E SIGNAL 303

THE DEVIL 311

EPIPHANY 321

IN THE WOOD 336

A FAMILY 343

JOSEPH 350

THE INN 358

UGLY 376

WORKS OF GUY DE MAUPASSANT

INTRODUCTION

BY

ARTHUR SYMONS

The first aim of art, no doubt, is the representation of things as they
are. But then things are as our eyes see them and as our minds make
them; and it is thus of primary importance for the critic to distinguish
the precise qualities of the eyes and minds which make the world into
imaginative literature. Reality may be so definite and so false, just as
it may be so fantastic and so true; and, among work which we can
apprehend as dealing justly with reality, there may be quite as much
difference in all that constitutes outward form and likeness as there is
between a Dutch interior by Peter van der Hooch, the portrait of a king
by Velasquez, and the image of a woman smiling by Leonardo da Vinci. The
soul, for instance, is at heart as real as the body; but, as we can hear
it only through the body speaking, and see it only through bodily eyes,
and measure it, often enough, only in the insignificant moment of its
action, it may come to seem to us, at all events less realizable; and
thus it is that we speak of those who have vividly painted exterior
things as realists. Properly speaking, Maupassant is no more a realist
than Maeterlinck. He paints a kind of reality which it is easier for us
to recognize; that is all.

Every artist has his own vision of the world. Maupassant's vision was of
solid superficies, of texture which his hands could touch, of actions
which his mind could comprehend from the mere sight of its incidents.
He saw the world as the Dutch painters saw it, and he was as great a
master of form, of rich and sober color, of the imitation of the outward
gestures of life, and of the fashion of external things. He had the same
view of humanity, and shows us, with the same indifference, the same
violent ferment of life--the life of full-blooded people who have to
elbow their way through the world. His sense of desire, of greed, of all
the base