International studio (82.1925)

mceRHAcionAL

"THE SUGAR PLUM TREE" FROM THE EUGENE FIELD MEMORIAL BY EDWARD MCCARTAN

Sculptors through all the ages have been
fashioning into shapes the ideals of the scribe.
Stylus and chisel were the tools of kindred arts in
the days when priests held the key of the written
word. To the sculptor it was given to incise the
hieroglyph; to mould the symbol; and to make
visible and tangible the things of the scroll.
Allegory and fable he took from the vellum and
bodied forth so that men might see. Such was
the beginning of this new mission of sculpture as
the interpreter of the typed page.

As so many of the earlier American sculptors
studied abroad, they were more or less influenced
by the Greek and Roman spirit in all that they did
in the transmutation of literature into the evi-
dence of things not seen. Randolph Rogers,
going from a little New York village, became a
pupil of Bartolini in Rome, and as such was
steeped in the classic tradition. When Bulwer
Lytton's "The Last Days of Pompeii" was pub-
lished, Rogers was fascinated by this melange of
history, archaeology and fiction, and was led to
model his "Nydia, the Blind Girl," one of the
characters of that novel. The figure, leaning upon
the staff, in an attitude of groping forward, and
with the look of strain about the sightless eyes, is
indeed a pathetic one, as we see it to this day in
the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of
Art. Here is a bit of story-telling sculpture, a
blending of refined antiquity with the modern
historical romance, if we view it as visualized
literature.

Then there was another Rogers, named John,

who gave to us the vision of the book in his own
self-taught way. Perhaps he should not be
mentioned on the same day with his namesake of
the grandiose school, but if to do so be sacrilege,
make the most of it. Many of us remember those
beige groups of his, just about the right size to
fit into the gap between the lace curtains of the
front parlor window, and raised on the black
walnut tables just high enough for all the world to
see in passing. Perhaps the hue of unwashed wool,
or of putty, or whatever the color of the dun
medium may be called, is not especially alluring.
Undoubtedly, however, his works reveal a certain
human quality, one might say a literary or, at
least, a narrative feeling, which had its appeal in
the much assailed Mid Victorian era, and has even
in this century. There are collectors of Rogeri-
ana, and one museum especially, up Salem way,
has gathered some for cultured Massachusetts to
admire. Rogers was ambitious in his range of
authors, for more than once he essayed to inter-
pret Shakespeare, as, for example, the trial scene
in "The Merchant of Venice," where the fair
Portia outwits Shylock. Oue of the most popular
of his creations was the episode of the proxy
proposal made by Alden in behalf of the Captain of
Plymouth, which brought forth the reply, "Why
don't you speak for yourself, John?"

Probably no American poet ever touched our
hearts more deeply than did Longfellow, and
naturally the sculptor, in seeking for literary
themes, has found much in the poems of the
amiable bard of Cambridge, which he could

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