ct. "Sapho" is the last of the great novels.

"L'Immortel" (1888) is a weak and unjust satire directed against the
French Academy. "Rose et Ninette" (1892) is a study of the evils of
divorce; "La Petite Paroisse" (1895), the only one of the novels with a
happy outcome, is a study of jealousy. In "Soutien de famille" (1898,
posthumous) two brothers are contrasted; the older, as a matter of course
recognized as the head of the family, is weak, and the younger is the real
"prop of the family."

Just after "Sapho" (1884) Daudet's health had begun to decline. Long years
of suffering follow, but, although in almost constant pain, the
indefatigable worker remains at his desk.

In "Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres" (1888) and "Trente Ans de Paris"
(1888) Daudet tells the story of his life and literary activity. It is
through these works that we become intimately acquainted with our author,
and we are not disillusioned. "Entre les frises et la rampe" (1893)
contains studies of the stage and its people.

* * * * *

Daudet claimed to be an independent,[1] and was indignant when an attempt
was made to class him with any school. He was certainly independent in his
youth, but in his second period, after the war, he became a realist with
Flaubert and Zola and an impressionist with Goncourt.

[Footnote 1: He consistently refused to have his name placed in candidacy
before the Academy. In a foreword prefixed to "L'Immortel" he declares:
"Je ne me presente pas, je ne me suis jamais presente, je ne me
presenterai jamais a l'Academie."]

It is, however, the southerner in Daudet that remains most pleasing. It is
in those works which are directly inspired by his native land of dreams
that he is most completely himself, and therefore most charming. It is
here that he discloses his kinship with Musset. With all the delicacy of
Musset and at the same time a saneness which Musset did not always
possess, what might he not have accomplished if he had only continued as
he began? Even as it is, the best Daudet is the young Daudet, the brother
of Musset. In his so-called great works, the long novels where questions
of the day are fearlessly treated yet never solved, the works which are
frequently considered his surest claim to immortality, we have an entirely
different Daudet, excellent of course, and strong too if you like, but not
the Daudet that nature had intended to produce.

Surely it would have been b