SOURCE: "The Buffoon of the New Eternities: Jules Laforgue," in Ivory Apes and Peacocks, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1915, pp. 32-51.

Huneker was an American musician and critic who focused on discovering the best of European music and literature and introducing them to the American public. In the following excerpt, he records his impressions of Moral Tales, particularly commenting on the artistry and wit of "Hamlet. "

The prose of Jules Laforgue recalls to me his description of the orchestra in "Salomé," the fourth of the Moralités légendaires. "Sur un mode allègre et fataliste, un orchestre aux instruments d'ivoire improvisait une petite overture unanime." That his syllables are of ivory I feel, and improvised, but his themes are pluralistic, the immedicable and colossal ennui of life the chiefest. Woman—the "Eternal Madame," as Baudelaire calls her—is a being both magical and mediocre; she is also an escape...