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diff --git a/old/artow10h.htm b/old/artow10h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..063a2e5 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/artow10h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,2452 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII"> +<title>The Art of Writing and Other Essays</title> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">The Art of Writing and Other Essays, by Robert Louis Stevenson</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Art of Writing and Other Essays +by Robert Louis Stevenson +(#22 in our series by Robert Louis Stevenson) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Art of Writing and Other Essays + +Author: Robert Louis Stevenson + +Release Date: April, 1996 [EBook #492] +[This file was first posted on February 21, 1996] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII +</pre> +<p> +<a name="startoftext"></a> +Transcribed from the 1905 Chatto & Windus edition by David Price, +email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +ESSAYS IN THE ART OF WRITING<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Contents:<br> + On some technical elements of style in literature<br> + The morality of the profession of letters<br> + Books which have influenced me<br> + A note on realism<br> + My first book: ‘Treasure Island’<br> + The genesis of ‘the master of Ballantrae’<br> + Preface to ‘the master of Ballantrae’<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +ON SOME TECHNICAL ELEMENTS OF STYLE IN LITERATURE <a name="citation1"></a><a href="#footnote1">{1}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +There is nothing more disenchanting to man than to be shown the springs +and mechanism of any art. All our arts and occupations lie wholly +on the surface; it is on the surface that we perceive their beauty, +fitness, and significance; and to pry below is to be appalled by their +emptiness and shocked by the coarseness of the strings and pulleys. +In a similar way, psychology itself, when pushed to any nicety, discovers +an abhorrent baldness, but rather from the fault of our analysis than +from any poverty native to the mind. And perhaps in aesthetics +the reason is the same: those disclosures which seem fatal to the dignity +of art seem so perhaps only in the proportion of our ignorance; and +those conscious and unconscious artifices which it seems unworthy of +the serious artist to employ were yet, if we had the power to trace +them to their springs, indications of a delicacy of the sense finer +than we conceive, and hints of ancient harmonies in nature. This +ignorance at least is largely irremediable. We shall never learn +the affinities of beauty, for they lie too deep in nature and too far +back in the mysterious history of man. The amateur, in consequence, +will always grudgingly receive details of method, which can be stated +but never can wholly be explained; nay, on the principle laid down in +<i>Hudibras</i>, that<br> +<br> +<br> +‘Still the less they understand,<br> +The more they admire the sleight-of-hand,’<br> +<br> +<br> +many are conscious at each new disclosure of a diminution in the ardour +of their pleasure. I must therefore warn that well-known character, +the general reader, that I am here embarked upon a most distasteful +business: taking down the picture from the wall and looking on the back; +and, like the inquiring child, pulling the musical cart to pieces.<br> +<br> +<i>1. Choice of Words</i>. - The art of literature stands apart +from among its sisters, because the material in which the literary artist +works is the dialect of life; hence, on the one hand, a strange freshness +and immediacy of address to the public mind, which is ready prepared +to understand it; but hence, on the other, a singular limitation. +The sister arts enjoy the use of a plastic and ductile material, like +the modeller’s clay; literature alone is condemned to work in +mosaic with finite and quite rigid words. You have seen these +blocks, dear to the nursery: this one a pillar, that a pediment, a third +a window or a vase. It is with blocks of just such arbitrary size +and figure that the literary architect is condemned to design the palace +of his art. Nor is this all; for since these blocks, or words, +are the acknowledged currency of our daily affairs, there are here possible +none of those suppressions by which other arts obtain relief, continuity, +and vigour: no hieroglyphic touch, no smoothed impasto, no inscrutable +shadow, as in painting; no blank wall, as in architecture; but every +word, phrase, sentence, and paragraph must move in a logical progression, +and convey a definite conventional import.<br> +<br> +Now the first merit which attracts in the pages of a good writer, or +the talk of a brilliant conversationalist, is the apt choice and contrast +of the words employed. It is, indeed, a strange art to take these +blocks, rudely conceived for the purpose of the market or the bar, and +by tact of application touch them to the finest meanings and distinctions, +restore to them their primal energy, wittily shift them to another issue, +or make of them a drum to rouse the passions. But though this +form of merit is without doubt the most sensible and seizing, it is +far from being equally present in all writers. The effect of words +in Shakespeare, their singular justice, significance, and poetic charm, +is different, indeed, from the effect of words in Addison or Fielding. +Or, to take an example nearer home, the words in Carlyle seem electrified +into an energy of lineament, like the faces of men furiously moved; +whilst the words in Macaulay, apt enough to convey his meaning, harmonious +enough in sound, yet glide from the memory like undistinguished elements +in a general effect. But the first class of writers have no monopoly +of literary merit. There is a sense in which Addison is superior +to Carlyle; a sense in which Cicero is better than Tacitus, in which +Voltaire excels Montaigne: it certainly lies not in the choice of words; +it lies not in the interest or value of the matter; it lies not in force +of intellect, of poetry, or of humour. The three first are but +infants to the three second; and yet each, in a particular point of +literary art, excels his superior in the whole. What is that point?<br> +<br> +<i>2. The Web</i>. - Literature, although it stands apart by reason +of the great destiny and general use of its medium in the affairs of +men, is yet an art like other arts. Of these we may distinguish +two great classes: those arts, like sculpture, painting, acting, which +are representative, or, as used to be said very clumsily, imitative; +and those, like architecture, music, and the dance, which are self-sufficient, +and merely presentative. Each class, in right of this distinction, +obeys principles apart; yet both may claim a common ground of existence, +and it may be said with sufficient justice that the motive and end of +any art whatever is to make a pattern; a pattern, it may be, of colours, +of sounds, of changing attitudes, geometrical figures, or imitative +lines; but still a pattern. That is the plane on which these sisters +meet; it is by this that they are arts; and if it be well they should +at times forget their childish origin, addressing their intelligence +to virile tasks, and performing unconsciously that necessary function +of their life, to make a pattern, it is still imperative that the pattern +shall be made.<br> +<br> +Music and literature, the two temporal arts, contrive their pattern +of sounds in time; or, in other words, of sounds and pauses. Communication +may be made in broken words, the business of life be carried on with +substantives alone; but that is not what we call literature; and the +true business of the literary artist is to plait or weave his meaning, +involving it around itself; so that each sentence, by successive phrases, +shall first come into a kind of knot, and then, after a moment of suspended +meaning, solve and clear itself. In every properly constructed +sentence there should be observed this knot or hitch; so that (however +delicately) we are led to foresee, to expect, and then to welcome the +successive phrases. The pleasure may be heightened by an element +of surprise, as, very grossly, in the common figure of the antithesis, +or, with much greater subtlety, where an antithesis is first suggested +and then deftly evaded. Each phrase, besides, is to be comely +in itself; and between the implication and the evolution of the sentence +there should be a satisfying equipoise of sound; for nothing more often +disappoints the ear than a sentence solemnly and sonorously prepared, +and hastily and weakly finished. Nor should the balance be too +striking and exact, for the one rule is to be infinitely various; to +interest, to disappoint, to surprise, and yet still to gratify; to be +ever changing, as it were, the stitch, and yet still to give the effect +of an ingenious neatness.<br> +<br> +The conjurer juggles with two oranges, and our pleasure in beholding +him springs from this, that neither is for an instant overlooked or +sacrificed. So with the writer. His pattern, which is to +please the supersensual ear, is yet addressed, throughout and first +of all, to the demands of logic. Whatever be the obscurities, +whatever the intricacies of the argument, the neatness of the fabric +must not suffer, or the artist has been proved unequal to his design. +And, on the other hand, no form of words must be selected, no knot must +be tied among the phrases, unless knot and word be precisely what is +wanted to forward and illuminate the argument; for to fail in this is +to swindle in the game. The genius of prose rejects the <i>cheville</i>no +less emphatically than the laws of verse; and the <i>cheville</i>, I +should perhaps explain to some of my readers, is any meaningless or +very watered phrase employed to strike a balance in the sound. +Pattern and argument live in each other; and it is by the brevity, clearness, +charm, or emphasis of the second, that we judge the strength and fitness +of the first.<br> +<br> +Style is synthetic; and the artist, seeking, so to speak, a peg to plait +about, takes up at once two or more elements or two or more views of +the subject in hand; combines, implicates, and contrasts them; and while, +in one sense, he was merely seeking an occasion for the necessary knot, +he will be found, in the other, to have greatly enriched the meaning, +or to have transacted the work of two sentences in the space of one. +In the change from the successive shallow statements of the old chronicler +to the dense and luminous flow of highly synthetic narrative, there +is implied a vast amount of both philosophy and wit. The philosophy +we clearly see, recognising in the synthetic writer a far more deep +and stimulating view of life, and a far keener sense of the generation +and affinity of events. The wit we might imagine to be lost; but +it is not so, for it is just that wit, these perpetual nice contrivances, +these difficulties overcome, this double purpose attained, these two +oranges kept simultaneously dancing in the air, that, consciously or +not, afford the reader his delight. Nay, and this wit, so little +recognised, is the necessary organ of that philosophy which we so much +admire. That style is therefore the most perfect, not, as fools +say, which is the most natural, for the most natural is the disjointed +babble of the chronicler; but which attains the highest degree of elegant +and pregnant implication unobtrusively; or if obtrusively, then with +the greatest gain to sense and vigour. Even the derangement of +the phrases from their (so-called) natural order is luminous for the +mind; and it is by the means of such designed reversal that the elements +of a judgment may be most pertinently marshalled, or the stages of a +complicated action most perspicuously bound into one.<br> +<br> +The web, then, or the pattern: a web at once sensuous and logical, an +elegant and pregnant texture: that is style, that is the foundation +of the art of literature. Books indeed continue to be read, for +the interest of the fact or fable, in which this quality is poorly represented, +but still it will be there. And, on the other hand, how many do +we continue to peruse and reperuse with pleasure whose only merit is +the elegance of texture? I am tempted to mention Cicero; and since +Mr. Anthony Trollope is dead, I will. It is a poor diet for the +mind, a very colourless and toothless ‘criticism of life’; +but we enjoy the pleasure of a most intricate and dexterous pattern, +every stitch a model at once of elegance and of good sense; and the +two oranges, even if one of them be rotten, kept dancing with inimitable +grace.<br> +<br> +Up to this moment I have had my eye mainly upon prose; for though in +verse also the implication of the logical texture is a crowning beauty, +yet in verse it may be dispensed with. You would think that here +was a death-blow to all I have been saying; and far from that, it is +but a new illustration of the principle involved. For if the versifier +is not bound to weave a pattern of his own, it is because another pattern +has been formally imposed upon him by the laws of verse. For that +is the essence of a prosody. Verse may be rhythmical; it may be +merely alliterative; it may, like the French, depend wholly on the (quasi) +regular recurrence of the rhyme; or, like the Hebrew, it may consist +in the strangely fanciful device of repeating the same idea. It +does not matter on what principle the law is based, so it be a law. +It may be pure convention; it may have no inherent beauty; all that +we have a right to ask of any prosody is, that it shall lay down a pattern +for the writer, and that what it lays down shall be neither too easy +nor too hard. Hence it comes that it is much easier for men of +equal facility to write fairly pleasing verse than reasonably interesting +prose; for in prose the pattern itself has to be invented, and the difficulties +first created before they can be solved. Hence, again, there follows +the peculiar greatness of the true versifier: such as Shakespeare, Milton, +and Victor Hugo, whom I place beside them as versifier merely, not as +poet. These not only knit and knot the logical texture of the +style with all the dexterity and strength of prose; they not only fill +up the pattern of the verse with infinite variety and sober wit; but +they give us, besides, a rare and special pleasure, by the art, comparable +to that of counterpoint, with which they follow at the same time, and +now contrast, and now combine, the double pattern of the texture and +the verse. Here the sounding line concludes; a little further +on, the well-knit sentence; and yet a little further, and both will +reach their solution on the same ringing syllable. The best that +can be offered by the best writer of prose is to show us the development +of the idea and the stylistic pattern proceed hand in hand, sometimes +by an obvious and triumphant effort, sometimes with a great air of ease +and nature. The writer of verse, by virtue of conquering another +difficulty, delights us with a new series of triumphs. He follows +three purposes where his rival followed only two; and the change is +of precisely the same nature as that from melody to harmony. Or +if you prefer to return to the juggler, behold him now, to the vastly +increased enthusiasm of the spectators, juggling with three oranges +instead of two. Thus it is: added difficulty, added beauty; and +the pattern, with every fresh element, becoming more interesting in +itself.<br> +<br> +Yet it must not be thought that verse is simply an addition; something +is lost as well as something gained; and there remains plainly traceable, +in comparing the best prose with the best verse, a certain broad distinction +of method in the web. Tight as the versifier may draw the knot +of logic, yet for the ear he still leaves the tissue of the sentence +floating somewhat loose. In prose, the sentence turns upon a pivot, +nicely balanced, and fits into itself with an obtrusive neatness like +a puzzle. The ear remarks and is singly gratified by this return +and balance; while in verse it is all diverted to the measure. +To find comparable passages is hard; for either the versifier is hugely +the superior of the rival, or, if he be not, and still persist in his +more delicate enterprise, he fails to be as widely his inferior. +But let us select them from the pages of the same writer, one who was +ambidexter; let us take, for instance, Rumour’s Prologue to the +Second Part of <i>Henry IV</i>., a fine flourish of eloquence in Shakespeare’s +second manner, and set it side by side with Falstaff’s praise +of sherris, act iv. scene iii.; or let us compare the beautiful prose +spoken throughout by Rosalind and Orlando; compare, for example, the +first speech of all, Orlando’s speech to Adam, with what passage +it shall please you to select - the Seven Ages from the same play, or +even such a stave of nobility as Othello’s farewell to war; and +still you will be able to perceive, if you have an ear for that class +of music, a certain superior degree of organisation in the prose; a +compacter fitting of the parts; a balance in the swing and the return +as of a throbbing pendulum. We must not, in things temporal, take +from those who have little, the little that they have; the merits of +prose are inferior, but they are not the same; it is a little kingdom, +but an independent.<br> +<br> +<i>3. Rhythm of the Phrase</i>. - Some way back, I used a word +which still awaits an application. Each phrase, I said, was to +be comely; but what is a comely phrase? In all ideal and material +points, literature, being a representative art, must look for analogies +to painting and the like; but in what is technical and executive, being +a temporal art, it must seek for them in music. Each phrase of +each sentence, like an air or a recitative in music, should be so artfully +compounded out of long and short, out of accented and unaccented, as +to gratify the sensual ear. And of this the ear is the sole judge. +It is impossible to lay down laws. Even in our accentual and rhythmic +language no analysis can find the secret of the beauty of a verse; how +much less, then, of those phrases, such as prose is built of, which +obey no law but to be lawless and yet to please? The little that +we know of verse (and for my part I owe it all to my friend Professor +Fleeming Jenkin) is, however, particularly interesting in the present +connection. We have been accustomed to describe the heroic line +as five iambic feet, and to be filled with pain and confusion whenever, +as by the conscientious schoolboy, we have heard our own description +put in practice.<br> +<br> +‘All night | the dreàd | less àn | gel ùn +| pursùed,’ <a name="citation2"></a><a href="#footnote2">{2}</a><br> +<br> +goes the schoolboy; but though we close our ears, we cling to our definition, +in spite of its proved and naked insufficiency. Mr. Jenkin was +not so easily pleased, and readily discovered that the heroic line consists +of four groups, or, if you prefer the phrase, contains four pauses:<br> +<br> +<br> +‘All night | the dreadless | angel | unpursued.’<br> +<br> +<br> +Four groups, each practically uttered as one word: the first, in this +case, an iamb; the second, an amphibrachys; the third, a trochee; and +the fourth, an amphimacer; and yet our schoolboy, with no other liberty +but that of inflicting pain, had triumphantly scanned it as five iambs. +Perceive, now, this fresh richness of intricacy in the web; this fourth +orange, hitherto unremarked, but still kept flying with the others. +What had seemed to be one thing it now appears is two; and, like some +puzzle in arithmetic, the verse is made at the same time to read in +fives and to read in fours.<br> +<br> +But again, four is not necessary. We do not, indeed, find verses +in six groups, because there is not room for six in the ten syllables; +and we do not find verses of two, because one of the main distinctions +of verse from prose resides in the comparative shortness of the group; +but it is even common to find verses of three. Five is the one +forbidden number; because five is the number of the feet; and if five +were chosen, the two patterns would coincide, and that opposition which +is the life of verse would instantly be lost. We have here a clue +to the effect of polysyllables, above all in Latin, where they are so +common and make so brave an architecture in the verse; for the polysyllable +is a group of Nature’s making. If but some Roman would return +from Hades (Martial, for choice), and tell me by what conduct of the +voice these thundering verses should be uttered - ‘<i>Aut</i> +<i>Lacedoe-monium Tarentum</i>,’ for a case in point - I feel +as if I should enter at last into the full enjoyment of the best of +human verses.<br> +<br> +But, again, the five feet are all iambic, or supposed to be; by the +mere count of syllables the four groups cannot be all iambic; as a question +of elegance, I doubt if any one of them requires to be so; and I am +certain that for choice no two of them should scan the same. The +singular beauty of the verse analysed above is due, so far as analysis +can carry us, part, indeed, to the clever repetition of L, D, and N, +but part to this variety of scansion in the groups. The groups +which, like the bar in music, break up the verse for utterance, fall +uniambically; and in declaiming a so-called iambic verse, it may so +happen that we never utter one iambic foot. And yet to this neglect +of the original beat there is a limit.<br> +<br> +<br> +‘Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts,’ <a name="citation3"></a><a href="#footnote3">{3}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +is, with all its eccentricities, a good heroic line; for though it scarcely +can be said to indicate the beat of the iamb, it certainly suggests +no other measure to the ear. But begin<br> +<br> +<br> +‘Mother Athens, eye of Greece,’<br> +<br> +<br> +or merely ‘Mother Athens,’ and the game is up, for the trochaic +beat has been suggested. The eccentric scansion of the groups +is an adornment; but as soon as the original beat has been forgotten, +they cease implicitly to be eccentric. Variety is what is sought; +but if we destroy the original mould, one of the terms of this variety +is lost, and we fall back on sameness. Thus, both as to the arithmetical +measure of the verse, and the degree of regularity in scansion, we see +the laws of prosody to have one common purpose: to keep alive the opposition +of two schemes simultaneously followed; to keep them notably apart, +though still coincident; and to balance them with such judicial nicety +before the reader, that neither shall be unperceived and neither signally +prevail.<br> +<br> +The rule of rhythm in prose is not so intricate. Here, too, we +write in groups, or phrases, as I prefer to call them, for the prose +phrase is greatly longer and is much more nonchalantly uttered than +the group in verse; so that not only is there a greater interval of +continuous sound between the pauses, but, for that very reason, word +is linked more readily to word by a more summary enunciation. +Still, the phrase is the strict analogue of the group, and successive +phrases, like successive groups, must differ openly in length and rhythm. +The rule of scansion in verse is to suggest no measure but the one in +hand; in prose, to suggest no measure at all. Prose must be rhythmical, +and it may be as much so as you will; but it must not be metrical. +It may be anything, but it must not be verse. A single heroic +line may very well pass and not disturb the somewhat larger stride of +the prose style; but one following another will produce an instant impression +of poverty, flatness, and disenchantment. The same lines delivered +with the measured utterance of verse would perhaps seem rich in variety. +By the more summary enunciation proper to prose, as to a more distant +vision, these niceties of difference are lost. A whole verse is +uttered as one phrase; and the ear is soon wearied by a succession of +groups identical in length. The prose writer, in fact, since he +is allowed to be so much less harmonious, is condemned to a perpetually +fresh variety of movement on a larger scale, and must never disappoint +the ear by the trot of an accepted metre. And this obligation +is the third orange with which he has to juggle, the third quality which +the prose writer must work into his pattern of words. It may be +thought perhaps that this is a quality of ease rather than a fresh difficulty; +but such is the inherently rhythmical strain of the English language, +that the bad writer - and must I take for example that admired friend +of my boyhood, Captain Reid? - the inexperienced writer, as Dickens +in his earlier attempts to be impressive, and the jaded writer, as any +one may see for himself, all tend to fall at once into the production +of bad blank verse. And here it may be pertinently asked, Why +bad? And I suppose it might be enough to answer that no man ever +made good verse by accident, and that no verse can ever sound otherwise +than trivial when uttered with the delivery of prose. But we can +go beyond such answers. The weak side of verse is the regularity +of the beat, which in itself is decidedly less impressive than the movement +of the nobler prose; and it is just into this weak side, and this alone, +that our careless writer falls. A peculiar density and mass, consequent +on the nearness of the pauses, is one of the chief good qualities of +verse; but this our accidental versifier, still following after the +swift gait and large gestures of prose, does not so much as aspire to +imitate. Lastly, since he remains unconscious that he is making +verse at all, it can never occur to him to extract those effects of +counterpoint and opposition which I have referred to as the final grace +and justification of verse, and, I may add, of blank verse in particular.<br> +<br> +<i>4. Contents of the Phrase</i>. - Here is a great deal of talk +about rhythm - and naturally; for in our canorous language rhythm is +always at the door. But it must not be forgotten that in some +languages this element is almost, if not quite, extinct, and that in +our own it is probably decaying. The even speech of many educated +Americans sounds the note of danger. I should see it go with something +as bitter as despair, but I should not be desperate. As in verse +no element, not even rhythm, is necessary, so, in prose also, other +sorts of beauty will arise and take the place and play the part of those +that we outlive. The beauty of the expected beat in verse, the +beauty in prose of its larger and more lawless melody, patent as they +are to English hearing, are already silent in the ears of our next neighbours; +for in France the oratorical accent and the pattern of the web have +almost or altogether succeeded to their places; and the French prose +writer would be astounded at the labours of his brother across the Channel, +and how a good quarter of his toil, above all <i>invita</i> <i>Minerva</i>, +is to avoid writing verse. So wonderfully far apart have races +wandered in spirit, and so hard it is to understand the literature next +door!<br> +<br> +Yet French prose is distinctly better than English; and French verse, +above all while Hugo lives, it will not do to place upon one side. +What is more to our purpose, a phrase or a verse in French is easily +distinguishable as comely or uncomely. There is then another element +of comeliness hitherto overlooked in this analysis: the contents of +the phrase. Each phrase in literature is built of sounds, as each +phrase in music consists of notes. One sound suggests, echoes, +demands, and harmonises with another; and the art of rightly using these +concordances is the final art in literature. It used to be a piece +of good advice to all young writers to avoid alliteration; and the advice +was sound, in so far as it prevented daubing. None the less for +that, was it abominable nonsense, and the mere raving of those blindest +of the blind who will not see. The beauty of the contents of a +phrase, or of a sentence, depends implicitly upon alliteration and upon +assonance. The vowel demands to be repeated; the consonant demands +to be repeated; and both cry aloud to be perpetually varied. You +may follow the adventures of a letter through any passage that has particularly +pleased you; find it, perhaps, denied a while, to tantalise the ear; +find it fired again at you in a whole broadside; or find it pass into +congenerous sounds, one liquid or labial melting away into another. +And you will find another and much stranger circumstance. Literature +is written by and for two senses: a sort of internal ear, quick to perceive +‘unheard melodies’; and the eye, which directs the pen and +deciphers the printed phrase. Well, even as there are rhymes for +the eye, so you will find that there are assonances and alliterations; +that where an author is running the open A, deceived by the eye and +our strange English spelling, he will often show a tenderness for the +flat A; and that where he is running a particular consonant, he will +not improbably rejoice to write it down even when it is mute or bears +a different value.<br> +<br> +Here, then, we have a fresh pattern - a pattern, to speak grossly, of +letters - which makes the fourth preoccupation of the prose writer, +and the fifth of the versifier. At times it is very delicate and +hard to perceive, and then perhaps most excellent and winning (I say +perhaps); but at times again the elements of this literal melody stand +more boldly forward and usurp the ear. It becomes, therefore, +somewhat a matter of conscience to select examples; and as I cannot +very well ask the reader to help me, I shall do the next best by giving +him the reason or the history of each selection. The two first, +one in prose, one in verse, I chose without previous analysis, simply +as engaging passages that had long re-echoed in my ear.<br> +<br> +‘I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised +and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks +out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without +dust and heat.’ <a name="citation4"></a><a href="#footnote4">{4}</a> +Down to ‘virtue,’ the current S and R are both announced +and repeated unobtrusively, and by way of a grace-note that almost inseparable +group PVF is given entire. <a name="citation5"></a><a href="#footnote5">{5}</a> +The next phrase is a period of repose, almost ugly in itself, both S +and R still audible, and B given as the last fulfilment of PVF. +In the next four phrases, from ‘that never’ down to ‘run +for,’ the mask is thrown off, and, but for a slight repetition +of the F and V, the whole matter turns, almost too obtrusively, on S +and R; first S coming to the front, and then R. In the concluding +phrase all these favourite letters, and even the flat A, a timid preference +for which is just perceptible, are discarded at a blow and in a bundle; +and to make the break more obvious, every word ends with a dental, and +all but one with T, for which we have been cautiously prepared since +the beginning. The singular dignity of the first clause, and this +hammer-stroke of the last, go far to make the charm of this exquisite +sentence. But it is fair to own that S and R are used a little +coarsely.<br> +<br> +<br> +‘In Xanady did Kubla Khan + (KANDL)<br> +A stately pleasure dome decree, (KDLSR)<br> +Where Alph the sacred river ran, (KANDLSR)<br> +Through caverns measureless to man, (KANLSR)<br> +Down to a sunless sea.’ <a name="citation6"></a><a href="#footnote6">{6}</a> + (NDLS)<br> +<br> +<br> +Here I have put the analysis of the main group alongside the lines; +and the more it is looked at, the more interesting it will seem. +But there are further niceties. In lines two and four, the current +S is most delicately varied with Z. In line three, the current +flat A is twice varied with the open A, already suggested in line two, +and both times (‘where’ and ‘sacred’) in conjunction +with the current R. In the same line F and V (a harmony in themselves, +even when shorn of their comrade P) are admirably contrasted. +And in line four there is a marked subsidiary M, which again was announced +in line two. I stop from weariness, for more might yet be said.<br> +<br> +My next example was recently quoted from Shakespeare as an example of +the poet’s colour sense. Now, I do not think literature +has anything to do with colour, or poets anyway the better of such a +sense; and I instantly attacked this passage, since ‘purple’ +was the word that had so pleased the writer of the article, to see if +there might not be some literary reason for its use. It will be +seen that I succeeded amply; and I am bound to say I think the passage +exceptional in Shakespeare - exceptional, indeed, in literature; but +it was not I who chose it.<br> +<br> +<br> +‘The BaRge she sat iN, like a BURNished throNe<br> +BURNT oN the water: the POOP was BeateN gold,<br> +PURPle the sails and so PUR* Fumèd that * per<br> +The wiNds were love-sick with them.’ <a name="citation7"></a><a href="#footnote7">{7}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +It may be asked why I have put the F of ‘perfumèd’ +in capitals; and I reply, because this change from P to F is the completion +of that from B to P, already so adroitly carried out. Indeed, +the whole passage is a monument of curious ingenuity; and it seems scarce +worth while to indicate the subsidiary S, L, and W. In the same +article, a second passage from Shakespeare was quoted, once again as +an example of his colour sense:<br> +<br> +<br> +‘A mole cinque-spotted like the crimson drops<br> +I’ the bottom of a cowslip.’ <a name="citation8"></a><a href="#footnote8">{8}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +It is very curious, very artificial, and not worth while to analyse +at length: I leave it to the reader. But before I turn my back +on Shakespeare, I should like to quote a passage, for my own pleasure, +and for a very model of every technical art:<br> +<br> +<br> +But in the wind and tempest of her frown,<br> +W. P. V.<a name="citation9"></a><a href="#footnote9">{9}</a> F. (st) +(ow)<br> +Distinction with a loud and powerful fan,<br> +W.P. F. (st) (ow) L.<br> +<br> +Puffing at all, winnows the light away;<br> +W. P. F. L.<br> +And what hath mass and matter by itself<br> +W. F. L. M. A.<br> +Lies rich in virtue and unmingled.’ <a name="citation10"></a><a href="#footnote10">{10}</a><br> +V. L. M.<br> +<br> +<br> +From these delicate and choice writers I turned with some curiosity +to a player of the big drum - Macaulay. I had in hand the two-volume +edition, and I opened at the beginning of the second volume. Here +was what I read:<br> +<br> +‘The violence of revolutions is generally proportioned to the +degree of the maladministration which has produced them. It is +therefore not strange that the government of Scotland, having been during +many years greatly more corrupt than the government of England, should +have fallen with a far heavier ruin. The movement against the +last king of the house of Stuart was in England conservative, in Scotland +destructive. The English complained not of the law, but of the +violation of the law.’<br> +<br> +This was plain-sailing enough; it was our old friend PVF, floated by +the liquids in a body; but as I read on, and turned the page, and still +found PVF with his attendant liquids, I confess my mind misgave me utterly. +This could be no trick of Macaulay’s; it must be the nature of +the English tongue. In a kind of despair, I turned half-way through +the volume; and coming upon his lordship dealing with General Cannon, +and fresh from Claverhouse and Killiecrankie, here, with elucidative +spelling, was my reward:<br> +<br> +‘Meanwhile the disorders of Kannon’s Kamp went on inKreasing. +He Kalled a Kouncil of war to Konsider what Kourse it would be advisable +to taKe. But as soon as the Kouncil had met, a preliminary Kuestion +was raised. The army was almost eKsKlusively a Highland army. +The recent vKktory had been won eKsKlusively by Highland warriors. +Great chie<i>f</i>s who had brought siKs or Se<i>v</i>en hundred <i>f</i>ighting +men into the <i>f</i>ield did not think it <i>f</i>air that they should +be out<i>v</i>oted by gentlemen <i>f</i>rom Ireland, and <i>f</i>rom +the Low Kountries, who bore indeed King James’s Kommission, and +were Kalled Kolonels and Kaptains, but who were Kolonels without regiments +and Kaptains without Kompanies.’<br> +<br> +A moment of FV in all this world of K’s! It was not the +English language, then, that was an instrument of one string, but Macaulay +that was an incomparable dauber.<br> +<br> +It was probably from this barbaric love of repeating the same sound, +rather than from any design of clearness, that he acquired his irritating +habit of repeating words; I say the one rather than the other, because +such a trick of the ear is deeper-seated and more original in man than +any logical consideration. Few writers, indeed, are probably conscious +of the length to which they push this melody of letters. One, +writing very diligently, and only concerned about the meaning of his +words and the rhythm of his phrases, was struck into amazement by the +eager triumph with which he cancelled one expression to substitute another. +Neither changed the sense; both being mono-syllables, neither could +affect the scansion; and it was only by looking back on what he had +already written that the mystery was solved: the second word contained +an open A, and for nearly half a page he had been riding that vowel +to the death.<br> +<br> +In practice, I should add, the ear is not always so exacting; and ordinary +writers, in ordinary moments, content themselves with avoiding what +is harsh, and here and there, upon a rare occasion, buttressing a phrase, +or linking two together, with a patch of assonance or a momentary jingle +of alliteration. To understand how constant is this preoccupation +of good writers, even where its results are least obtrusive, it is only +necessary to turn to the bad. There, indeed, you will find cacophony +supreme, the rattle of incongruous consonants only relieved by the jaw-breaking +hiatus, and whole phrases not to be articulated by the powers of man.<br> +<br> +<i>Conclusion</i>. - We may now briefly enumerate the elements of style. +We have, peculiar to the prose writer, the task of keeping his phrases +large, rhythmical, and pleasing to the ear, without ever allowing them +to fall into the strictly metrical: peculiar to the versifier, the task +of combining and contrasting his double, treble, and quadruple pattern, +feet and groups, logic and metre - harmonious in diversity: common to +both, the task of artfully combining the prime elements of language +into phrases that shall be musical in the mouth; the task of weaving +their argument into a texture of committed phrases and of rounded periods +- but this particularly binding in the case of prose: and, again common +to both, the task of choosing apt, explicit, and communicative words. +We begin to see now what an intricate affair is any perfect passage; +how many faculties, whether of taste or pure reason, must be held upon +the stretch to make it; and why, when it is made, it should afford us +so complete a pleasure. From the arrangement of according letters, +which is altogether arabesque and sensual, up to the architecture of +the elegant and pregnant sentence, which is a vigorous act of the pure +intellect, there is scarce a faculty in man but has been exercised. +We need not wonder, then, if perfect sentences are rare, and perfect +pages rarer.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +THE MORALITY OF THE PROFESSION OF LETTERS <a name="citation11"></a><a href="#footnote11">{11}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +The profession of letters has been lately debated in the public prints; +and it has been debated, to put the matter mildly, from a point of view +that was calculated to surprise high-minded men, and bring a general +contempt on books and reading. Some time ago, in particular, a +lively, pleasant, popular writer <a name="citation12"></a><a href="#footnote12">{12}</a> +devoted an essay, lively and pleasant like himself, to a very encouraging +view of the profession. We may be glad that his experience is +so cheering, and we may hope that all others, who deserve it, shall +be as handsomely rewarded; but I do not think we need be at all glad +to have this question, so important to the public and ourselves, debated +solely on the ground of money. The salary in any business under +heaven is not the only, nor indeed the first, question. That you +should continue to exist is a matter for your own consideration; but +that your business should be first honest, and second useful, are points +in which honour and morality are concerned. If the writer to whom +I refer succeeds in persuading a number of young persons to adopt this +way of life with an eye set singly on the livelihood, we must expect +them in their works to follow profit only, and we must expect in consequence, +if he will pardon me the epithets, a slovenly, base, untrue, and empty +literature. Of that writer himself I am not speaking: he is diligent, +clean, and pleasing; we all owe him periods of entertainment, and he +has achieved an amiable popularity which he has adequately deserved. +But the truth is, he does not, or did not when he first embraced it, +regard his profession from this purely mercenary side. He went +into it, I shall venture to say, if not with any noble design, at least +in the ardour of a first love; and he enjoyed its practice long before +he paused to calculate the wage. The other day an author was complimented +on a piece of work, good in itself and exceptionally good for him, and +replied, in terms unworthy of a commercial traveller that as the book +was not briskly selling he did not give a copper farthing for its merit. +It must not be supposed that the person to whom this answer was addressed +received it as a profession of faith; he knew, on the other hand, that +it was only a whiff of irritation; just as we know, when a respectable +writer talks of literature as a way of life, like shoemaking, but not +so useful, that he is only debating one aspect of a question, and is +still clearly conscious of a dozen others more important in themselves +and more central to the matter in hand. But while those who treat +literature in this penny-wise and virtue-foolish spirit are themselves +truly in possession of a better light, it does not follow that the treatment +is decent or improving, whether for themselves or others. To treat +all subjects in the highest, the most honourable, and the pluckiest +spirit, consistent with the fact, is the first duty of a writer. +If he be well paid, as I am glad to hear he is, this duty becomes the +more urgent, the neglect of it the more disgraceful. And perhaps +there is no subject on which a man should speak so gravely as that industry, +whatever it may be, which is the occupation or delight of his life; +which is his tool to earn or serve with; and which, if it be unworthy, +stamps himself as a mere incubus of dumb and greedy bowels on the shoulders +of labouring humanity. On that subject alone even to force the +note might lean to virtue’s side. It is to be hoped that +a numerous and enterprising generation of writers will follow and surpass +the present one; but it would be better if the stream were stayed, and +the roll of our old, honest English books were closed, than that esurient +book-makers should continue and debase a brave tradition, and lower, +in their own eyes, a famous race. Better that our serene temples +were deserted than filled with trafficking and juggling priests.<br> +<br> +There are two just reasons for the choice of any way of life: the first +is inbred taste in the chooser; the second some high utility in the +industry selected. Literature, like any other art, is singularly +interesting to the artist; and, in a degree peculiar to itself among +the arts, it is useful to mankind. These are the sufficient justifications +for any young man or woman who adopts it as the business of his life. +I shall not say much about the wages. A writer can live by his +writing. If not so luxuriously as by other trades, then less luxuriously. +The nature of the work he does all day will more affect his happiness +than the quality of his dinner at night. Whatever be your calling, +and however much it brings you in the year, you could still, you know, +get more by cheating. We all suffer ourselves to be too much concerned +about a little poverty; but such considerations should not move us in +the choice of that which is to be the business and justification of +so great a portion of our lives; and like the missionary, the patriot, +or the philosopher, we should all choose that poor and brave career +in which we can do the most and best for mankind. Now Nature, +faithfully followed, proves herself a careful mother. A lad, for +some liking to the jingle of words, betakes himself to letters for his +life; by-and-by, when he learns more gravity, he finds that he has chosen +better than he knew; that if he earns little, he is earning it amply; +that if he receives a small wage, he is in a position to do considerable +services; that it is in his power, in some small measure, to protect +the oppressed and to defend the truth. So kindly is the world +arranged, such great profit may arise from a small degree of human reliance +on oneself, and such, in particular, is the happy star of this trade +of writing, that it should combine pleasure and profit to both parties, +and be at once agreeable, like fiddling, and useful, like good preaching.<br> +<br> +This is to speak of literature at its highest; and with the four great +elders who are still spared to our respect and admiration, with Carlyle, +Ruskin, Browning, and Tennyson before us, it would be cowardly to consider +it at first in any lesser aspect. But while we cannot follow these +athletes, while we may none of us, perhaps, be very vigorous, very original, +or very wise, I still contend that, in the humblest sort of literary +work, we have it in our power either to do great harm or great good. +We may seek merely to please; we may seek, having no higher gift, merely +to gratify the idle nine days’ curiosity of our contemporaries; +or we may essay, however feebly, to instruct. In each of these +we shall have to deal with that remarkable art of words which, because +it is the dialect of life, comes home so easily and powerfully to the +minds of men; and since that is so, we contribute, in each of these +branches, to build up the sum of sentiments and appreciations which +goes by the name of Public Opinion or Public Feeling. The total +of a nation’s reading, in these days of daily papers, greatly +modifies the total of the nation’s speech; and the speech and +reading, taken together, form the efficient educational medium of youth. +A good man or woman may keep a youth some little while in clearer air; +but the contemporary atmosphere is all-powerful in the end on the average +of mediocre characters. The copious Corinthian baseness of the +American reporter or the Parisian <i>chroniquear</i>, both so lightly +readable, must exercise an incalculable influence for ill; they touch +upon all subjects, and on all with the same ungenerous hand; they begin +the consideration of all, in young and unprepared minds, in an unworthy +spirit; on all, they supply some pungency for dull people to quote. +The mere body of this ugly matter overwhelms the rare utterances of +good men; the sneering, the selfish, and the cowardly are scattered +in broad sheets on every table, while the antidote, in small volumes, +lies unread upon the shelf. I have spoken of the American and +the French, not because they are so much baser, but so much more readable, +than the English; their evil is done more effectively, in America for +the masses, in French for the few that care to read; but with us as +with them, the duties of literature are daily neglected, truth daily +perverted and suppressed, and grave subjects daily degraded in the treatment. +The journalist is not reckoned an important officer; yet judge of the +good he might do, the harm he does; judge of it by one instance only: +that when we find two journals on the reverse sides of politics each, +on the same day, openly garbling a piece of news for the interest of +its own party, we smile at the discovery (no discovery now!) as over +a good joke and pardonable stratagem. Lying so open is scarce +lying, it is true; but one of the things that we profess to teach our +young is a respect for truth; and I cannot think this piece of education +will be crowned with any great success, so long as some of us practise +and the rest openly approve of public falsehood.<br> +<br> +There are two duties incumbent upon any man who enters on the business +of writing: truth to the fact and a good spirit in the treatment. +In every department of literature, though so low as hardly to deserve +the name, truth to the fact is of importance to the education and comfort +of mankind, and so hard to preserve, that the faithful trying to do +so will lend some dignity to the man who tries it. Our judgments +are based upon two things: first, upon the original preferences of our +soul; but, second, upon the mass of testimony to the nature of God, +man, and the universe which reaches us, in divers manners, from without. +For the most part these divers manners are reducible to one, all that +we learn of past times and much that we learn of our own reaching us +through the medium of books or papers, and even he who cannot read learning +from the same source at second-hand and by the report of him who can. +Thus the sum of the contemporary knowledge or ignorance of good and +evil is, in large measure, the handiwork of those who write. Those +who write have to see that each man’s knowledge is, as near as +they can make it, answerable to the facts of life; that he shall not +suppose himself an angel or a monster; nor take this world for a hell; +nor be suffered to imagine that all rights are concentred in his own +caste or country, or all veracities in his own parochial creed. +Each man should learn what is within him, that he may strive to mend; +he must be taught what is without him, that he may be kind to others. +It can never be wrong to tell him the truth; for, in his disputable +state, weaving as he goes his theory of life, steering himself, cheering +or reproving others, all facts are of the first importance to his conduct; +and even if a fact shall discourage or corrupt him, it is still best +that he should know it; for it is in this world as it is, and not in +a world made easy by educational suppressions, that he must win his +way to shame or glory. In one word, it must always be foul to +tell what is false; and it can never be safe to suppress what is true. +The very fact that you omit may be the fact which somebody was wanting, +for one man’s meat is another man’s poison, and I have known +a person who was cheered by the perusal of <i>Candide</i>. Every +fact is a part of that great puzzle we must set together; and none that +comes directly in a writer’s path but has some nice relations, +unperceivable by him, to the totality and bearing of the subject under +hand. Yet there are certain classes of fact eternally more necessary +than others, and it is with these that literature must first bestir +itself. They are not hard to distinguish, nature once more easily +leading us; for the necessary, because the efficacious, facts are those +which are most interesting to the natural mind of man. Those which +are coloured, picturesque, human, and rooted in morality, and those, +on the other hand, which are clear, indisputable, and a part of science, +are alone vital in importance, seizing by their interest, or useful +to communicate. So far as the writer merely narrates, he should +principally tell of these. He should tell of the kind and wholesome +and beautiful elements of our life; he should tell unsparingly of the +evil and sorrow of the present, to move us with instances: he should +tell of wise and good people in the past, to excite us by example; and +of these he should tell soberly and truthfully, not glossing faults, +that we may neither grow discouraged with ourselves nor exacting to +our neighbours. So the body of contemporary literature, ephemeral +and feeble in itself, touches in the minds of men the springs of thought +and kindness, and supports them (for those who will go at all are easily +supported) on their way to what is true and right. And if, in +any degree, it does so now, how much more might it do so if the writers +chose! There is not a life in all the records of the past but, +properly studied, might lend a hint and a help to some contemporary. +There is not a juncture in to-day’s affairs but some useful word +may yet be said of it. Even the reporter has an office, and, with +clear eyes and honest language, may unveil injustices and point the +way to progress. And for a last word: in all narration there is +only one way to be clever, and that is to be exact. To be vivid +is a secondary quality which must presuppose the first; for vividly +to convey a wrong impression is only to make failure conspicuous.<br> +<br> +But a fact may be viewed on many sides; it may be chronicled with rage, +tears, laughter, indifference, or admiration, and by each of these the +story will be transformed to something else. The newspapers that +told of the return of our representatives from Berlin, even if they +had not differed as to the facts, would have sufficiently differed by +their spirits; so that the one description would have been a second +ovation, and the other a prolonged insult. The subject makes but +a trifling part of any piece of literature, and the view of the writer +is itself a fact more important because less disputable than the others. +Now this spirit in which a subject is regarded, important in all kinds +of literary work, becomes all-important in works of fiction, meditation, +or rhapsody; for there it not only colours but itself chooses the facts; +not only modifies but shapes the work. And hence, over the far +larger proportion of the field of literature, the health or disease +of the writer’s mind or momentary humour forms not only the leading +feature of his work, but is, at bottom, the only thing he can communicate +to others. In all works of art, widely speaking, it is first of +all the author’s attitude that is narrated, though in the attitude +there be implied a whole experience and a theory of life. An author +who has begged the question and reposes in some narrow faith cannot, +if he would, express the whole or even many of the sides of this various +existence; for, his own life being maim, some of them are not admitted +in his theory, and were only dimly and unwillingly recognised in his +experience. Hence the smallness, the triteness, and the inhumanity +in works of merely sectarian religion; and hence we find equal although +unsimilar limitation in works inspired by the spirit of the flesh or +the despicable taste for high society. So that the first duty +of any man who is to write is intellectual. Designedly or not, +he has so far set himself up for a leader of the minds of men; and he +must see that his own mind is kept supple, charitable, and bright. +Everything but prejudice should find a voice through him; he should +see the good in all things; where he has even a fear that he does not +wholly understand, there he should be wholly silent; and he should recognise +from the first that he has only one tool in his workshop, and that tool +is sympathy. <a name="citation13"></a><a href="#footnote13">{13}</a><br> +<br> +The second duty, far harder to define, is moral. There are a thousand +different humours in the mind, and about each of them, when it is uppermost, +some literature tends to be deposited. Is this to be allowed? +Not certainly in every case, and yet perhaps in more than rigourists +would fancy. It were to be desired that all literary work, and +chiefly works of art, issued from sound, human, healthy, and potent +impulses, whether grave or laughing, humorous, romantic, or religious.<br> +<br> +Yet it cannot be denied that some valuable books are partially insane; +some, mostly religious, partially inhuman; and very many tainted with +morbidity and impotence. We do not loathe a masterpiece although +we gird against its blemishes. We are not, above all, to look +for faults, but merits. There is no book perfect, even in design; +but there are many that will delight, improve, or encourage the reader. +On the one hand, the Hebrew psalms are the only religious poetry on +earth; yet they contain sallies that savour rankly of the man of blood. +On the other hand, Alfred de Musset had a poisoned and a contorted nature; +I am only quoting that generous and frivolous giant, old Dumas, when +I accuse him of a bad heart; yet, when the impulse under which he wrote +was purely creative, he could give us works like <i>Carmosine</i> or<i> +Fantasio</i>, in which the last note of the romantic comedy seems to +have been found again to touch and please us. When Flaubert wrote +<i>Madame Bovary</i>, I believe he thought chiefly of a somewhat morbid +realism; and behold! the book turned in his hands into a masterpiece +of appalling morality. But the truth is, when books are conceived +under a great stress, with a soul of ninefold power, nine times heated +and electrified by effort, the conditions of our being are seized with +such an ample grasp, that, even should the main design be trivial or +base, some truth and beauty cannot fail to be expressed. Out of +the strong comes forth sweetness; but an ill thing poorly done is an +ill thing top and bottom. And so this can be no encouragement +to knock-kneed, feeble-wristed scribes, who must take their business +conscientiously or be ashamed to practise it.<br> +<br> +Man is imperfect; yet, in his literature, he must express himself and +his own views and preferences; for to do anything else is to do a far +more perilous thing than to risk being immoral: it is to be sure of +being untrue. To ape a sentiment, even a good one, is to travesty +a sentiment; that will not be helpful. To conceal a sentiment, +if you are sure you hold it, is to take a liberty with truth. +There is probably no point of view possible to a sane man but contains +some truth and, in the true connection, might be profitable to the race. +I am not afraid of the truth, if any one could tell it me, but I am +afraid of parts of it impertinently uttered. There is a time to +dance and a time to mourn; to be harsh as well as to be sentimental; +to be ascetic as well as to glorify the appetites; and if a man were +to combine all these extremes into his work, each in its place and proportion, +that work would be the world’s masterpiece of morality as well +as of art. Partiality is immorality; for any book is wrong that +gives a misleading picture of the world and life. The trouble +is that the weakling must be partial; the work of one proving dank and +depressing; of another, cheap and vulgar; of a third, epileptically +sensual; of a fourth, sourly ascetic. In literature as in conduct, +you can never hope to do exactly right. All you can do is to make +as sure as possible; and for that there is but one rule. Nothing +should be done in a hurry that can be done slowly. It is no use +to write a book and put it by for nine or even ninety years; for in +the writing you will have partly convinced yourself; the delay must +precede any beginning; and if you meditate a work of art, you should +first long roll the subject under the tongue to make sure you like the +flavour, before you brew a volume that shall taste of it from end to +end; or if you propose to enter on the field of controversy, you should +first have thought upon the question under all conditions, in health +as well as in sickness, in sorrow as well as in joy. It is this +nearness of examination necessary for any true and kind writing, that +makes the practice of the art a prolonged and noble education for the +writer.<br> +<br> +There is plenty to do, plenty to say, or to say over again, in the meantime. +Any literary work which conveys faithful facts or pleasing impressions +is a service to the public. It is even a service to be thankfully +proud of having rendered. The slightest novels are a blessing +to those in distress, not chloroform itself a greater. Our fine +old sea-captain’s life was justified when Carlyle soothed his +mind with <i>The</i> <i>King’s Own</i> or<i> Newton Forster</i>. +To please is to serve; and so far from its being difficult to instruct +while you amuse, it is difficult to do the one thoroughly without the +other. Some part of the writer or his life will crop out in even +a vapid book; and to read a novel that was conceived with any force +is to multiply experience and to exercise the sympathies.<br> +<br> +Every article, every piece of verse, every essay, every <i>entre-filet</i>, +is destined to pass, however swiftly, through the minds of some portion +of the public, and to colour, however transiently, their thoughts. +When any subject falls to be discussed, some scribbler on a paper has +the invaluable opportunity of beginning its discussion in a dignified +and human spirit; and if there were enough who did so in our public +press, neither the public nor the Parliament would find it in their +minds to drop to meaner thoughts. The writer has the chance to +stumble, by the way, on something pleasing, something interesting, something +encouraging, were it only to a single reader. He will be unfortunate, +indeed, if he suit no one. He has the chance, besides, to stumble +on something that a dull person shall be able to comprehend; and for +a dull person to have read anything and, for that once, comprehended +it, makes a marking epoch in his education.<br> +<br> +Here, then, is work worth doing and worth trying to do well. And +so, if I were minded to welcome any great accession to our trade, it +should not be from any reason of a higher wage, but because it was a +trade which was useful in a very great and in a very high degree; which +every honest tradesman could make more serviceable to mankind in his +single strength; which was difficult to do well and possible to do better +every year; which called for scrupulous thought on the part of all who +practised it, and hence became a perpetual education to their nobler +natures; and which, pay it as you please, in the large majority of the +best cases will still be underpaid. For surely, at this time of +day in the nineteenth century, there is nothing that an honest man should +fear more timorously than getting and spending more than he deserves.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +BOOKS WHICH HAVE INFLUENCED ME <a name="citation14"></a><a href="#footnote14">{14}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +The Editor <a name="citation15"></a><a href="#footnote15">{15}</a> has +somewhat insidiously laid a trap for his correspondents, the question +put appearing at first so innocent, truly cutting so deep. It +is not, indeed, until after some reconnaissance and review that the +writer awakes to find himself engaged upon something in the nature of +autobiography, or, perhaps worse, upon a chapter in the life of that +little, beautiful brother whom we once all had, and whom we have all +lost and mourned, the man we ought to have been, the man we hoped to +be. But when word has been passed (even to an editor), it should, +if possible, be kept; and if sometimes I am wise and say too little, +and sometimes weak and say too much, the blame must lie at the door +of the person who entrapped me.<br> +<br> +The most influential books, and the truest in their influence, are works +of fiction. They do not pin the reader to a dogma, which he must +afterwards discover to be inexact; they do not teach him a lesson, which +he must afterwards unlearn. They repeat, they rearrange, they +clarify the lessons of life; they disengage us from ourselves, they +constrain us to the acquaintance of others; and they show us the web +of experience, not as we can see it for ourselves, but with a singular +change - that monstrous, consuming <i>ego</i> of ours being, for the +nonce, struck out. To be so, they must be reasonably true to the +human comedy; and any work that is so serves the turn of instruction. +But the course of our education is answered best by those poems and +romances where we breathe a magnanimous atmosphere of thought and meet +generous and pious characters. Shakespeare has served me best. +Few living friends have had upon me an influence so strong for good +as Hamlet or Rosalind. The last character, already well beloved +in the reading, I had the good fortune to see, I must think, in an impressionable +hour, played by Mrs. Scott Siddons. Nothing has ever more moved, +more delighted, more refreshed me; nor has the influence quite passed +away. Kent’s brief speech over the dying Lear had a great +effect upon my mind, and was the burthen of my reflections for long, +so profoundly, so touchingly generous did it appear in sense, so overpowering +in expression. Perhaps my dearest and best friend outside of Shakespeare +is D’Artagnan - the elderly D’Artagnan of the <i>Vicomte +de Bragelonne</i>. I know not a more human soul, nor, in his way, +a finer; I shall be very sorry for the man who is so much of a pedant +in morals that he cannot learn from the Captain of Musketeers. +Lastly, I must name the <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i>, a book that +breathes of every beautiful and valuable emotion.<br> +<br> +But of works of art little can be said; their influence is profound +and silent, like the influence of nature; they mould by contact; we +drink them up like water, and are bettered, yet know not how. +It is in books more specifically didactic that we can follow out the +effect, and distinguish and weigh and compare. A book which has +been very influential upon me fell early into my hands, and so may stand +first, though I think its influence was only sensible later on, and +perhaps still keeps growing, for it is a book not easily outlived: the +<i>Essais</i> of Montaigne. That temperate and genial picture +of life is a great gift to place in the hands of persons of to-day; +they will find in these smiling pages a magazine of heroism and wisdom, +all of an antique strain; they will have their ‘linen decencies’ +and excited orthodoxies fluttered, and will (if they have any gift of +reading) perceive that these have not been fluttered without some excuse +and ground of reason; and (again if they have any gift of reading) they +will end by seeing that this old gentleman was in a dozen ways a finer +fellow, and held in a dozen ways a nobler view of life, than they or +their contemporaries.<br> +<br> +The next book, in order of time, to influence me, was the New Testament, +and in particular the Gospel according to St. Matthew. I believe +it would startle and move any one if they could make a certain effort +of imagination and read it freshly like a book, not droningly and dully +like a portion of the Bible. Any one would then be able to see +in it those truths which we are all courteously supposed to know and +all modestly refrain from applying. But upon this subject it is +perhaps better to be silent.<br> +<br> +I come next to Whitman’s <i>Leaves of</i> <i>Grass</i>, a book +of singular service, a book which tumbled the world upside down for +me, blew into space a thousand cobwebs of genteel and ethical illusion, +and, having thus shaken my tabernacle of lies, set me back again upon +a strong foundation of all the original and manly virtues. But +it is, once more, only a book for those who have the gift of reading. +I will be very frank - I believe it is so with all good books except, +perhaps, fiction. The average man lives, and must live, so wholly +in convention, that gunpowder charges of the truth are more apt to discompose +than to invigorate his creed. Either he cries out upon blasphemy +and indecency, and crouches the closer round that little idol of part-truths +and part-conveniences which is the contemporary deity, or he is convinced +by what is new, forgets what is old, and becomes truly blasphemous and +indecent himself. New truth is only useful to supplement the old; +rough truth is only wanted to expand, not to destroy, our civil and +often elegant conventions. He who cannot judge had better stick +to fiction and the daily papers. There he will get little harm, +and, in the first at least, some good.<br> +<br> +Close upon the back of my discovery of Whitman, I came under the influence +of Herbert Spencer. No more persuasive rabbi exists, and few better. +How much of his vast structure will bear the touch of time, how much +is clay and how much brass, it were too curious to inquire. But +his words, if dry, are always manly and honest; there dwells in his +pages a spirit of highly abstract joy, plucked naked like an algebraic +symbol but still joyful; and the reader will find there a <i>caput mortuum</i> +of piety, with little indeed of its loveliness, but with most of its +essentials; and these two qualities make him a wholesome, as his intellectual +vigour makes him a bracing, writer. I should be much of a hound +if I lost my gratitude to Herbert Spencer.<br> +<br> +<i>Goethe’s Life</i>, by Lewes, had a great importance for me +when it first fell into my hands - a strange instance of the partiality +of man’s good and man’s evil. I know no one whom I +less admire than Goethe; he seems a very epitome of the sins of genius, +breaking open the doors of private life, and wantonly wounding friends, +in that crowning offence of <i>Werther</i>, and in his own character +a mere pen-and-ink Napoleon, conscious of the rights and duties of superior +talents as a Spanish inquisitor was conscious of the rights and duties +of his office. And yet in his fine devotion to his art, in his +honest and serviceable friendship for Schiller, what lessons are contained! +Biography, usually so false to its office, does here for once perform +for us some of the work of fiction, reminding us, that is, of the truly +mingled tissue of man’s nature, and how huge faults and shining +virtues cohabit and persevere in the same character. History serves +us well to this effect, but in the originals, not in the pages of the +popular epitomiser, who is bound, by the very nature of his task, to +make us feel the difference of epochs instead of the essential identity +of man, and even in the originals only to those who can recognise their +own human virtues and defects in strange forms, often inverted and under +strange names, often interchanged. Martial is a poet of no good +repute, and it gives a man new thoughts to read his works dispassionately, +and find in this unseemly jester’s serious passages the image +of a kind, wise, and self-respecting gentleman. It is customary, +I suppose, in reading Martial, to leave out these pleasant verses; I +never heard of them, at least, until I found them for myself; and this +partiality is one among a thousand things that help to build up our +distorted and hysterical conception of the great Roman Empire.<br> +<br> +This brings us by a natural transition to a very noble book - the <i>Meditations</i> +of Marcus Aurelius. The dispassionate gravity, the noble forgetfulness +of self, the tenderness of others, that are there expressed and were +practised on so great a scale in the life of its writer, make this book +a book quite by itself. No one can read it and not be moved. +Yet it scarcely or rarely appeals to the feelings - those very mobile, +those not very trusty parts of man. Its address lies further back: +its lesson comes more deeply home; when you have read, you carry away +with you a memory of the man himself; it is as though you had touched +a loyal hand, looked into brave eyes, and made a noble friend; there +is another bond on you thenceforward, binding you to life and to the +love of virtue.<br> +<br> +Wordsworth should perhaps come next. Every one has been influenced +by Wordsworth, and it is hard to tell precisely how. A certain +innocence, a rugged austerity of joy, a sight of the stars, ‘the +silence that is in the lonely hills,’ something of the cold thrill +of dawn, cling to his work and give it a particular address to what +is best in us. I do not know that you learn a lesson; you need +not - Mill did not - agree with any one of his beliefs; and yet the +spell is cast. Such are the best teachers; a dogma learned is +only a new error - the old one was perhaps as good; but a spirit communicated +is a perpetual possession. These best teachers climb beyond teaching +to the plane of art; it is themselves, and what is best in themselves, +that they communicate.<br> +<br> +I should never forgive myself if I forgot <i>The Egoist</i>. It +is art, if you like, but it belongs purely to didactic art, and from +all the novels I have read (and I have read thousands) stands in a place +by itself. Here is a Nathan for the modern David; here is a book +to send the blood into men’s faces. Satire, the angry picture +of human faults, is not great art; we can all be angry with our neighbour; +what we want is to be shown, not his defects, of which we are too conscious, +but his merits, to which we are too blind. And <i>The Egoist</i> +is a satire; so much must be allowed; but it is a satire of a singular +quality, which tells you nothing of that obvious mote, which is engaged +from first to last with that invisible beam. It is yourself that +is hunted down; these are your own faults that are dragged into the +day and numbered, with lingering relish, with cruel cunning and precision. +A young friend of Mr. Meredith’s (as I have the story) came to +him in an agony. ‘This is too bad of you,’ he cried. +‘Willoughby is me!’ ‘No, my dear fellow,’ +said the author; ‘he is all of us.’<br> +<br> +I have read <i>The Egoist</i> five or six times myself, and I mean to +read it again; for I am like the young friend of the anecdote - I think +Willoughby an unmanly but a very serviceable exposure of myself.<br> +<br> +I suppose, when I am done, I shall find that I have forgotten much that +was most influential, as I see already I have forgotten Thoreau, and +Hazlitt, whose paper ‘On the Spirit of Obligations’ was +a turning-point in my life, and Penn, whose little book of aphorisms +had a brief but strong effect on me, and Mitford’s <i>Tales</i> +<i>of Old Japan</i>, wherein I learned for the first time the proper +attitude of any rational man to his country’s laws - a secret +found, and kept, in the Asiatic islands. That I should commemorate +all is more than I can hope or the Editor could ask. It will be +more to the point, after having said so much upon improving books, to +say a word or two about the improvable reader. The gift of reading, +as I have called it, is not very common, nor very generally understood. +It consists, first of all, in a vast intellectual endowment - a free +grace, I find I must call it - by which a man rises to understand that +he is not punctually right, nor those from whom he differs absolutely +wrong. He may hold dogmas; he may hold them passionately; and +he may know that others hold them but coldly, or hold them differently, +or hold them not at all. Well, if he has the gift of reading, +these others will be full of meat for him. They will see the other +side of propositions and the other side of virtues. He need not +change his dogma for that, but he may change his reading of that dogma, +and he must supplement and correct his deductions from it. A human +truth, which is always very much a lie, hides as much of life as it +displays. It is men who hold another truth, or, as it seems to +us, perhaps, a dangerous lie, who can extend our restricted field of +knowledge, and rouse our drowsy consciences. Something that seems +quite new, or that seems insolently false or very dangerous, is the +test of a reader. If he tries to see what it means, what truth +excuses it, he has the gift, and let him read. If he is merely +hurt, or offended, or exclaims upon his author’s folly, he had +better take to the daily papers; he will never be a reader.<br> +<br> +And here, with the aptest illustrative force, after I have laid down +my part-truth, I must step in with its opposite. For, after all, +we are vessels of a very limited content. Not all men can read +all books; it is only in a chosen few that any man will find his appointed +food; and the fittest lessons are the most palatable, and make themselves +welcome to the mind. A writer learns this early, and it is his +chief support; he goes on unafraid, laying down the law; and he is sure +at heart that most of what he says is demonstrably false, and much of +a mingled strain, and some hurtful, and very little good for service; +but he is sure besides that when his words fall into the hands of any +genuine reader, they will be weighed and winnowed, and only that which +suits will be assimilated; and when they fall into the hands of one +who cannot intelligently read, they come there quite silent and inarticulate, +falling upon deaf ears, and his secret is kept as if he had not written.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +A NOTE ON REALISM <a name="citation16"></a><a href="#footnote16">{16}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Style is the invariable mark of any master; and for the student who +does not aspire so high as to be numbered with the giants, it is still +the one quality in which he may improve himself at will. Passion, +wisdom, creative force, the power of mystery or colour, are allotted +in the hour of birth, and can be neither learned nor simulated. +But the just and dexterous use of what qualities we have, the proportion +of one part to another and to the whole, the elision of the useless, +the accentuation of the important, and the preservation of a uniform +character from end to end - these, which taken together constitute technical +perfection, are to some degree within the reach of industry and intellectual +courage. What to put in and what to leave out; whether some particular +fact be organically necessary or purely ornamental; whether, if it be +purely ornamental, it may not weaken or obscure the general design; +and finally, whether, if we decide to use it, we should do so grossly +and notably, or in some conventional disguise: are questions of plastic +style continually rearising. And the sphinx that patrols the highways +of executive art has no more unanswerable riddle to propound.<br> +<br> +In literature (from which I must draw my instances) the great change +of the past century has been effected by the admission of detail. +It was inaugurated by the romantic Scott; and at length, by the semi-romantic +Balzac and his more or less wholly unromantic followers, bound like +a duty on the novelist. For some time it signified and expressed +a more ample contemplation of the conditions of man’s life; but +it has recently (at least in France) fallen into a merely technical +and decorative stage, which it is, perhaps, still too harsh to call +survival. With a movement of alarm, the wiser or more timid begin +to fall a little back from these extremities; they begin to aspire after +a more naked, narrative articulation; after the succinct, the dignified, +and the poetic; and as a means to this, after a general lightening of +this baggage of detail. After Scott we beheld the starveling story +- once, in the hands of Voltaire, as abstract as a parable - begin +to be pampered upon facts. The introduction of these details developed +a particular ability of hand; and that ability, childishly indulged, +has led to the works that now amaze us on a railway journey. A +man of the unquestionable force of M. Zola spends himself on technical +successes. To afford a popular flavour and attract the mob, he +adds a steady current of what I may be allowed to call the rancid. +That is exciting to the moralist; but what more particularly interests +the artist is this tendency of the extreme of detail, when followed +as a principle, to degenerate into mere<i> feux-de-joie</i> of literary +tricking. The other day even M. Daudet was to be heard babbling +of audible colours and visible sounds.<br> +<br> +This odd suicide of one branch of the realists may serve to remind us +of the fact which underlies a very dusty conflict of the critics. +All representative art, which can be said to live, is both realistic +and ideal; and the realism about which we quarrel is a matter purely +of externals. It is no especial cultus of nature and veracity, +but a mere whim of veering fashion, that has made us turn our back upon +the larger, more various, and more romantic art of yore. A photographic +exactitude in dialogue is now the exclusive fashion; but even in the +ablest hands it tells us no more - I think it even tells us less - than +Molière, wielding his artificial medium, has told to us and to +all time of Alceste or Orgon, Dorine or Chrysale. The historical +novel is forgotten. Yet truth to the conditions of man’s +nature and the conditions of man’s life, the truth of literary +art, is free of the ages. It may be told us in a carpet comedy, +in a novel of adventure, or a fairy tale. The scene may be pitched +in London, on the sea-coast of Bohemia, or away on the mountains of +Beulah. And by an odd and luminous accident, if there is any page +of literature calculated to awake the envy of M. Zola, it must be that +<i>Troilus and Cressida</i> which Shakespeare, in a spasm of unmanly +anger with the world, grafted on the heroic story of the siege of Troy.<br> +<br> +This question of realism, let it then be clearly understood, regards +not in the least degree the fundamental truth, but only the technical +method, of a work of art. Be as ideal or as abstract as you please, +you will be none the less veracious; but if you be weak, you run the +risk of being tedious and inexpressive; and if you be very strong and +honest, you may chance upon a masterpiece.<br> +<br> +A work of art is first cloudily conceived in the mind; during the period +of gestation it stands more clearly forward from these swaddling mists, +puts on expressive lineaments, and becomes at length that most faultless, +but also, alas! that incommunicable product of the human mind, a perfected +design. On the approach to execution all is changed. The +artist must now step down, don his working clothes, and become the artisan. +He now resolutely commits his airy conception, his delicate Ariel, to +the touch of matter; he must decide, almost in a breath, the scale, +the style, the spirit, and the particularity of execution of his whole +design.<br> +<br> +The engendering idea of some works is stylistic; a technical preoccupation +stands them instead of some robuster principle of life. And with +these the execution is but play; for the stylistic problem is resolved +beforehand, and all large originality of treatment wilfully foregone. +Such are the verses, intricately designed, which we have learnt to admire, +with a certain smiling admiration, at the hands of Mr. Lang and Mr. +Dobson; such, too, are those canvases where dexterity or even breadth +of plastic style takes the place of pictorial nobility of design. +So, it may be remarked, it was easier to begin to write <i>Esmond</i> +than <i>Vanity Fair</i>, since, in the first, the style was dictated +by the nature of the plan; and Thackeray, a man probably of some indolence +of mind, enjoyed and got good profit of this economy of effort. +But the case is exceptional. Usually in all works of art that +have been conceived from within outwards, and generously nourished from +the author’s mind, the moment in which he begins to execute is +one of extreme perplexity and strain. Artists of indifferent energy +and an imperfect devotion to their own ideal make this ungrateful effort +once for all; and, having formed a style, adhere to it through life. +But those of a higher order cannot rest content with a process which, +as they continue to employ it, must infallibly degenerate towards the +academic and the cut-and-dried. Every fresh work in which they +embark is the signal for a fresh engagement of the whole forces of their +mind; and the changing views which accompany the growth of their experience +are marked by still more sweeping alterations in the manner of their +art. So that criticism loves to dwell upon and distinguish the +varying periods of a Raphael, a Shakespeare, or a Beethoven.<br> +<br> +It is, then, first of all, at this initial and decisive moment when +execution is begun, and thenceforth only in a less degree, that the +ideal and the real do indeed, like good and evil angels, contend for +the direction of the work. Marble, paint, and language, the pen, +the needle, and the brush, all have their grossnesses, their ineffable +impotences, their hours, if I may so express myself, of insubordination. +It is the work and it is a great part of the delight of any artist to +contend with these unruly tools, and now by brute energy, now by witty +expedient, to drive and coax them to effect his will. Given these +means, so laughably inadequate, and given the interest, the intensity, +and the multiplicity of the actual sensation whose effect he is to render +with their aid, the artist has one main and necessary resource which +he must, in every case and upon any theory, employ. He must, that +is, suppress much and omit more. He must omit what is tedious +or irrelevant, and suppress what is tedious and necessary. But +such facts as, in regard to the main design, subserve a variety of purposes, +he will perforce and eagerly retain. And it is the mark of the +very highest order of creative art to be woven exclusively of such. +There, any fact that is registered is contrived a double or a treble +debt to pay, and is at once an ornament in its place, and a pillar in +the main design. Nothing would find room in such a picture that +did not serve, at once, to complete the composition, to accentuate the +scheme of colour, to distinguish the planes of distance, and to strike +the note of the selected sentiment; nothing would be allowed in such +a story that did not, at the same time, expedite the progress of the +fable, build up the characters, and strike home the moral or the philosophical +design. But this is unattainable. As a rule, so far from +building the fabric of our works exclusively with these, we are thrown +into a rapture if we think we can muster a dozen or a score of them, +to be the plums of our confection. And hence, in order that the +canvas may be filled or the story proceed from point to point, other +details must be admitted. They must be admitted, alas! upon a +doubtful title; many without marriage robes. Thus any work of +art, as it proceeds towards completion, too often - I had almost written +always - loses in force and poignancy of main design. Our little +air is swamped and dwarfed among hardly relevant orchestration; our +little passionate story drowns in a deep sea of descriptive eloquence +or slipshod talk.<br> +<br> +But again, we are rather more tempted to admit those particulars which +we know we can describe; and hence those most of all which, having been +described very often, have grown to be conventionally treated in the +practice of our art. These we choose, as the mason chooses the +acanthus to adorn his capital, because they come naturally to the accustomed +hand. The old stock incidents and accessories, tricks of workmanship +and schemes of composition (all being admirably good, or they would +long have been forgotten) haunt and tempt our fancy, offer us ready-made +but not perfectly appropriate solutions for any problem that arises, +and wean us from the study of nature and the uncompromising practice +of art. To struggle, to face nature, to find fresh solutions, +and give expression to facts which have not yet been adequately or not +yet elegantly expressed, is to run a little upon the danger of extreme +self-love. Difficulty sets a high price upon achievement; and +the artist may easily fall into the error of the French naturalists, +and consider any fact as welcome to admission if it be the ground of +brilliant handiwork; or, again, into the error of the modern landscape-painter, +who is apt to think that difficulty overcome and science well displayed +can take the place of what is, after all, the one excuse and breath +of art - charm. A little further, and he will regard charm in +the light of an unworthy sacrifice to prettiness, and the omission of +a tedious passage as an infidelity to art.<br> +<br> +We have now the matter of this difference before us. The idealist, +his eye singly fixed upon the greater outlines, loves rather to fill +up the interval with detail of the conventional order, briefly touched, +soberly suppressed in tone, courting neglect. But the realist, +with a fine intemperance, will not suffer the presence of anything so +dead as a convention; he shall have all fiery, all hot-pressed from +nature, all charactered and notable, seizing the eye. The style +that befits either of these extremes, once chosen, brings with it its +necessary disabilities and dangers. The immediate danger of the +realist is to sacrifice the beauty and significance of the whole to +local dexterity, or, in the insane pursuit of completion, to immolate +his readers under facts; but he comes in the last resort, and as his +energy declines, to discard all design, abjure all choice, and, with +scientific thoroughness, steadily to communicate matter which is not +worth learning. The danger of the idealist is, of course, to become +merely null and lose all grip of fact, particularity, or passion.<br> +<br> +We talk of bad and good. Everything, indeed, is good which is +conceived with honesty and executed with communicative ardour. +But though on neither side is dogmatism fitting, and though in every +case the artist must decide for himself, and decide afresh and yet afresh +for each succeeding work and new creation; yet one thing may be generally +said, that we of the last quarter of the nineteenth century, breathing +as we do the intellectual atmosphere of our age, are more apt to err +upon the side of realism than to sin in quest of the ideal. Upon +that theory it may be well to watch and correct our own decisions, always +holding back the hand from the least appearance of irrelevant dexterity, +and resolutely fixed to begin no work that is not philosophical, passionate, +dignified, happily mirthful, or, at the last and least, romantic in +design.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +MY FIRST BOOK: ‘TREASURE ISLAND’ <a name="citation17"></a><a href="#footnote17">{17}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +It was far indeed from being my first book, for I am not a novelist +alone. But I am well aware that my paymaster, the Great Public, +regards what else I have written with indifference, if not aversion; +if it call upon me at all, it calls on me in the familiar and indelible +character; and when I am asked to talk of my first book, no question +in the world but what is meant is my first novel.<br> +<br> +Sooner or later, somehow, anyhow, I was bound to write a novel. +It seems vain to ask why. Men are born with various manias: from +my earliest childhood, it was mine to make a plaything of imaginary +series of events; and as soon as I was able to write, I became a good +friend to the paper-makers. Reams upon reams must have gone to +the making of ‘Rathillet,’ ‘The Pentland Rising,’ +<a name="citation18"></a><a href="#footnote18">{18}</a> ‘The King’s +Pardon’ (otherwise ‘Park Whitehead’), ‘Edward +Daven,’ ‘A Country Dance,’ and ‘A Vendetta in +the West’; and it is consolatory to remember that these reams +are now all ashes, and have been received again into the soil. +I have named but a few of my ill-fated efforts, only such indeed as +came to a fair bulk ere they were desisted from; and even so they cover +a long vista of years. ‘Rathillet’ was attempted before +fifteen, ‘The Vendetta’ at twenty-nine, and the succession +of defeats lasted unbroken till I was thirty-one. By that time, +I had written little books and little essays and short stories; and +had got patted on the back and paid for them - though not enough to +live upon. I had quite a reputation, I was the successful man; +I passed my days in toil, the futility of which would sometimes make +my cheek to burn - that I should spend a man’s energy upon this +business, and yet could not earn a livelihood: and still there shone +ahead of me an unattained ideal: although I had attempted the thing +with vigour not less than ten or twelve times, I had not yet written +a novel. All - all my pretty ones - had gone for a little, and +then stopped inexorably like a schoolboy’s watch. I might +be compared to a cricketer of many years’ standing who should +never have made a run. Anybody can write a short story - a bad +one, I mean - who has industry and paper and time enough; but not every +one may hope to write even a bad novel. It is the length that +kills.<br> +<br> +The accepted novelist may take his novel up and put it down, spend days +upon it in vain, and write not any more than he makes haste to blot. +Not so the beginner. Human nature has certain rights; instinct +- the instinct of self-preservation - forbids that any man (cheered +and supported by the consciousness of no previous victory) should endure +the miseries of unsuccessful literary toil beyond a period to be measured +in weeks. There must be something for hope to feed upon. +The beginner must have a slant of wind, a lucky vein must be running, +he must be in one of those hours when the words come and the phrases +balance of themselves - <i>even to begin</i>. And having begun, +what a dread looking forward is that until the book shall be accomplished! +For so long a time, the slant is to continue unchanged, the vein to +keep running, for so long a time you must keep at command the same quality +of style: for so long a time your puppets are to be always vital, always +consistent, always vigorous! I remember I used to look, in those +days, upon every three-volume novel with a sort of veneration, as a +feat - not possibly of literature - but at least of physical and moral +endurance and the courage of Ajax.<br> +<br> +In the fated year I came to live with my father and mother at Kinnaird, +above Pitlochry. Then I walked on the red moors and by the side +of the golden burn; the rude, pure air of our mountains inspirited, +if it did not inspire us, and my wife and I projected a joint volume +of logic stories, for which she wrote ‘The Shadow on the Bed,’ +and I turned out ‘Thrawn Janet,’ and a first draft of ‘The +Merry Men.’ I love my native air, but it does not love me; +and the end of this delightful period was a cold, a fly-blister, and +a migration by Strathairdle and Glenshee to the Castleton of Braemar.<br> +<br> +There it blew a good deal and rained in a proportion; my native air +was more unkind than man’s ingratitude, and I must consent to +pass a good deal of my time between four walls in a house lugubriously +known as the Late Miss McGregor’s Cottage. And now admire +the finger of predestination. There was a schoolboy in the Late +Miss McGregor’s Cottage, home from the holidays, and much in want +of ‘something craggy to break his mind upon.’ He had +no thought of literature; it was the art of Raphael that received his +fleeting suffrages; and with the aid of pen and ink and a shilling box +of water colours, he had soon turned one of the rooms into a picture +gallery. My more immediate duty towards the gallery was to be +showman; but I would sometimes unbend a little, join the artist (so +to speak) at the easel, and pass the afternoon with him in a generous +emulation, making coloured drawings. On one of these occasions, +I made the map of an island; it was elaborately and (I thought) beautifully +coloured; the shape of it took my fancy beyond expression; it contained +harbours that pleased me like sonnets; and with the unconsciousness +of the predestined, I ticketed my performance ‘Treasure Island.’ +I am told there are people who do not care for maps, and find it hard +to believe. The names, the shapes of the woodlands, the courses +of the roads and rivers, the prehistoric footsteps of man still distinctly +traceable up hill and down dale, the mills and the ruins, the ponds +and the ferries, perhaps the <i>Standing Stone</i> or the <i>Druidic +Circle</i> on the heath; here is an inexhaustible fund of interest for +any man with eyes to see or twopence-worth of imagination to understand +with! No child but must remember laying his head in the grass, +staring into the infinitesimal forest and seeing it grow populous with +fairy armies.<br> +<br> +Somewhat in this way, as I paused upon my map of ‘Treasure Island,’ +the future character of the book began to appear there visibly among +imaginary woods; and their brown faces and bright weapons peeped out +upon me from unexpected quarters, as they passed to and fro, fighting +and hunting treasure, on these few square inches of a flat projection. +The next thing I knew I had some papers before me and was writing out +a list of chapters. How often have I done so, and the thing gone +no further! But there seemed elements of success about this enterprise. +It was to be a story for boys; no need of psychology or fine writing; +and I had a boy at hand to be a touchstone. Women were excluded. +I was unable to handle a brig (which the <i>Hispaniola</i> should have +been), but I thought I could make shift to sail her as a schooner without +public shame. And then I had an idea for John Silver from which +I promised myself funds of entertainment; to take an admired friend +of mine (whom the reader very likely knows and admires as much as I +do), to deprive him of all his finer qualities and higher graces of +temperament, to leave him with nothing but his strength, his courage, +his quickness, and his magnificent geniality, and to try to express +these in terms of the culture of a raw tarpaulin. Such psychical +surgery is, I think, a common way of ‘making character’; +perhaps it is, indeed, the only way. We can put in the quaint +figure that spoke a hundred words with us yesterday by the wayside; +but do we know him? Our friend, with his infinite variety and +flexibility, we know - but can we put him in? Upon the first, +we must engraft secondary and imaginary qualities, possibly all wrong; +from the second, knife in hand, we must cut away and deduct the needless +arborescence of his nature, but the trunk and the few branches that +remain we may at least be fairly sure of.<br> +<br> +On a chill September morning, by the cheek of a brisk fire, and the +rain drumming on the window, I began <i>The Sea Cook</i>, for that was +the original title. I have begun (and finished) a number of other +books, but I cannot remember to have sat down to one of them with more +complacency. It is not to be wondered at, for stolen waters are +proverbially sweet. I am now upon a painful chapter. No +doubt the parrot once belonged to Robinson Crusoe. No doubt the +skeleton is conveyed from Poe. I think little of these, they are +trifles and details; and no man can hope to have a monopoly of skeletons +or make a corner in talking birds. The stockade, I am told, is +from <i>Masterman Ready</i>. It may be, I care not a jot. +These useful writers had fulfilled the poet’s saying: departing, +they had left behind them Footprints on the sands of time, Footprints +which perhaps another - and I was the other! It is my debt to +Washington Irving that exercises my conscience, and justly so, for I +believe plagiarism was rarely carried farther. I chanced to pick +up the <i>Tales of a Traveller</i> some years ago with a view to an +anthology of prose narrative, and the book flew up and struck me: Billy +Bones, his chest, the company in the parlour, the whole inner spirit, +and a good deal of the material detail of my first chapters - all were +there, all were the property of Washington Irving. But I had no +guess of it then as I sat writing by the fireside, in what seemed the +spring-tides of a somewhat pedestrian inspiration; nor yet day by day, +after lunch, as I read aloud my morning’s work to the family. +It seemed to me original as sin; it seemed to belong to me like my right +eye. I had counted on one boy, I found I had two in my audience. +My father caught fire at once with all the romance and childishness +of his original nature. His own stories, that every night of his +life he put himself to sleep with, dealt perpetually with ships, roadside +inns, robbers, old sailors, and commercial travellers before the era +of steam. He never finished one of these romances; the lucky man +did not require to! But in <i>Treasure Island</i> he recognised +something kindred to his own imagination; it was <i>his</i> kind of +picturesque; and he not only heard with delight the daily chapter, but +set himself acting to collaborate. When the time came for Billy +Bones’s chest to be ransacked, he must have passed the better +part of a day preparing, on the back of a legal envelope, an inventory +of its contents, which I exactly followed; and the name of ‘Flint’s +old ship’ - the <i>Walrus</i> - was given at his particular request. +And now who should come dropping in, <i>ex machinâ</i>, but Dr. +Japp, like the disguised prince who is to bring down the curtain upon +peace and happiness in the last act; for he carried in his pocket, not +a horn or a talisman, but a publisher - had, in fact, been charged by +my old friend, Mr. Henderson, to unearth new writers for <i>Young Folks</i>. +Even the ruthlessness of a united family recoiled before the extreme +measure of inflicting on our guest the mutilated members of <i>The Sea +Cook</i>; at the same time, we would by no means stop our readings; +and accordingly the tale was begun again at the beginning, and solemnly +re-delivered for the benefit of Dr. Japp. From that moment on, +I have thought highly of his critical faculty; for when he left us, +he carried away the manuscript in his portmanteau.<br> +<br> +Here, then, was everything to keep me up, sympathy, help, and now a +positive engagement. I had chosen besides a very easy style. +Compare it with the almost contemporary ‘Merry Men’, one +reader may prefer the one style, one the other - ’tis an affair +of character, perhaps of mood; but no expert can fail to see that the +one is much more difficult, and the other much easier to maintain. +It seems as though a full-grown experienced man of letters might engage +to turn out <i>Treasure Island</i> at so many pages a day, and keep +his pipe alight. But alas! this was not my case. Fifteen +days I stuck to it, and turned out fifteen chapters; and then, in the +early paragraphs of the sixteenth, ignominiously lost hold. My +mouth was empty; there was not one word of <i>Treasure Island</i> in +my bosom; and here were the proofs of the beginning already waiting +me at the ‘Hand and Spear’! Then I corrected them, +living for the most part alone, walking on the heath at Weybridge in +dewy autumn mornings, a good deal pleased with what I had done, and +more appalled than I can depict to you in words at what remained for +me to do. I was thirty-one; I was the head of a family; I had +lost my health; I had never yet paid my way, never yet made £200 +a year; my father had quite recently bought back and cancelled a book +that was judged a failure: was this to be another and last fiasco? +I was indeed very close on despair; but I shut my mouth hard, and during +the journey to Davos, where I was to pass the winter, had the resolution +to think of other things and bury myself in the novels of M. de Boisgobey. +Arrived at my destination, down I sat one morning to the unfinished +tale; and behold! it flowed from me like small talk; and in a second +tide of delighted industry, and again at a rate of a chapter a day, +I finished <i>Treasure Island</i>. It had to be transcribed almost +exactly; my wife was ill; the schoolboy remained alone of the faithful; +and John Addington Symonds (to whom I timidly mentioned what I was engaged +on) looked on me askance. He was at that time very eager I should +write on the characters of Theophrastus: so far out may be the judgments +of the wisest men. But Symonds (to be sure) was scarce the confidant +to go to for sympathy on a boy’s story. He was large-minded; +‘a full man,’ if there was one; but the very name of my +enterprise would suggest to him only capitulations of sincerity and +solecisms of style. Well! he was not far wrong.<br> +<br> +<i>Treasure Island</i> - it was Mr. Henderson who deleted the first +title, <i>The Sea Cook</i> - appeared duly in the story paper, where +it figured in the ignoble midst, without woodcuts, and attracted not +the least attention. I did not care. I liked the tale myself, +for much the same reason as my father liked the beginning: it was my +kind of picturesque. I was not a little proud of John Silver, +also; and to this day rather admire that smooth and formidable adventurer. +What was infinitely more exhilarating, I had passed a landmark; I had +finished a tale, and written ‘The End’ upon my manuscript, +as I had not done since ‘The Pentland Rising,’ when I was +a boy of sixteen not yet at college. In truth it was so by a set +of lucky accidents; had not Dr. Japp come on his visit, had not the +tale flowed from me with singular case, it must have been laid aside +like its predecessors, and found a circuitous and unlamented way to +the fire. Purists may suggest it would have been better so. +I am not of that mind. The tale seems to have given much pleasure, +and it brought (or, was the means of bringing) fire and food and wine +to a deserving family in which I took an interest. I need scarcely +say I mean my own.<br> +<br> +But the adventures of <i>Treasure Island</i> are not yet quite at an +end. I had written it up to the map. The map was the chief +part of my plot. For instance, I had called an islet ‘Skeleton +Island,’ not knowing what I meant, seeking only for the immediate +picturesque, and it was to justify this name that I broke into the gallery +of Mr. Poe and stole Flint’s pointer. And in the same way, +it was because I had made two harbours that the <i>Hispaniola</i> was +sent on her wanderings with Israel Hands. The time came when it +was decided to republish, and I sent in my manuscript, and the map along +with it, to Messrs. Cassell. The proofs came, they were corrected, +but I heard nothing of the map. I wrote and asked; was told it +had never been received, and sat aghast. It is one thing to draw +a map at random, set a scale in one corner of it at a venture, and write +up a story to the measurements. It is quite another to have to +examine a whole book, make an inventory of all the allusions contained +in it, and with a pair of compasses, painfully design a map to suit +the data. I did it; and the map was drawn again in my father’s +office, with embellishments of blowing whales and sailing ships, and +my father himself brought into service a knack he had of various writing, +and elaborately <i>forged</i> the signature of Captain Flint, and the +sailing directions of Billy Bones. But somehow it was never <i>Treasure +Island</i> to me.<br> +<br> +I have said the map was the most of the plot. I might almost say +it was the whole. A few reminiscences of Poe, Defoe, and Washington +Irving, a copy of Johnson’s <i>Buccaneers</i>, the name of the +Dead Man’s Chest from Kingsley’s <i>At Last</i>, some recollections +of canoeing on the high seas, and the map itself, with its infinite, +eloquent suggestion, made up the whole of my materials. It is, +perhaps, not often that a map figures so largely in a tale, yet it is +always important. The author must know his countryside, whether +real or imaginary, like his hand; the distances, the points of the compass, +the place of the sun’s rising, the behaviour of the moon, should +all be beyond cavil. And how troublesome the moon is! I +have come to grief over the moon in <i>Prince</i> <i>Otto</i>, and so +soon as that was pointed out to me, adopted a precaution which I recommend +to other men - I never write now without an almanack. With an +almanack, and the map of the country, and the plan of every house, either +actually plotted on paper or already and immediately apprehended in +the mind, a man may hope to avoid some of the grossest possible blunders. +With the map before him, he will scarce allow the sun to set in the +east, as it does in <i>The Antiquary</i>. With the almanack at +hand, he will scarce allow two horsemen, journeying on the most urgent +affair, to employ six days, from three of the Monday morning till late +in the Saturday night, upon a journey of, say, ninety or a hundred miles, +and before the week is out, and still on the same nags, to cover fifty +in one day, as may be read at length in the inimitable novel of <i>Rob +Roy</i>. And it is certainly well, though far from necessary, +to avoid such ‘croppers.’ But it is my contention +- my superstition, if you like - that who is faithful to his map, and +consults it, and draws from it his inspiration, daily and hourly, gains +positive support, and not mere negative immunity from accident. +The tale has a root there; it grows in that soil; it has a spine of +its own behind the words. Better if the country be real, and he +has walked every foot of it and knows every milestone. But even +with imaginary places, he will do well in the beginning to provide a +map; as he studies it, relations will appear that he had not thought +upon; he will discover obvious, though unsuspected, short-cuts and footprints +for his messengers; and even when a map is not all the plot, as it was +in <i>Treasure Island</i>, it will be found to be a mine of suggestion.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +THE GENESIS OF ‘THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE’<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +I was walking one night in the verandah of a small house in which I +lived, outside the hamlet of Saranac. It was winter; the night +was very dark; the air extraordinary clear and cold, and sweet with +the purity of forests. From a good way below, the river was to +be heard contending with ice and boulders: a few lights appeared, scattered +unevenly among the darkness, but so far away as not to lessen the sense +of isolation. For the making of a story here were fine conditions. +I was besides moved with the spirit of emulation, for I had just finished +my third or fourth perusal of <i>The Phantom Ship</i>. ‘Come,’ +said I to my engine, ‘let us make a tale, a story of many years +and countries, of the sea and the land, savagery and civilisation; a +story that shall have the same large features, and may be treated in +the same summary elliptic method as the book you have been reading and +admiring.’ I was here brought up with a reflection exceedingly +just in itself, but which, as the sequel shows, I failed to profit by. +I saw that Marryat, not less than Homer, Milton, and Virgil, profited +by the choice of a familiar and legendary subject; so that he prepared +his readers on the very title-page; and this set me cudgelling my brains, +if by any chance I could hit upon some similar belief to be the centre-piece +of my own meditated fiction. In the course of this vain search +there cropped up in my memory a singular case of a buried and resuscitated +fakir, which I had been often told by an uncle of mine, then lately +dead, Inspector-General John Balfour.<br> +<br> +On such a fine frosty night, with no wind and the thermometer below +zero, the brain works with much vivacity; and the next moment I had +seen the circumstance transplanted from India and the tropics to the +Adirondack wilderness and the stringent cold of the Canadian border. +Here then, almost before I had begun my story, I had two countries, +two of the ends of the earth involved: and thus though the notion of +the resuscitated man failed entirely on the score of general acceptation, +or even (as I have since found) acceptability, it fitted at once with +my design of a tale of many lands; and this decided me to consider further +of its possibilities. The man who should thus be buried was the +first question: a good man, whose return to life would be hailed by +the reader and the other characters with gladness? This trenched +upon the Christian picture, and was dismissed. If the idea, then, +was to be of any use at all for me, I had to create a kind of evil genius +to his friends and family, take him through many disappearances, and +make this final restoration from the pit of death, in the icy American +wilderness, the last and the grimmest of the series. I need not +tell my brothers of the craft that I was now in the most interesting +moment of an author’s life; the hours that followed that night +upon the balcony, and the following nights and days, whether walking +abroad or lying wakeful in my bed, were hours of unadulterated joy. +My mother, who was then living with me alone, perhaps had less enjoyment; +for, in the absence of my wife, who is my usual helper in these times +of parturition, I must spur her up at all seasons to hear me relate +and try to clarify my unformed fancies.<br> +<br> +And while I was groping for the fable and the character required, behold +I found them lying ready and nine years old in my memory. Pease +porridge hot, pease porridge cold, pease porridge in the pot, nine years +old. Was there ever a more complete justification of the rule +of Horace? Here, thinking of quite other things, I had stumbled +on the solution, or perhaps I should rather say (in stagewright phrase) +the Curtain or final Tableau of a story conceived long before on the +moors between Pitlochry and Strathardle, conceived in Highland rain, +in the blend of the smell of heather and bog-plants, and with a mind +full of the Athole correspondence and the memories of the dumlicide +Justice. So long ago, so far away it was, that I had first evoked +the faces and the mutual tragic situation of the men of Durrisdeer.<br> +<br> +My story was now world-wide enough: Scotland, India, and America being +all obligatory scenes. But of these India was strange to me except +in books; I had never known any living Indian save a Parsee, a member +of my club in London, equally civilised, and (to all seeing) equally +accidental with myself. It was plain, thus far, that I should +have to get into India and out of it again upon a foot of fairy lightness; +and I believe this first suggested to me the idea of the Chevalier Burke +for a narrator. It was at first intended that he should be Scottish, +and I was then filled with fears that he might prove only the degraded +shadow of my own Alan Breck. Presently, however, it began to occur +to me it would be like my Master to curry favour with the Prince’s +Irishmen; and that an Irish refugee would have a particular reason to +find himself in India with his countryman, the unfortunate Lally. +Irish, therefore, I decided he should be, and then, all of a sudden, +I was aware of a tall shadow across my path, the shadow of Barry Lyndon. +No man (in Lord Foppington’s phrase) of a nice morality could +go very deep with my Master: in the original idea of this story conceived +in Scotland, this companion had been besides intended to be worse than +the bad elder son with whom (as it was then meant) he was to visit Scotland; +if I took an Irishman, and a very bad Irishman, in the midst of the +eighteenth century, how was I to evade Barry Lyndon? The wretch +besieged me, offering his services; he gave me excellent references; +he proved that he was highly fitted for the work I had to do; he, or +my own evil heart, suggested it was easy to disguise his ancient livery +wit a little lace and a few frogs and buttons, so that Thackeray himself +should hardly recognise him. And then of a sudden there came to +me memories of a young Irishman, with whom I was once intimate, and +had spent long nights walking and talking with, upon a very desolate +coast in a bleak autumn: I recalled him as a youth of an extraordinary +moral simplicity - almost vacancy; plastic to any influence, the creature +of his admirations: and putting such a youth in fancy into the career +of a soldier of fortune, it occurred to me that he would serve my turn +as well as Mr. Lyndon, and in place of entering into competition with +the Master, would afford a slight though a distinct relief. I +know not if I have done him well, though his moral dissertations always +highly entertained me: but I own I have been surprised to find that +he reminded some critics of Barry Lyndon after all. . . .<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +PREFACE TO ‘THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE’ <a name="citation19"></a><a href="#footnote19">{19}</a><br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Although an old, consistent exile, the editor of the following pages +revisits now and again the city of which he exults to be a native; and +there are few things more strange, more painful, or more salutary, than +such revisitations. Outside, in foreign spots, he comes by surprise +and awakens more attention than he had expected; in his own city, the +relation is reversed, and he stands amazed to be so little recollected. +Elsewhere he is refreshed to see attractive faces, to remark possible +friends; there he scouts the long streets, with a pang at heart, for +the faces and friends that are no more. Elsewhere he is delighted +with the presence of what is new, there tormented by the absence of +what is old. Elsewhere he is content to be his present self; there +he is smitten with an equal regret for what he once was and for what +he once hoped to be.<br> +<br> +He was feeling all this dimly, as he drove from the station, on his +last visit; he was feeling it still as he alighted at the door of his +friend Mr. Johnstone Thomson, W.S., with whom he was to stay. +A hearty welcome, a face not altogether changed, a few words that sounded +of old days, a laugh provoked and shared, a glimpse in passing of the +snowy cloth and bright decanters and the Piranesis on the dining-room +wall, brought him to his bed-room with a somewhat lightened cheer, and +when he and Mr. Thomson sat down a few minutes later, cheek by jowl, +and pledged the past in a preliminary bumper, he was already almost +consoled, he had already almost forgiven himself his two unpardonable +errors, that he should ever have left his native city, or ever returned +to it.<br> +<br> +‘I have something quite in your way,’ said Mr. Thomson. +‘I wished to do honour to your arrival; because, my dear fellow, +it is my own youth that comes back along with you; in a very tattered +and withered state, to be sure, but - well! - all that’s left +of it.’<br> +<br> +‘A great deal better than nothing,’ said the editor. +‘But what is this which is quite in my way?’<br> +<br> +‘I was coming to that,’ said Mr. Thomson: ‘Fate has +put it in my power to honour your arrival with something really original +by way of dessert. A mystery.’<br> +<br> +‘A mystery?’ I repeated.<br> +<br> +‘Yes,’ said his friend, ‘a mystery. It may prove +to be nothing, and it may prove to be a great deal. But in the +meanwhile it is truly mysterious, no eye having looked on it for near +a hundred years; it is highly genteel, for it treats of a titled family; +and it ought to be melodramatic, for (according to the superscription) +it is concerned with death.’<br> +<br> +‘I think I rarely heard a more obscure or a more promising annunciation,’ +the other remarked. ‘But what is It?’<br> +<br> +‘You remember my predecessor’s, old Peter M’Brair’s +business?’<br> +<br> +‘I remember him acutely; he could not look at me without a pang +of reprobation, and he could not feel the pang without betraying it. +He was to me a man of a great historical interest, but the interest +was not returned.’<br> +<br> +‘Ah well, we go beyond him,’ said Mr. Thomson. ‘I +daresay old Peter knew as little about this as I do. You see, +I succeeded to a prodigious accumulation of old law-papers and old tin +boxes, some of them of Peter’s hoarding, some of his father’s, +John, first of the dynasty, a great man in his day. Among other +collections were all the papers of the Durrisdeers.’<br> +<br> +‘The Durrisdeers!’ cried I. ‘My dear fellow, +these may be of the greatest interest. One of them was out in +the ‘45; one had some strange passages with the devil - you will +find a note of it in Law’s <i>Memorials</i>, I think; and there +was an unexplained tragedy, I know not what, much later, about a hundred +years ago - ‘<br> +<br> +‘More than a hundred years ago,’ said Mr. Thomson. +‘In 1783.’<br> +<br> +‘How do you know that? I mean some death.’<br> +<br> +‘Yes, the lamentable deaths of my lord Durrisdeer and his brother, +the Master of Ballantrae (attainted in the troubles),’ said Mr. +Thomson with something the tone of a man quoting. ‘Is that +it?’<br> +<br> +‘To say truth,’ said I, ‘I have only seen some dim +reference to the things in memoirs; and heard some traditions dimmer +still, through my uncle (whom I think you knew). My uncle lived +when he was a boy in the neighbourhood of St. Bride’s; he has +often told me of the avenue closed up and grown over with grass, the +great gates never opened, the last lord and his old maid sister who +lived in the back parts of the house, a quiet, plain, poor, hum-drum +couple it would seem - but pathetic too, as the last of that stirring +and brave house - and, to the country folk, faintly terrible from some +deformed traditions.’<br> +<br> +‘Yes,’ said Mr. Thomson. Henry Graeme Durie, the last +lord, died in 1820; his sister, the Honourable Miss Katherine Durie, +in ‘27; so much I know; and by what I have been going over the +last few days, they were what you say, decent, quiet people and not +rich. To say truth, it was a letter of my lord’s that put +me on the search for the packet we are going to open this evening. +Some papers could not be found; and he wrote to Jack M’Brair suggesting +they might be among those sealed up by a Mr. Mackellar. M’Brair +answered, that the papers in question were all in Mackellar’s +own hand, all (as the writer understood) of a purely narrative character; +and besides, said he, “I am bound not to open them before the +year 1889.” You may fancy if these words struck me: I instituted +a hunt through all the M’Brair repositories; and at last hit upon +that packet which (if you have had enough wine) I propose to show you +at once.’<br> +<br> +In the smoking-room, to which my host now led me, was a packet, fastened +with many seals and enclosed in a single sheet of strong paper thus +endorsed:-<br> +<br> +<br> +Papers relating to the lives and lamentable deaths of the late Lord +Durisdeer, and his elder brother James, commonly called Master of Ballantrae, +attainted in the troubles: entrusted into the hands of John M’Brair +in the Lawnmarket of Edinburgh, W.S.; this 20th day of September Anno +Domini 1789; by him to be kept secret until the revolution of one hundred +years complete, or until the 20th day of September 1889: the same compiled +and written by me,<br> +<br> +EPHRAIM MACKELLAR,<br> +<br> +<i>For near forty years Land Steward on the<br> +estates of His Lordship.<br> +<br> +</i>As Mr. Thomson is a married man, I will not say what hour had struck +when we laid down the last of the following pages; but I will give a +few words of what ensued.<br> +<br> +‘Here,’ said Mr. Thomson, ‘is a novel ready to your +hand: all you have to do is to work up the scenery, develop the characters, +and improve the style.’<br> +<br> +‘My dear fellow,’ said I, ‘they are just the three +things that I would rather die than set my hand to. It shall be +published as it stands.’<br> +<br> +‘But it’s so bald,’ objected Mr. Thomson.<br> +<br> +‘I believe there is nothing so noble as baldness,’ replied +I, ‘and I am sure there is nothing so interesting. I would +have all literature bald, and all authors (if you like) but one.’<br> +<br> +‘Well, well,’ said Mr. Thomson, ‘we shall see.’<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +Footnotes:<br> +<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote1"></a><a href="#citation1">{1}</a> First published +in the Contemporary Review, April 1885<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote2"></a><a href="#citation2">{2}</a> Milton.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote3"></a><a href="#citation3">{3}</a> Milton.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote4"></a><a href="#citation4">{4}</a> Milton.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote5"></a><a href="#citation5">{5}</a> As PVF will continue +to haunt us through our English examples, take, by way of comparison, +this Latin verse, of which it forms a chief adornment, and do not hold +me answerable for the all too Roman freedom of the sense: ‘Hanc +volo, quae facilis, quae palliolata vagatur.’<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote6"></a><a href="#citation6">{6}</a> Coleridge.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote7"></a><a href="#citation7">{7}</a> Antony and +Cleopatra.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote8"></a><a href="#citation8">{8}</a> Cymbeline.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote9"></a><a href="#citation9">{9}</a> The V is +in ‘of.’<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote10"></a><a href="#citation10">{10}</a> Troilus +and Cressida.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote11"></a><a href="#citation11">{11}</a> First +published in the <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, April 1881.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote12"></a><a href="#citation12">{12}</a> Mr. James +Payn.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote13"></a><a href="#citation13">{13}</a> A footnote, +at least, is due to the admirable example set before all young writers +in the width of literary sympathy displayed by Mr. Swinburne. +He runs forth to welcome merit, whether in Dickens or Trollope, whether +in Villon, Milton, or Pope. This is, in criticism, the attitude +we should all seek to preserve; not only in that, but in every branch +of literary work.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote14"></a><a href="#citation14">{14}</a> First +published in the <i>British Weekly</i>, May 13, 1887.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote15"></a><a href="#citation15">{15}</a> Of the<i> +British Weekly.<br> +<br> +</i><a name="footnote16"></a><a href="#citation16">{16}</a> First +published in the <i>Magazine of Art</i> in 1883.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote17"></a><a href="#citation17">{17}</a> First +published in the <i>Idler</i>, August 1894.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote18"></a><a href="#citation18">{18}</a> <i>Ne +pas confondre</i>. Not the slim green pamphlet with the imprint +of Andrew Elliot, for which (as I see with amazement from the book-lists) +the gentlemen of England are willing to pay fancy prices; but its predecessor, +a bulky historical romance without a spark of merit, and now deleted +from the world.<br> +<br> +<a name="footnote19"></a><a href="#citation19">{19}</a> 1889.<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE ART OF WRITING ***<br> +<pre> + +******This file should be named artow10h.htm or artow10h.zip****** +Corrected EDITIONS of our EBooks get a new NUMBER, artow11h.htm +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, artow10ah.htm + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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