Not so with Thackeray. Every reading reveals new beauties
of thought or style. An entire book has been made up of brief extracts
from Thackeray's novels, and it is an ideal little volume for a pocket
companion on walks, as Thackeray fits into any mood and always gives
one material for thought.
[Illustration: WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY A CARICATURE DRAWN BY
HIMSELF]
Of all Thackeray's novels _Vanity Fair_ is the best known and most
popular. It is a remarkable picture of a thoroughly hard, selfish
woman whom even motherhood did not soften; but it is something more
than the chronicle of Becky Sharp's fortunes. It is a panoramic sketch
of many phases of London life; it is the free giving out by a great
master of fiction of his impressions of life. Hence _Vanity Fair_
alone is worth a hundred books filled merely with exciting adventures,
which do not make the reader think. The problems that Thackeray
presents in his masterpiece are those of love, duty, self-sacrifice;
of high aims and many temptations to fall below those aspirations; of
sordid, selfish life, and of fine, noble, generous souls who light up
the world and make it richer by their presence.
Thackeray, in _Vanity Fair_, has sixty characters, yet each is drawn
sharply and clearly, and the whole story moves on with the ease of
real life. Consummate art is shown in the painting of Becky's gradual
rise to power and the great scene at the climax of her success, when
Rawdon Crawley strikes down the Marquis of Steyne, is one of the
finest in all fiction.
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