book. It is like some dreadful liturgy of self-inflicted pain, set to measured music: and the cadence of that music becomes intolerable by its suave phrasing and perfect modulation. The last long chapter with its recurring themes is a masterpiece of prose, and in its way unique."
After that, there would seem to be no need for further comment on "The Hill of Dreams." But there is—there is!
Quite as important as what Mr. Machen says is his manner of saying it. He possesses an English prose style which in its mystical suggestion and beauty is unlike any other I have encountered. There is ecstacy in his pages. Joris-Karl Huysmans in a really good translation suggests Machen better, perhaps, than another; both are debtors to Baudelaire.[1]
The "ecstasy" one finds in Machen's work (of which more anon) is due in no small de-
- ↑ I have let this last assertion stand as part of the original article, although Mr. Machen writes me that I am in error. "I never read a line of Baudelaire," he says, "but I have read deeply in Poe, who, I believe, derives largely from Baudelaire." Of course, it is the other way 'round, Baudelaire derives from Poe, but my own assumption is rendered clear.—V. S.
