to me that there should have been a time when my spirit
was deaf to its wondrous harmonies; but I remember well a rainy Sunday
morning when, having nothing else to do, I begged my cousin to read me a
story out of the Bible. Although she did not think I should understand,
she began to spell into my hand the story of Joseph and his brothers.
Somehow it failed to interest me. The unusual language and repetition
made the story seem unreal and far away in the land of Canaan, and I
fell asleep and wandered off to the land of Nod, before the brothers
came with the coat of many colours unto the tent of Jacob and told their
wicked lie! I cannot understand why the stories of the Greeks should
have been so full of charm for me, and those of the Bible so devoid
of interest, unless it was that I had made the acquaintance of several
Greeks in Boston and been inspired by their enthusiasm for the stories
of their country; whereas I had not met a single Hebrew or Egyptian, and
therefore concluded that they were nothing more than barbarians, and the
stories about them were probably all made up, which hypothesis explained
the repetitions and the queer names. Curiously enough, it never occurred
to me to call Greek patronymics "queer."
But how shall I speak of the glories I have since discovered in the
Bible? For years I have read it with an ever-broadening sense of joy and
inspiration; and I love it as I love no other book. Still there is much
in the Bible against which every instinct of my being rebels, so much
that I regret the necessity which has compelled me to read it through
from beginning to end. I do not think that the knowledge which I have
gained of its history and sources compensates me for the unpleasant
details it has forced upon my attention. For my part, I wish, with Mr.
Howells, that the literature of the past might be purged of all that is
ugly and barbarous in it, although I should object as much as any one to
having these great works weakened or falsified.
There is something impressive, awful, in the simplicity and terrible
directness of the book of Esther. Could there be anything more dramatic
than the scene in which Esther stands before her wicked lord? She knows
her life is in his hands; there is no one to protect her from his wrath.
Yet, conquering her woman's fear, she approaches him, animated by the
noblest patriotism, having but one thought: "If I perish, I perish; but
if I live, my people shall live."
The story of Ruth, too--how Oriental it is! Yet how different is the
life of these simple country folks from that of the Persian capital!
Ruth is so loyal and gentle-hearted, we cannot help loving her, as she
stands with the reapers amid the waving corn. Her beautiful, unselfish
spirit shines out like a bright star in the night of a dark and cruel
age. Love like Ruth's, love which can rise above conflicting creeds and
deep-seated racial prejudices, is hard to find in all the world.
The Bible gives me a deep, comforting sense that "things seen are
temporal, and things unseen are eternal."
I do not remember a time since I have been capable of loving books that
I have not loved Shakespeare. I cannot tell exactly when I began Lamb's
"Tales from Shakespeare"; but I know that I read them at first with
a child's understanding and a child's wonder. "Macbeth" seems to have
impressed me most. One reading was sufficient to stamp every detail of
the story upon my memory forever. For a long time the ghosts and witches
pursued me even into Dreamland. I could see, absolutely see, the dagger
and Lady Macbeth's little white hand--the dreadful stain was as real to
me as to the grief-stricken queen.
I read "King Lear" soon after "Macbeth," and I shall never forget the
feeling of horror when I came to the scene in which Gloster's eyes are
put out. Anger seized me, my fingers refused to move, I sat rigid for
one long moment, the blood throbbing in my temples, and all the hatred
that a child can feel concentrated in my heart.
I must have made the acquaintance of Shylock and Satan about the same
time, for the two characters were long associated in my mind. I remember
that I was sorry for them. I felt vaguely that they could not be good
even if they wished to, because no one seemed willing to help them or
to give them a fair chance. Even now I cannot find it in my heart to
condemn them utterly. There are moments when I feel that the Shylocks,