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+ +border-left-style: none; border-bottom-style: none + +} + +</style> + </head> + + <body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12743 ***</div> + + <hr class="full" /> + + <h1>THE AUTHOR'S CRAFT</h1> + + <h3>By</h3> + + <h2>ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 1 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page__i" name="page__i">[pg i]</a> + </span> + + <h2>WORKS BY ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> + + <dl> + <dt> + <b> + <br /> + + NOVELS</b> + </dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>A Man from the North</li> + + <li>Anna of the Five Towns</li> + + <li>Leonora</li> + + <li>A Great Man</li> + + <li>Sacred and Profane Love</li> + + <li>Whom God hath Joined</li> + + <li>Buried Alive</li> + + <li>The Old Wives' Tale</li> + + <li>The Glimpse</li> + + <li>Helen with the High Hand</li> + + <li>Clayhanger</li> + + <li>The Card</li> + + <li>Hilda Lessways</li> + + <li>The Regent</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <b> + <br /> + + FANTASIAS</b> + </dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>The Grand Babylon Hotel</li> + + <li>The Gates of Wrath</li> + + <li>Teresa of Watling Street</li> + + <li>The Loot of Cities</li> + + <li>Hugo</li> + + <li>The Ghost</li> + + <li>The City of Pleasure</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <b> + <br /> + + SHORT STORIES</b> + </dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>Tales of the Five Towns</li> + + <li>The Grim Smile of the Five Towns</li> + + <li>The Matador of the Five Towns</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <b> + <br /> + + BELLES-LETTRES</b> + </dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>Journalism for Women</li> + + <li>Fame and Fiction</li> + + <li>How to become an Author</li> + + <li>The Reasonable Life</li> + + <li>How to Live on Twenty-Four Hours a Day</li> + + <li>The Human Machine</li> + + <li>Literary Taste</li> + + <li>The Feast of St Friend</li> + + <li>Those United States</li> + + <li>The Plain Man and His Wife</li> + + <li>Paris Nights</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <b> + <br /> + + DRAMA</b> + </dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>Polite Farces</li> + + <li>Cupid and Common Sense</li> + + <li>What the Public Wants</li> + + <li>The Honeymoon</li> + + <li>The Great Adventure</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <br /> + + ( + <i>In Collaboration with EDEN PHILLPOTTS</i> + + )</dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>The Sinews of War: A Romance</li> + + <li>The Statue: A Romance</li> + </ul> + </dd> + + <dt> + <br /> + + ( + <i>In Collaboration with EDWARD KNOBLAUCH</i> + + )</dt> + + <dd> + <ul> + <li>Milestones: A Play</li> + </ul> + </dd> + </dl> + + <hr /> + + <a name='THE_AUTHORS_CRAFT'> + </a> + + <h1>THE AUTHOR'S CRAFT</h1> + +<!-- Page 2 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page_ii" name="page_ii">[pg ii]</a> + </span> + + <h3>By</h3> + + <h2>ARNOLD BENNETT</h2> + + + <center>HODDER AND STOUGHTON + <br /> + + LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO</center> + + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 3 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="pageiii" name="pageiii">[pg iii]</a> + </span> + + <center>Printed in 1914</center> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 4 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page_iv" name="page_iv">[pg iv]</a> + </span> + + <h2>CONTENTS</h2> + + <table border="0" width="50%" align="center" + summary="Table of Contents"> + <tr> + <td align="center"> + <a href="#page001">PART I. + <br /> + + SEEING LIFE</a> + </td> + </tr> + + <tr> + <td align="center"> + <a href="#page035">PART II. + <br /> + + WRITING NOVELS</a> + </td> + </tr> + + <tr> + <td align="center"> + <a href="#page067">PART III. + <br /> + + WRITING PLAYS</a> + </td> + </tr> + + <tr> + <td align="center"> + <a href="#page101">PART IV. + <br /> + + THE ARTIST AND THE PUBLIC</a> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 5 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page001" name="page001">[pg 1]</a> + </span> + + <h2>PART I</h2> + + <h3>SEEING LIFE</h3> + +<!-- Page 6 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page002" name="page002">[pg 2]</a> + </span> + + <br /> + +<!-- Page 7 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page003" name="page003">[pg 3]</a> + </span> + + <h3>I</h3> + + <p>A young dog, inexperienced, sadly lacking in even primary + education, ambles and frisks along the footpath of Fulham Road, + near the mysterious gates of a Marist convent. He is a large + puppy, on the way to be a dog of much dignity, but at present + he has little to recommend him but that gawky elegance, and + that bounding gratitude for the gift of life, which distinguish + the normal puppy. He is an ignorant fool. He might have entered + the convent of nuns and had a fine time, but instead he steps + off the pavement into the road, the road being a vast and + interesting continent imperfectly explored. His confidence in + his nose, in his agility, and in the goodness of God is + touching, absolutely painful to witness. He glances casually at + a huge, towering vermilion construction that is +<!-- Page 8 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page004" name="page004">[pg 4]</a> + </span> + + whizzing towards him on four wheels, preceded by a glint of + brass and a wisp of steam; and then with disdain he ignores it + as less important than a mere speck of odorous matter in the + mud. The next instant he is lying inert in the mud. His + confidence in the goodness of God had been misplaced. Since the + beginning of time God had ordained him a victim.</p> + + <p>An impressive thing happens. The motor-bus reluctantly + slackens and stops. Not the differential brake, nor the + foot-brake, has arrested the motor-bus, but the invisible brake + of public opinion, acting by administrative transmission. There + is not a policeman in sight. Theoretically, the motor-'bus is + free to whiz onward in its flight to the paradise of + Shoreditch, but in practice it is paralysed by dread. A man in + brass buttons and a stylish cap leaps down from it, and the + blackened demon who sits on its neck also leaps down from it, + and they move gingerly towards the puppy. A little while ago +<!-- Page 9 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page005" name="page005">[pg 5]</a> + </span> + + the motor-bus might have overturned a human cyclist or so, and + proceeded nonchalant on its way. But now even a puppy requires + a post-mortem: such is the force of public opinion aroused. Two + policemen appear in the distance.</p> + + <p>"A street accident" is now in being, and a crowd gathers + with calm joy and stares, passive and determined. The puppy + offers no sign whatever; just lies in the road. Then a boy, + destined probably to a great future by reason of his singular + faculty of initiative, goes to the puppy and carries him by the + scruff of the neck, to the shelter of the gutter. Relinquished + by the boy, the lithe puppy falls into an easy horizontal + attitude, and seems bent upon repose. The boy lifts the puppy's + head to examine it, and the head drops back wearily. The puppy + is dead. No cry, no blood, no disfigurement! Even no + perceptible jolt of the wheel as it climbed over the obstacle + of the puppy's body! A wonderfully clean and perfect + accident!</p> + + <p> +<!-- Page 10 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page006" name="page006">[pg 6]</a> + </span> + + The increasing crowd stares with beatific placidity. People + emerge impatiently from the bowels of the throbbing motor-bus + and slip down from its back, and either join the crowd or + vanish. The two policemen and the crew of the motor-bus have + now met in parley. The conductor and the driver have an air at + once nervous and resigned; their gestures are quick and + vivacious. The policemen, on the other hand, indicate by their + slow and huge movements that eternity is theirs. And they could + not be more sure of the conductor and the driver if they had + them manacled and leashed. The conductor and the driver admit + the absolute dominion of the elephantine policemen; they admit + that before the simple will of the policemen inconvenience, + lost minutes, shortened leisure, docked wages, count as less + than naught. And the policemen are carelessly sublime, well + knowing that magistrates, jails, and the very Home Secretary on + his throne—yes, and a whole system of conspiracy +<!-- Page 11 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page007" name="page007">[pg 7]</a> + </span> + + and perjury and brutality—are at their beck in case of + need. And yet occasionally in the demeanour of the policemen + towards the conductor and the driver there is a silent message + that says: "After all, we, too, are working men like you, + over-worked and under-paid and bursting with grievances in the + service of the pitiless and dishonest public. We, too, have + wives and children and privations and frightful apprehensions. + We, too, have to struggle desperately. Only the awful magic of + these garments and of the garter which we wear on our wrists + sets an abyss between us and you." And the conductor writes and + one of the policemen writes, and they keep on writing, while + the traffic makes beautiful curves to avoid them.</p> + + <p>The still increasing crowd continues to stare in the pure + blankness of pleasure. A close-shaved, well-dressed, + middle-aged man, with a copy of + <i>The Sportsman</i> + + in his podgy hand, who has descended from the motor-bus, starts + stamping his feet. "I was knocked down by a taxi last year," he + +<!-- Page 12 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page008" name="page008">[pg 8]</a> + </span> + + says fiercely. "But nobody took no notice of + <i>that</i> + + ! Are they going to stop here all the blank morning for a blank + tyke?" And for all his respectable appearance, his features + become debased, and he emits a jet of disgusting profanity and + brings most of the Trinity into the thunderous assertion that + he has paid his fare. Then a man passes wheeling a muck-cart. + And he stops and talks a long time with the other uniforms, + because he, too, wears vestiges of a uniform. And the crowd + never moves nor ceases to stare. Then the new arrival stoops + and picks up the unclaimed, masterless puppy, and flings it, + all soft and yielding, into the horrid mess of the cart, and + passes on. And only that which is immortal and divine of the + puppy remains behind, floating perhaps like an invisible vapour + over the scene of the tragedy.</p> + + <p>The crowd is tireless, all eyes. The four principals still + converse and write. Nobody in the crowd comprehends what they + are about. At length the driver +<!-- Page 13 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page009" name="page009">[pg 9]</a> + </span> + + separates himself, but is drawn back, and a new parley is + commenced. But everything ends. The policemen turn on their + immense heels. The driver and conductor race towards the + motor-bus. The bell rings, the motor-bus, quite empty, + disappears snorting round the corner into Walham Green. The + crowd is now lessening. But it separates with reluctance, many + of its members continuing to stare with intense absorption at + the place where the puppy lay or the place where the policemen + stood. An appreciable interval elapses before the "street + accident" has entirely ceased to exist as a phenomenon.</p> + + <p>The members of the crowd follow their noses, and during the + course of the day remark to acquaintances:</p> + + <p>"Saw a dog run over by a motor-bus in the Fulham Road this + morning! Killed dead!"</p> + + <p>And that is all they do remark. That is all they have + witnessed. They will not, and could not, give intelligible and + in +<!-- Page 14 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page010" name="page010">[pg 10]</a> + </span> + + teresting particulars of the affair (unless it were as to the + breed of the dog or the number of the bus-service). They have + watched a dog run over. They analyse neither their sensations + nor the phenomenon. They have witnessed it whole, as a bad + writer uses a + <i>cliché</i> + + . They have observed—that is to say, they have really + seen—nothing.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 15 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page011" name="page011">[pg 11]</a> + </span> + + <h3>II</h3> + + <p>It will be well for us not to assume an attitude of + condescension towards the crowd. Because in the matter of + looking without seeing we are all about equal. We all go to and + fro in a state of the observing faculties which somewhat + resembles coma. We are all content to look and not see.</p> + + <p>And if and when, having comprehended that the + <i>rôle</i> + + of observer is not passive but active, we determine by an + effort to rouse ourselves from the coma and really to see the + spectacle of the world (a spectacle surpassing circuses and + even street accidents in sustained dramatic interest), we shall + discover, slowly in the course of time, that the act of seeing, + which seems so easy, is not so easy as it seems. Let a man + resolve: "I will keep my eyes open on the way to the office of + a morning," +<!-- Page 16 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page012" name="page012">[pg 12]</a> + </span> + + and the probability if that for many mornings he will see + naught that is not trivial, and that his system of perspective + will be absurdly distorted. The unusual, the unaccustomed, will + infallibly attract him, to the exclusion of what is fundamental + and universal. Travel makes observers of us all, but the things + which as travellers we observe generally show how unskilled we + are in the new activity.</p> + + <p>A man went to Paris for the first time, and observed right + off that the carriages of suburban trains had seats on the roof + like a tramcar. He was so thrilled by the remarkable discovery + that he observed almost nothing else. This enormous fact + occupied the whole foreground of his perspective. He returned + home and announced that Paris was a place where people rode on + the tops of trains. A Frenchwoman came to London for the first + time—and no English person would ever guess the + phenomenon which vanquished all others in her mind on the +<!-- Page 17 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page013" name="page013">[pg 13]</a> + </span> + + opening day. She saw a cat walking across a street. The vision + excited her. For in Paris cats do not roam in thoroughfares, + because there are practically no houses with gardens or + "areas"; the flat system is unfavourable to the enlargement of + cats. I remember once, in the days when observation had first + presented itself to me as a beautiful pastime, getting up very + early and making the circuit of inner London before summer dawn + in quest of interesting material. And the one note I gathered + was that the ground in front of the all-night coffee-stalls was + white with egg-shells! What I needed then was an operation for + cataract. I also remember taking a man to the opera who had + never seen an opera. The work was + <i>Lohengrin</i> + + . When we came out he said: "That swan's neck was rather + stiff." And it was all he did say. We went and had a drink. He + was not mistaken. His observation was most just; but his + perspective was that of those literary critics who give ten + lines to point +<!-- Page 18 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page014" name="page014">[pg 14]</a> + </span> + + ing out three slips of syntax, and three lines to an + ungrammatical admission that the novel under survey is not + wholly tedious.</p> + + <p>But a man may acquire the ability to observe even a large + number of facts, and still remain in the infantile stage of + observation. I have read, in some work of literary criticism, + that Dickens could walk up one side of a long, busy street and + down the other, and then tell you in their order the names on + all the shop-signs; the fact was alleged as an illustration of + his great powers of observation. Dickens was a great observer, + but he would assuredly have been a still greater observer had + he been a little less pre-occupied with trivial and + unco-ordinated details. Good observation consists not in + multiplicity of detail, but in co-ordination of detail + according to a true perspective of relative importance, so that + a finally just general impression may be reached in the + shortest possible time. The skilled observer is he who does not + have to change +<!-- Page 19 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page015" name="page015">[pg 15]</a> + </span> + + his mind. One has only to compare one's present adjusted + impression of an intimate friend with one's first impression of + him to perceive the astounding inadequacy of one's powers of + observation. The man as one has learnt to see him is simply not + the same man who walked into one's drawing-room on the day of + introduction.</p> + + <p>There are, by the way, three sorts of created beings who are + sentimentally supposed to be able to judge individuals at the + first glance: women, children, and dogs. By virtue of a mystic + gift with which rumour credits them, they are never mistaken. + It is merely not true. Women are constantly quite wrong in the + estimates based on their "feminine instinct"; they sometimes + even admit it; and the matrimonial courts prove it + <i>passim</i> + + . Children are more often wrong than women. And as for dogs, it + is notorious that they are for ever being taken in by plausible + scoundrels; the perspective of dogs is grotesque. Not +<!-- Page 20 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page016" name="page016">[pg 16]</a> + </span> + + seldom have I grimly watched the gradual disillusion of + deceived dogs. Nevertheless, the sentimental legend of the + infallibility of women, children, and dogs, will persist in + Anglo-Saxon countries.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 21 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page017" name="page017">[pg 17]</a> + </span> + + <h3>III</h3> + + <p>One is curious about one's fellow-creatures: therefore one + watches them. And generally the more intelligent one is, the + more curious one is, and the more one observes. The mere + satisfaction of this curiosity is in itself a worthy end, and + would alone justify the business of systematised observation. + But the aim of observation may, and should, be expressed in + terms more grandiose. Human curiosity counts among the highest + social virtues (as indifference counts among the basest + defects), because it leads to the disclosure of the causes of + character and temperament and thereby to a better understanding + of the springs of human conduct. Observation is not practised + directly with this high end in view (save by prigs and other + futile souls); nevertheless it is a moral act and must + inevitably +<!-- Page 22 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page018" name="page018">[pg 18]</a> + </span> + + promote kindliness—whether we like it or not. It also + sharpens the sense of beauty. An ugly deed—such as a deed + of cruelty—takes on artistic beauty when its origin and + hence its fitness in the general scheme begin to be + comprehended. In the perspective of history we can derive an + æsthetic pleasure from the tranquil scrutiny of all kinds + of conduct—as well, for example, of a Renaissance Pope as + of a Savonarola. Observation endows our day and our street with + the romantic charm of history, and stimulates charity—not + the charity which signs cheques, but the more precious charity + which puts itself to the trouble of understanding. The one + condition is that the observer must never lose sight of the + fact that what he is trying to see is life, is the woman next + door, is the man in the train—and not a concourse of + abstractions. To appreciate all this is the first inspiring + preliminary to sound observation.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 23 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page019" name="page019">[pg 19]</a> + </span> + + <h3>IV</h3> + + <p>The second preliminary is to realise that all physical + phenomena are interrelated, that there is nothing which does + not bear on everything else. The whole spectacular and sensual + show—what the eye sees, the ear hears, the nose scents, + the tongue tastes and the skin touches—is a cause or an + effect of human conduct. Naught can be ruled out as negligible, + as not forming part of the equation. Hence he who would beyond + all others see life for himself—I naturally mean the + novelist and playwright—ought to embrace all phenomena in + his curiosity. Being finite, he cannot. Of course he cannot! + But he can, by obtaining a broad notion of the whole, determine + with some accuracy the position and relative importance of the + particular series of phenomena to which his instinct draws him. + If he +<!-- Page 24 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page020" name="page020">[pg 20]</a> + </span> + + does not thus envisage the immense background of his special + interests, he will lose the most precious feeling for interplay + and proportion without which all specialism becomes distorted + and positively darkened.</p> + + <p>Now, the main factor in life on this planet is the planet + itself. Any logically conceived survey of existence must begin + with geographical and climatic phenomena. This is surely + obvious. If you say that you are not interested in meteorology + or the configurations of the earth, I say that you deceive + yourself. You are. For an east wind may upset your liver and + cause you to insult your wife. Beyond question the most + important fact about, for example, Great Britain is that it is + an island. We sail amid the Hebrides, and then talk of the fine + qualities and the distressing limitations of those islanders; + it ought to occur to us English that we are talking of + ourselves in little. In moments of journalistic vainglory we + are apt to refer to the "sturdy island race," meaning us. But + that we are +<!-- Page 25 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page021" name="page021">[pg 21]</a> + </span> + + insular in the full significance of the horrid word is certain. + Why not? A genuine observation of the supreme phenomenon that + Great Britain is surrounded by water—an effort to keep it + always at the back of the consciousness—will help to + explain all the minor phenomena of British existence. + Geographical knowledge is the mother of discernment, for the + varying physical characteristics of the earth are the sole + direct terrestrial influence determining the evolution of + original vital energy.</p> + + <p>All other influences are secondary, and have been effects of + character and temperament before becoming causes. Perhaps the + greatest of them are roads and architecture. Nothing could be + more English than English roads, or more French than French + roads. Enter England from France, let us say through the gate + of Folkestone, and the architectural illustration which greets + you (if you can look and see) is absolutely dramatic in its + spectacular force. You say that there is no architecture in + Folke +<!-- Page 26 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page022" name="page022">[pg 22]</a> + </span> + + stone. But Folkestone, like other towns, is just as full of + architecture as a wood is full of trees. As the train winds on + its causeway over the sloping town you perceive below you + thousands of squat little homes, neat, tended, respectable, + comfortable, prim, at once unostentatious and conceited. Each a + separate, clearly-defined entity! Each saying to the others: + "Don't look over my wall, and I won't look over yours!" Each + with a ferocious jealousy bent on guarding its own + individuality! Each a stronghold—an island! And all + careless of the general effect, but making a very impressive + general effect. The English race is below you. Your own son is + below you insisting on the inviolability of his own den of a + bedroom! ... And contrast all that with the immense communistic + and splendid façades of a French town, and work out the + implications. If you really intend to see life you cannot + afford to be blind to such thrilling phenomena.</p> + + <p> +<!-- Page 27 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page023" name="page023">[pg 23]</a> + </span> + + Yet an inexperienced, unguided curiosity would be capable of + walking through a French street and through an English street, + and noting chiefly that whereas English lamp-posts spring from + the kerb, French lamp-posts cling to the side of the house! Not + that that detail is not worth noting. It is—in its place. + French lamp-posts are part of what we call the "interesting + character" of a French street. We say of a French street that + it is "full of character." As if an English street was not! + Such is blindness—to be cured by travel and the exercise + of the logical faculty, most properly termed common sense. If + one is struck by the magnificence of the great towns of the + Continent, one should ratiocinate, and conclude that a major + characteristic of the great towns of England is their shabby + and higgledy-piggledy slovenliness. It is so. But there are + people who have lived fifty years in Manchester, Leeds, Hull + and Hanley without noticing it. The English idiosyncrasy is in + that +<!-- Page 28 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page024" name="page024">[pg 24]</a> + </span> + + awful external slovenliness too, causing it, and being caused + by it. Every street is a mirror, an illustration, an + exposition, an explanation, of the human beings who live in it. + Nothing in it is to be neglected. Everything in it is valuable, + if the perspective is maintained. Nevertheless, in the narrow + individualistic novels of English literature—and in some + of the best—you will find a domestic organism described + as though it existed in a vacuum, or in the Sahara, or between + Heaven and earth; as though it reacted on nothing and was + reacted on by nothing; and as though it could be adequately + rendered without reference to anything exterior to itself. How + can such novels satisfy a reader who has acquired or wants to + acquire the faculty of seeing life?</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 29 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page025" name="page025">[pg 25]</a> + </span> + + <h3>V</h3> + + <p>The net result of the interplay of instincts and influences + which determine the existence of a community is shown in the + general expression on the faces of the people. This is an index + which cannot lie and cannot be gainsaid. It is fairly easy, and + extremely interesting, to decipher. It is so open, shameless, + and universal, that not to look at it is impossible. Yet the + majority of persons fail to see it. We hear of inquirers + standing on London Bridge and counting the number of + motor-buses, foot-passengers, lorries, and white horses that + pass over the bridge in an hour. But we never hear of anybody + counting the number of faces happy or unhappy, honest or + rascally, shrewd or ingenuous, kind or cruel, that pass over + the bridge. Perhaps the public may be surprised to hear that + the general ex +<!-- Page 30 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page026" name="page026">[pg 26]</a> + </span> + + pression on the faces of Londoners of all ranks varies from the + sad to the morose; and that their general mien is one of haste + and gloomy preoccupation. Such a staring fact is paramount in + sociological evidence. And the observer of it would be + justified in summoning Heaven, the legislature, the county + council, the churches, and the ruling classes, and saying to + them: "Glance at these faces, and don't boast too much about + what you have accomplished. The climate and the industrial + system have so far triumphed over you all."</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 31 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page027" name="page027">[pg 27]</a> + </span> + + <h3>VI</h3> + + <p>When we come to the observing of the individual—to + which all human observing does finally come if there is any + right reason in it—the aforesaid general considerations + ought to be ever present in the hinterland of the + consciousness, aiding and influencing, perhaps vaguely, perhaps + almost imperceptibly, the formation of judgments. If they do + nothing else, they will at any rate accustom the observer to + the highly important idea of the correlation of all phenomena. + Especially in England a haphazard particularity is the chief + vitiating element in the operations of the mind.</p> + + <p>In estimating the individual we are apt not only to forget + his environment, but—really strange!—to ignore much + of the evidence visible in the individual himself. The + inexperienced and ardent observer, +<!-- Page 32 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page028" name="page028">[pg 28]</a> + </span> + + will, for example, be astonishingly blind to everything in an + individual except his face. Telling himself that the face must + be the reflection of the soul, and that every thought and + emotion leaves inevitably its mark there, he will concentrate + on the face, singling it out as a phenomenon apart and + self-complete. Were he a god and infallible, he could no doubt + learn the whole truth from the face. But he is bound to fall + into errors, and by limiting the field of vision he minimises + the opportunity for correction. The face is, after all, quite a + small part of the individual's physical organism. An Englishman + will look at a woman's face and say she is a beautiful woman or + a plain woman. But a woman may have a plain face, and yet by + her form be entitled to be called beautiful, and (perhaps) + <i>vice versâ</i> + + . It is true that the face is the reflexion of the soul. It is + equally true that the carriage and gestures are the reflection + of the soul. Had one eyes, the tying of a bootlace is the + reflection of the +<!-- Page 33 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page029" name="page029">[pg 29]</a> + </span> + + soul. One piece of evidence can be used to correct every other + piece of evidence. A refined face may be refuted by clumsy + finger-ends; the eyes may contradict the voice; the gait may + nullify the smile. None of the phenomena which every individual + carelessly and brazenly displays in every motor-bus terrorising + the streets of London is meaningless or negligible.</p> + + <p>Again, in observing we are generally guilty of that + particularity which results from sluggishness of the + imagination. We may see the phenomenon at the moment of looking + at it, but we particularise in that moment, making no effort to + conceive what the phenomenon is likely to be at other + moments.</p> + + <p>For example, a male human creature wakes up in the morning + and rises with reluctance. Being a big man, and existing with + his wife and children in a very confined space, he has to adapt + himself to his environment as he goes through the various + functions incident to preparing for his day's work. He is just + like you +<!-- Page 34 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page030" name="page030">[pg 30]</a> + </span> + + or me. He wants his breakfast, he very much wants to know where + his boots are, and he has the usually sinister preoccupations + about health and finance. Whatever the force of his egoism, he + must more or less harmonise his individuality with those of his + wife and children. Having laid down the law, or accepted it, he + sets forth to his daily duties, just a fraction of a minute + late. He arrives at his office, resumes life with his + colleagues sympathetic and antipathetic, and then leaves the + office for an expedition extending over several hours. In the + course of his expedition he encounters the corpse of a young + dog run down by a motor-bus. Now you also have encountered that + corpse and are gazing at it; and what do you say to yourself + when he comes along? You say: "Oh! Here's a policeman." For he + happens to be a policeman. You stare at him, and you never see + anything but a policeman—an indivisible phenomenon of + blue cloth, steel buttons, flesh resembling a face, and a + helmet; " +<!-- Page 35 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page031" name="page031">[pg 31]</a> + </span> + + a stalwart guardian of the law"; to you little more human than + an algebraic symbol: in a word—a policeman.</p> + + <p>Only, that word actually conveys almost nothing to you of + the reality which it stands for. You are satisfied with it as + you are satisfied with the description of a disease. A friend + tells you his eyesight is failing. You sympathise. "What is + it?" you ask. "Glaucoma." "Ah! Glaucoma!" You don't know what + glaucoma is. You are no wiser than you were before. But you are + content. A name has contented you. Similarly the name of + policeman contents you, seems to absolve you from further + curiosity as to the phenomenon. You have looked at tens of + thousands of policemen, and perhaps never seen the hundredth + part of the reality of a single one. Your imagination has not + truly worked on the phenomenon.</p> + + <p>There may be some excuse for not seeing the reality of a + policeman, because a uniform is always a thick veil. But you + — +<!-- Page 36 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page032" name="page032">[pg 32]</a> + </span> + + I mean you, I, any of us—are oddly dim-sighted also in + regard to the civil population. For instance, we get into the + empty motor-bus as it leaves the scene of the street accident, + and examine the men and women who gradually fill it. Probably + we vaunt ourselves as being interested in the spectacle of + life. All the persons in the motor-bus have come out of a past + and are moving towards a future. But how often does our + imagination put itself to the trouble of realising this? We may + observe with some care, yet owing to a fundamental defect of + attitude we are observing not the human individuals, but a + peculiar race of beings who pass their whole lives in + motor-buses, who exist only in motor-buses and only in the + present! No human phenomenon is adequately seen until the + imagination has placed it back into its past and forward into + its future. And this is the final process of observation of the + individual.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 37 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page033" name="page033">[pg 33]</a> + </span> + + <h3>VII</h3> + + <p>Seeing life, as I have tried to show, does not begin with + seeing the individual. Neither does it end with seeing the + individual. Particular and unsystematised observation cannot go + on for ever, aimless, formless. Just as individuals are singled + out from systems, in the earlier process of observation, so in + the later processes individuals will be formed into new groups, + which formation will depend upon the personal bent of the + observer. The predominant interests of the observer will + ultimately direct his observing activities to their own + advantage. If he is excited by the phenomena of + organisation—as I happen to be—he will see + individuals in new groups that are the result of organisation, + and will insist on the variations from type due to that + grouping. If he is convinced—as numbers of people appear +<!-- Page 38 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page034" name="page034">[pg 34]</a> + </span> + + to be—that society is just now in an extremely critical + pass, and that if something mysterious is not forthwith done + the structure of it will crumble to atoms—he will see + mankind grouped under the different reforms which, according to + him, the human dilemma demands. And so on! These tendencies, + while they should not be resisted too much, since they give + character to observation and redeem it from the frigidity of + mechanics, should be resisted to a certain extent. For, + whatever they may be, they favour the growth of sentimentality, + the protean and indescribably subtle enemy of common sense.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 39 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page035" name="page035">[pg 35]</a> + </span> + + <h2>PART II</h2> + + <h3>WRITING NOVELS</h3> + +<!-- Page 40 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page036" name="page036">[pg 36]</a> + </span> + + <br /> + +<!-- Page 41 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page037" name="page037">[pg 37]</a> + </span> + + <h3>I</h3> + + <p>The novelist is he who, having seen life, and being so + excited by it that he absolutely must transmit the vision to + others, chooses narrative fiction as the liveliest vehicle for + the relief of his feelings. He is like other artists—he + cannot remain silent; he cannot keep himself to himself, he is + bursting with the news; he is bound to tell—the affair is + too thrilling! Only he differs from most artists in + this—that what most chiefly strikes him is the + indefinable humanness of human nature, the large general manner + of existing. Of course, he is the result of evolution from the + primitive. And you can see primitive novelists to this day + transmitting to acquaintances their fragmentary and crude + visions of life in the café or the club, or on the + kerbstone. They belong to the lowest circle of artists; +<!-- Page 42 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page038" name="page038">[pg 38]</a> + </span> + + but they are artists; and the form that they adopt is the very + basis of the novel. By innumerable entertaining steps from them + you may ascend to the major artist whose vision of life, + inclusive, intricate and intense, requires for its due + transmission the great traditional form of the novel as + perfected by the masters of a long age which has temporarily + set the novel higher than any other art-form.</p> + + <p>I would not argue that the novel should be counted supreme + among the great traditional forms of art. Even if there is a + greatest form, I do not much care which it is. I have in turn + been convinced that Chartres Cathedral, certain Greek + sculpture, Mozart's + <i>Don Juan</i> + + , and the juggling of Paul Cinquevalli, was the finest thing in + the world—not to mention the achievements of Shakspere or + Nijinsky. But there is something to be said for the real + pre-eminence of prose fiction as a literary form. (Even the + modern epic has learnt almost all it knows from prose-fiction.) + The novel has, and always will have, the +<!-- Page 43 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page039" name="page039">[pg 39]</a> + </span> + + advantage of its comprehensive bigness. St Peter's at Rome is a + trifle compared with Tolstoi's + <i>War and Peace</i> + + ; and it is as certain as anything can be that, during the + present geological epoch at any rate, no epic half as long as + <i>War and Peace</i> + + will ever be read, even if written.</p> + + <p>Notoriously the novelist (including the playwright, who is a + sub-novelist) has been taking the bread out of the mouths of + other artists. In the matter of poaching, the painter has done + a lot, and the composer has done more, but what the painter and + the composer have done is as naught compared to the grasping + deeds of the novelist. And whereas the painter and the composer + have got into difficulties with their audacious schemes, the + novelist has poached, colonised, and annexed with a success + that is not denied. There is scarcely any aspect of the + interestingness of life which is not now rendered in prose + fiction—from landscape-painting to sociology—and + none which might not be. Unnecessary to go back to the + ante-Scott +<!-- Page 44 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page040" name="page040">[pg 40]</a> + </span> + + age in order to perceive how the novel has aggrandised itself! + It has conquered enormous territories even since + <i>Germinal</i> + + . Within the last fifteen years it has gained. Were it to adopt + the hue of the British Empire, the entire map of the universe + would soon be coloured red. Wherever it ought to stand in the + hierarchy of forms, it has, actually, no rival at the present + day as a means for transmitting the impassioned vision of life. + It is, and will be for some time to come, the form to which the + artist with the most inclusive vision instinctively turns, + because it is the most inclusive form, and the most adaptable. + Indeed, before we are much older, if its present rate of + progress continues, it will have reoccupied the dazzling + position to which the mighty Balzac lifted it, and in which he + left it in 1850. So much, by the way, for the rank of the + novel.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 45 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page041" name="page041">[pg 41]</a> + </span> + + <h3>II</h3> + + <p>In considering the equipment of the novelist there are two + attributes which may always be taken for granted. The first is + the sense of beauty—indispensable to the creative artist. + Every creative artist has it, in his degree. He is an artist + because he has it. An artist works under the stress of + instinct. No man's instinct can draw him towards material which + repels him—the fact is obvious. Obviously, whatever kind + of life the novelist writes about, he has been charmed and + seduced by it, he is under its spell—that is, he has seen + beauty in it. He could have no other reason for writing about + it. He may see a strange sort of beauty; he may—indeed he + does—see a sort of beauty that nobody has quite seen + before; he may see a sort of beauty that none save a few odd + spirits ever will or can be made +<!-- Page 46 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page042" name="page042">[pg 42]</a> + </span> + + to see. But he does see beauty. To say, after reading a novel + which has held you, that the author has no sense of beauty, is + inept. (The mere fact that you turned over his pages with + interest is an answer to the criticism—a criticism, + indeed, which is not more sagacious than that of the reviewer + who remarks: "Mr Blank has produced a thrilling novel, but + unfortunately he cannot write." Mr Blank has written; and he + could, anyhow, write enough to thrill the reviewer.) All that a + wise person will assert is that an artist's sense of beauty is + different for the time being from his own.</p> + + <p>The reproach of the lack of a sense of beauty has been + brought against nearly all original novelists; it is seldom + brought against a mediocre novelist. Even in the extreme cases + it is untrue; perhaps it is most untrue in the extreme cases. I + do not mean such a case as that of Zola, who never went to + extremes. I mean, for example, Gissing, a real extremist, who, + it is now admitted, saw a +<!-- Page 47 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page043" name="page043">[pg 43]</a> + </span> + + clear and undiscovered beauty in forms of existence which + hitherto no artist had deigned seriously to examine. And I mean + Huysmans, a case even more extreme. Possibly no works have been + more abused for ugliness than Huysman's novel + <i>En Ménage</i> + + and his book of descriptive essays + <i>De Tout</i> + + . Both reproduce with exasperation what is generally regarded + as the sordid ugliness of commonplace daily life. Yet both + exercise a unique charm (and will surely be read when + <i>La Cathédrale</i> + + is forgotten). And it is inconceivable that + Huysmans—whatever he may have said—was not ravished + by the secret beauty of his subjects and did not exult in + it.</p> + + <p>The other attribute which may be taken for granted in the + novelist, as in every artist, is passionate intensity of + vision. Unless the vision is passionately intense the artist + will not be moved to transmit it. He will not be inconvenienced + by it; and the motive to pass it on will thus not exist. Every + fine emotion produced in +<!-- Page 48 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page044" name="page044">[pg 44]</a> + </span> + + the reader has been, and must have been, previously felt by the + writer, but in a far greater degree. It is not altogether + uncommon to hear a reader whose heart has been desolated by the + poignancy of a narrative complain that the writer is + unemotional. Such people have no notion at all of the processes + of artistic creation.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 49 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page045" name="page045">[pg 45]</a> + </span> + + <h3>III</h3> + + <p>A sense of beauty and a passionate intensity of vision being + taken for granted, the one other important attribute in the + equipment of the novelist—the attribute which indeed by + itself practically suffices, and whose absence renders futile + all the rest—is fineness of mind. A great novelist must + have great qualities of mind. His mind must be sympathetic, + quickly responsive, courageous, honest, humorous, tender, just, + merciful. He must be able to conceive the ideal without losing + sight of the fact that it is a human world we live in. Above + all, his mind must be permeated and controlled by common sense. + His mind, in a word, must have the quality of being noble. + Unless his mind is all this, he will never, at the ultimate + bar, be reckoned supreme. That which counts, on every page, and + +<!-- Page 50 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page046" name="page046">[pg 46]</a> + </span> + + all the time, is the very texture of his mind—the glass + through which he sees things. Every other attribute is + secondary, and is dispensable. Fielding lives unequalled among + English novelists because the broad nobility of his mind is + unequalled. He is read with unreserved enthusiasm because the + reader feels himself at each paragraph to be in close contact + with a glorious personality. And no advance in technique among + later novelists can possibly imperil his position. He will take + second place when a more noble mind, a more superb common + sense, happens to wield the narrative pen, and not before. What + undermines the renown of Dickens is the growing conviction that + the texture of his mind was common, that he fell short in + courageous facing of the truth, and in certain delicacies of + perception. As much may be said of Thackeray, whose mind was + somewhat incomplete for so grandiose a figure, and not free + from defects which are inimical to immortality.</p> + + <p>It is a hard saying for me, and full of +<!-- Page 51 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page047" name="page047">[pg 47]</a> + </span> + + danger in any country whose artists have shown contempt for + form, yet I am obliged to say that, as the years pass, I attach + less and less importance to good technique in fiction. I love + it, and I have fought for a better recognition of its + importance in England, but I now have to admit that the modern + history of fiction will not support me. With the single + exception of Turgenev, the great novelists of the world, + according to my own standards, have either ignored technique or + have failed to understand it. What an error to suppose that the + finest foreign novels show a better sense of form than the + finest English novels! Balzac was a prodigious blunderer. He + could not even manage a sentence, not to speak of the general + form of a book. And as for a greater than + Balzac—Stendhal—his scorn of technique was + notorious. Stendhal was capable of writing, in a masterpiece: + "By the way I ought to have told you earlier that the + Duchess—!" And as for a greater +<!-- Page 52 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page048" name="page048">[pg 48]</a> + </span> + + than either Balzac or Stendhal—Dostoievsky—what a + hasty, amorphous lump of gold is the sublime, the + unapproachable + <i>Brothers Karamazov</i> + + ! Any tutor in a college for teaching the whole art of fiction + by post in twelve lessons could show where Dostoievsky was + clumsy and careless. What would have been Flaubert's detailed + criticism of that book? And what would it matter? And, to take + a minor example, witness the comically amateurish technique of + the late "Mark Rutherford"—nevertheless a novelist whom + one can deeply admire.</p> + + <p>And when we come to consider the great technicians, Guy de + Maupassant and Flaubert, can we say that their technique will + save them, or atone in the slightest degree for the defects of + their minds? Exceptional artists both, they are both now + inevitably falling in esteem to the level of the second-rate. + Human nature being what it is, and de Maupassant being tinged + with eroticism, his work is sure to be read with interest by +<!-- Page 53 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page049" name="page049">[pg 49]</a> + </span> + + mankind; but he is already classed. Nobody, now, despite all + his brilliant excellences, would dream of putting de Maupassant + with the first magnitudes. And the declension of Flaubert is + one of the outstanding phenomena of modern French criticism. It + is being discovered that Flaubert's mind was not quite noble + enough—that, indeed, it was a cruel mind, and a little + anæmic. + <i>Bouvard et Pécuchet</i> + + was the crowning proof that Flaubert had lost sight of the + humanness of the world, and suffered from the delusion that he + had been born on the wrong planet. The glitter of his technique + is dulled now, and fools even count it against him. In regard + to one section of human activity only did his mind seem + noble—namely, literary technique. His correspondence, + written, of course, currently, was largely occupied with the + question of literary technique, and his correspondence stands + forth to-day as his best work—a marvellous fount of + inspiration to his fellow artists. So I +<!-- Page 54 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page050" name="page050">[pg 50]</a> + </span> + + return to the point that the novelist's one important attribute + (beyond the two postulated) is fundamental quality of mind. It + and nothing else makes both the friends and the enemies which + he has; while the influence of technique is slight and + transitory. And I repeat that it is a hard saying.</p> + + <p>I begin to think that great writers of fiction are by the + mysterious nature of their art ordained to be "amateurs." There + may be something of the amateur in all great artists. I do not + know why it should be so, unless because, in the exuberance of + their sense of power, they are impatient of the exactitudes of + systematic study and the mere bother of repeated attempts to + arrive at a minor perfection. Assuredly no great artist was + ever a profound scholar. The great artist has other ends to + achieve. And every artist, major and minor, is aware in his + conscience that art is full of artifice, and that the desire to + proceed rapidly with the affair of creation, and an excus +<!-- Page 55 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page051" name="page051">[pg 51]</a> + </span> + + able dislike of re-creating anything twice, thrice, or ten + times over—unnatural task!—are responsible for much + of that artifice. We can all point in excuse to Shakspere, who + was a very rough-and-ready person, and whose methods would + shock Flaubert. Indeed, the amateurishness of Shakspere has + been mightily exposed of late years. But nobody seems to care. + If Flaubert had been a greater artist he might have been more + of an amateur.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 56 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page052" name="page052">[pg 52]</a> + </span> + + <h3>IV</h3> + + <p>Of this poor neglected matter of technique the more + important branch is design—or construction. It is the + branch of the art—of all arts—which comes next + after "inspiration"—a capacious word meant to include + everything that the artist must be born with and cannot + acquire. The less important branch of technique—far less + important—may be described as an ornamentation.</p> + + <p>There are very few rules of design in the novel; but the few + are capital. Nevertheless, great novelists have often flouted + or ignored them—to the detriment of their work. In my + opinion the first rule is that the interest must be + centralised; it must not be diffused equally over various parts + of the canvas. To compare one art with another may be perilous, + but really the convenience of +<!-- Page 57 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page053" name="page053">[pg 53]</a> + </span> + + describing a novel as a canvas is extreme. In a well-designed + picture the eye is drawn chiefly to one particular spot. If the + eye is drawn with equal force to several different spots, then + we reproach the painter for having "scattered" the interest of + the picture. Similarly with the novel. A novel must have one, + two, or three figures that easily overtop the rest. These + figures must be in the foreground, and the rest in the + middle-distance or in the back-ground.</p> + + <p>Moreover, these figures—whether they are saints or + sinners—must somehow be presented more sympathetically + than the others. If this cannot be done, then the inspiration + is at fault. The single motive that should govern the choice of + a principal figure is the motive of love for that figure. What + else could the motive be? The race of heroes is essential to + art. But what makes a hero is less the deeds of the figure + chosen than the understanding sympathy of the artist with the + figure. To say that the hero has disappeared from +<!-- Page 58 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page054" name="page054">[pg 54]</a> + </span> + + modern fiction is absurd. All that has happened is that the + characteristics of the hero have changed, naturally, with the + times. When Thackeray wrote "a novel without a hero," he wrote + a novel with a first-class hero, and nobody knew this better + than Thackeray. What he meant was that he was sick of the + conventional bundle of characteristics styled a hero in his + day, and that he had changed the type. Since then we have grown + sick of Dobbins, and the type has been changed again more than + once. The fateful hour will arrive when we shall be sick of + Ponderevos.</p> + + <p>The temptation of the great novelist, overflowing with + creative force, is to scatter the interest. In both his major + works Tolstoi found the temptation too strong for him. + <i>Anna Karenina</i> + + is not one novel, but two, and suffers accordingly. As for + <i>War and Peace</i> + + , the reader wanders about in it as in a forest, for days, + lost, deprived of a sense of direction, and with no vestige of + a sign-post; at +<!-- Page 59 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page055" name="page055">[pg 55]</a> + </span> + + intervals encountering mysterious faces whose identity he in + vain tries to recall. On a much smaller scale Meredith + committed the same error. Who could assert positively which of + the sisters Fleming is the heroine of + <i>Rhoda Fleming</i> + + ? For nearly two hundred pages at a stretch Rhoda scarcely + appears. And more than once the author seems quite to forget + that the little knave Algernon is not, after all, the hero of + the story.</p> + + <p>The second rule of design—perhaps in the main merely a + different view of the first—is that the interest must be + maintained. It may increase, but it must never diminish. Here + is that special aspect of design which we call construction, or + plot. By interest I mean the interest of the story itself, and + not the interest of the continual play of the author's mind on + his material. In proportion as the interest of the story is + maintained, the plot is a good one. In so far as it lapses, the + plot is a bad one. There is no other criterion of good con +<!-- Page 60 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page056" name="page056">[pg 56]</a> + </span> + + struction. Readers of a certain class are apt to call good the + plot of that story in which "you can't tell what is going to + happen next." But in some of the most tedious novels ever + written you can't tell what is going to happen next—and + you don't care a fig what is going to happen next. It would be + nearer the mark to say that the plot is good when "you want to + make sure what will happen next"! Good plots set you anxiously + guessing what will happen next.</p> + + <p>When the reader is misled—not intentionally in order + to get an effect, but clumsily through + amateurishness—then the construction is bad. This + calamity does not often occur in fine novels, but in really + good work another calamity does occur with far too much + frequency—namely, the tantalising of the reader at a + critical point by a purposeless, wanton, or negligent shifting + of the interest from the major to the minor theme. A sad + example of this infantile trick is to be found in the + thirty-first chapter of + <i>Rhoda</i> + +<!-- Page 61 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page057" name="page057">[pg 57]</a> + </span> + + <i>Fleming</i> + + , wherein, well knowing that the reader is tingling for the + interview between Roberts and Rhoda, the author, unable to + control his own capricious and monstrous fancy for Algernon, + devotes some sixteen pages to the young knave's vagaries with + an illicit thousand pounds. That the sixteen pages are + excessively brilliant does not a bit excuse the wilful + unshapeliness of the book's design.</p> + + <p>The Edwardian and Georgian out-and-out defenders of + Victorian fiction are wont to argue that though the event-plot + in sundry great novels may be loose and casual (that is to say, + simply careless), the "idea-plot" is usually close-knit, + coherent, and logical. I have never yet been able to comprehend + how an idea-plot can exist independently of an event-plot (any + more than how spirit can be conceived apart from matter); but + assuming that an idea-plot can exist independently, and that + the mysterious thing is superior in form to its coarse fellow, + the event-plot (which I positively +<!-- Page 62 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page058" name="page058">[pg 58]</a> + </span> + + do not believe),—even then I still hold that sloppiness + in the fabrication of the event-plot amounts to a grave + iniquity. In this connection I have in mind, among English + novels, chiefly the work of "Mark Rutherford," George Eliot, + the Brontës, and Anthony Trollope.</p> + + <p>The one other important rule in construction is that the + plot should be kept throughout within the same convention. All + plots—even those of our most sacred naturalistic + contemporaries—are and must be a conventionalisation of + life. We imagine we have arrived at a convention which is + nearer to the truth of life than that of our forerunners. + Perhaps we have—but so little nearer that the difference + is scarcely appreciable! An aviator at midday may be nearer the + sun than the motorist, but regarded as a portion of the entire + journey to the sun, the aviator's progress upward can safely be + ignored. No novelist has yet, or ever will, come within a + hundred million miles of life itself. It is impossible for us + to +<!-- Page 63 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page059" name="page059">[pg 59]</a> + </span> + + see how far we still are from life. The defects of a new + convention disclose themselves late in its career. The notion + that "naturalists" have at last lighted on a final formula + which ensures truth to life is ridiculous. "Naturalist" is + merely an epithet expressing self-satisfaction.</p> + + <p>Similarly, the habit of deriding as "conventional" plots + constructed in an earlier convention, is ridiculous. Under this + head Dickens in particular has been assaulted; I have assaulted + him myself. But within their convention, the plots of Dickens + are excellent, and show little trace of amateurishness, and + every sign of skilled accomplishment. And Dickens did not + blunder out of one convention into another, as certain of + ourselves undeniably do. Thomas Hardy, too, has been arraigned + for the conventionalism of his plots. And yet Hardy happens to + be one of the rare novelists who have evolved a new convention + to suit their idiosyncrasy. Hardy's idiosyncrasy is a +<!-- Page 64 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page060" name="page060">[pg 60]</a> + </span> + + deep conviction of the whimsicality of the divine power, and + again and again he has expressed this with a virtuosity of + skill which ought to have put humility into the hearts of + naturalists, but which has not done so. The plot of + <i>The Woodlanders</i> + + is one of the most exquisite examples of subtle symbolic + illustration of an idea that a writer of fiction ever achieved; + it makes the symbolism of Ibsen seem crude. You may say that + <i>The Woodlanders</i> + + could not have occurred in real life. No novel could have + occurred in real life. The balance of probabilities is + incalculably against any novel whatsoever; and rightly so. A + convention is essential, and the duty of a novelist is to be + true within his chosen convention, and not further. Most + novelists still fail in this duty. Is there any reason, indeed, + why we should be so vastly cleverer than our fathers? I do not + think we are.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 65 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page061" name="page061">[pg 61]</a> + </span> + + <h3>V</h3> + + <p>Leaving the seductive minor question of ornamentation, I + come lastly to the question of getting the semblance of life on + to the page before the eyes of the reader—the daily and + hourly texture of existence. The novelist has selected his + subject; he has drenched himself in his subject. He has laid + down the main features of the design. The living embryo is + there, and waits to be developed into full organic structure. + Whence and how does the novelist obtain the vital tissue which + must be his material? The answer is that he digs it out of + himself. First-class fiction is, and must be, in the final + resort autobiographical. What else should it be? The novelist + may take notes of phenomena likely to be of use to him. And he + may acquire the skill to invent very apposite illustrative inci +<!-- Page 66 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page062" name="page062">[pg 62]</a> + </span> + + dent. But he cannot invent psychology. Upon occasion some human + being may entrust him with confidences extremely precious for + his craft. But such windfalls are so rare as to be negligible. + From outward symptoms he can guess something of the psychology + of others. He can use a real person as the unrecognisable but + helpful basis for each of his characters.... And all that is + nothing. And all special research is nothing. When the real + intimate work of creation has to be done—and it has to be + done on every page—the novelist can only look within for + effective aid. Almost solely by arranging and modifying what he + has felt and seen, and scarcely at all by inventing, can he + accomplish his end. An inquiry into the career of any + first-class novelist invariably reveals that his novels are + full of autobiography. But, as a fact, every good novel + contains far more autobiography than any inquiry could reveal. + Episodes, moods, characters of autobiography can be detected + and traced +<!-- Page 67 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page063" name="page063">[pg 63]</a> + </span> + + to their origin by critical acumen, but the intimate + autobiography that runs through each page, vitalising it, may + not be detected. In dealing with each character in each episode + the novelist must for a thousand convincing details interrogate + that part of his own individuality which corresponds to the + particular character. The foundation of his equipment is + universal sympathy. And the result of this (or the + cause—I don't know which) is that in his own + individuality there is something of everybody. If he is a born + novelist he is safe in asking himself, when in doubt as to the + behaviour of a given personage at a given point: "Now, what + should + <i>I</i> + + have done?" And incorporating the answer! And this in practice + is what he does. Good fiction is autobiography dressed in the + colours of all mankind.</p> + + <p>The necessarily autobiographical nature of fiction accounts + for the creative repetition to which all + novelists—including the most powerful—are reduced. + They +<!-- Page 68 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page064" name="page064">[pg 64]</a> + </span> + + monotonously yield again and again to the strongest + predilections of their own individuality. Again and again they + think they are creating, by observation, a quite new + character—and lo! when finished it is an old + one—autobiographical psychology has triumphed! A novelist + may achieve a reputation with only a single type, created and + re-created in varying forms. And the very greatest do not + contrive to create more than half a score genuine separate + types. In Cerfberr and Christophe's biographical dictionary of + the characters of Balzac, a tall volume of six hundred pages, + there are some two thousand entries of different individuals, + but probably fewer than a dozen genuine distinctive types. No + creative artist ever repeated himself more brazenly or more + successfully than Balzac. His miser, his vicious delightful + actress, his vicious delightful duchess, his young + man-about-town, his virtuous young man, his heroic weeping + virgin, his angelic wife and mother, his poor relation, and his + +<!-- Page 69 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page065" name="page065">[pg 65]</a> + </span> + + faithful stupid servant—each is continually popping up + with a new name in the Human Comedy. A similar phenomenon, as + Frank Harris has proved, is to be observed in Shakspere. Hamlet + of Denmark was only the last and greatest of a series of + Shaksperean Hamlets.</p> + + <p>It may be asked, finally: What of the actual process of + handling the raw material dug out of existence and of the + artist's self—the process of transmuting life into art? + There is no process. That is to say, there is no conscious + process. The convention chosen by an artist is his illusion of + the truth. Consciously, the artist only omits, selects, + arranges. But let him beware of being false to his illusion, + for then the process becomes conscious, and bad. This is + sentimentality, which is the seed of death in his work. Every + artist is tempted to sentimentalise, or to be + cynical—practically the same thing. And when he falls to + the temptation, the reader whispers in his heart, be it only + for one instant: "That +<!-- Page 70 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page066" name="page066">[pg 66]</a> + </span> + + is not true to life." And in turn the reader's illusion of + reality is impaired. Readers are divided into two + classes—the enemies and the friends of the artist. The + former, a legion, admire for a fortnight or a year. They hate + an uncompromising struggle for the truth. They positively like + the artist to fall to temptation. If he falls, they exclaim, + "How sweet!" The latter are capable of savouring the fine + unpleasantness of the struggle for truth. And when they whisper + in their hearts: "That is not true to life," they are ashamed + for the artist. They are few, very few; but a vigorous clan. It + is they who confer immortality.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 71 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page067" name="page067">[pg 67]</a> + </span> + + <h2>PART III</h2> + + <h3>WRITING PLAYS</h3> + +<!-- Page 72 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page068" name="page068">[pg 68]</a> + </span> + + <br /> + +<!-- Page 73 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page069" name="page069">[pg 69]</a> + </span> + + <h3>I</h3> + + <p>There is an idea abroad, assiduously fostered as a rule by + critics who happen to have written neither novels nor plays, + that it is more difficult to write a play than a novel. I do + not think so. I have written or collaborated in about twenty + novels and about twenty plays, and I am convinced that it is + easier to write a play than a novel. Personally, I would sooner + + <i>write</i> + + two plays than one novel; less expenditure of nervous force and + mere brains would be required for two plays than for one novel. + (I emphasise the word "write," because if the whole weariness + between the first conception and the first performance of a + play is compared with the whole weariness between the first + conception and the first publication of a novel, then the play + has it. I would sooner get seventy-and-seven novels produced + than one play. But my +<!-- Page 74 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page070" name="page070">[pg 70]</a> + </span> + + immediate object is to compare only writing with writing.) It + seems to me that the sole persons entitled to judge of the + comparative difficulty of writing plays and writing novels are + those authors who have succeeded or failed equally well in both + departments. And in this limited band I imagine that the + differences of opinion on the point could not be marked. I + would like to note in passing, for the support of my + proposition, that whereas established novelists not + infrequently venture into the theatre with audacity, + established dramatists are very cautious indeed about quitting + the theatre. An established dramatist usually takes good care + to write plays and naught else; he will not affront the risks + of coming out into the open; and therein his instinct is quite + properly that of self-preservation. Of many established + dramatists all over the world it may be affirmed that if they + were so indiscreet as to publish a novel, the result would be a + great shattering and a great awakening.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 75 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page071" name="page071">[pg 71]</a> + </span> + + <h3>II</h3> + + <p>An enormous amount of vague reverential nonsense is talked + about the technique of the stage, the assumption being that in + difficulty it far surpasses any other literary technique, and + that until it is acquired a respectable play cannot be written. + One hears also that it can only be acquired behind the scenes. + A famous actor-manager once kindly gave me the benefit of his + experience, and what he said was that a dramatist who wished to + learn his business must live behind the scenes—and study + the works of Dion Boucicault! The truth is that no technique is + so crude and so simple as the technique of the stage, and that + the proper place to learn it is not behind the scenes but in + the pit. Managers, being the most conservative people on earth, + except compositors, will honestly try to +<!-- Page 76 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page072" name="page072">[pg 72]</a> + </span> + + convince the naïve dramatist that effects can only be + obtained in the precise way in which effects have always been + obtained, and that this and that rule must not be broken on + pain of outraging the public.</p> + + <p>And indeed it is natural that managers should talk thus, + seeing the low state of the drama, because in any art rules and + reaction always flourish when creative energy is sick. The + mandarins have ever said and will ever say that a technique + which does not correspond with their own is no technique, but + simple clumsiness. There are some seven situations in the + customary drama, and a play which does not contain at least one + of those situations in each act will be condemned as + "undramatic," or "thin," or as being "all talk." It may contain + half a hundred other situations, but for the mandarin a + situation which is not one of the seven is not a situation. + Similarly there are some dozen character types in the customary + drama, and all original +<!-- Page 77 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page073" name="page073">[pg 73]</a> + </span> + + that is, truthful—characterisation will be dismissed as a + total absence of characterisation because it does not reproduce + any of these dozen types. Thus every truly original play is + bound to be indicted for bad technique. The author is bound to + be told that what he has written may be marvellously clever, + but that it is not a play. I remember the day—and it is + not long ago—when even so experienced and sincere a + critic as William Archer used to argue that if the + "intellectual" drama did not succeed with the general public, + it was because its technique was not up to the level of the + technique of the commercial drama! Perhaps he has changed his + opinion since then. Heaven knows that the so-called + "intellectual" drama is amateurish enough, but nearly all + literary art is amateurish, and assuredly no intellectual drama + could hope to compete in clumsiness with some of the most + successful commercial plays of modern times. I tremble to think + what the mandarins and William Archer would +<!-- Page 78 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page074" name="page074">[pg 74]</a> + </span> + + say to the technique of + <i>Hamlet</i> + + , could it by some miracle be brought forward as a new piece by + a Mr Shakspere. They would probably recommend Mr Shakspere to + consider the ways of Sardou, Henri Bernstein, and Sir Herbert + Tree, and be wise. Most positively they would assert that + <i>Hamlet</i> + + was not a play. And their pupils of the daily press would point + out—what surely Mr Shakspere ought to have perceived for + himself—that the second, third, or fourth act might be + cut wholesale without the slightest loss to the piece.</p> + + <p>In the sense in which mandarins understand the word + technique, there is no technique special to the stage except + that which concerns the moving of solid human bodies to and + fro, and the limitations of the human senses. The dramatist + must not expect his audience to be able to see or hear two + things at once, nor to be incapable of fatigue. And he must not + expect his interpreters to stroll round or come on or go off in + a satisfactory manner unless he provides +<!-- Page 79 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page075" name="page075">[pg 75]</a> + </span> + + them with satisfactory reasons for strolling round, coming on, + or going off. Lastly, he must not expect his interpreters to + achieve physical impossibilities. The dramatist who sends a + pretty woman off in street attire and seeks to bring her on + again in thirty seconds fully dressed for a court ball may fail + in stage technique, but he has not proved that stage technique + is tremendously difficult; he has proved something quite + else.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 80 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page076" name="page076">[pg 76]</a> + </span> + + <h3>III</h3> + + <p>One reason why a play is easier to write than a novel is + that a play is shorter than a novel. On the average, one may + say that it takes six plays to make the matter of a novel. + Other things being equal, a short work of art presents fewer + difficulties than a longer one. The contrary is held true by + the majority, but then the majority, having never attempted to + produce a long work of art, are unqualified to offer an + opinion. It is said that the most difficult form of poetry is + the sonnet. But the most difficult form of poetry is the epic. + The proof that the sonnet is the most difficult form is alleged + to be in the fewness of perfect sonnets. There are, however, + far more perfect sonnets than perfect epics. A perfect sonnet + may be a heavenly accident. But such accidents can never happen + to writers of +<!-- Page 81 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page077" name="page077">[pg 77]</a> + </span> + + epics. Some years ago we had an enormous palaver about the "art + of the short story," which numerous persons who had omitted to + write novels pronounced to be more difficult than the novel. + But the fact remains that there are scores of perfect short + stories, whereas it is doubtful whether anybody but Turgenev + ever did write a perfect novel. A short form is easier to + manipulate than a long form, because its construction is less + complicated, because the balance of its proportions can be more + easily corrected by means of a rapid survey, because it is + lawful and even necessary in it to leave undone many things + which are very hard to do, and because the emotional strain is + less prolonged. The most difficult thing in all art is to + maintain the imaginative tension unslackened throughout a + considerable period.</p> + + <p>Then, not only does a play contain less matter than a + novel—it is further simplified by the fact that it + contains fewer kinds of matter, and less subtle kinds of +<!-- Page 82 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page078" name="page078">[pg 78]</a> + </span> + + matter. There are numerous delicate and difficult affairs of + craft that the dramatist need not think about at all. If he + attempts to go beyond a certain very mild degree of subtlety, + he is merely wasting his time. What passes for subtle on the + stage would have a very obvious air in a novel, as some + dramatists have unhappily discovered. Thus whole continents of + danger may be shunned by the dramatist, and instead of being + scorned for his cowardice he will be very rightly applauded for + his artistic discretion. Fortunate predicament! Again, he need + not—indeed, he must not—save in a primitive and + hinting manner, concern himself with "atmosphere." He may + roughly suggest one, but if he begins on the feat of "creating" + an atmosphere (as it is called), the last suburban train will + have departed before he has reached the crisis of the play. The + last suburban train is the best friend of the dramatist, though + the fellow seldom has the sense to see it. Further, he is saved + all de +<!-- Page 83 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page079" name="page079">[pg 79]</a> + </span> + + scriptive work. See a novelist harassing himself into his grave + over the description of a landscape, a room, a + gesture—while the dramatist grins. The dramatist may have + to imagine a landscape, a room, or a gesture; but he has not + got to write it—and it is the writing which hastens + death. If a dramatist and a novelist set out to portray a + clever woman, they are almost equally matched, because each has + to make the creature say things and do things. But if they set + out to portray a charming woman, the dramatist can recline in + an easy chair and smoke while the novelist is ruining temper, + digestion and eyesight, and spreading terror in his household + by his moodiness and unapproachability. The electric light + burns in the novelist's study at three a.m.,—the novelist + is still endeavouring to convey by means of words the + extraordinary fascination that his heroine could exercise over + mankind by the mere act of walking into a room; and he never + has really succeeded and never will. The dramatist +<!-- Page 84 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page080" name="page080">[pg 80]</a> + </span> + + writes curtly, "Enter Millicent." All are anxious to do the + dramatist's job for him. Is the play being read at + home—the reader eagerly and with brilliant success puts + his imagination to work and completes a charming Millicent + after his own secret desires. (Whereas he would coldly decline + to add one touch to Millicent were she the heroine of a novel.) + Is the play being performed on the stage—an experienced, + conscientious, and perhaps lovely actress will strive her + hardest to prove that the dramatist was right about Millicent's + astounding fascination. And if she fails, nobody will blame the + dramatist; the dramatist will receive naught but sympathy.</p> + + <p>And there is still another region of superlative difficulty + which is narrowly circumscribed for the spoilt dramatist: I + mean the whole business of persuading the public that the + improbable is probable. Every work of art is and must be + crammed with improbabilities and artifice; and the greater + portion of the artifice is employed +<!-- Page 85 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page081" name="page081">[pg 81]</a> + </span> + + in just this trickery of persuasion. Only, the public of the + dramatist needs far less persuading than the public of the + novelist. The novelist announces that Millicent accepted the + hand of the wrong man, and in spite of all the novelist's + corroborative and exegetical detail the insulted reader + declines to credit the statement and condemns the incident as + unconvincing. The dramatist decides that Millicent must accept + the hand of the wrong man, and there she is on the stage in + flesh and blood, veritably doing it! Not easy for even the + critical beholder to maintain that Millicent could not and did + not do such a silly thing when he has actually with his eyes + seen her in the very act! The dramatist, as usual, having done + less, is more richly rewarded by results.</p> + + <p>Of course it will be argued, as it has always been argued, + by those who have not written novels, that it is precisely the + "doing less"—the leaving out—that constitutes the + unique and fearful difficulty of dramatic art. "The +<!-- Page 86 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page082" name="page082">[pg 82]</a> + </span> + + skill to leave out"—lo! the master faculty of the + dramatist! But, in the first place, I do not believe that, + having regard to the relative scope of the play and of the + novel, the necessity for leaving out is more acute in the one + than in the other. The adjective "photographic" is as absurd + applied to the novel as to the play. And, in the second place, + other factors being equal, it is less exhausting, and it + requires less skill, to refrain from doing than to do. To know + when to refrain from doing may be hard, but positively to do is + even harder. Sometimes, listening to partisans of the drama, I + have been moved to suggest that, if the art of omission is so + wondrously difficult, a dramatist who practised the habit of + omitting to write anything whatever ought to be hailed as the + supreme craftsman.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 87 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page083" name="page083">[pg 83]</a> + </span> + + <h3>IV</h3> + + <p>The more closely one examines the subject, the more clear + and certain becomes the fact that there is only one fundamental + artistic difference between the novel and the play, and that + difference (to which I shall come later) is not the difference + which would be generally named as distinguishing the play from + the novel. The apparent differences are superficial, and are + due chiefly to considerations of convenience.</p> + + <p>Whether in a play or in a novel the creative artist has to + tell a story—using the word story in a very wide sense. + Just as a novel is divided into chapters, and for a similar + reason, a play is divided into acts. But neither chapters nor + acts are necessary. Some of Balzac's chief novels have no + chapter-divisions, and it has been proved that a theatre + audience +<!-- Page 88 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page084" name="page084">[pg 84]</a> + </span> + + can and will listen for two hours to "talk," and even + recitative singing, on the stage, without a pause. Indeed, + audiences, under the compulsion of an artist strong and + imperious enough, could, I am sure, be trained to marvellous + feats of prolonged receptivity. However, chapters and acts are + usual, and they involve the same constructional processes on + the part of the artist. The entire play or novel must tell a + complete story—that is, arouse a curiosity and reasonably + satisfy it, raise a main question and then settle it. And each + act or other chief division must tell a definite portion of the + story, satisfy part of the curiosity, settle part of the + question. And each scene or other minor division must do the + same according to its scale. Everything basic that applies to + the technique of the novel applies equally to the technique of + the play.</p> + + <p>In particular, I would urge that a play, any more than a + novel, need not be dramatic, employing the term as it is +<!-- Page 89 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page085" name="page085">[pg 85]</a> + </span> + + usually employed. In so far as it suspends the listener's + interest, every tale, however told, may be said to be dramatic. + In this sense + <i>The Golden Bowl</i> + + is dramatic; so are + <i>Dominique</i> + + and + <i>Persuasion</i> + + . A play need not be more dramatic than that. Very emphatically + a play need not be dramatic in the stage sense. It need never + induce interest to the degree of excitement. It need have + nothing that resembles what would be recognisable in the + theatre as a situation. It may amble on—and it will still + be a play, and it may succeed in pleasing either the fastidious + hundreds or the unfastidious hundreds of thousands, according + to the talent of the author. Without doubt mandarins will + continue for about a century yet to excommunicate certain plays + from the category of plays. But nobody will be any the worse. + And dramatists will go on proving that whatever else divides a + play from a book, "dramatic quality" does not. Some + arch-Mandarin may launch at me one of those mandarinic epigram +<!-- Page 90 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page086" name="page086">[pg 86]</a> + </span> + + matic questions which are supposed to overthrow the adversary + at one dart. "Do you seriously mean to argue, sir, that drama + need not be dramatic?" I do, if the word dramatic is to be used + in the mandarinic signification. I mean to state that some of + the finest plays of the modern age differ from a psychological + novel in nothing but the superficial form of telling. Example, + Henri Becque's + <i>La Parisienne</i> + + , than which there is no better. If I am asked to give my own + definition of the adjective "dramatic," I would say that that + story is dramatic which is told in dialogue imagined to be + spoken by actors and actresses on the stage, and that any + narrower definition is bound to exclude some genuine plays + universally accepted as such—even by mandarins. For be it + noted that the mandarin is never consistent.</p> + + <p>My definition brings me to the sole technical difference + between a play and a novel—in the play the story is told + by means of a dialogue. It is a difference +<!-- Page 91 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page087" name="page087">[pg 87]</a> + </span> + + less important than it seems, and not invariably even a sure + point of distinction between the two kinds of narrative. For a + novel may consist exclusively of dialogue. And plays may + contain other matter than dialogue. The classic chorus is not + dialogue. But nowadays we should consider the device of the + chorus to be clumsy, as, nowadays, it indeed would be. We have + grown very ingenious and clever at the trickery of making + characters talk to the audience and explain themselves and + their past history while seemingly innocent of any such + intention. And here, I admit, the dramatist has to face a + difficulty special to himself, which the novelist can avoid. I + believe it to be the sole difficulty which is peculiar to the + drama, and that it is not acute is proved by the ease with + which third-rate dramatists have generally vanquished it. + Mandarins are wont to assert that the dramatist is also + handicapped by the necessity for rigid economy in the use of + material. This is not so. Rigid economy +<!-- Page 92 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page088" name="page088">[pg 88]</a> + </span> + + in the use of material is equally advisable in every form of + art. If it is a necessity, it is a necessity which all artists + flout from time to time, and occasionally with gorgeous + results, and the successful dramatist has hitherto not been + less guilty of flouting it than the novelist or any other + artist.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 93 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page089" name="page089">[pg 89]</a> + </span> + + <h3>V</h3> + + <p>And now, having shown that some alleged differences between + the play and the novel are illusory, and that a certain + technical difference, though possibly real, is superficial and + slight, I come to the fundamental difference between + them—a difference which the laity does not suspect, which + is seldom insisted upon and never sufficiently, but which + nobody who is well versed in the making of both plays and + novels can fail to feel profoundly. The emotional strain of + writing a play is not merely less prolonged than that of + writing a novel, it is less severe even while it lasts, lower + in degree and of a less purely creative character. And herein + is the chief of all the reasons why a play is easier to write + than a novel. The drama does not belong exclusively to + literature, because its effect +<!-- Page 94 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page090" name="page090">[pg 90]</a> + </span> + + depends on something more than the composition of words. The + dramatist is the sole author of a play, but he is not the sole + creator of it. Without him nothing can be done, but, on the + other hand, he cannot do everything himself. He begins the work + of creation, which is finished either by creative interpreters + on the stage, or by the creative imagination of the reader in + the study. It is as if he carried an immense weight to the + landing at the turn of a flight of stairs, and that thence + upward the lifting had to be done by other people. Consider the + affair as a pyramidal structure, and the dramatist is the + base—but he is not the apex. A play is a collaboration of + creative faculties. The egotism of the dramatist resents this + uncomfortable fact, but the fact exists. And further, the + creative faculties are not only those of the author, the + stage-director ("producer") and the actors—the audience + itself is unconsciously part of the collaboration.</p> + + <p> +<!-- Page 95 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page091" name="page091">[pg 91]</a> + </span> + + Hence a dramatist who attempts to do the whole work of creation + before the acting begins is an inartistic usurper of the + functions of others, and will fail of proper accomplishment at + the end. The dramatist must deliberately, in performing his + share of the work, leave scope for a multitude of alien + faculties whose operations he can neither precisely foresee nor + completely control. The point is not that in the writing of a + play there are various sorts of matters—as we have + already seen—-which the dramatist must ignore; the point + is that even in the region proper to him he must not push the + creative act to its final limit. He must ever remember those + who are to come after him. For instance, though he must + visualise a scene as he writes it, he should not visualise it + completely, as a novelist should. The novelist may perceive + vividly the faces of his personages, but if the playwright + insists on seeing faces, either he will see the faces of real + actors and hamper himself by moulding the scene to suit such +<!-- Page 96 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page092" name="page092">[pg 92]</a> + </span> + + real actors, or he will perceive imaginary faces, and the + ultimate interpretation will perforce falsify his work and + nullify his intentions. This aspect of the subject might well + be much amplified, but only for a public of practising + dramatists.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 97 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page093" name="page093">[pg 93]</a> + </span> + + <h3>VI</h3> + + <p>When the play is "finished," the processes of collaboration + have yet to begin. The serious work of the dramatist is over, + but the most desolating part of his toil awaits him. I do not + refer to the business of arranging with a theatrical manager + for the production of the play. For, though that generally + partakes of the nature of tragedy, it also partakes of the + nature of amusing burlesque, owing to the fact that theatrical + managers are—no doubt inevitably—theatrical. + Nevertheless, even the theatrical manager, while disclaiming + the slightest interest in anything more vital to the stage than + the box-office, is himself in some degree a collaborator, and + is the first to show to the dramatist that a play is not a play + till it is performed. The manager reads the play, and, to the + dramatist's astonishment, +<!-- Page 98 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page094" name="page094">[pg 94]</a> + </span> + + reads quite a different play from that which the dramatist + imagines he wrote. In particular the manager reads a play which + can scarcely hope to succeed—indeed, a play against whose + chances of success ten thousand powerful reasons can be + adduced. It is remarkable that a manager nearly always foresees + failure in a manuscript, and very seldom success. The manager's + profoundest instinct—self-preservation again!—is to + refuse a play; if he accepts, it is against the grain, against + his judgment—and out of a mad spirit of adventure. Some + of the most glittering successes have been rehearsed in an + atmosphere of settled despair. The dramatist naturally feels an + immense contempt for the opinions artistic and otherwise of the + manager, and he is therein justified. The manager's vocation is + not to write plays, nor (let us hope) to act in them, nor to + direct the rehearsals of them, and even his knowledge of the + vagaries of his own box-office has often proved to be pitiably + delusive. The +<!-- Page 99 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page095" name="page095">[pg 95]</a> + </span> + + manager's true and only vocation is to refrain from producing + plays. Despite all this, however, the manager has already + collaborated in the play. The dramatist sees it differently + now. All sorts of new considerations have been presented to + him. Not a word has been altered; but it is noticeably another + play. Which is merely to say that the creative work on it which + still remains to be done has been more accurately envisaged. + This strange experience could not happen to a novel, because + when a novel is written it is finished.</p> + + <p>And when the director of rehearsals, or producer, has been + chosen, and this priceless and mysterious person has his first + serious confabulation with the author, then at once the play + begins to assume new shapes—contours undreamt of by the + author till that startling moment. And even if the author has + the temerity to conduct his own rehearsals, similar + disconcerting phenomena will occur; for the author as a + producer is a different +<!-- Page 100 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page096" name="page096">[pg 96]</a> + </span> + + fellow from the author as author. The producer is up against + realities. He, first, renders the play concrete, gradually + condenses its filmy vapours into a solid element.... He + suggests the casting. "What do you think of X. for the old + man?" asks the producer. The author is staggered. Is it + conceivable that so renowned a producer can have so misread and + misunderstood the play? X. would be preposterous as the old + man. But the producer goes on talking. And suddenly the author + sees possibilities in X. But at the same time he sees a + different play from what he wrote. And quite probably he sees a + more glorious play. Quite probably he had not suspected how + great a dramatist he is.... Before the first rehearsal is + called, the play, still without a word altered, has gone + through astounding creative transmutations; the author + recognises in it some likeness to his beloved child, but it is + the likeness of a first cousin.</p> + + <p>At the first rehearsal, and for many +<!-- Page 101 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page097" name="page097">[pg 97]</a> + </span> + + rehearsals, to an extent perhaps increasing, perhaps + decreasing, the dramatist is forced into an apologetic and + self-conscious mood; and his mien is something between that of + a criminal who has committed a horrid offence and that of a + father over the crude body of a new-born child. Now in truth he + deeply realises that the play is a collaboration. In extreme + cases he may be brought to see that he himself is one of the + less important factors in the collaboration. The first + preoccupation of the interpreters is not with his play at all, + but—quite rightly—with their own careers; if they + were not honestly convinced that their own careers were the + chief genuine excuse for the existence of the theatre and the + play they would not act very well. But, more than that, they do + not regard his play as a sufficient vehicle for the furtherance + of their careers. At the most favourable, what they secretly + think is that if they are permitted to exercise their talents + on his play there is a chance that they may be +<!-- Page 102 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page098" name="page098">[pg 98]</a> + </span> + + able to turn it into a sufficient vehicle for the furtherance + of their careers. The attitude of every actor towards his part + is: "My part is not much of a part as it stands, but if my + individuality is allowed to get into free contact with it, I + may make something brilliant out of it." Which attitude is a + proper attitude, and an attitude in my opinion justified by the + facts of the case. The actor's phrase is that he + <i>creates</i> + + a part, and he is right. He completes the labour of creation + begun by the author and continued by the producer, and if + reasonable liberty is not accorded to him—if either the + author or the producer attempts to do too much of the creative + work—the result cannot be satisfactory.</p> + + <p>As the rehearsals proceed the play changes from day to day. + However autocratic the producer, however obstinate the + dramatist, the play will vary at each rehearsal like a large + cloud in a gentle wind. It is never the same play for two days + together. Nor is this surprising, +<!-- Page 103 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page099" name="page099">[pg 99]</a> + </span> + + seeing that every day and night a dozen, or it may be two + dozen, human beings endowed with the creative gift are + creatively working on it. Every dramatist who is candid with + himself—I do not suggest that he should be candid to the + theatrical world—well knows that though his play is often + worsened by his collaborators it is also often + improved,—and improved in the most mysterious and + dazzling manner—without a word being altered. Producer + and actors do not merely suggest possibilities, they execute + them. And the author is confronted by artistic phenomena for + which lawfully he may not claim credit. On the other hand, he + may be confronted by inartistic phenomena in respect to which + lawfully he is blameless, but which he cannot prevent; a + rehearsal is like a battle,—certain persons are + theoretically in control, but in fact the thing principally + fights itself. And thus the creation goes on until the + dress-rehearsal, when it seems to have come to a stop. And the +<!-- Page 104 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page100" name="page100">[pg 100]</a> + </span> + + dramatist lying awake in the night reflects, stoically, + fatalistically: "Well, that is the play that they have made of + <i>my</i> + + play!" And he may be pleased or he may be disgusted. But if he + attends the first performance he cannot fail to notice, after + the first few minutes of it, that he was quite mistaken, and + that what the actors are performing is still another play. The + audience is collaborating.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 105 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page101" name="page101">[pg 101]</a> + </span> + + <h2>PART IV</h2> + + <h3>THE ARTIST AND THE PUBLIC</h3> + +<!-- Page 106 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page102" name="page102">[pg 102]</a> + </span> + + <br /> + +<!-- Page 107 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page103" name="page103">[pg 103]</a> + </span> + + <h3>I</h3> + + <p>I can divide all the imaginative writers I have ever met + into two classes—those who admitted and sometimes + proclaimed loudly that they desired popularity; and those who + expressed a noble scorn or a gentle contempt for popularity. + The latter, however, always failed to conceal their envy of + popular authors, and this envy was a phenomenon whose truculent + bitterness could not be surpassed even in political or + religious life. And indeed, since (as I have held in a previous + chapter) the object of the artist is to share his emotions with + others, it would be strange if the normal artist spurned + popularity in order to keep his emotions as much as possible to + himself. An enormous amount of dishonest nonsense has been and + will be written by uncreative critics, of course in the higher + interests of crea +<!-- Page 108 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page104" name="page104">[pg 104]</a> + </span> + + tive authors, about popularity and the proper attitude of the + artist thereto. But possibly the attitude of a first-class + artist himself may prove a more valuable guide.</p> + + <p>The + <i>Letters of George Meredith</i> + + (of which the first volume is a magnificent unfolding of the + character of a great man) are full of references to popularity, + references overt and covert. Meredith could never—and + quite naturally—get away from the idea of popularity. He + was a student of the English public, and could occasionally be + unjust to it. Writing to M. André Raffalovich (who had + sent him a letter of appreciation) in November, 1881, he said: + "I venture to judge by your name that you are at most but half + English. I can consequently believe in the feeling you express + for the work of an unpopular writer. Otherwise one would + incline to be sceptical, for the English are given to practical + jokes, and to stir up the vanity of authors who are supposed to + languish in the shade amuses +<!-- Page 109 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page105" name="page105">[pg 105]</a> + </span> + + them." A remark curiously unfair to the small, faithful band of + admirers which Meredith then had. The whole letter, while + warmly and touchingly grateful, is gloomy. Further on in it he + says: "Good work has a fair chance to be recognised in the end, + and if not, what does it matter?" But there is constant proof + that it did matter very much. In a letter to William Hardman, + written when he was well and hopeful, he says: "Never mind: if + we do but get the public ear, oh, my dear old boy!" To Captain + Maxse, in reference to a vast sum of £8,000 paid by the + <i>Cornhill</i> + + people to George Eliot (for an unreadable novel), he exclaims: + "Bon Dieu! Will aught like this ever happen to me?"</p> + + <p>And to his son he was very explicit about the extent to + which unpopularity "mattered": "As I am unpopular I am + ill-paid, and therefore bound to work double tides, hardly ever + able to lay down the pen. This affects my +<!-- Page 110 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page106" name="page106">[pg 106]</a> + </span> + + weakened stomach, and so the round of the vicious circle is + looped." (Vol. I., p. 322.) And in another letter to Arthur + Meredith about the same time he sums up his career thus: "As + for me, I have failed, and I find little to make the end + undesirable." (Vol. I., p. 318.) This letter is dated June + 23rd, 1881. Meredith was then fifty-three years of age. He had + written + <i>Modern Love</i> + + , + <i>The Shaving of Shagpat</i> + + , + <i>The Ordeal of Richard Feverel</i> + + , + <i>Rhoda Fleming</i> + + , + <i>The Egoist</i> + + and other masterpieces. He knew that he had done his best and + that his best was very fine. It would be difficult to credit + that he did not privately deem himself one of the masters of + English literature and destined to what we call immortality. He + had the enthusiastic appreciation of some of the finest minds + of the epoch. And yet, "As for me, I have failed, and I find + little to make the end undesirable." But he had not failed in + his industry, nor in the quality +<!-- Page 111 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page107" name="page107">[pg 107]</a> + </span> + + of his work, nor in achieving self-respect and the respect of + his friends. He had failed only in one thing—immediate + popularity.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 112 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page108" name="page108">[pg 108]</a> + </span> + + <h3>II</h3> + + <p>Assuming then that an author is justified in desiring + immediate popularity, instead of being content with poverty and + the unheard plaudits of posterity, another point presents + itself. Ought he to limit himself to a mere desire for + popularity, or ought he actually to do something, or to refrain + from doing something, to the special end of obtaining + popularity? Ought he to say: "I shall write exactly what and + how I like, without any regard for the public; I shall consider + nothing but my own individuality and powers; I shall be guided + solely by my own personal conception of what the public ought + to like"? Or ought he to say: "Let me examine this public, and + let me see whether some compromise between us is not + possible"?</p> + + <p>Certain authors are never under the +<!-- Page 113 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page109" name="page109">[pg 109]</a> + </span> + + necessity of facing the alternative. Occasionally, by chance, a + genius may be so fortunately constituted and so brilliantly + endowed that he captures the public at once, prestige being + established, and the question of compromise never arises. But + this is exceedingly rare. On the other hand, many mediocre + authors, exercising the most complete sincerity, find ample + appreciation in the vast mediocrity of the public, and are + never troubled by any problem worse than the vagaries of their + fountain-pens. Such authors enjoy in plenty the gewgaw known as + happiness. Of nearly all really original artists, however, it + may be said that they are at loggerheads with the + public—as an almost inevitable consequence of their + originality; and for them the problem of compromise or + no-compromise acutely exists.</p> + + <p>George Meredith was such an artist. George Meredith before + anything else was a poet. He would have been a better poet than + a novelist, and I believe that +<!-- Page 114 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page110" name="page110">[pg 110]</a> + </span> + + he thought so. The public did not care for his poetry. If he + had belonged to the no-compromise school, whose adherents + usually have the effrontery to claim him, he would have said: + "I shall keep on writing poetry, even if I have to become a + stockbroker in order to do it." But when he was only + thirty-three—a boy, as authors go—he had already + tired of no-compromise. He wrote to Augustus Jessopp: "It may + be that in a year or two I shall find time for a full sustained + Song.... The worst is that having taken to prose delineations + of character and life, one's affections are divided.... And in + truth, being a servant of the public, + <i>I must wait till my master commands before I take seriously + to singing</i> + + ." (Vol. I., p. 45.) Here is as good an example as one is + likely to find of a first-class artist openly admitting the + futility of writing what will not be immediately read, when he + can write something else, less to his taste, that will be read. + The same sentiment has actuated an immense number +<!-- Page 115 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page111" name="page111">[pg 111]</a> + </span> + + of first-class creative artists, including Shakspere, who would + have been a rare client for a literary agent.... So much for + refraining from doing the precise sort of work one would prefer + to do because it is not appreciated by the public.</p> + + <p>There remains the doing of a sort of work against the grain + because the public appreciates it—otherwise the + pot-boiler. In 1861 Meredith wrote to Mrs Ross: "I am engaged + in extra potboiling work which enables me to do this," i.e., to + write an occasional long poem. (Vol. I., p. 52.) Oh, base + compromise! Seventeen years later he wrote to R.L. Stevenson: + "Of potboilers let none speak. Jove hangs them upon necks that + could soar above his heights but for the accursed weight." + (Vol. I., p. 291.) It may be said that Meredith was forced to + write potboilers. He was no more forced to write potboilers + than any other author. Sooner than wallow in that shame, he + might have earned money in more difficult ways. Or he might + have indulged in +<!-- Page 116 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page112" name="page112">[pg 112]</a> + </span> + + that starvation so heartily prescribed for authors by a + plutocratic noble who occasionally deigns to employ the English + tongue in prose. Meredith subdued his muse, and Meredith wrote + potboilers, because he was a first-class artist and a man of + profound common sense. Being extremely creative, he had to + arrive somehow, and he remembered that the earth is the earth, + and the world the world, and men men, and he arrived as best he + could. The great majority of his peers have acted + similarly.</p> + + <p>The truth is that an artist who demands appreciation from + the public on his own terms, and on none but his own terms, is + either a god or a conceited and impractical fool. And he is + somewhat more likely to be the latter than the former. He wants + too much. There are two sides to every bargain, including the + artistic. The most fertile and the most powerful artists are + the readiest to recognise this, because their sense of + proportion, which is the sense of order, is well developed. The + +<!-- Page 117 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page113" name="page113">[pg 113]</a> + </span> + + lack of the sense of proportion is the mark of the + <i>petit maître</i> + + . The sagacious artist, while respecting himself, will respect + the idiosyncrasies of his public. To do both simultaneously is + quite possible. In particular, the sagacious artist will + respect basic national prejudices. For example, no first-class + English novelist or dramatist would dream of allowing to his + pen the freedom in treating sexual phenomena which Continental + writers enjoy as a matter of course. The British public is + admittedly wrong on this important point—hypocritical, + illogical and absurd. But what would you? You cannot defy it; + you literally cannot. If you tried, you would not even get as + far as print, to say nothing of library counters. You can only + get round it by ingenuity and guile. You can only go a very + little further than is quite safe. You can only do one man's + modest share in the education of the public.</p> + + <p>In Valery Larbaud's latest novel, + <i>A.O. Barnabooth,</i> + + occurs a phrase of deep +<!-- Page 118 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page114" name="page114">[pg 114]</a> + </span> + + wisdom about women: " + <i>La femme est une grande realite, comme la guerre</i> + + ." It might be applied to the public. The public is a great + actuality, like war. If you are a creative and creating artist, + you cannot ignore it, though it can ignore you. There it is! + You can do something with it, but not much. And what you do not + do with it, it must do with you, if there is to be the contact + which is essential to the artistic function. This contact may + be closened and completed by the artist's cleverness—the + mere cleverness of adaptability which most first-class artists + have exhibited. You can wear the fashions of the day. You can + tickle the ingenuous beast's ear in order to distract his + attention while you stab him in the chest. You can cajole money + out of him by one kind of work in order to gain leisure in + which to force him to accept later on something that he would + prefer to refuse. You can use a thousand devices on the + excellent simpleton.... And in the process you may degrade your +<!-- Page 119 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page115" name="page115">[pg 115]</a> + </span> + + self to a mere popularity-hunter! Of course you may; as you may + become a drunkard through drinking a glass of beer. Only, if + you have anything to say worth saying, you usually don't + succumb to this danger. If you have anything to say worth + saying, you usually manage somehow to get it said, and read. + The artist of genuine vocation is apt to be a wily person. He + knows how to sacrifice inessentials so that he may retain + essentials. And he can mysteriously put himself even into a + potboiler. + <i>Clarissa Harlowe</i> + + , which influenced fiction throughout Europe, was the direct + result of potboiling. If the artist has not the wit and the + strength of mind to keep his own soul amid the collisions of + life, he is the inferior of a plain, honest merchant in + stamina, and ought to retire to the upper branches of the Civil + Service.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 120 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page116" name="page116">[pg 116]</a> + </span> + + <h3>III</h3> + + <p>When the author has finished the composition of a work, when + he has put into the trappings of the time as much of his + eternal self as they will safely hold, having regard to the + best welfare of his creative career as a whole, when, in short, + he has done all that he can to ensure the fullest public + appreciation of the essential in him—there still remains + to be accomplished something which is not unimportant in the + entire affair of obtaining contact with the public. He has to + see that the work is placed before the public as advantageously + as possible. In other words, he has to dispose of the work as + advantageously as possible. In other words, when he lays down + the pen he ought to become a merchant, for the mere reason that + he has an article to sell, and +<!-- Page 121 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page117" name="page117">[pg 117]</a> + </span> + + the more skilfully he sells it the better will be the result, + not only for the public appreciation of his message, but for + himself as a private individual and as an artist with further + activities in front of him.</p> + + <p>Now this absolutely logical attitude of a merchant towards + one's finished work infuriates the dilettanti of the literary + world, to whom the very word "royalties" is anathema. They + apparently would prefer to treat literature as they imagine + Byron treated it, although as a fact no poet in a short life + ever contrived to make as many pounds sterling out of verse as + Byron made. Or perhaps they would like to return to the golden + days when the author had to be "patronised" in order to exist; + or even to the mid-nineteenth century, when practically all + authors save the most successful—and not a few of the + successful also—failed to obtain the fair reward of their + work. The dilettanti's snobbishness and sentimentality prevent + them from admitting +<!-- Page 122 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page118" name="page118">[pg 118]</a> + </span> + + that, in a democratic age, when an author is genuinely + appreciated, either he makes money or he is the foolish victim + of a scoundrel. They are fond of saying that agreements and + royalties have nothing to do with literature. But agreements + and royalties have a very great deal to do with literature. + Full contact between artist and public depends largely upon + publisher or manager being compelled to be efficient and just. + And upon the publisher's or manager's efficiency and justice + depend also the dignity, the leisure, the easy flow of coin, + the freedom, and the pride which are helpful to the full + fruition of any artist. No artist was ever assisted in his + career by the yoke, by servitude, by enforced monotony, by + overwork, by economic inferiority. See Meredith's + correspondence everywhere.</p> + + <p>Nor can there be any satisfaction in doing badly that which + might be done well. If an artist writes a fine poem, shows it + to his dearest friend, and +<!-- Page 123 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page119" name="page119">[pg 119]</a> + </span> + + burns it—I can respect him. But if an artist writes a + fine poem, and then by sloppiness and snobbishness allows it to + be inefficiently published, and fails to secure his own + interests in the transaction, on the plea that he is an artist + and not a merchant, then I refuse to respect him. A man cannot + fulfil, and has no right to fulfil, one function only in this + complex world. Some, indeed many, of the greatest creative + artists have managed to be very good merchants also, and have + not been ashamed of the double + <i>rôle</i> + + . To read the correspondence and memoirs of certain supreme + artists one might be excused for thinking, indeed, that they + were more interested in the + <i>rôle</i> + + of merchant than in the other + <i>rôle</i> + + ; and yet their work in no wise suffered. In the distribution + of energy between the two + <i>rôles</i> + + common sense is naturally needed. But the artist who has enough + common sense—or, otherwise expressed, enough sense of + reality—not to disdain the + <i>rôle</i> + + of +<!-- Page 124 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page120" name="page120">[pg 120]</a> + </span> + + merchant will probably have enough not to exaggerate it. He may + be reassured on one point—namely, that success in the + <i>rôle</i> + + of merchant will never impair any self-satisfaction he may feel + in the + <i>rôle</i> + + of artist. The late discovery of a large public in America + delighted Meredith and had a tonic effect on his whole system. + It is often hinted, even if it is not often said, that great + popularity ought to disturb the conscience of the artist. I do + not believe it. If the conscience of the artist is not + disturbed during the actual work itself, no subsequent + phenomenon will or should disturb it. Once the artist is + convinced of his artistic honesty, no public can be too large + for his peace of mind. On the other hand, failure in the + <i>rôle</i> + + of merchant will emphatically impair his self-satisfaction in + the + <i>rôle</i> + + of artist and his courage in the further pursuance of that + <i>rôle</i> + + .</p> + + <p>But many artists have admittedly no aptitude for merchantry. + Not only is their sense of the bindingness of a bargain +<!-- Page 125 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page121" name="page121">[pg 121]</a> + </span> + + imperfect, but they are apt in business to behave in a puerile + manner, to close an arrangement out of mere impatience, to be + grossly undiplomatic, to be victimised by their vanity, to + believe what they ought not to believe, to discredit what is + patently true, to worry over negligible trifles, and generally + to make a clumsy mess of their affairs. An artist may say: "I + cannot work unless I have a free mind, and I cannot have a free + mind if I am to be bothered all the time by details of + business."</p> + + <p>Apart from the fact that no artist who pretends also to be a + man can in this world hope for a free mind, and that if he + seeks it by neglecting his debtors he will be deprived of it by + his creditors—apart from that, the artist's demand for a + free mind is reasonable. Moreover, it is always a distressing + sight to see a man trying to do what nature has not fitted him + to do, and so doing it ill. Such artists, however—and + they form possibly the majority—can always employ an +<!-- Page 126 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page122" name="page122">[pg 122]</a> + </span> + + expert to do their business for them, to cope on their behalf + with the necessary middleman. Not that I deem the publisher or + the theatrical manager to be by nature less upright than any + other class of merchant. But the publisher and the theatrical + manager have been subjected for centuries to a special and + grave temptation. The ordinary merchant deals with other + merchants—his equals in business skill. The publisher and + the theatrical manager deal with what amounts to a race of + children, of whom even arch-angels could not refrain from + taking advantage.</p> + + <p>When the democratisation of literature seriously set in, it + inevitably grew plain that the publisher and the theatrical + manager had very humanly been giving way to the temptation with + which heaven in her infinite wisdom had pleased to afflict + them,—and the Society of Authors came into being. A + natural consequence of the general awakening was the + self-invention of the literary agent. The +<!-- Page 127 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page123" name="page123">[pg 123]</a> + </span> + + Society of Authors, against immense obstacles, has performed + wonders in the economic education of the creative artist, and + therefore in the improvement of letters. The literary agent, + against obstacles still more immense, has carried out the + details of the revolution. The outcry—partly sentimental, + partly snobbish, but mainly interested—was at first + tremendous against these meddlers who would destroy the + charming personal relations that used to exist between, for + example, the author and the publisher. (The less said about + those charming personal relations the better. Documents exist.) + But the main battle is now over, and everyone concerned is + beautifully aware who holds the field. Though much remains to + be done, much has been done; and today the creative artist who, + conscious of inability to transact his own affairs efficiently, + does not obtain efficient advice and help therein, stands in + his own light both as an artist and as a man, and is a +<!-- Page 128 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page124" name="page124">[pg 124]</a> + </span> + + reactionary force. He owes the practice of elementary common + sense to himself, to his work, and to his profession at + large.</p> + + <hr /> + +<!-- Page 129 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page125" name="page125">[pg 125]</a> + </span> + + <h3>IV</h3> + + <p>The same dilettante spirit which refuses to see the + connection between art and money has also a tendency to + repudiate the world of men at large, as being unfit for the + habitation of artists. This is a still more serious error of + attitude—especially in a storyteller. No artist is likely + to be entirely admirable who is not a man before he is an + artist. The notion that art is first and the rest of the + universe nowhere is bound to lead to preciosity and futility in + art. The artist who is too sensitive for contacts with the + non-artistic world is thereby too sensitive for his vocation, + and fit only to fall into gentle ecstasies over the work of + artists less sensitive than himself.</p> + + <p>The classic modern example of the tragedy of the artist who + repudiates the world is Flaubert. At an early age +<!-- Page 130 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page126" name="page126">[pg 126]</a> + </span> + + Flaubert convinced himself that he had no use for the world of + men. He demanded to be left in solitude and tranquillity. The + morbid streak in his constitution grew rapidly under the + fostering influences of peace and tranquillity. He was + brilliantly peculiar as a schoolboy. As an old man of + twenty-two, mourning over the vanished brio of youth, he + carried morbidity to perfection. Only when he was travelling + (as, for example, in Egypt) do his letters lose for a time + their distemper. His love-letters are often ignobly inept, and + nearly always spoilt by the crass provincialism of the refined + and cultivated hermit. His mistress was a woman difficult to + handle and indeed a Tartar in egotism, but as the recipient of + Flaubert's love-letters she must win universal sympathy.</p> + + <p>Full of a grievance against the whole modern planet, + Flaubert turned passionately to ancient times (in which he + would have been equally unhappy had he lived in them), and + hoped to resurrect beauty +<!-- Page 131 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page127" name="page127">[pg 127]</a> + </span> + + when he had failed to see it round about him. Whether or not he + did resurrect beauty is a point which the present age is now + deciding. His fictions of modern life undoubtedly suffer from + his detestation of the material; but considering his manner of + existence it is marvellous that he should have been able to + accomplish any of them, except + <i>Un Coeur Simple</i> + + . The final one, + <i>Bouvard et Pécuchet</i> + + , shows the lack of the sense of reality which must be the + inevitable sequel of divorce from mankind. It is realism + without conviction. No such characters as Bouvard and Pecuchet + could ever have existed outside Flaubert's brain, and the + reader's resultant impression is that the author has ruined a + central idea which was well suited for a grand larkish + extravaganza in the hands of a French Swift. But the spectacle + of Flaubert writing in + <i>mots justes</i> + + a grand larkish extravaganza cannot be conjured up by + fancy.</p> + + <p>There are many sub-Flauberts rife in London. They are + usually more critical +<!-- Page 132 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page128" name="page128">[pg 128]</a> + </span> + + than creative, but their influence upon creators, and + especially the younger creators, is not negligible. Their aim + in preciosity would seem to be to keep themselves unspotted + from the world. They are for ever being surprised and hurt by + the crudity and coarseness of human nature, and for ever + bracing themselves to be not as others are. They would have + incurred the anger of Dr. Johnson, and a just discipline for + them would be that they should be cross-examined by the great + bully in presence of a jury of butchers and sentenced + accordingly. The morbid Flaubertian shrinking from reality is + to be found to-day even in relatively robust minds. I was + recently at a provincial cinema, and witnessed on the screen + with a friend a wondrously ingenuous drama entitled "Gold is + not All." My friend, who combines the callings of engineer and + general adventurer with that of serving his country, leaned + over to me in the darkness amid the violent applause, and said: + "You know, this +<!-- Page 133 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page129" name="page129">[pg 129]</a> + </span> + + kind of thing always makes me ashamed of human nature." I + answered him as Johnsonially as the circumstances would allow. + Had he lived to the age of fifty so blind that it needed a + cinema audience to show him what the general level of human + nature really is? Nobody has any right to be ashamed of human + nature. Is one ashamed of one's mother? Is one ashamed of the + cosmic process of evolution? Human nature + <i>is</i> + + . And the more deeply the creative artist, by frank contacts, + absorbs that supreme fact into his brain, the better for his + work.</p> + + <p>There is a numerous band of persons in London—and the + novelist and dramatist are not infrequently drawn into their + circle—who spend so much time and emotion in practising + the rites of the religion of art that they become incapable of + real existence. Each is a Stylites on a pillar. Their opinion + on Leon Bakst, Francis Thompson, Augustus John, Cyril Scott, + Maurice Ravel, Vuillard, James +<!-- Page 134 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page130" name="page130">[pg 130]</a> + </span> + + Stephens, E.A. Rickards, Richard Strauss, Eugen d'Albert, etc., + may not be without value, and their genuine feverish morbid + interest in art has its usefulness; but they know no more about + reality than a Pekinese dog on a cushion. They never approach + normal life. They scorn it. They have a horror of it. They + class politics with the differential calculus. They have heard + of Lloyd George, the rise in the price of commodities, and the + eternal enigma, what is a sardine; but only because they must + open a newspaper to look at the advertisements and + announcements relating to the arts. The occasional frequenting + of this circle may not be disadvantageous to the creative + artist. But let him keep himself inoculated against its disease + by constant steady plunges into the cold sea of the general + national life. Let him mingle with the public, for God's sake! + No phenomenon on this wretched planet, which after all is ours, + is meet for the artist's shrinking scorn. And the average man, + as to +<!-- Page 135 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page131" name="page131">[pg 131]</a> + </span> + + whom the artist's ignorance is often astounding, must for ever + constitute the main part of the material in which he works.</p> + + <p>Above all, let not the creative artist suppose that the + antidote to the circle of dilettantism is the circle of social + reform. It is not. I referred in the first chapter to the + prevalent illusion that the republic has just now arrived at a + crisis, and that if something is not immediately done disaster + will soon be upon us. This is the illusion to which the circle + of social reforms is naturally prone, and it is an illusion + against which the common sense of the creative artist must + mightily protest. The world is, without doubt, a very bad + world; but it is also a very good world. The function of the + artist is certainly concerned more with what is than with what + ought to be. When all necessary reform has been accomplished + our perfected planet will be stone-cold. Until then the + artist's affair is to keep his balance amid warring points of + view, +<!-- Page 136 --> + <span class="pagenum"> + <a id="page132" name="page132">[pg 132]</a> + </span> + + and in the main to record and enjoy what is.... But is not the + Minimum Wage Bill urgent? But when the minimum wage is as trite + as the jury-system, the urgency of reform will still be + tempting the artist too far out of his true path. And the + artist who yields is lost.</p> + + <hr class="full" /> + + <div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12743 ***</div> +</body> +</html> + |