Aet. 44, to a man of letters. “23 January 1894” is inscribed on the manuscript by an unknown hand.
Frank Harris later wrote of the accident: George Moore “had all of the qualifications of the English country gentleman, yet just because he was a writer with a love of letters and knowledge of art, English society… regarded him with suspicion and aversion as not true to type. One day when out shooting, Moore was accidentally hit by a glancing pellet; instead of covering the sportsman’s want of skill or care with silence the occasion was used for a rude jibe. ‘What could Moore expect when he went out shooting with gentlemen?’ a double-edged sneer which I persisted in construing to Moore’s advantage.” Contemporary Portraits 2nd series, (1919), pages 110-111).
Max Beerbohm also wrote of the accident: “On the second day, the guilty youth came to the bedside, to express his contrition. ‘And what’, we asked Moore, as he described the scene to us in London, ‘what did you say?’ ‘I said “Oh, go a-way. I do not want ever to see you. You are an id-i-ot. For heaven’s sake, go a-way,” and I turned on my pillow.’ How much better after all, because how much more sincere, this was” than conventional politeness. “George Moore,” Atlantic Monthly (December 1950), page 34-39.
William Archer’s translation of Ibsen’s John Gabriel Borkman was recently published by Heinemann.
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