Page:EB1911 - Volume 19.djvu/870

 his very curious romance, Abenteuerliche Simplicius Simplicissimus, was printed at Mömpelgard in 1669. This is an account of the adventures of a simple-minded fellow during the Thirty Years War, and is a chain of episodes, brilliantly recorded, but hardly a novel. Early in the 18th century, an extraordinary number of imitations of Defoe’s great romance were published in Germany, and these are known to scholars as the Robinsonaden. Later on, Wieland imitated Don Quixote, but the earliest German novel which possesses original value is the celebrated work of Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774). The still more celebrated Wilhelm Meister did not appear until 1796. A third novel, Elective Affinities, was published by Goethe in 1809. Meanwhile, a very characteristic group of picturesque stories had been issued by Johann Paul Richter (Jean Paul) (1763–1825), destined to have a wide influence upon romantic literature throughout Europe. Purely romantic were the stories of Tieck, of Brentano, of Arnim, of Fouqué, of Kleist, of Immermann. The German novelists of this period wrote like poets, deprived of the discipline of verse. In later times novels of high merit have been written by Gustav Freytag, Wilibald Alexis (1798–1871), called the German Walter Scott, Laube, Fontane, Ebers, Jeremias Gotthelf, Berthold Auerbach, Spielhagen, Heyse and many others, but the 19th century produced no German novelist of commanding originality.

13. Russia.—In Russia alone, among the countries of central and eastern Europe, the novel has developed with a radical originality. Until the second quarter of the 19th century the prose fiction of Russia was confined to imitators of Sir Walter Scott, but about the year 1834 Gogol (1809–1852) began to revolt against the historico-romantic school and to produce stories in which an almost savage realism was curiously blended with the Slavonic dreaminess and melancholy. Since then the Russian novel has consistently been the novel of resignation and pity, but wholly divorced from sentimentality. Gogol was succeeded by Gontcharov, Tourgéniev, Dostoievski, Pissemski (1820–1881) and Tolstoi, forming the most consistent and, doubtless, the most powerful school of novelists which Europe saw in the 19th century. The influence of these writers on the rest of the world was immense, and even in England, where it was least acutely felt, it was significant. That the Russians have indicated the path to new fields in the somewhat outworn province of novel-writing is abundantly manifest.

14. Oriental.—In a primitive form, the novel has long been cultivated in Asia. It was introduced into China, but whence is unknown, in the 13th century, and Le Kuan-chung was the first Chinese novelist. The productions of this writer and of his followers are tales of bloody warfare, or record the adventures of travellers. The novel called The Twice-Flowering Plum-Trees, belonging to the 16th (or 17th) century, is a typical example of the moral Chinese novel, written with a virtuous purpose. Professor Giles holds that the novel of China reached its highest point of development in The Dream of the Red Chamber, an anonymous story of the end of the 17th century; this is a panorama of Chinese social life, “worked out with a completeness worthy of Fielding.” Prose stories began to be met with in the literature of Japan early in the 10th century. But the inventor of the Japanese novel was a woman of genius, Murasaki no Shikibu, whose Genji Monogatari has been compared to the writings of Richardson; it was finished in 1004 and may, therefore, be considered the oldest novel in the world. This book, which is one of the great classics of Japan, was widely imitated. After the classic period novel-writing was long neglected in Japan, but the humours of 17th-century life were successfully translated into popular fiction by Saikaku (1641–1693), and later by Jisho and Kiseki, who collaborated in a great number of remarkable stories.

 NOVELDA, a town of E. Spain, in the province of Alicante; on the right bank of the river Vinalopó, and on the railway from Madrid to Alicante. Pop. (1900) 11,388. The country around is flat and fertile, producing much wine, dates, oranges, oil, saffron and aniseed. In the town there are tanneries, and manufactures of alcohol, chocolate and soap. The women make fine lace. In the neighbouring village of Salinetas de Elda there are warm sulphur and saline baths.

NOVELLI, ERMETE (1851–), Italian actor and playwright, was born in Lucca on the 5th of March 1851, the son of a prompter. He made his first appearance in 1866, and played character and leading comedy parts in the best companies between 1871 and 1884. By 1885 he had his own company, and made a great success in Paris in 1898 and 1902. He established in Rome in 1900 a new theatre, the Casa di Goldoni, on the lines of the Comédie Française. He dramatized Gaboriau’s Monsieur Lecoq, and alone or in collaboration wrote several comedies and many monologues.

NOVELLO, VINCENT (1781–1861), English musician, son of an Italian who married an English wife, was born in London on the 6th of September 1781. As a boy, he was a chorister at the Sardinian chapel in Duke Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields, where he learnt the organ; and from 1796 to 1822 he became in succession organist of the Sardinian, Spanish (in Manchester Square) and Portuguese (in South Street, Grosvenor Square) chapels, and from 1840 to 1843 of St Mary’s chapel, Moorfields. He was an original member of the Philharmonic Society, of the Classical Harmonists and of the Choral Harmonists, officiating frequently as conductor. In 1849 he went to live at Nice, where he died on the 9th of August 1861. He composed an immense quantity of sacred music, much of which is still deservedly popular; but his great work lay in the introduction to England of unknown compositions by the great masters. The Masses of Haydn and Mozart were absolutely unknown in England until he edited them, as were also the works of Palestrina, the treasures of the Fitzwilliam Museum, and innumerable great compositions, now well known to every one. His first work, a collection of Sacred Music, as performed at the Royal Portuguese Chapel, which appeared in 1811, has the additional interest of giving a date to the practical founding of the publishing firm with which his name is associated, as Novello issued it from his own house; and he did the same with succeeding works, till his son (1810–1896), who had started as a bass singer, became a regular music publisher in 1829. It was the latter who really created the business, and who has the credit of introducing cheap music, and departing from the method of publishing by subscription. From 1841 Henry Littleton assisted him, becoming a partner in 1861, when the firm became Novello & Co., and, on J. A. Novello’s retirement in 1866, sole proprietor. Having incorporated the firm of Ewer & Co. in 1867, the title was changed to Novello, Ewer & Co., and still later back to Novello & Co., and, on Henry Littleton’s death in 1888, his two sons carried on the business.

Vincent Novello had several children besides his son Joseph Alfred. Four of his daughters (of whom the youngesteldest [sic], Mary, married Charles Cowden Clarke) were gifted singers; but the most famous was (1818–1908), whose beautiful high soprano and pure style made her one of the greatest vocalists, alike in opera, oratorio and on the concert stage, from 1833 onwards. In 1843 she married Count Gigliucci, but after a few years returned to her profession, and only retired in 1860. Charles Lamb wrote a poem (To Clara N.) in her praise.

NOVEMBER (Lat. novem, nine), the ninth month of the old Roman year, which began with March. By the Julian arrangement, according to which the year began with the 1st of January, November became the eleventh month and had thirty days assigned to it. The 11th of November was held to mark the