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BRYLLION FAGIN—A Project Gutenberg eBook - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css"> - -body {margin: auto 25%;} - - h1,h2,h3 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both;} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em;} - -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.p6 {margin-top: 6em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; visibility: hidden;} - -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%; visibility: hidden;} -@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } - -hr.r5 {width: 5%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 47.5%; margin-right: 47.5%; visibility: visible;} - -div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} -h2.nobreak {page-break-before: avoid;} - -ul { list-style-type: none; } -li.ifrst { margin-top: 1em; } - -table { - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto;} -table.autotable { border-collapse: collapse; } -table.autotable td, -table.autotable th { padding: 4px; } - -.tdr {text-align: right;} -.tdc {text-align: center;} - -.pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ -/* visibility: hidden; */ /* define the position */ -position: absolute; right: 3%; margin-right: 0em; -text-align: right; /* remove any special formating that could be inherited */ -font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; font-variant: normal; -letter-spacing: 0em; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0em; -font-size: x-small; /* never wrap this */ white-space: nowrap;} -.pagenum span { /* do not show text that is meant for non-css version*/ -visibility: hidden;} -.pagenum a {display: inline-block; color: #808080; -padding: 1px 4px 1px 4px;} - -.hang {text-indent: -1em; margin-left: 1em;} -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} - -.allsmcap {font-variant: small-caps; text-transform: lowercase;} - -.u {text-decoration: underline;} - -/* Images */ - -img { - max-width: 100%; - height: auto;} -img.w100 {width: 100%;} - -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; - page-break-inside: avoid; - max-width: 100%; -} - -.err {border-bottom: thin dotted red;} - -.footnotes {border: none;} -.footnote {margin: 1em 4em; font-size: 1em;} -.footnote .label {position: relative; bottom: 0.4em; - vertical-align: baseline; font-size: 80%; text-decoration: none;} -.fnanchor {vertical-align: super; bottom: 0.4em; - font-size: 80%; white-space: nowrap;} - -/* Poetry */ -.poetry-container {text-align: center;} -.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} -/* uncomment the next line for centered poetry in browsers */ -/* .poetry {display: inline-block;} */ -.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} -.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} -/* large inline blocks don't split well on paged devices */ -@media print { .poetry {display: block;} } -.x-ebookmaker .poetry {display: block;} - -/* Transcriber’s notes */ -.transnote {background-color: #E6E6FA; - color: black; - font-size:smaller; - padding:0.5em; - margin-bottom:5em; - font-family:sans-serif, serif; } - -/* Poetry indents */ -.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} -.poetry .indent29 {text-indent: 11.5em;} - -/* Illustration classes */ -.illowp100 {width: 100%;} -.illowp45 {width: 45%;} -.x-ebookmaker .illowp45 {width: 100%;} - - </style> - </head> -<body> -<p style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Short Story-Writing: An Art or a Trade?, by N. Bryllion Fagin</p> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Short Story-Writing: An Art or a Trade?</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: N. Bryllion Fagin</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: October 23, 2021 [eBook #66600]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Charlene Taylor, Eleni Christofaki and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHORT STORY-WRITING: AN ART OR A TRADE? ***</div> - -<div class="transnote"><h3>Transcriber’s note</h3> - -<p>Variable spelling and hyphenation have been retained. Minor punctuation -inconsistencies have been silently repaired. A list of the changes made -can be found <a href="#Corrections">at the end of the book</a>.</p></div> -<hr /> -<h1> -SHORT STORY WRITING: <br /> - -<i>An Art or a Trade?</i> -</h1> - -<hr /> -<div class="figcenter illowp45" id="cover" style="max-width: 40.625em;"> - <img class="w100" src="images/cover.jpg" alt="" /> -</div> -<hr /> -<div class="chapter"><p class="center"> -<big>SHORT STORY-WRITING</big><br /> - -<i>An Art or a Trade?</i></p> -<p class="p4 center"> -<i><small>by</small></i><br /> - -N. BRYLLION FAGIN</p> -<p> -Dean of the School of Literary Arts, Research University, -Washington, D. C., and instructor in Short -Story Writing, University of Maryland.</p> - -<div class="figcenter illowp100" id="illustration" style="max-width: 12.5em;"> - <img class="w100" style="width: 12.5em;" src="images/illustration.jpg" alt="decoration" /> -</div> - -<p class="center p6"> -NEW YORK<br /> -THOMAS SELTZER, INC.<br /> -1923 -</p></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"><p class="center p2"> -Copyright, 1923, by<br /> -THOMAS SELTZER, INC.</p> -<hr class="r5"/> -<p class="center"><i>All Rights Reserved</i></p> -<p class="center p6"> -<span class="allsmcap">PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA</span> -</p></div> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</h2> -</div> - -<table class="autotable" summary="contents"> -<tr> -<td class="tdc"><span class="allsmcap">CHAPTER</span></td><td> </td> -<td class="tdc"><span class="allsmcap">PAGE</span></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">I</td><td><span class="smcap">Overture</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">II</td><td> <span class="smcap">Action</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_12">12</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">III</td><td> “<span class="smcap">O. Henryism</span>”</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">IV</td><td> <span class="smcap">The Moving Pictures</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">V </td><td><span class="smcap">Verboten</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">VI</td><td> <span class="smcap">The Artificial Ending</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_101">101</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">VII</td><td> <span class="smcap">Form and Substance</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_114">114</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">VIII</td><td> <span class="smcap">Finale</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td class="tdr">IX</td><td> <span class="smcap">Effect</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_132">132</a></td> -</tr> -<tr> -<td colspan="2"><span class="smcap">Index</span></td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_137">137</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"><p class="center"> -SHORT STORY WRITING:<br /> - -<i>An Art or a Trade</i>? -</p></div> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">[1]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I -<br /> - -<span class="smcap">Overture</span></h2></div> - -<p>Moods may be uncomfortable, and sad, and painfully -disturbing, but, on the other hand, they make -pleasant music occasionally. Here I sit in the dusk, -looking out into the street that is ordinarily so -familiar to me, but has suddenly become blurred and -weirdly mysterious in the gathering murk. A veil -is over my eyes, which see the familiar houses across -the street, the young poplars in front of them, the -few passers-by. But my mind does not discern -these objects; it sees far subtler things—floating, -flimsy, evanescent. The dusk is in my mind, evoking -thoughts, illusions, pictures—and speaking, -questioning, singing. The dusk is an overture to -the things I have set out to say, playing innumerable -variations of my theme, whispering in every -note: “Stories, Stories, Stories!”</p> - -<p>There <span class="err" title="original: as">are</span> so many stories afloat in the world! -Every door and window and curtain and shade has -a story to tell; every clod and tree and leaf; and -every pebble of a human being washed by the waves -of life. And how many of these stories have I -helped to be told? And how many have I helped<span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[2]</span> -to be maimed, mutilated of soul? Yes, and how -many have I helped to kill?</p> - -<p>For I have been teaching, for a number of years, -the “Technique of Short Story-Writing,” and my -guidance and judgment have meant life and death -to countless stories born in the breasts and minds -of trustful people. I have been the great discourager -and encourager of genius and quasi-genius, -and I know my hands are not without stain of literary -blood.</p> - -<p>I am not reproaching myself. Among the many -hundreds of men and women who derive their -daily bread and clothes and gasoline by directing -the story-fancy of the country’s million or more -literary aspirants, I class myself among the most -conscientious and least harmful. The share of injury -I may have contributed has simply been the -unavoidable accompaniment of being engaged in a -profession grounded upon the popular belief that -literature is a trade, like plumbing, or tailoring, or -hod-carrying, and requires but an understanding of -the stupendous emoluments involved and a will to -learn. That it is in the interests of the profession -to foster and perpetuate this popular belief needs -no elaborate substantiation. But that the belief -itself should be based on a measure of solid truth -is a sardonic phenomenon calling for enlightening -discussion.</p> - -<p>Professor Arlo Bates in one of his talks on<span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[3]</span> -writing English once said: “Given a reasonable -intelligence and sufficient patience, any man with -the smallest gifts may learn to write at least marketable -stuff, and may earn an honest livelihood, -if he studies the taste of the least exacting portion -of the public, and accommodates himself to the -whim of the time.” It is the business of my profession -to dedicate its services to the promotion of -the production of this “marketable stuff,” and to -elevate its own calling it has blatantly labeled this -product as “literature.” With this end in view -numerous textbooks have been written, thousands -of magazine articles have been published, and millions -of copies of pamphlets and other advertising -matter distributed broadcast over the country. -The magic slogan is “Writers are made—not -born!” Then follows a “heart-to-heart” talk on -the advantages of a literary career, and the flourishing -of some dozen notable successes, measured -in formidable numbers of dollars received, usually -headed by Jack London and ending with Fannie -Hurst or some still more recent “arrival,” and -finally concluding with the weighty query, explicitly -propounded or subtly implied: “Why aren’t you -a story writer?”</p> - -<p>The young man or young woman just out of the -gray portals of some fresh-water college and not -knowing what to turn to next, or the insipid clerk -dreaming over his ledger, or her typewriter, of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[4]</span> -some Tyltyl cap thus suddenly comes into possession -of a startling idea. Why not be a story writer? -The work does not seem hard; compensation is said -to be good; and one is master of one’s own time -and destiny. The would-be casts his lot on the side -of practical reasoning, pays in a sum of money to -a school of fiction-writing or enrolls for a course -with one of our universities, buys a typewriter on -the installment plan, and begins to collect editorial -rejection slips. When the course is completed another -one is taken up, perhaps with another school, -thus crediting all lack of achievement to the insufficiency -or inefficiency of the instruction received so -far, and the typewriter continues to click and the -periodic comings of the postman are again awaited -eagerly; for hadn’t a major part of the instruction -been devoted to the inculcation of the conviction that -the world is exceedingly tardy in extending its -acknowledgment of genius? Why, think of Jack -London; read his “Martin Eden”—biographical, -you know. Then, Masefield, dishwashing in New -York, and returning to England to become the foremost -poet of the day; and Maupassant working -away at his little masterpieces for seven long years -before even venturing to bring them before the cold -light of the unappreciative world; and Kipling, -knocking about the streets of New York with his -wonderful Indian stories in his pockets and no -editor or publisher willing to look at them; and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span> -Knut Hamsun, working as a common farm hand in -North Dakota, and later as a common conductor -collecting fares on a Chicago street-car line, finally -returning to his native Norway to fame and fortune -and, ultimately, to a Nobel prize in literature. -Then think of our own more recent story writers—Hergesheimer, -writing away in obscurity for fourteen -years; Fannie Hurst, submitting thirty-five -stories to one periodical and succeeding with the -thirty-sixth—and now receiving $1800 for every -short story she writes, you know—etc., etc.</p> - -<p>Fully ninety per cent. never do succeed and -finally become discouraged and drop out of the -ranks. Of the other ten per cent. many live to see -their names in print over a story or poem or article -in some obscure periodical, while a few ultimately -become our best sellers and their names adorn the -conspicuous pages in our most popular fiction periodicals. -Among the ninety per cent. are the hopelessly -incompetent, with a sprinkling of artistic -idealists who utterly fail to accommodate themselves -to the taste of the public and the whim of -the time. Among the ten per cent. are the keen, -shrewd, practical craftsmen who are able to get at -the spirit of the literary mart. To the chosen ones -among these comes the adulation of the populace -and the golden shekels blazing a glittering path -across the pages of special feature articles in our -Sunday newspapers. And these are the writers<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[6]</span> -who justify my profession in spreading the gospel -that one needs but a will to learn to achieve a successful -literary career.</p> - -<p>If, with some such unpopular fellow as Nietzsche, -we should rise to a sublime pinnacle of contemptuous -detachment, we might say that the ninety per -cent. of failures do not deserve our pity. It is best -for a fighting, competitive world that weaklings -and incompetents are failures. We might even say -that the few artistic idealists among them deserve -no better. Life is a process of adaptation and compromise -and, among men, a pair of sturdy legs are -of greater utility than a pair of feeble wings. -Perhaps there is a stern justice in the fate of a -Chatterton or, say, a François Villon. But is it -not equally possible that by the grim, whimsical -jugglings of the gods a mist may sometimes envelop -the battlefield of men, such let us say, as -brought confusion to the last hordes of the noble -Arthur, when</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">“... friend and foe were shadows in the mist,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">And friend slew friend not knowing whom he slew;</div> - <div class="verse indent29">... and in the mist</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Was many a noble deed, many a base,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">And chance and craft...”?</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>Verily, such a “death-white” mist does envelop -our literary battlefield, and, in the confusion, my -profession, supported by the vast majority of -editors and professional critics, is aiding the weak -to conquer the strong. Blinded by the mist, we aid<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span> -aspirants to rise to power by craft and cunning, and -when they emerge to reign for a single day we -crown them, thus contributing to the future nothing -but the dust of our petty kings. Those who would -reign for centuries are jeered at, discouraged, vanquished.</p> - -<p>A dozen names leap to mind—pathetic examples -of great talent forced to decay, of great sincerity -diluted and polluted, of noble fires extinguished. -But of all these names the two most pregnant with -tragedy are those of Mark Twain and Jack London. -The author of “Huckleberry Finn” and “Tom -Sawyer,” deep, penetrating, cynical, was obliged to -play the amusing clown until the end. The author -of “The Call of the Wild” and “Martin Eden” -until his dying breath continued to fill his lucrative -contracts with popular claptrap. If no one in -particular can be blamed, the sickly light shining -upon our literary firmament must take responsibility. -There are formative years when a writer’s -talent matures, mellows, is molded. The attitude -of the populace and, above all, of the oracles -on the mountains and in the temples is eagerly -watched and heeded. In the case of Jack London -the influence of this attitude as a determining factor -in the evolution of his career is a matter of record. -One of the editors of <i>The Seven Arts</i>, a monthly -magazine that was too lofty of purpose and too -pure of policy to continue existence, once invited<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span> -Jack London to submit any stories he might have -that had failed of acceptance with the popular magazines -because of lack of adaptation. London’s -reply was that no such stories existed, and concluded -with a statement that explains very ingenuously the -melancholy disillusionment that pervades the best -of his work. “I don’t mind telling you,” he wrote, -“that had the United States been as kindly toward -the short story writer as France has always been -kindly, from the beginning of my writing career I -would have written many a score of short stories -quite different from the ones I have written.”<a id="FNanchor_1" href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a></p> - -<p>It is clear, of course, to what particular brand of -kindliness London had reference. For the United -States is kindly toward the short story writer, very -kindly indeed. It was kindly toward Jack London—but -not in the way of helping him to bring forth -the best that was in him. And this was his tragedy—and -therein lies the unkindliness of the United -States toward all its short story writers. It wanted -none of the work of Jack London the man with a -soul and genuine emotions which burned for expression; -it remunerated lavishly Jack London the -writer chap for his artificial concoctions that he despised. -It made Joseph Hergesheimer wait fourteen -years for the most moderate recognition while -giving such a writer as H. C. Witwer almost instantaneous -acclaim. It calls Ellis Parker Butler<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span> -a great humorist and George Ade a mere fable -writer. It proclaims O. Henry a prince of story -writers and doesn’t even know that the unfortunate -Ambrose Bierce once lived among us. And the -vast majority of priests and oracles in my profession -persist in justifying and perpetuating this kind unkindliness -and in instructing the new generation -according to its tenets. Example par excellence: -Speaks an instructor in story writing in one of our -leading universities, in a critical and biographical -survey of our short story writers, of “Robert W. -Chambers, imaginative artist,” and of Jack London, -“at best a third-rate writer.”<a id="FNanchor_2" href="#Footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p> - -<p>The sum and substance of all we preach may be -summarized in the one commandment we zealously -enforce above all others: “Thou shalt not write -anything an editor won’t buy.” Then we analyze -what editors do buy, arriving, by the process of induction, -at rules and regulations, which we promptly -proceed to incorporate into textbooks for the unlettered. -Some of our rules are flexible, others are -not, depending solely upon the attitude of their -compiler. An editor of a prominent periodical -once outlined the qualifications that recommended -a literary offering to him. He had set up before -him an ideal reader, an imaginary lady with a -family of daughters up in Vermont, and any manuscript -submitted to him had to answer satisfactorily<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span> -this mighty query: “Would the old lady want her -daughters to read this?” If this editor happened -to write a textbook for the instruction of the would-be -story writer, the old-lady-and-daughters question -would undoubtedly figure quite prominently therein. -I am not aware of any textbook on the subject by -this gentleman, but other writers have had this -question, or similar ones, in mind in evolving laws -for the would-be successful.</p> - -<p>I admit that I have taught people to answer these -mighty queries, before permitting them to entrust -their precious wares to the Post Office. For most -editors have a question of some sort— Will it -please some imaginary old man, or country girl, or -young parson, or the editor’s own blue-eyed little -girl, or, especially, his advertisers; and when a man -or a woman pays hard-earned dollars for the information -of how to “get by” the unfriendly editor, -my professional ethics demand that I supply this -information to the limits of my knowledge. Moreover, -when a man or a woman hands in a story -which has no earthly chance of being accepted by -any magazine because it is burdened with a soul -which violates every tradition and rule and policy -by which magazines are governed, it becomes my -duty to enlighten this student that his is not the way -to “get by.” For even such a student—an exception, -to be sure—has read our advertising literature, -has studied the popular psychology of success, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span> -often, like the other plodders, sincerely believes that -a published story is a masterpiece, a rejected one -worthless. If a story brings five dollars it is a poor -one; if it brings fifty it is a good one; if it brings -five hundred it is a work of art. Getting-by, then, -becomes the supreme problem, and getting-by means -having in mind the old lady with her daughters or -the old man with the gout. And who can answer -what becomes of poor Lafcadio Hearn’s queer idea -that</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“Literary success of any enduring kind is made only by refusing -to do what publishers want, by refusing to write what the -public want, by refusing to accept any popular standard, by refusing -to write anything to order”?</p> -</div> - -<p>Poor, poor indeed!</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II - -<br /> -<span class="smcap">Action</span></h2></div> - -<p>The very first rule our textbooks endeavor to -impress upon the would-be story writer is that -action must dominate his story. Whole chapters -are devoted to the importance of this ingredient, -bringing quotations from sundry editors proving -beyond the merest suspicion of a doubt that action -is the life and health of a story, the “punch” and -“pep” and “pull” of it. Then follow chapters on -how to capture action; on how to introduce it into -one’s own stories; on how to govern its course to -the greatest advantage.</p> - -<p>The editors quoted are, of course, all of the adventure -and action type magazines. One is reputed -to have stated his ideal beginning of a story to be -something like this: “He got up and looked at -his watch. It was twelve o’clock. He went up -into the garret and hanged himself.” Another is -said to like a more mystifying beginning, something -like this: “Who was the lady in 43? Was she the -blond man’s wife, sister or sweetheart? John -couldn’t sleep nights trying to find out.” And still -another gives his preferences, in the form of an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span> -announcement of a contest widely advertised in professional -magazines, for stories of “plot, of action, -of interesting complication. Spend the sweat of -your brow on deeds, not on acute character analysis; -on big situations, on suspense and appeal, not in -tedious description and fine writing.”</p> - -<p>The few editors who express preferences that -conflict with this cry for action are not quoted. -Here is one, for instance, who likes “realistic and -psychological stories from writers who want to do -for American life what Chekhov did for Russian -life. ‘Plot’ fiction of the type desired by popular -magazines is not wanted.” But, then, there is the -implication that his is not a popular magazine, and -besides, he goes on to say that “our rates for fiction -are very modest.” And here is another editor -who wants stories “that are characterized more by -feeling and artistry than by ‘punch.’” But who is -she, for it is a she in this instance, to tell us what -is wanted! Why, the circulation of her little periodical -is so insignificant that she is hardly justified -in having any wants at all! The fact that this little -publication publishes some of the most distinctive -stories written in America today does not count, of -course. It is not a widely-read magazine; it does not -pay for contributions;—it deserves no attention.</p> - -<p>Plainly, our duty as instructors and moulders of -the new generation of story writers is to base our -instruction on the needs and preferences of the fiction<span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span> -periodicals having the largest circulations and -able to pay well for material used. The inculcation -of literary ideals, the stimulation of original talent -and the enriching of our national letters are all -excellent themes for papers to be read before high-brow -clubs and respectable societies, but as practical -propositions, in a practical world, they do not -lead anywhere. Any one who joins a class to take -up story-writing as a profession wants to sell—and -as quickly as possible. And the story that sells -today the quickest and brings the fattest check is -the story of action. Hence our first rule: “Spend -the sweat of your brow on deeds!”</p> - -<p>It is true that there do creep up some unpleasant -contradictions in our methods. After laying down -the law of action we refer students to Edgar Allan -Poe or Robert Louis Stevenson or Maupassant for -perfect short-story models, and they come back to -us in a state of perplexity. They have picked up -Poe and some garrulous old critic, in a superfluous -introduction, had pronounced “The Fall of the -House of Usher” to be Poe’s best tale. They have -picked up Stevenson, and some equally old-fashioned -pedant had classed “Markheim” as a masterpiece. -They have picked up Maupassant, and, again, some -ancient scholar had lifted “Solitude” to a pre-eminent -position. Yet not one of these three stories -is particularly conspicuous for action. Poe seems -to have spent the sweat of his brow in creating an<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span> -atmosphere of extreme morbidity (oh, terror-striking -word in our optimistic texts!); Stevenson, on -acute character analysis; and the insane Frenchman -on some irrelevant prattlings about solitude and the -whys and wherefores of this queer life of ours.</p> - -<p>Occasionally some student with sufficient courage -to voice his perplexity timidly inquires: “Would any -magazine accept such stories today? There is so -little action and still less optimism in them!” I -think of all the stories I have read in recent periodicals -that I can remember and am obliged to admit -that few present-day magazines would be tempted to -accept a story of the type on which the masters -chose to lavish their best work. I think this estimate -conservative, but soon the various anthologies -of the best short stories that have appeared in our -magazines in the last half dozen years leap into my -mind and protest against my harsh verdict. Some -sort of a change really has come over our fiction -recently. Fully twenty-five per cent. of the stories -in Mr. O’Brien’s yearly collection, for instance, are -decidedly not of the “rapid action” type, and more -than seventy-five per cent. of the stories in such an -anthology as that compiled by the late William Dean -Howells would not stand the “action” test, although -the latter anthology is not a very exact reflector -of modern tendencies since but few living writers -are represented.</p> - -<p>So it becomes necessary to explain the discrepancy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span> -between the type of story we teach our students to -produce and the type of story we refer them to -for study purposes. It becomes necessary to emphasize -the fact that such periodicals as “The Little -Review,” “Midland,” “The Pagan” (discontinued), -“The Stratford Journal” (temporarily suspended), -“The Wave,” and a few others of the “unpopular” -group do not pay for contributions and that the -few “leaders” or “giants” in the group pay but little, -and that, therefore, few “respectable” writers contribute -to them. Of the youngsters that do make -their way to the top, once in a great while, through -the medium of these high-brow little magazines one -or two may ever hope to get into the “Big Four” -or similar high-prestiged and well-paying periodicals. -So that while it may be flattering to receive -the pale encomiums of a few snobbish critics, the -safest way is to write “real” stories full of red-blooded -action and reap a golden harvest. Let -those who do not care for the riches of a material -world be satisfied with the deluge of praise poured -upon a Sherwood Anderson; as for most, Holworthy -Hall or Octavus Roy Cohen seems a more -inviting model.</p> - -<p>And if this does not really explain the uncanny -discrepancy in our texts and they still seem somewhat -confused and more than a bit contradictory, -we can, as a last resort, have recourse to that eloquent -dictum: Laws should be studied to be broken!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span> -And we suddenly acquire the becoming halo of -iconoclasts and have at last a satisfactory explanation -of why our students should read Poe and -Maupassant and Stevenson, yet not model their -own work along the best of these masters; why -they should study our anthologies full of such -“anemic” stories as those of Dreiser, Anderson, -Cabell, Waldo Frank, Ben Hecht, Djuna Barnes, -and even those of Susan Glaspell and Alice Brown, -yet not write in similar vein but should emulate -rather writers whose names never appear in anthologies.</p> - -<p>Having thus explained the validity of our first -rule and having insisted on strict compliance therewith, -we proceed to evolve methods for a satisfactory -meeting of our rule. If action must dominate -a story there should be some system of capturing -this indispensable ingredient, of imprisoning it within -our brief literary form, of whipping it into marketable -shape. We find this system and reduce it -to terse understandable terms. We dig down into -our bag of story-lore and lo! we flourish before the -weak eyes of the uninitiate another magic commandment: -Complicate! Complicate if you would -have Action in your stories. Complicate if you -would have Suspense. Complicate if you would -exchange rejection slips for checks!</p> - -<p>It is true that we are careful to explain our -schemes of complication, lest they be taken too<span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span> -literally. Accompanying our commandments are -various precautionary remarks about Logic and -Plausibility and numerous other qualifying statements. -But in the main Action and Complication -are held forth as the two most important principles -of sound story-writing. First of all, then, our -students are urged to plot and complicate so that -there be not a tedious moment in their product. -Let every sentence move forward the action. Let -new developments, startling in their unusualness -and unexpectedness, crop up all the time. And -don’t forget to keep in reserve the grandest development -of all, the most surprising, for the very -end. The Dénouement is the thing! Charming -word—French, you know.</p> - -<p>I remember a young girl who attended my classes -but a short time. “My weakness seems to be a lack -of inventiveness,” she confided to me. “My plots -are too quiet.” She handed in a story and I agreed -with her. Her plots were quiet, but it was the -quiet of Spoon River and Winesburg and Gopher -Prairie. She knew intimately the little old Southern -town she hailed from, and she had the gift of making -me know it. I knew it in its past and present -and future, which was all of one tone and texture; -I knew its proud inhabitants, patrician and plebeian; -I felt its pulse. I told the girl not to attempt to -infuse plot into her story and suggested a number of -magazines that might accept it as it was.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span></p> - -<p>“But I don’t want to write for these small publications!” -she objected. “Nobody has ever heard -of them. I want to get into the ‘Saturday Evening -Post,’ the ‘Cosmopolitan,’ and the ‘Red Book.’ -And they want more plot than I manage to put into -my stories; that’s what—told me.” And she named -a much advertised commercial critic.</p> - -<p>Evidently I proved incapable of generating within -her the coveted element of inventiveness, for the -girl dropped out after an exceedingly brief stay -and I have heard nothing from or of her since. Her -name has not yet appeared in the <i>Saturday Evening -Post</i>, nor in the <i>Cosmopolitan</i>, nor in the <i>Red Book</i>—nor, -to my knowledge, in any other magazine. -The eminent critic had done his work very well -indeed. His teachings that <i>every</i> story must have -an ingenious plot had seemingly struck root, and -the girl with her plotless little town and its plotless -little lives has probably decided, in utter despair, -that her mind is hopelessly devoid of the one -essential for successful story-writing—inventiveness.</p> - -<p>Of course, she could have been made to stay and -persevere a little longer, and perhaps she might -have yet attained her modicum of success. If to -her quiet little story a few entanglement tricks had -been dexterously applied the girl would have been -satisfied and probably also some editor or another -of the more remunerative magazines to which she -aspired. The aspect of her sleepy Southern town<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span> -would have undergone a strange metamorphosis, -and her lethargic hero and heroine would have been -changed into inhabitants of some hectic metropolis, -but that, of course, would have merely proved the -magic of sound technique.</p> - -<p>One of the surest of these tricks of ours is the -introduction of a second or third line of interest. -Where a story is thin and uninteresting an entirely -different story can be brought in and the two skillfully -connected, related and correlated. Our texts -abound in geometric diagrams of lines and curves -and circles, bisected and intersected, zig-zagging, -up and down, rising to various points of crises and -climaxes and catastrophes, and falling again with -the inevitable dénouement. These diagrams look -like sacred hieroglyphics to the credulous student -who approaches their cryptic meaning with a reverent -awe. Given a story that reads too “narrative”-like, -that lacks interest because too few crises are -arrived at, and its weakness can usually be traced -to its single line of interest which is not thick -enough to generate the necessary amount of suspense. -The introduction of another line brightens -it up, adds suspense, complication—Interest.</p> - -<p>The process really is a simple one. The moving -pictures employ it, invariably, with greatest effect. -A young man is leading the confident life of a freshman -in some Middle-Western town. The first line -is started. The young man’s environment is pictured,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span> -his habits and likes and dislikes and his towering -ambitions. He is a marked man. But here his -line breaks. The continuity writer has become busy -introducing an entirely different line of interest. -Beautiful Lady Psyche has left her shire castle and -is sailing for America on the Mammoth liner. The -orchestra is playing, and the Lady is standing on -the upper deck, her delicate white hands grasping -the railing. Her eyes are deep and wistful and -hopeful. We know, of course, even at this time, -that she will in some fateful way meet our unsuspecting -freshman. It is only a question of time. -Her career and his will become entangled and -merged into one. In the meantime we are watching -and waiting. But at this point the continuity -writer again breaks the line and begins an entirely -new one. On the liner is “Taffy” Slim and he is -scheming to rob Lady Psyche of her famous jewels. -Now we are watching Taffy’s career. He succeeds -and makes his get-away, but Lady Psyche’s jewels -are known the world over, having been photographed -on numerous occasions for the rotogravure -supplements of our Sunday newspapers, and Taffy -finds himself unable to dispose of them. He wanders -through the length and breadth of our land -starving, with a fortune’s worth of jewels in his -pocket, until finally, he comes to our Mid-Western -college town and meets our freshman. This clever -hero buys the jewels for a bun and—oh, gallantry of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span> -gallantries!—undertakes to return them to their -beautiful heart-broken owner. Now we see how -these three lines have been crossed and recrossed -and why! We don’t know yet what the gallant’s -reward will consist of but we hope it will be a proposal -of matrimony; in fact, we are not willing to -accept anything less for our hero.</p> - -<p>In the short story this double-or multiple-line-of-interest -method was employed most successfully by -O. Henry and is clung to by most of his followers. -Its skillful manipulation undoubtedly results in a -more marketable product. It insures a thrilling -sequence of events, if not always a logical one. It -is one of our most venerated tricks. We underline -it in our texts. We point out its potency in unmistakable -terms. We hold it up as a shining revelation -to a gasping novitiate, and for revelations the -timeworn practice is to demand blind, absolute -acceptance.</p> - -<p>One result of our attitude has just been traced in -the experience of the girl with her sleepy little -Southern town story. The incompetent who cannot -think in terms of criss-cross lines is eliminated. -Artificiality is not only encouraged but placed at a -premium. Sincerity and that highest of artistic -qualities, simplicity, are held up as baneful stumbling -blocks in the way of successful authorship. We -may have read Joseph Hergesheimer but we have -never heard of his philosophic Chwang-Tze whose<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span> -pithy sentence prefaces “Java Head,” a sentence -full of illuminating words: “It is only the path of -pure simplicity which guards and preserves the -spirit.” By undermining the young story-teller’s -faith in the path of pure simplicity we undermine -his spirit; we maim it; often destroy it completely.</p> - -<p>Aside from the effect upon our story writers, this -doctrine of constant action and complication and -entanglement has also been one of the causes that -have kept American fiction until very recently -almost entirely in the cheaply Romantic school of -the long-forgotten past. It has become strongly -rooted in our readers through a perpetual diet of -fiction that embodies these “vital” ingredients, and -consequently also in our editors who must alertly -watch the demand to engage successfully in its -supply. As far as we are concerned it would seem -that the great realists and naturalists have lived -and died in vain. We are still writing largely fairy -tales, American in color and setting to be sure, about -bizarre adventures and quixotic adventurers. And -in our institutions of learning we are still preaching -that stories must be full of thrilling incidents and -brave dénouements to be interesting and meritorious. -We are still living in the fantastic land of improbable -plots where men bound and rebound according -to specific orders of the author. That “the value -of a dramatic action has nothing to do with novelty -of incident or the tingle of physical suspense”; that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span> -“Character, motive and fatality, man and the earth -and the gods—such are the elements of dramatic -action,”<a id="FNanchor_3" href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> has, as yet, occurred to few of us.</p> - -<p>An admission must be made: It is becoming -increasingly difficult to find plot material that hasn’t -been worn threadbare by immoderate use. The -South Seas and the Pacific Islands have been pretty -well covered. Alaska and Hudson Bay are no -longer inviting. The cow-boy story, though not -yet entirely extinct, is fast becoming so. The crook -story, though still popular with a particular type of -magazine and magazine purchaser, requires a -greater measure of ingenuity to be attractive. Baseball -and football heroism is still going strong but -the market is limited. The Country-Boy-who-becomes-a-Wall-Street-magnate -story will probably -continue as long as the large business fiction magazines -will retain their million-and-more circulation -marks, but it is beginning to tax the writer’s inventive -capacity for brilliant deals for the hero to get -to that crowded narrow thoroughfare below Brooklyn -bridge. The rash-things-that-pretty-girls-do -story is just now having its vogue, but will blow over -like a Bill Hart or Douglas Fairbanks fame. The -situation is gloomy indeed, even critical—if we wish -to look at it that way. Many old writers as well as -young ones admit it.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span></p> -<p>But we don’t. We are optimists. When cornered -we say: “Yes, the present market does have -some such aspect, but it simply proves one thing—the -necessity for the greater mastery of technique, -for more originality.” Then we proceed to elucidate. -We define originality. It isn’t concerned -with theme but with the handling of theme. There -are no new themes under the sun; never were. A -novel twist applied to a threadbare theme is originality. -These twists can be learned—that’s what we, -teachers of technique, are here for: to show how. -The secret lies not only in plenty of action and complication -but in the spectacular handling of these -elements. There are many ways of doing it effectively; -plot order, for instance.</p> - -<p>The common fault of the inexpert literary mechanician -is that he usually tells his story in the -chronological order. Assuming that his story presents -a series of twenty steps, composed of incidents -and episodes of varying intensity, he presents them -all in the order of time of occurrence, thus obtaining -a quiet narrative lacking in either suspense or -“punch.” But it is possible to juggle these steps in -different ways so as to get them to unfold in a most -dramatic sequence. It is possible to reverse this -chronological order and begin with incident number -twenty and work back to number one. That is, -instead of narrating the crimes of our picaresque -hero, which finally get him into jail, in the order of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span> -commission, we begin with the man already safely -tucked away behind the bars—it is nearly always a -man; women get into jails but rarely in our fiction, -except for the heart-rending scene of meeting their -husbands or sweethearts—and then work back to -his crimes and the day when evil was not yet in his -heart and he was still attending the Y. M. C. A.</p> - -<p>We may then use this “logical” method of plot -order or we may use a mixed method or we may -use any one of a number of variants of these -methods. We may, for example, begin with step -number five and run up to step number ten, then -work in steps one to five and proceed with step number -eleven. Or we may begin with step one, then -skip number two, withholding it as a missing link -in the chain for the sole purpose of intriguing the -reader, and spring it after step nineteen. All we -need to know is how to do these jugglings with the -greatest possible skill—and this is where originality -comes to the fore: in the play of craftsmanship.</p> - -<p>This jugglery we can teach with an absolutely -clear conscience. We can cite any number of great -masters who have at various times employed these -several schemes of plot development. Maupassant -and Kipling and Stevenson and Poe and O. Henry -and even the quiet Chekhov have all placed their -stamp of approval upon these methods by employing -them in their own celebrated little masterpieces. -There is really no necessity to question whether<span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span> -they came upon these methods consciously or intuitively, -from within or without. This would raise -the uncomfortable problem of synthetic and analytic -processes, which would merely confuse the student -and lead nowhere. There may be a distinction -between incidents marshalling themselves in some -inevitable sequence of which the author may not -even be aware and incidents juggled about artificially -by a writer who has had it impressed upon him -that method A is more dramatic than method B. -There may be a distinction; but for our purposes -it is best not to consider it. Suffice us merely to -point out that our story-construction lore is justified -by the masters. The deductions are simple enough: -Learn the tricks of the masters and be a master -yourself.</p> - -<p>I said we can teach plot legerdemain with a clear -conscience. As for me, however, I have often -shuddered to think what a zealous graduate might -have done to such a story as Conrad’s “Youth.” In -his or her deft hand it certainly would not have -remained a mere “Narrative,” told in the colorless -chronological order; it would have become a finished -short-story. Assuredly finished.</p> - -<p>And yet it must be admitted that a skillful manipulation -of our tricks is, after all, not so easily -acquired. There is a brain and a temperament -which is especially adaptable to them, but to the -majority they remain an occult science forever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span> -beyond their ken. These unhappy toilers cannot -apply them to their labors. For most students are -unable to construct the slightest kind of plot. -There’s a certain knack that must be acquired. The -young, inexperienced mind must be disciplined along -certain grooves. Most students seem to be unable -to concentrate unless driven to do so. I experiment -with my class. Unexpectedly I announce a theme -and request the class to construct an incident. Like -children bent upon solving a puzzle, they go to -work and I am left to examine the result. Fully -fifty per cent. have used the same situation and -dénouement, as if by agreement; forty-nine per cent. -have striven to inject a novel twist or “O. Henryism” -at the end. But the one per cent! Why here -is but a thin bit of paper, with just a few lines -scribbled on it. If this is an incident, it is a very -short incident, indeed. It reads: “I have never -been able to write under pressure. I must find myself -in a proper mood. I suppose I shall never make -a story writer.” I smile. I have a vivid picture of -young Tommy Sandys losing his scholarship because -one elusive word had refused to respond to his -bidding.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III -<br /> - -“<span class="smcap">O. Henryism</span>”</h2></div> - -<p>The mottoes of most of our fiction periodicals are -told on their covers: “A magazine of clever fiction,” -“A magazine of bright fiction,” “A magazine -of entertaining fiction,” “A magazine of frisky fiction.” -But with all the available supply of novel -plot material exhausted by writers who had the good -fortune of being here before our generation had an -opportunity, what is left to us is neither clever, -bright, nor entertaining. However, O. Henry -proved that it was possible to take the same age-old -material and brighten it up with a coat of sparkling -cleverness. He had but to juggle his incidents in -such a way as to make them follow one another in -a most spectacular sequence. He had but to play -upon the credulity of his reader. Like the stage -magician, he said to his audience: “Observe that -there is a tree here and a fountain there, and without -moving a finger I shall reverse their positions. -Now watch, presto! Here they are!” And the -audience applauded, wondering how he did it, and -crowned him king of the wizards.</p> - -<p>The king of the wizards, then, occupies a most<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span> -honorable position in our textbooks. Stories written -in the vein of O. Henry sell more readily than -stories written in the vein of any other master. -There is a brightness, a snappiness, a cheerfulness -of style about them that draws the artistic sensibilities -of editors. And yet our insistence upon the -emulation of O. Henry has not produced many other -O. Henrys. Perhaps it is because O. Henry went -to the highways and byways of North and Central -America for his plot material which he then juggled -to his heart’s content, while our students go to O. -Henry for their plot material. Perhaps also it is -because O. Henryism was as much a part of William -Sidney Porter as was his speaking voice which is -buried with him.</p> - -<p>A very young student once lodged a complaint -against her own unruly self. “It is absolutely impossible -for me to write a single sentence in the O. -Henry way,” she said. “My stuff somehow doesn’t -have that swing—it’s dead. I don’t believe I shall -ever learn. I am too sad of disposition, I suppose.”</p> - -<p>That was one time I did not smile. “Why should -you want to write like O. Henry?” I asked. “Why -don’t you try to wear the shape of shoes or the -color of clothes he wore, or drink the kind of ginger-ale -he preferred?” But I was sorry later for my -unguarded outburst, for I realize that that was not -the way to make story writers, not the kind that -sell, at any rate.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span></p> - -<p>After all, O. Henry’s technique consisted mainly -of a series of clever tricks, and tricks can be taught, -even though not perhaps his dexterity in performing -them. His was truly a gift of the Magi and not -really a gift of the gods. Admitting that through -his superficial cleverness there occasionally glimmers -an uncommon understanding of and a sympathy for -the people whose destinies he juggles, the fact -remains that his example is that of clever execution -rather than artistic conception. It remains needless, -then, for us to point to anything else in his makeup -save his successful technique. We read a dozen of -his stories, call attention to their brilliant mannerisms -and surprising twists at the end, and exhort -our students to go and do likewise. Sometimes we -go a little further and discuss the underlying psychology -upon which O. Henry based his loops and -twists—his belief that our modern reader was so -well-nourished on stereotyped fiction as to guess the -conclusion of a story by its beginning, and, consequently, -O. Henry led him on to believe that his -guess was being borne out until the very end, when -a pleasantly startling disappointment was sprung -upon him.</p> - -<p>To substantiate our eulogies of the wizard and -to impress upon the would-be writer the importance -of studying and emulating O. Henry, we quote copiously -from Stephen Leacock, Prof. C. Alphonso -Smith, and numerous other O. Henry friends. We<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">[32]</span> -seldom, if ever, quote opinions of critics and editors -who are hostile to O. Henry and his cult. Here is -one editor, for instance, who actually believes that -“the effects of such mannerism, trickery, shallowness, -and artifice as distinguished O. Henry’s -work, are baleful on all literary students who do -not despise them.”<a id="FNanchor_4" href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> We know that this editor’s -opinion must not be credited with importance. His -is only a small Greenwich Village publication. The -checks that writers receive come from editors who -do like O. Henry’s ways; in fact, prefer O. Henryesque -stories almost to the exclusion of any other -type. Hence we examine the work of our students -with a feeling of satisfaction. By far the greater -number have imbibed our teachings. Their work -shows a striving after cleverness, witty flippancy, -grotesque slang, and an attempt to cap the dénouement -with a novel twist, a perfectly surprising turn. -Thus we know that our work is not in vain; at -least some of our students are on the way to success.</p> - -<p>Again, this is not a plea on behalf of those incompetents -who are not O. Henryesquely gifted and are -therefore not on the way to success. It is merely -a dispassionate consideration of the profession of -teaching story-writing and its existing standards and -ethics. Since the O. Henry story is held up as the -supreme model, it is only fair to inquire into the -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">[33]</span>results thus produced. We have been so eloquent -with pride on the progress of our short story. Since -Professor Brander Matthews first expounded its -philosophy, away back in 1884, and connected the -two little words by a hyphen to distinguish this form -beginning with an Initial Impulse and running up to -a Climax and falling down to a Dénouement from -the story which is merely short, it has become our -prevailing form of literature. The quantity turned -out annually is beyond the dreams of such a pioneer -as Poe. But the quality—ah, that is another story!</p> - -<p>What proportion of this wholesale output can be -candidly, suppressing for the moment our desire to -experience flattering sensations, added to our -national literary treasury? How many memorable -stories come to mind to waylay us with their poignant -spell of subtlety and beauty—such, let us say, -as Kipling’s “Without Benefit of Clergy,” or Chekhov’s -“Ward No. 6,” or Maupassant’s “In the -Moonlight”? Few, isn’t it? And peculiar, is it -not, that though we have been heaping the warmest -of praise upon Richard Harding Davis and Clarence -Budington Kelland and George Randolph -Chester and Richard Washburn Child and Mary -Roberts Rinehart and a score or more of our other -popular writers, the few memorable stories that do -come to mind were not written by these favorites. -How much of the O. Henryesque is to be found in -Mary E. Wilkins Freeman’s “Revolt of Mother,”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">[34]</span> -or in Theodore Dreiser’s “The Lost Phoebe,”<a id="FNanchor_5" href="#Footnote_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> or, -to take a more recent example, in Anzia Yezierska’s -“Hungry Hearts”?<a id="FNanchor_6" href="#Footnote_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> These stories are everything -that the wizard’s stories are not. They are neither -breezy, nor flippant, nor surprising; nor “refreshing.” -Judged by our standards they are anomalies.</p> - -<p>I am sufficiently steeped in our inspirational literature -to be aware of the dangers of pessimism. -The Doctors Crane and Orison Swett Marden and -Walt Mason have left their effect upon my disposition. -But it is only logical to deduct that if all the -O. Henry standards that we have so triumphantly -established and extolled for the guidance of our -story writers have failed to produce a single great -story to compare with the best that other countries -which do not preach and practice O. Henryism have -produced, there is something wrong with our standards. -These are unusual times we are living in. -Everything that has seemed to us wise and sound -and sublime is coming in for a share of skepticism -and revaluation. Unquestionable things are being -questioned. Is it not a propitious time to attempt -a revaluation of our short-story dogmas? What -is the contribution of O. Henryism to our national -letters and to the short story as a form of literary -expression? How great an artist really was William -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span>Sidney Porter, the founder of the Cult? Is it -sacrilege to attempt to answer these questions?</p> - -<p>O. Henry left us more than two hundred and fifty -stories. In the decade before his death he turned -out an average of twenty-five stories a year. Mr. -William Johnston, an editor of the New York -<i>World</i> relates<a id="FNanchor_7" href="#Footnote_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> the struggles of O. Henry in trying -to live up to a three-year contract he had with that -paper calling for a story a week. There were weeks -when O. Henry would haunt the hotels and cafés -of New York in a frantic search of material, and -there were times when the stories could not be produced -on time and O. Henry would sit down and -write the most ingenious excuses. Needless to state -that O. Henry’s stories bear all the marks of this -haste and anxiety. Nearly all of them are sketchy, -reportorial, superficial, his gift of felicitous expression -“camouflaging” the poverty of theme and character. -The best of them lack depth and roundness, -often disclosing a glint of a sharp idea unworked, -untransmuted by thought and emotion.</p> - -<p>Of his many volumes of stories, “The Four -Million” is without doubt the one which is most -widely known. It was his bold challenge to the -world that he was the discoverer—even though he -gave the census taker due credit—of four million -people instead of four hundred in America’s metropolis -that first attracted attention and admiration. -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span>The implication was that he was imbued with the -purpose of unbaring the lives of these four million -and especially of the neglected lower classes. A -truly admirable and ambitious self-assignment. And -so we have “The Four Million.” But to what -extent was he successful in carrying out his assignment. -How much of the surging, shifting, pale, -rich, orderly, chaotic, and wholly incongruous life -of New York is actually pulsating in the twenty-five -little stories collected in the volume?</p> - -<p>What is the first one, “Tobin’s Palm,” if not a -mere long-drawn-out jest? Is it anything more than -an anecdote exploiting palmistry as a “trait”—to -use another technical term—or point? It isn’t New -York, nor Tobin, nor any other character, that -makes this story interesting. It is O. Henry’s trick -at the end. The prophecy is fulfilled, after all, in -such an unexpected way, and we are such satisfied -children!</p> - -<p>What is the second story, the famous “Gift of -the Magi”? We have discussed it and analyzed it -in our texts and lauded it everywhere. How much -of the life of the four million does it hold up to us? -It is better than the first story; yes, much better. -But why is it a masterpiece? Not because it tries -to take us into the home of a married couple -attempting to exist in our largest city on the husband’s -income of $20 per week. No, that wouldn’t -make it famous. Much better stories of poverty<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span> -have been written, much more faithful and poignant, -and the great appreciative public does not -even remember them. It is the wizard’s mechanics, -his stunning invention—that’s the thing! Della -sells her hair and buys a fob for hubby’s watch; -while at the same time hubby sells his watch and -buys her a comb. But you don’t know all this until -they get together for the presentation of the gifts, -and then you gasp. We call this working criss-cross, -a plot of cross purposes. In this story we usually -overlook entirely one little thing—the last paragraph. -It really is superfluous and therefore constitutes -a breech of technique. We preach against -preaching. Tell your story, we say, and stop. -“Story” is synonymous with <i>action</i>. O. Henry -didn’t stop—so that even he was sometimes a -breaker of laws. But this uncomfortable thought -doesn’t really have to be noted!</p> - -<p>“A Cosmopolite in a Café” is a little skit proving -that “since Adam no true citizen of the world has -existed.” It is the type of writing that is termed -“short story” by our humorous weeklies.</p> - -<p>“Between Rounds” is the first story in the volume -that really displays O. Henry’s gift of mature satire. -Here underneath his superficial jesting lurks reality. -The pathos in the lives of the McCaskeys and the -Murphys is touched upon, lightly to be sure, but -sufficiently to indicate that O. Henry saw it.</p> - -<p>The plotted happy ending with plenty of “punch”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span> -is best exemplified by “The Skylight Room.” The -gullible reader must have really thought that Billy -Jackson was little Miss Leeson’s name of some star. -But not so, ha-ha! It really was the name of the -ambulance doctor who came to take her to the hospital. -“Fishy,” you say? Not any more than “A -Service of Love.” Not that the young couple in -this latter story might not have both worked and -concealed the fact from each other. But why both -in a laundry and in the same laundry? Coincidence -of course! Incidentally, can you recognize the -“Gift of the Magi” here? Shakespeare may have -never repeated, but O. Henry did, very frequently -too. Here we have again the poor loving couple -trying to get along on next to nothing a week. A -slightly different twist but the formula is the same. -Even the names of the principals are almost the -same. In “The Gift of the Magi” we had Della -and Jim, in “A Service of Love” we have Delia and -Joe.</p> - -<p>In “The Coming-out of Maggie” O. Henry again -brushes real life and real romance. In the hands of -a sincere artist this material could have been worked -into an immortal story. As a matter of fact, the -same basic theme—the heart-hunger of a neglected -girl—has been treated by Gorki in his “Her -Lover.”<a id="FNanchor_8" href="#Footnote_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> And the difference between the two -stories is the difference between tinsel and diamond.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span></p> -<p>“Man About Town,” “The Cop and the Anthem” -and “An Adjustment of Nature” are trivial things—expanded -anecdotes at best. “Memories of a Yellow -Dog” presents O. Henry at his happiest. It is a -fine bit of satire—a field in which lay his strength. -In “The Love-Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein” the -wizard again displays his bag of theatrical tricks. -And so he does in “Mammon and the Archer,” -with its needless anti-climax—again breaking the -law: “Thou shalt stop when through.” “Springtime -à la Carte” is a long-drawn-out joke. So is -“From a Cabby’s Seat.” In “The Green Room” O. -Henry once more had a cursory glimpse of his -“four million.”</p> - -<p>Now we reach “An Unfinished Story.” Thanks -to the good imps that may have influenced him to -leave this story unfinished. It is the only one in the -volume that shows O. Henry was capable of genuine -emotion and had a sense of artistic truth. Dr. -Blanche Colton Williams would not include it among -O. Henry’s best because “It is just what the author -called it—unfinished.”<a id="FNanchor_9" href="#Footnote_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> Yes, admittedly, it is unfinished—in -a technical sense. The $5 a week shop-girl -has nothing to wear and does not go to the -dance with Piggy. And that’s all that happens, -except a little sermon at the end in which O. Henry -intimates that the fellow that sets fire to an orphan -asylum, and murders a blind man for his pennies, -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span>has a cleaner conscience than the prosperous-looking -gentleman who hires working girls and pays -them five or six dollars a week to live on in the city -of New York. To “finish” this story would have -necessitated the distortion of truth, the blurring of -the drab little picture. That Sidney Porter refused -to do it indicates to what extent he was above the -practical standards of his admiring disciples and -interpreters.</p> - -<p>“The Caliph, Cupid and The Clock” is a bit of -romantic clap-trap. So is “Sisters of the Golden -Circle.” “The Romance of a Busy Broker” is -the old absent-minded-professor-who-forgot-he-was-married -joke belabored to the dignity of a story.</p> - -<p>“After Twenty Years” is another bit of writing -that has been burdened with unqualified encomiums -by the O. Henry clergy. The ingenuity of the plot -and the strong “kick” at the end fill them with a -halleluiah ecstacy. An empty little crook story, -sketchy, anecdotal, is hailed as a masterpiece.</p> - -<p>In “Lost on Dress Parade” you can again recognize -the same old formula underlying the construction -of “The Gift of the Magi” and “A Service of -Love.” Another example of criss-cross plotting. -“By Courier” is a typical syndicate story. The woman -the doctor had held in his arms was only a -patient who had fainted. It was all a mistake. The -Best Girl forgives and forgets. Nevertheless it -represents an improvement over the old type of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span> -similar story. The fair suspect was after all a -patient and not the hero’s sister.</p> - -<p>“The Furnished Room” is another indication that -O. Henry was capable of feeling the pulse of his -four million when he was so attuned, and “The -Brief Debút of Tilly,” though in smaller measure, -corroborates it.</p> - -<p>Thus an examination of O. Henry’s work by any -one not blinded by hero-worship and popular esteem, -discloses at best an occasional brave peep at life, -hasty, superficial and dazzlingly flippant; an idea, -raw, unassimilated, timidly works its way to the -surface only to be promptly suppressed by a hand -skilled in producing sensational effects. At its -worst, his work is no more than a series of cheap -jokes renovated and expanded. But over all there -is the unmistakable charm of a master trickster, of -a facile player with incidents and words.</p> - -<p>That William Sidney Porter was himself greatly -displeased with his accomplishment, that he even -held it in contempt is attested by his prevailing -cynical tone. He knew he was not creating art, that -he was not giving the best there was in him. There -was not time for that and editors did not want it, -and with a bitterness that Mark Twain and Jack -London shared to their dying day he continued to -perform tricks. Mr. William Johnston in his article -in the <i>Bookman</i>, referred to above, states that after -reading one of his, Mr. Johnston’s, stories, in some<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span> -obscure Southern periodical, O. Henry wrote to -him: “I wish <i>I’d</i> written that story.” The story -was probably not remarkable in any particular way. -Mr. Johnston is not known as a great story writer. -But O. Henry must have felt that it was written -sincerely and his own artifice weighed upon him.</p> - -<p>This is the lesson that an honest teaching profession -with any critical vision at all, undertaking to -mold a generation of fiction writers, ought to point -out. Instead of worshipping him blindly, calling -him the “American Maupassant,” and quoting -from his biographies painstaking proof that he -was innocent of the crime of embezzlement for -which he served a prison sentence, we might at least -mention the danger of following his methods too -slavishly. The puritanic impulse which inhibits -any praise of a man’s work unless it can first establish -his “sterling” character is excruciatingly -laughable if not downright pathetic. Thus attempts -have been made by meticulous biographers to establish -the fact that Edgar Allan Poe never tasted any -sinful beverage. And only then, having vindicated -his character, does the conscience of these brave biographers -permit them to accept Poe as a great -writer and the pride of America. Whether O. -Henry was guilty or not does not change his standing -as a story writer, nor his influence on other -writers, and it is only as such that the student and -critic is interested in him.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span></p> - -<p>In our attitude toward O. Henry and O. Henryism -lies one explanation of the prevailing mediocrity -of the contemporary American short story. -The conventional editor, teacher, student, and -reader look upon the short story as upon some interesting -puzzle, the key to which is cleverly concealed -until the befuddled reader is ready to “give -up.” Our would-be writers seeking guidance from -my profession are never disabused of this conception -but deliberately encouraged to retain it. We -overwhelm them with our analyses of the work of -the Master, with our glowing tributes to his art and -charm and genius, his purity of thought and his -philosophy. An article on O. Henry, containing -essentially the same material presented in this -chapter, was rejected by a magazine circulating -among young writers for the reason that “the -editor does not hold your views with regard to O. -Henry’s contribution to the American short story. -He <i>is</i> our supreme short-story master....” In not -a single textbook on story-writing, of the many that -have come to my attention, have I found such a -simple estimate of O. Henry as this: “His weakness -lay in the very nature of his art. He was an -entertainer bent only on amusing and surprising his -reader. Everywhere brilliancy, but too often it is -joined to cheapness; art, yet art merging swiftly -into caricature. Like Harte, he cannot be trusted. -Both writers on the whole may be said to have<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span> -lowered the standards of American literature, since -both worked in the surface of life with theatric -intent.... O. Henry moves, but he never lifts. -All is fortissimo; he slaps the reader on the back -and laughs loudly as if he were in a bar-room. His -characters, with few exceptions, are extremes, caricatures. -Even his shop girls, in the limning of -whom he did his best work, are not really individuals; -rather are they types, symbols. His work -was literary vaudeville, brilliant, highly amusing, -and yet vaudeville.”<a id="FNanchor_10" href="#Footnote_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a></p> - -<p>This estimate, coming as it does from a standard -source, cannot be discounted by attributing it to -radical or ultra-advanced tendencies. The fact is -that the case of O. Henry is so simple that even -standard critics and historians, if they but choose -to be open-minded, can see through it. When in -1916 Mrs. Katharine Fullerton Gerould in an interview -with the late Joyce Kilmer called O. Henry -“a pernicious literary influence,” even the New -York <i>Times</i>, though hastening to the defense of the -wizard, admitted that there might be something in -this outburst of depreciation of O. Henryism. “I -hear that O. Henry is held up as a model by critics -and professors of English,” said Mrs. Gerould. -“The effect of this must be pernicious. It cannot -but be pernicious to spread the idea that he is a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[45]</span> -master of the short story.” And the <i>Times</i>, in an -editorial, although taking issue with Mrs. Gerould, -was obliged to conclude:</p> - -<p>“Maybe some day we shall get away from writing -with a set of rules before us, and then we shall -have literature instead of best sellers. Maybe the -trouble with our writing is that we have developed -technique to such a point that Tom, Dick and -Harry are masters of technique and anybody who -can get the hang of it can write a publishable story. -Maybe our fiction has been whetted to a razor edge, -until it is technique and nothing else. Maybe the -story has been perfected until now we can tell perfectly -a story that is not worth telling, but have not -even thought of learning what stories are worth -telling. Maybe, if we did that, and told them -without thinking of technique and without knowing -that there were any rules whatever, we might write -stories that would be remembered, say, ten years -hence. Maybe there is, after all, only one rule -for telling a story—to have one worth telling and -then to tell it as well as you can. Maybe that is -what is the matter with the American drama as -well as with American fiction. If we could unlearn -some of the rules and forget technique we might -not produce best sellers; and maybe if we told, as -clumsily as our ignorance of the rules compelled us, -stories that were worth telling, there might be no -more best sellers, only stories that would live as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[46]</span> -long as the clumsy plots of Dickens and the inartistic -anecdotes of O. Henry.”</p> - -<p>Just how long O. Henry’s stories will live and -his influence predominate is a prediction no one can -safely undertake to venture at this time. It depends -upon how long we will permit his influence -to predominate. The great mass of our reading -public will continue to venerate any writer as long -as our official censors continue to write panegyrics -of him, and our colleges to hold him up as a model. -The literary aspirants coming to us for instruction -are recruited largely from among this indiscriminating -public. Sooner or later, however, we must -realize that the American Maupassant has not yet -come and that those who foisted the misnomer upon -William Sidney Porter have done the American -short story a great injury. Before this most popular -of our literary forms can come into its own the -O. Henry cult must be demolished. O. Henry himself -must be assigned his rightful position—among -the tragic figures of America’s potential artists -whose genius was distorted and stifled by our prevailing -commercial and infantile conception of literary -values. Our short story itself must be cleansed; -its paint and powder removed; its fluffy curls shorn—so -that our complacent reader may be left to contemplate -its “rag and a bone and a hank of hair.”</p> - -<p>When the great American short-story master -finally does come, no titles borrowed from the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[47]</span> -French or any other nationality will be necessary -and adequate. His own worth will forge his -crown, and his worth will not be measured in tricks -and stunts and puzzles and cleverness. His sole -object will not be to spring effects upon his unwary -reader. His will be sincere honest art—with due -apologies for this obvious contradiction in terms, -for art can be nothing but sincere!—a result of -deep, genuine emotions and an overflowing imagination. -His very soul will be imbued with the simple -truth, so succinctly put by Mr. H. L. Mencken, that -“the way to sure and tremendous effects is by the -route of simplicity, naturalness, ingenuousness.”<a id="FNanchor_11" href="#Footnote_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[48]</span></p> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV -<br /> - -<span class="smcap">The Moving Pictures</span></h2></div> - -<p>An assignment once given my class called for a -story based on this simple germ: “A servant kills -his master.” To my great astonishment I found -that fully seventy-five per cent. of the class had -decided, as if by agreement, that the servant must -be either a Japanese or a Chinaman. Why? The -students themselves could not explain it, but I could. -I had observed this unison of plot conception many -times before. They had all drawn their inspiration -from the same inexhaustible source—the moving -pictures. In all probability not a single student -had ever employed or seen his or her friends -employ a Japanese or Chinese servant. If they had -ever employed a servant at all, it was most likely -some negro girl, and yet their fancy had taken them -to the Asiatics. For every one has surely noticed -that in the moving pictures the lowly individual -who carries the master’s suitcase is always an -Asiatic valet. It is fashionable and ethical. The -laborer, the servant, is nearly always a foreigner, -the American is the “boss,” the domineering chap -who wears the full-dress suit and faces the camera<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[49]</span> -with a compelling, clean-shaven chin. The drowsy -members of our A. F. of L. and the weak-eyed -bookkeepers and typists filling the galleries of our -motion-picture houses must feel highly flattered as -they applaud the shadows of their dreams projected -on the screen. What has plausibility to do with -the “Eighth Art”? And who is naïve enough to -expect to find it there?</p> - -<p>Yet to the student of the modern American short -story, and novel as well, the moving pictures must -come in for a great share of consideration. This -institution exerts a tremendous influence on the -trend of our fiction, determining both its form and -substance. It is no longer a secret that most of -our prominent fiction-writers who still are unattached -to some studio are writing stories for the -magazines with a view to their ultimate adaptation -for the screen. A number of magazine publishers -maintain brokerage departments where the stories -appearing in their publications are sold to film -manufacturers and the profits thus realized divided -with the authors or quietly deposited to their own -accounts. The editors of these magazines are instructed -to keep an eye on moving-picture possibilities -of manuscripts submitted to them. The -remuneration involved is so alluring that even -the best writers with high literary traditions behind -them are fast succumbing. But whereas -these old writers for the most part have already<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[50]</span> -done their best work and have spent themselves, -so that their loss to American letters is -not very serious, the effect of the moving-pictures -urge upon the young author is truly disastrous.</p> - -<p>To write for the screen as it is at present managed -requires neither art nor knowledge. Writers -with any literary compunctions cannot hope to -succeed in a field which demands a complete distortion -of all values. What is required is the ability -to supply some acrobatically inclined matinée idols -and curly-haired ingénues with fast-moving vehicles -to display their “stunts.” It presupposes an intimate -acquaintance with the peculiar talents of each -star. If a star can swim and dive and ride horse-back -and jump off a running train and dance gracefully -opportunities must be provided in the scenario -for the parading of these talents. If another can -wear pretty clothes daintily or has pretty dimples -on her knees or looks particularly charming in the -uniform of a maid or a governess the scenario -writer must be governed accordingly in constructing -his story. It is precisely because no one outside of -a studio can have such an intimate knowledge of the -abilities of the various stars featured by a producing -company that staffs are employed to rewrite -and prepare for production every script purchased -from an outsider.</p> - -<p>The moving-picture industry is almost entirely<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[51]</span> -dominated by investors who are as far from literature -as the average would-be story writer is from -being featured in the pages of the <i>Cosmopolitan</i>. -Their concern is solely with the box-office. They -will purvey anything that will yield the desired dividends. -Manifestly to apply the word “art” to an -industry with such mercenaries at its helm is to -cover the word with mud, unless we stretch the -term to include the art of making money. As -Channing Pollock, in a “Plain Talk About the -Movies,”<a id="FNanchor_12" href="#Footnote_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> once said: “One of the troubles with the -regular theatre is its conviction that the possession -of a hundred thousand dollars turns a laundryman -into a littérateur.” The remark is still more pungently -apposite to the cinema theatre. The ignorance -of the rich investors controlling the destinies -of the moving-picture industry is truly stupendous. -An anecdote current among scenario editors and -vouched for by one of them as an actual happening -throws a pitiless light on this prevailing trait. -When several years ago the craze of adapting -Dickens’ novels for the screen was on, the president -of a large film corporation one day stormed into -his scenario editor’s office and demanded to know -why Dickens’ work had been permitted to go to a -rival company. The editor defended himself by -saying that some of Dickens’ work could still be got. -“See to it, then,” the great man ordered. “Wire -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[52]</span>Mr. Dickens that hereafter we want his entire -output!”</p> - -<p>And these intellectual giants are influencing the -output of our Dickenses! The singularly few exceptions -in the industry are powerless to change the -state of affairs. They are either smothered by the -great ones or are tolerated because they are so insignificant. -And these great ones have decreed that -adaptations of stage successes, old classics, best -sellers, and magazine stories are more desirable -wares than original stories written especially for -the screen. The governing factor, of course, is the -previous advertising that these adapted stories have -had without cost to the film producers. Story -values are the least consideration. Our public is -so amusement-hungry and so well-trained that it will -consume anything. Besides, the star is ninety per -cent. of the show anyhow—people go to see the -celebrated So-and-so rather than the vehicle in -which So-and-so appears—otherwise the magnates -would not pay five hundred dollars for a story -and fifty thousand dollars for a star’s performance -in it.</p> - -<p>The fact, however, that moving-picture producers -are not purchasing original scenarios does not deter -the numerous literary schools of the country from -offering instruction in photoplay writing. The advertising -matter of these schools is as optimistic as -ever. “Makes $50,000 a year by writing for the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[53]</span> -screen,” reads one headline. “Moving-picture -stories in demand everywhere!” reads another. -Then the information is generously volunteered -that a certain scenario writer in a California studio -is earning fifty thousand dollars a year; another -twenty-five thousand; and countless others between -five and ten thousand. Convincing proof is presented -that no education or previous experience is -necessary; that one farmer in the backwoods of -Washington or Oregon or on the prairies of Illinois -has sold a scenario for eighteen hundred and fifty -dollars; that one woman who was never graduated -from a public school has written a masterpiece in -her spare time between cooking her victuals and -tending to her seven children and an invalid husband, -and that as a result of her exploit she has now -paid off the mortgage on her house and is experimenting -with the mechanism of a Dodge car.</p> - -<p>This alluring prospect of becoming affluent via -a course in photoplay writing is held out not only -by the average correspondence school but also by -not a few of our dignified institutions of learning. -There is no excuse for offering any instruction in an -art that is on such a low plane of development, except, -perhaps, that of elevating it, which is not an -aim avowed by any of these institutions; and, -besides, mere honesty alone ought to compel even -the most enterprising trustee or administrator to -reach the simple conclusion that since the demand<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[54]</span> -for original photoplays is practically non-existent, -as far as the novice is concerned, it is useless to -manufacture photoplaywrights. The refusal to -accept such a logical conclusion results in disappointments -and heartaches and the upsetting of normal -useful careers. A glimpse at the record of original -scenarios purchased by some of our leading producers -even as far back as 1918, when the policy of -using adaptations only was not yet rigidly adhered -to, proves conclusively the extent of the market. -The American Film Company purchased only fifteen -scenarios during the entire year. The National -Studios—twelve. William S. Hart—eight. -The Fairbanks Studio—six. The Dorothy Gish -Company—four. Mary Pickford—one. The -Chaplin Studio—one.<a id="FNanchor_13" href="#Footnote_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a></p> - -<p>When it is considered that some of our ablest -fictionists and dramatists have been writing photoplays -and that some of these accepted scenarios -were written for particular stars and often sent -direct to them or to their directors, the chances of -the obscure novice, even the most meritorious one, -are far from glorious indeed. And since 1918 the -policy of adaptations only has been enforced more -stringently—almost to the complete exclusion of -the original script submitted by the outsider. A -few producing companies have frankly admitted, -in the various writers’ magazines, that they do not -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[55]</span>even read manuscripts submitted by unknown outsiders.</p> - -<p>But while the great mass of aspirants may not be -aware of the true state of conditions our more or -less successful writers know it full well. The -Authors’ League and the Pen Women’s League -and the various Writers’ Clubs throughout the -country have all discussed and analyzed the moving-pictures -market, and their members are taking -means to meet its eccentric exactions. Why write -a story in photoplay continuity or even detailed -synopsis form only to have it returned from the -Coast most likely unread, when the same material -can be written up in a short story or a novelette, its -serial rights sold to a magazine and its photoplay -rights reserved and offered to a film company which -is then sure to accord it a friendly reading? As a -matter of record the price paid for photoplay rights -to a magazine story is usually twice and sometimes -tenfold the price paid for an original story written -especially for the screen. Part of this extra compensation -is probably for the advertising value of -the story, and part for the judgment of the magazine -editor which the film magnates are more inclined -to accept than that of their own hired editors.</p> - -<p>That fiction writers are taking advantage of this -unusual opportunity to sell their work twice is an -absolute certainty. “In fact, as several writers -remarked at the Writers’ Club dinner, a large percentage<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[56]</span> -of the present-day magazine stories are -written—planned and plotted—with the screen -directly in mind.... It is well known, on the inside -of the game, that successful fictionists plan -every situation and bit of dialogue in certain stories, -visualizing, as they write, the way those situations -will, as they hope, work out on the screen.”<a id="FNanchor_14" href="#Footnote_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> And -again: “Today, among the more successful writers -of action-stories for the magazines, there exists the -feeling that it is a criminal waste of time to write -originals for the screen. Their method is deliberately -to plan their fiction ... so that it will actually -contain abundant photoplay material, while yet -being properly balanced up with the necessary word-painting -and dialogue which good fiction demands. -In other words, they systematically plan their fiction -to make its picture possibilities ‘hit the producer in -the eye’ the first time he—or his scenario editor—reads -it.... Almost nine-tenths of the pictures -shown today are adaptations of successful fiction -stories or stage plays. If you doubt that, watch -the productions in your theatres and note their -origin.”<a id="FNanchor_15" href="#Footnote_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a></p> - -<p>What this “systematic planning” results in is -self-evident. The moving-picture story and the -fiction story are two different products. Their -technique is different. The photoplay is pantomime -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[57]</span>pure and simple. Ideas and emotions can -only be expressed by means of gestures and facial -contortions, with the aid of a schoolboy subtitle -flashed on the screen. Literary style, psychologic -delineation, and nice subtleties of thought and -emotion cannot be transmitted. The plot must unfold -rapidly and teem with surprising and tense -situations. The actors must have something <i>to do</i> -every second. To write a fiction story with photoplay -possibilities requires a careful selection of -theme and plot. Unlike the magazines, which run -in types, each catering to a particular group of temperamental -and intellectual stratum of our people, -the moving pictures depend for success upon the -approval of the Ladies’ Auxiliary Society and the -Chew Tobacco Club of Dead Hollow as well as -upon Greenwich Village and the bourgeois Philistines -of our metropolises. No theme must be used -that might give offense to any of these patrons; all -must be kept satisfied so that a continuance of their -patronage may be insured. It is also apparent that -the pale, quiet story which does not depend upon -action for its “punch” must be entirely sacrificed, -since it cannot possibly have any moving-picture -adaptability. Only the swift-moving, red-blooded -plot can be utilized.</p> - -<p>Needless to suggest that our story writers are -well aware of these limitations. The fact that -their work is adapted almost wholesale into photoplays<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[58]</span> -speaks eloquently for their knowledge on this -score. Needless to suggest, also, that they have -become expert mechanics in the way of constructing -a fiction story so that it will be certain to “hit the -producer in the eye.” They have learned that “the -photoplaywright depends upon his ability to <i>think</i> -and <i>write</i> in action.”<a id="FNanchor_16" href="#Footnote_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> And they have learned to -think and write in action. They have also taken -to heart the dictum regarding theme. “In selecting -your theme, ask yourself if either dialogue or description -may not be really required to bring out -the theme satisfactorily. If such is the case, -abandon the theme. The few inserts permitted -cannot be relied upon to give much aid—the chief -reliance <i>must</i> be pantomime.”<a id="FNanchor_17" href="#Footnote_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> It is only natural, -then, for our writers to eschew the unadaptable -theme altogether.</p> - -<p>That the bulk of our magazine fiction is, therefore, -not magazine fiction at all, but merely disguised -moving-picture stories is a fact that has -found entirely too little general publicity. A moving-picture -story differs from a fiction story not -only in matter of technique and theme barred by -limitations of technique but also in many other -respects. As we have seen, because of the general -appeal of the moving pictures certain themes that -might offend any part of the great public must be -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[59]</span>avoided. Obviously this results in the humiliating -condition of degenerating to the standard of the -lowest patron, of courting his approval as the final -goal of successful authorship. But should, perchance, -an author with a virile conscience bolt the -ranks of the meek conformists and yet, by dint of -extraordinarily fortunate circumstances, break -through with his product, the power of the various -Boards of Censorship must be reckoned with.</p> - -<p>There are, of course, official, semi-official and -unofficial censors presiding over the production of -our magazine fiction, too. But while a revolting -author may take his work to some less respectable -magazine and thus save his soul, no such outlet -exists for the photoplaywright. His work must be -so harmless that it will pass not only the National -Board of Censorship but also the various State and -city boards, otherwise no enterprising producer will -risk his money producing it. The experienced -photoplaywright, then, studies the proscriptions of -the various boards and keeps himself informed of -all their decisions. He knows, for instance, that -crime must be treated cautiously, and it must always -be punished in the end; that the National Board will -not pass a picture in which there is a suicide, that -burglary may be shown, but not by what means it -is committed; that flirtations with women of easy -virtue are banned; that lynching scenes are permissible -only when the picture is laid in places<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[60]</span> -where no other law exists; that scenes showing kidnapping -do not always “get by”; that elopements -must be handled delicately; that, in short, the effect -of the picture on the young, the evil-minded, and -the weak-minded must always be carefully gaged.</p> - -<p>The experienced photoplaywright also knows of -all important precedents established by the censors. -He knows that Shakespeare’s plays have not gotten -by unscathed; that “Macbeth” was deemed too full -of crime and “Romeo and Juliet” too full of love; -that a kiss between the two youngsters in the latter -play was limited to three feet; that Eugene Walter’s -“Easiest Way” could not be exhibited in the sovereign -State of Pennsylvania because the Board of -Censors of that State had condemned it “in accordance -with Section 6 of the Act.... Because it -deals with prostitution”; that in O. Henry’s “Past -One at Rooney’s” such sub-titles as “At one end -was a human pianola with drugged eyes,” and “I -know how bad it looked—me smokin’ and comin’ -in here. But I’ll promise you, Eddie—I’ll give -up cigarettes and stay home every night if you want -me to” were deleted; etc., etc. And above all he -knows that religious and political views must never -be expressed. Furthermore, that if he breaks the -last law and does essay to express any views at all, -they must be the worn-out popular views that even -the humblest deacon or the mistress of the little red -schoolhouse back home might be gladdened with,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[61]</span> -because they have been cherishing them as an heritage -from their ancient forbears.</p> - -<p>Thus the influence of the moving pictures on the -bulk of our magazine and even book fiction. It is -a moving-picture fiction, “strong,” fast-moving, -startling, full of cheap ideas and a gushy hackneyed -idealism, written largely by photoplaywrights who -use the fiction medium simply because it enables -them to exact a higher price for their product, and -catering to a photoplay public. For this moving-picture -influence extends not only to the makers of -stories but to the general reading public as well. It -tames it, if indeed it need any taming, molds it, -forms it into a hardened cast with a definite æstheticism -which it carries from the cinema house to -<i>Happy Stories</i> and <i>Virile Stories</i> and <i>Goody Stories</i> -and back again. There are traditional themes, -traditional views and a traditional treatment, in -spite of the loud cry for novelty, and any theme, -view or treatment violating the tradition, should it -succeed to get by the vigilantes higher up, has to -brave a combat with this traditional moving-picture -taste.</p> - -<p>The young story writer, like his more mature -brother or sister, is infected with this influence and -from the very beginning of his career looks askance -at any doctrine that conflicts with his proud æstheticism. -But in our profession it is seldom that he is -required to be false to the culture of the screen.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[62]</span> -Our textbooks and the bombastic dogmas they -largely exploit are themselves for the most part a -product of the same culture. He is told to think -in terms of action rather than in terms of idea and -character. He is trained in the construction and -management of situation and incident until, although -not consciously intending to, he is able, like -his more successful colleagues, to turn out passable -photoplay material. Small wonder that most of -our short stories abound in wooden characters, -clumsily moving about on well-oiled springs, thinking -stereotyped thoughts and talking wooden dialogue. -The atmosphere fanning upon them has -the hot fetid tang of the darkened-theatre air.</p> - -<p>When told to write a story the student almost -without hesitation betakes himself to his supreme -source for plot material. It matters little that this -material itself merely represents the adaptation of -some fiction story. The moving pictures today -could be used as another illustration of Emerson’s -theory of circles, or is it merely a modification of -the delightful pastime of see-saw of which we were -so fond in our childhood? The scenario writer -adapts the magazine story and the magazine story -writer adapts the photoplay story, etc., etc., ad infinitum. -Of course the disguising twist often goes -with it, but the material nevertheless basically remains -the same. And, as a matter of fact, from -the point of view of salability the method is not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[63]</span> -without merit, everybody involved—the scenario -editor, the producer, the public—recognizes in the -revamped material an old friend, and, if the revamping -has been done dexterously and ingeniously, -glories in its novel familiarity. The failures employing -this method are confined mainly to two -classes of students—those who are temperamentally -entirely out of tune with the moving-picture -traditions, a small minority to be sure, and those -who, though favorably attuned to the spirit of the -silver sheet, fail to acquire the knack of giving their -work the necessary disguising twist which passes for -the much-vaunted novelty.</p> - -<p>Admitting that it would be extremely difficult -and perhaps even futile to attempt to wean the -young student-majority away from the well-assimilated -influence of the show house, one cannot avoid -speculation upon what could be made by a serious-minded -critical teaching profession of the open-minded -minority diffidently seeking encouragement -in their desire to follow newer traditions or to give -birth to still newer ones. If for one chapter in -our texts or for one semester in our institutions of -learning the joy of creating for the mere love of it, -for the sheer beauty of it, had been glorified as we -glorify popularity and commercial success, what a -buoyancy of spirit we could have engendered, what -a fluttering of young wings!</p> - -<p>For two years in succession a young woman came<span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[64]</span> -to my classes and each year she dropped out before -the expiration of the term sending me a note of -despair. She had traveled extensively through -Europe and the Orient as well as through North -and South America and she had accumulated a fund -of experience to draw on for material. She tried -hard to imprison it in story form but the finished -product lacked thrill and suspense and airiness. -She received nothing but the cold platitudes of -printed rejection slips, while other students—as -innocent of any knowledge of life as a fluffy ingénue -capering through five reels of silent drama—who -modeled their work along the lines of <i>Popular -Stories</i> and the <i>Jolly Book Magazine</i> and the latest -releases, and seasoned it with a generous dash of -O. Henryism, occasionally displayed fair-sized -checks. She worked away despondently and each -succeeding story tended to prove that the text we -were using and the current magazines we were -studying were helping her but little. There was a -heaviness, almost an eeriness, permeating her work, -and yet it was a heaviness somewhat akin to that -which permeates the work of Thomas Hardy. She -admitted that most of the magazines we were studying -bored her, that she preferred “Beyond the -Horizon” and “John Ferguson” to “Irene” and -“The Passing Show.” I advised her to write sombre -tragedy, yes, morbid stuff. She produced a -passably good story. It was rejected by the first<span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">[65]</span> -magazine she sent it to with a personal letter expressing -the editors’ regrets at their inability to accept -such an interesting story, but they never purchased -“depressing” material. Wouldn’t she be kind -enough to let them see something else of her work, -something in much lighter vein? She refused to -try another market, insisting that she had known all -along that she could not write. All the writers’ -magazines she had read and even our own textbook -declared most emphatically that “morbid” stories -were not wanted. She discontinued her studies.</p> - -<p>The next year she came back. “I can’t help -writing,” she apologized. “I simply can’t resist -the impulse to write. I don’t care if I don’t sell, -I am going to write just for myself—whatever I -like. I merely want you to see what I am doing.” -A few months later she sold a tragic little tale to -an unpopular little periodical. But she did not take -advantage of this, her first success. Soon her work -began to show labored flippancy and attempted ingenuity, -and it looked ludicrously pathetic—a Hawthorne -austerity with an H. C. Witwer lightness; -the combination was irritably grotesque. Before -the end of the year she dropped out again. And -now she is back once more. Whether she will ever -be able to cut away entirely from the cords of a -moving-picture impulse only time can tell.</p> - -<p>This case is a mild example of the struggle now -waged with a sinister environment alien to all literary<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">[66]</span> -aspiration except for immediate gain by many -lonely souls. Their resistance could be materially -strengthened by sympathetic guidance. Contrary -to the proverbial jibes of the cynics the literary -aspirant is far from possessing an over-abundance -of confidence. Intelligent persistence is a rare quality, -not to be found among too many. The mediocre -aspirant either soon deserts the ranks or begins -to turn out salable wares. And the person with a -genuine case of divine afflatus also either leaves the -ranks with a curse in his heart or finally learns to -turn out regulation material and becomes a cynic -for life. Cynicism may be a much more admirable -attitude than open-mouthed subservience, but it is -not always conducive to sturdy accomplishment. -Often it is a sense of surrender. And since missions -seem to be such a popular necessity among our -pedagogues and literary clergy, what could be a -more worthy one than the saving of these lonely -strugglers from life-long cynicism? But that requires, -first of all, an intelligent and fearless weighing -of the forces on either side and the rolling up of -greater support on the side of the weaker. Truth -and spontaneity are struggling against stifling commercialism -and artifice; against a hostile environment -resting complacently on old dilapidated dogmas, -and chuckling contentedly with its moving-picture -standards of life, art, and literature,—its moving-picture -civilization.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">[67]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V -<br /> - -<span class="smcap">Verboten</span></h2></div> - -<p>The field of the short story is first of all the field -of the magazine. To be a successful story writer -requires a comprehensive knowledge of the policies -and preferences of the various periodicals that buy -stories. It is natural to assume that literary agents, -commercial critics, and teachers should be well -aware of these editorial policies and preferences, -and should make every effort to inspire the amateur -with the respect and deference due such essential -knowledge. We use this knowledge to stem any -inclination to mischief. We hold it aloft, over the -heads of the unmanageable ones, threatening them -with failure, unless they become manageable. Thus -we preserve the dignity of the profession and help -stragglers on their weary pilgrimage to the golden -calf.</p> - -<p>For us the task is after all an easy one. It is but -necessary to tabulate the good old taboos as to the -content of our stories and then be-write and be-lecture -them to make our words impressive. We do -that in our teaching of photoplaywriting; we do it in -the teaching of fiction-writing. But no one has ever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">[68]</span> -seriously labeled the photoplay as it is finally produced -on the screen as a form of literature, while -our fiction undeniably is a form, if not <i>the</i> form, of -our national literature. It behooves us, therefore, -to bring forward all the pomp and pride and glory -we are capable of and point out the peculiar characteristics -that distinguish our fiction as a national -product from the fiction of other nations. And we -usually find it more advisable to do it by the negative -method of pointing out what our fiction is not -rather than by the positive method of pointing out -what it is. Crystallizing the more-important undesirable -and therefore absent elements in our fiction -into single words, we can say that it is not -<i>pessimistic</i>; that it is not <i>lewd</i>; that it is not -<i>irreverent</i>; that it is not “<i>red</i>”; that it is not -<i>un-American</i>.</p> - -<p>This does not mean that our literature abstains -from all discussion of the topics of pessimism, sex, -religion, politics and economics, and Americanism. -It is merely the extent to which they are discussed -and the angle of discussion that elevate our fiction -to a position of what passes for national expression. -Like the vicious circle that governs photoplay -scripts—adaptation of fiction stories being adapted -in turn from the screen and re-adapted back again -into scripts—our opinions on the phenomena of -life are adaptations of the opinions imprisoned -within covers of best sellers and our million-and-more-circulation<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">[69]</span> -magazines, only the circle is somewhat -more complicated. Scripts are written to -meet the prejudices of all moving-picture patrons; -stories, to meet the needs of a particular type of -reader. And this much must be said for our magazines: -The variety of types has made possible -whatever untrammelled literature we have. For -after all there is a wide difference between the moral -tone of <i>Harper’s</i> and the arch-sophistication of the -<i>Smart Set</i>, or between the big-business glorification -of the <i>Saturday Evening Post</i> and the <i>New Success</i> -and the artistic quiet and rebelliousness of the <i>Dial</i> -and the <i>Little Review</i>.</p> - -<p>Whatever untrammelled literature we have, however, -is little enough. The tone-givers, the guides, -the molders are the magazines of power with public -opinion and millions of dollars behind them, -with unbreakable traditional prejudices and taboos. -And so long as the humblest critic and the highest-paid -institutional authority unite in upholding these -traditional taboos as glittering marks of Americanism, -public opinion will continue to demand a literature -that is for the most part infantile, insipid and -lifeless. The generations that rise to pound the -typewriter keys in the production of stories are for -the most part imbued with this negative conception -of our literature and unquestionably the most dangerous -instrument for the perpetuation of this -degrading conception is the literary teaching profession.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">[70]</span> -Again, in not a single textbook on story-writing -have I been able to find an intelligent, fearless -analysis of our national taboos and their effect -of sterility upon our literature. I have found -warnings and admonitions and scarecrows. “Thou -shalt not!” is the sum and substance of our learned -attitude on these mummifying influences. The vacillating -feet of the aspirant are directed toward -the proper, well-trodden roads at the very outset, -and the punishment for straying is stressed to the -point where it requires a superhuman courage to -brave it.</p> - -<h3>1. <i>Optimism</i></h3> - -<p>Our first dictate is “Thou shalt not be morbid!” -Depressing stuff may be characteristic of the Russians, -the Germans, the French, the Italians, the -Scandinavians, but not of the Americans. Ours is -a young country, a free country, a happy country, -full of the joy of existence. Ours is a hopeful people, -cheerful and gay and proud; glad to be alive. -“People have all the gloom they want,” says the -editor of <i>The American Magazine</i> in his “Fourteen -Points” to contributors. “They manufacture it on -their own premises. You cannot sell them gloom. -What they want to buy is a cure for their gloom. -They don’t want to buy more gloom.” And Dr. -Frank Crane in his ever-buoyant style exclaims:<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">[71]</span> -“<i>The Saturday Evening Post</i> and <i>The American -Magazine</i> have what I call ‘good literature.’”<a id="FNanchor_18" href="#Footnote_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a></p> - -<p>Since salability is the only criterion of worth, any -story that violates our fundamental optimistic tone -is at once intercepted, revamped, “improved” or -pronounced hopeless and condemned to extinction. -“Not salable,” is a phrase as ominous as a jury’s -“Guilty!” on a charge of murder in the first degree, -and the only appeal possible is for the defendant -to plead a sudden seizure of passionate desire to -“pack up his troubles in his old kit bag and smile, -smile, smile!” And so the law of supply and demand -operates once more. The “calamity howler” is -eliminated and the man or woman with the “smile -that won’t come off” gets to the top. American -literature becomes enriched by the advent of another -“genius” imbued with the gospel that “life is great -fun, after all!”</p> - -<p>That no literature can thrive on such a barren -optimism seems to be a statement so obvious as to -challenge even the mere ordinary intelligence offering -it. Yet pedants carry forward this optimism-tradition -and preach, and lecture, and prate about -the spirit of America, and threaten and punish -and outlaw the few unfortunate rebels. What -literature can a country produce which refuses to -take even the most timid peep at life as it is, which -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">[72]</span>shuts its eyes in very horror at the most fundamental -problems of the land, which does not brood, contemplate -or inquire, which does not know the benediction -of a tear or the relief of a sigh? Can a -steady diet of sugar produce anything more invigorating -than diabetes? And literary sugar is what we -think and preach and worship. All heroines are -pretty; all heroes succeed; all complications are -solved; wedding bells ring; promotions are given -out; only bad people die young; the good live to a -mellow age of four score and ten; life is a fairy-tale -in which all the fairies are sweet young things -waving magic wands over honest young brokers of -their choice; the world, and America especially, is -a Vale of Tempe where limousines are passed out -as the reward of virtue and endeavor and where -successful matches are consummated.</p> - -<p>Our writers must be either inanimate machines -or sorry human beings trained to suppress their -instincts and moods. They must be on their guard -not to succumb to the “blues”; quick to inhibit any -sad reflection or discouraging thought. “If you -can’t see the sun is shining,” wrote one editor very -bluntly, rejecting a “depressing” story, “take Epsom -salts and sleep it over.” And whether they are -drowsy or not, sleep it over our writers must. Those -who suffer with insomnia find their good neighbors -either snoring peacefully or stamping about in -infuriated protest. Our writers must sift their<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">[73]</span> -experience; if it is tragic or insufficiently uplifting -they must dispatch it to oblivion. It is really most -advisable not to draw upon experience at all. Not -of such stuff can optimistic fiction be made. For -is there life without tears and heartache and doubt; -without innumerable deaths of precious fragile -dreams; without graying of heads; without perplexity? -Hence arises what Van Wyck Brooks calls -“the doctrine of the fear of experience.... It -assumes that experience is not the stuff of life but -something essentially meaningless; and not merely -meaningless but an obstruction which retards and -complicates our real business of getting on in the -world and getting up in the world, and which must, -therefore, be ignored and forgotten and evaded -and beaten down by every means in our power.”<a id="FNanchor_19" href="#Footnote_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></p> - -<p>Here again the inconsistency in our theory of -optimistic fiction is glaring. We shriek anathemas -at any native product that repudiates it, yet we bow -with respect to importations. We acclaim all the -morbid geniuses of Europe; we accord their works -places of special privilege in our curricula; we consider -it a mark of culture to mention the titles of at -least a half-dozen depressing books. Even our -most respectable magazines are proud on occasion -to publish a story by an eminent European author -with the flamboyant legend placed upon it or boxed -in the center of its first page by the editor: “No -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">[74]</span>one but Gorki (or Maeterlink, or D’Annunzio, or -D. H. Lawrence, or whoever else it might be) would -have the courage to write a story such as this, and -no magazine in America but <i>The</i>—— would -have the courage to publish it.” The same legend -is placed sometimes upon the work of a native -writer, but after reading the story one finds that -either the writer did not dare, after all, or that the -editor of the brave magazine edited the contribution; -that both the writer and the worthy editor had -been so frightened at the mere flap of a wing that -they had to offer an apology for attempting to soar.</p> - -<p>This inconsistency is particularly reflected in our -current criticism and literary textbooks. With the -same breath a reviewer will praise Dostoyevski and -chastise some native youngster for his horrible -morbidity. In the same chapter the text will refer -to Chekhov and Maupassant and Zola and Poe with -almost cringing reverence and eloquently preach -the gospel of cheap optimism as the supreme -message of the story writer. And the young would-be -procures copies of the great masters, reads them, -and comes back perplexed. “Why do <i>they</i> write -about such horrid things?” asks one young student. -I look into her large, innocent eyes and smile. The -Great Creator must have been in a diplomatic mood -when he invented a smile. I glance down at my -copy of <i>The Literary News</i>, lying on my desk and -note that an editor of a prominent and liberally-paying<span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">[75]</span> -magazine is in the market for “stories of -rapid action—cheery short stories, encouraging, -helpful—the kind that makes the world better,” and -I proceed to discuss how this kind of story is -written....</p> - -<h3>2. <i>Sex</i></h3> - -<p>Of all our taboos none has contributed so large -a share in keeping our literature swathed in baby -blankets as that on sex. In its essence it is merely -a direct irradiation of taboo No. 1 on optimism. -If everything in the universe is good and beautiful -and holy and the writer’s business is to chant incessant -halleluiahs, then sex is all of these and must -be treated reverently. Its unsavory aspects as well -as those leading to unhappiness must be passed by, -and since in the muddled world we are living in sex -has felt most severely the combined forces of bigotry, -suppression and inhibition, of pathologic social -and moral conditions, its aspects are most frequently -unsavory and unhappy and therefore must be either -ignored entirely or made savory and happy. We -have a hoary phrase perpetually playing upon our -glib lips—it is to the effect that we are a “clean-living, -moral people.” The phrase itself has long -lost its meaning, even to the most uninformed of -citizens, but it has remained a sacred fetish forever, -it seems.</p> - -<p>Again it is not in the total abstaining from any<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">[76]</span> -treatment of sex that our taboo is expressed, but in -our peculiar angle of treatment. Total abstaining -were indeed impossible, for any literature, and -least of all for our literature. The truth is that ours -is, in the main, essentially a sex-literature—largely -because of our “reverent” attitude. Strong elemental -forces long suppressed erupt in irrepressible, -if furtive, curiosity. No country on earth can -boast of as many periodicals specializing in the -risque, the sexually-sensational, the cheaply suggestive, -as the land of the “clean-living.” The fact is -incontrovertible. Where there is a continued supply -there must be a continued demand. Our publishers -know their market. Even the titles of a host of -our periodicals exploit, not too artistically, this -crude reaction of a sex-conscious people. “Saucy -Stories,” “Breezy Stories,” “Snappy Stories,” “Live -Stories,” “Droll Stories,” “The Parisienne,” “True -Stories,” “The Follies,” “Telling Tales,” “Secrets,” -“I Confess,” “True Confessions,” “High Life,” -“Hot Dog,”—these are some of the titles that wink -mischievously at the purchaser timid with guilt. -But the purchaser is rarely pleased with his dissipation. -He finds the wine exceedingly mild. Most -of the stories under the suggestive cover bearing the -inviting title and a still more inviting pretty girl, -usually attired in very becoming <i>négligé</i>, are, after -all, “clean.”</p> - -<p>And this “cleanness” is the characteristic blight<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">[77]</span> -of nine-tenths of our entire literature. It is vulgar -with the lowest kind of sex-consciousness but it -doesn’t go “too far.” It is the “cleanness” of our -moving pictures. Is there any reason why a production -entitled “Du Barry” in Europe should be -rechristened to read “Passion” for American exhibition? -Is there any reason why Barrie’s “Admirable -Crichton” should become “Male and Female” as -a photoplay? Is there any reason for such titles -as “Sex,” “The Restless Sex,” “His Wedded Wife,” -“The First Night,” “The She Woman,” “The Leopard -Woman,” “Wedded Husbands,” “Why Wives -Go Wrong,” “Forbidden Fruit,” “The Primrose -Path,” “What Happened to Rosa,” “Why Change -Your Wife?” “The Woman Untamed,” etc., etc? -It surely does not require an erudite psychoanalyst -to find the reason for this avalanche of suggestiveness.</p> - -<p>Perhaps, if they deemed it wise to speak, our -motion-picture producers could shed some light on -the subject. Seemingly their opinion of our “clean-living, -moral people” is not very flattering. And -their judgment is substantially founded upon the -generous reports they receive from the distributing -exchanges.</p> - -<p>Here, too, carefully as the titles are selected the -pictures themselves are “clean.” If they were not, -the various Boards of Censorship would have seen -to it that they become so. At most a director will<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">[78]</span> -manage to show the heroine plunging into her -morning’s rose-water bath, as in “Male and -Female,” for instance, or an exotic harem partially -disrobing for a cold dip into the perfumed waters of -the Rajah’s pool, as in “Kismet.” Whether the -scenes are vitally necessary to the unfolding of the -plot is immaterial. They constitute an irresistible -attraction in themselves, and must be smuggled in, -if possible. A couple of feet of nakedness results -in thousands of dollars’ worth of advertising.</p> - -<p>What is true of the moving pictures is equally -true of our spoken stage. Think of “Twin Beds” -and “Up in Mabel’s Room” and “Parlor, Bedroom -and Bath” and “Mary’s Ankle” and “Nighty, -Nighty” and “Scrambled Wives” and “Ladies’ -Night in a Turkish Bath” and “Getting Gertie’s -Garter” and the various “Follies” and “Scandals” -and a hundred-and-one other titles which were surely -chosen for a purpose—the same purpose which -impelled some years ago the manager of the old -Academy of Music in New York to advertise a stock -company production of Daudet’s “Sapho” as the -“greatest immoral play ever written.” And again -the plays themselves are not remotely as licentious -as the titles would intimate.</p> - -<p>What, then, is this “cleanness” of ours? What -are its impositions and how far can they be -stretched? The answer is simple and more than a -trifle sad. Our “cleanness” excludes serious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">[79]</span> -thought. “Something audacious suits us, but nothing -salacious,” writes one editor of a well-known -publication of the frothy type. “Salacious” stands -for thought, reflection, analysis. A little suggestiveness, -a hint, a double-edged joke, a farcical situation, -a vulgar thrust, will do. But a deep, sincere -analysis, a fearless uncovering of a cowering conscience—that -is salacious, immoral, lewd, unclean. -That accounts for the free and open dissemination -of so much debasing, lurid stuff and the hypocritical -suppression of Dreiser and Cabell. That accounts -for the popularity of Bertha M. Clay <i>et al.</i> and the -unpopularity of Sherwood Anderson <i>et al.</i> Sex is a -fit subject to jest about, to inject breezily as a gently-naughty -stimulant. Sex as an elemental force which -shapes the lives of men and women, which actuates -their struggles in this terrestrial sphere of ours, -making for success or failure, for happiness or despair, -for sinner or saint, is vile, lascivious, and -therefore taboo.</p> - -<p>The literary teaching profession has not passed -this degrading scene unnoticed. It has broken up in -two camps. The great mass of instructors have -simply adopted the position that a writer must give -whatever is demanded of him. Would a tailor refuse -to accept an order calling for a fabric he personally -does not approve of and a fashion he -detests? Granted that this is not a particularly -lofty conception of literary art, it is still less pernicious<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">[80]</span> -than the conception held by the smaller group -of so-called idealists in the profession. To these -the sex aspect of our literature calls for stormy denunciation. -They would impress upon the future -writer the sanctity of his mission. The pen must -not be polluted. Sex must be left alone entirely. -The moral tone must be preserved in all productions. -Laws for the ruthless suppression of the unclean -must be fought for and their enactment obtained.</p> - -<p>What these honest Puritans cannot understand -is that the entire class of bawdy, sex-reeking literature -is a product of the very laws they have been -fortunate enough to have enacted; that the complete -abolition of these laws and the absolute cessation -from persecution in the interests of morality of -any expression of sex would purge our literature of -the curse as nothing else. If any one could purchase -a mature, intelligent literary expression of -the mysterious passion that animates nature and -moves the world, the profane effusions of shriveled -minds would appear shocking and abhorrent by comparison. -All literature that has ever been written -has dealt directly or indirectly with the relation of -men and women—for the very trite reason that all -life that has ever been lived has been the life of this -relation of men and women. To place the yellow -ticket of evil upon this relation as a literary subject -is to degrade it beyond words of contempt. -The prevailing spectacle of our literary sewage is<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">[81]</span> -perfectly natural: the thought of uncleanness -wrapped around the stuff of life is bound to pollute -it.</p> - -<p>But the pernicious influence of this immoral taboo -goes beyond its direct inhibition of the most legitimate -of themes. It perpetuates an æsthetic literary -tenet which is a relic of the Age of Darkness. -It is to the effect that the morality or unmorality of -its contents determines the value of a literary production. -“It is a shame that such splendid writing -should be wasted on such an atrocious theme,” said -a sweet little lady student apropos Sherwood Anderson’s -“The Other Woman.”<a id="FNanchor_20" href="#Footnote_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> The remark at -once characterized her as a member of the Second-Grade -Bigots. The First-Grade Bigots would not -permit themselves to see any excellences in a work -so pronouncedly unorthodox. When cornered, the -little lady admitted that there might be sound psychology -in Anderson’s story—and a large measure -of unsavory truth. “But why choose such horrid -themes when there are so many nice, clean ones?” -It is the cry of all Pollyanna-nurtured readers. It’s -the cry of the author of “Pollyanna” herself. “Is -there, then, no human experience that deals with the -good, the happy, the beautiful?” she asks, in a circular -issued by her publishers. “Are joy, faith and -purity utterly illogical? Is only the thunder-cloud -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">[82]</span>real?—the sunshine a sham?” In such cases argument -is impossible. The criterion of moral and -optimistic content is deep-rooted and well-nourished -by authority. Is it not largely this same criterion -that for more than a half century prevented the -acceptance by the Judges of Walt Whitman as a -poet, and that is excluding the name of Theodore -Dreiser from its rightful place in our scholarly -histories of the modern American novel?</p> - -<p>To counteract this blind perpetuation of a fallacious -doctrine demands a complete severance with -old school criticism and old-age pedagogy. Not -until authority-worship is mightily shaken can this -be accomplished. But that would be a hopeless task -to undertake. The great mass must have and will -have its Great Authorities to bow to. It is easier -than to depend upon one’s own critical faculties. -Besides, habit has become second nature. We have -always been taught that knowledge is merely to -know where to find what we want to know. No, -we must be merciful; our literary apostles must -remain. But among them there are those that are -blind with senility and those that are glowing with -fresh vision. Let us follow the more musical of the -new criers until they, in their turn, reach their dotage -and truth turns to ashes in their toothless -mouths. In no other way can we hope to uproot -the puerile beliefs that art can be judged by its -optimistic or uplifting message, by its morality, or<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">[83]</span> -by any other of, what Joel Elias Spingarn terms, the -“Seven confusions.” We have not yet reached the -stage where the relativity of the term “morality” -can be discussed with impunity and to any considerable -advantage. But we can bring to bear upon a -rising generation of readers and writers all the force -of our warm logic to combat the notion that any -standard of morality, no matter how sublime, has -any determining value in art. We can insist that a -story might be entirely devoid of any moral significance -and yet be an immortal masterpiece; that the -whole notion is merely another one of the confusions -we have inherited from an age which was too busy -developing the raw resources of a vast young continent—a -task which necessitated the invocation of -Providential aid—to pay attention to literature.</p> - -<p>“To say that poetry (or any other art) is moral -or immoral is as meaningless as to say that an -equilateral triangle is moral and an isosceles triangle -immoral. Surely we must realize the absurdity of -testing anything by a standard which does not belong -to it or a purpose for which it was not intended. -Imagine these whiffs of conversation at a dinner -table: ‘This cauliflower would be excellent if it -had only been prepared in accordance with international -law.’ ‘Do you know why my cook’s pastry is -so good? He has never told a lie or seduced a -woman.’ But why multiply obvious examples? -We do not concern ourselves with morals when we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">[84]</span> -test the engineer’s bridge or the scientist’s researches; -indeed we go farther, and say that it is -the moral duty of the scientist to disregard morals -in his search for truth. As a man he may be judged -by moral standards, but the truth of his conclusions -can only be judged by the standard of science.... -Art is expression, and poets succeed or fail by their -success or failure in completely and perfectly -expressing themselves. If the ideals they express -are not the ideals we admire most, we must blame -not the poets but ourselves; in the world where -morals count we have failed to give them the -proper material out of which to rear a nobler edifice. -To separate art and morality is not to destroy -moral values but to augment them—to give them -increased powers and a new freedom in the realm -in which they have the right to reign.”<a id="FNanchor_21" href="#Footnote_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p> - -<h3>3. <i>Religion</i></h3> - -<p>It is literally true that American literature is not -irreverent. The penalty for meddling with religion -in any unconventional way is contemptuous obscurity. -But meddling with religion in a way that -brings out its blessings to humanity is praiseworthy -and leads to opulence and glory. For that reason -nine-tenths of our literature has a strain of religious -righteousness running through it. In the main<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">[85]</span> -the specters of Cotton Mather and Jonathan -Edwards still hover over our literary output, imparting -to it a theological tint. Our fictionists are still -obsessed with the idea that a story or a novel must -preach, must instill the right kind of ideals, must -exert a redeeming influence upon its reader. To be -sure, the experienced ones among them are fully -aware of the dangers of obvious moralizing, but -they have mastered the devious ways of preaching -without arousing the reader’s suspicion that he -is being preached to.</p> - -<p>It is this last point—the devious ways of unsuspected -preaching—that my profession is concerned -with. Either we are altogether silent on the subject -of religion in literature, deeming it too ticklish -a subject upon which to commit ourselves, or we -are zealous in our efforts to perpetuate the tradition -that literature must complement the work of the -church, only in a less outspoken way. Perhaps we -do not do it consciously but the results obtained -are the same. We merely advise students as to -what subjects may be exploited and what subjects -may not. Surely a subject bordering on the atheistic -could never be made salable; not more than two -or three periodicals would be open to such a story—and -these of the obscure, “freaky” kind. Without -a doubt even such a mild story as Balzac’s “An -Atheist’s Mass” could never have seen the light of -publication in an American periodical. The fact<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">[86]</span> -that the hero remains unconverted to the end would -be fatal. We may write a story about an atheist, -and have written such, but in our story, when the -dénouement comes, the hero must exclaim to the -assembled multitude, that he had tried to live without -God and had found it unprofitable. The fact -that there might be some poor wretch of a hero in -this queer wide world who would not issue such a -proclamation does not detract from the urgency of -such a dénouement. It is one of our devious ways; -without it the story can hope to travel no farther -than the return-to-author basket. The characters -we create must ultimately come to know God and -the church—or they never come to know the reader. -It is doubtful if an American Flaubert could hope -for as cordial a reception of an atheistic character -of his as the French have accorded the mediocre -M. Homais of “Madame Bovary” fame.</p> - -<p>It is far from my purpose to leave the implication -that literature should preach atheism; but neither -should it preach religion, theology, or anything else, -for that matter, except in so far as life itself is a -sermon to whomever it pleases to view it as such. -“As a rule we may say that nothing in the world -improves one less than sermonizing books and conversations; -nothing is more wearisome, quite apart -from the fact that nothing is more inartistic.... -We do not demand of an author that he should -work to make us better.... All that we<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">[87]</span> -can demand of him is that he work conscientiously.”<a id="FNanchor_22" href="#Footnote_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> -The moment an author stoops to uplift -us he loses his balance as an artistic observer, -recorder, and interpreter.</p> - -<p>The attitude of our literature toward religion is -based on a churchy interpretation of life and character -which was unconsciously but none the less comprehensively -expressed in a magazine article by Dr. -Frank Crane. “Church people,” he wrote, “as a -rule, pay their debts, observe the decencies of life, -are clean of mind and body, cultivate those qualities -that make for a successful and contented life, and -get along together peacefully. And, as a rule, the -embezzlers, thugs, drunkards, harlots, rascals, adulterers, -gamblers, and swindlers do not cultivate -church-going to any great extent.”<a id="FNanchor_23" href="#Footnote_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a></p> - -<p>This is a safe and sane doctrine to embrace when -writing fiction for the popular magazines. Our -editors, almost universally, have embraced it, and -even though the Reverend Doctor specifically states -that he speaks of people “as a rule,” which would -permit of exceptions, editors at large will not recognize -the existence of such exceptions. Truth does -not count and experience is an illusion. If a writer -has in his life had the misfortune of coming across -a man or woman who was kind, charitable, gentle, -moral, and noble and yet instead of being affiliated<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">[88]</span> -with a church was a member of the Secular League -and a subscriber to the Truth Seeker he would best -suppress the latter two points. If a writer has read -statistics of extra-generous donations made to various -church funds and has found among the names -of donors not a few of universally notorious embezzlers, -he must ignore the fact, if only in the interests -of his career. His motto must be: Never write -anything about church that could not be turned into -an advertisement of the institution. If the motto -conflicts with life, scratch life.</p> - -<p>And yet religion, like sex, is one of the basic -forces of life; it has helped to shape the course of -human history and civilization. To deny the artist -the prerogative to touch upon it unless it be in -praise is to deny him the means to probe the human -soul. To compel him to accept any institution as -infallible and therefore beyond question of imperfection -is to fetter his spirit. That a man who is a -respected member of a respected church cannot be -a thief in his business life or a brute at home is a -more prostituting doctrine, the more so if not actually -believed in but adopted for commercial purposes -only, than any harlot was ever guided by, -because it is so flagrantly contrary to truth. That -the call of sex can never prove stronger than the -holiest of religious precepts is a malicious canon of -hypocritical dogmatism. This is the natural stuff -of literature—the dramatic conflicts and seeming<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">[89]</span> -paradoxes, physical, psychic and intellectual, the -eternal clash of nature and dogma, of passion and -idea, of man and the world.</p> - -<p>Puny fledgelings come to us for instruction in -aerial literary navigation and we look in the tome -of Thou Shalt Nots and clip their weak little wings. -“Never dare to lift yourself more than a yard above -the earth,” we admonish; “and you’ll find it easier -if you use this trick and that,” we add. If, perchance, -one of them after awhile finds the fawning -breath of the earth too close and spreads its wings -and begins to soar up into the clear ether we shrug -our shoulders compassionately and say to the rest: -“Another young bird gone wrong.” It has broken -the limits of our taboos; it has tasted the wine of -pure ozone; it has heard the call of exploration; it -has turned irreverent. Should it succeed in growing -a few dazzling feathers by the time it comes -back in sight we may meet it with music and shout to -it the hospitality of our gardens—as a mark of our -ability to appreciate fine feathers; but more frequently -we let it starve to death and keep the music -for a touching funeral. During their lifetime we -have nothing to do with the irreverent....</p> - -<h3>4. <i>Social and Political Problems</i></h3> - -<p>No literature is more afraid of a courageous presentation -of the social welter which America, in -common with all the rest of the world, is undergoing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">[90]</span> -in this age of reconstruction, than American literature. -Not that it entirely fails to touch upon the -mighty problems that have shaken our national life, -but it still clings to an ancient sense of delicacy and -an orthodox point of view which determines what -may and may not be said. Whether a writer really -subscribes to the point of view which colors nearly -all of our efforts is immaterial; in order to sell his -product he must adopt it, irrespective of any protesting -personal scruples he might feel. Thus we -find our literature, with the exception of a small and -highly unprofitable part, expressing no more advanced -views on the social phenomena of the day -than our forefathers held, and most frequently less -advanced.</p> - -<p>The editor of <i>The Coming Nation</i>, discussing the -kind of stories that are not wanted by film companies, -mentions, among others, stories “where the -hero arises and makes a soap-box speech on Socialism -converting all by-standers.”<a id="FNanchor_24" href="#Footnote_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> This statement -applies with equal force to our magazine fiction as -well. That no respectable editor of a fiction periodical -will take such stories is a fact universally -known among people acquainted with prevailing -policies of our magazines. There would be nothing -sinister in this policy, it would even be highly laudable, -were it based on the logical assumption that -men’s minds are not so easily swayed and that therefore -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">[91]</span>no audience of by-standers can be converted by -a single speech. But it is based on no such reasoning. -The fact is that the story depicting a -speaker converting by a few eloquent phrases, -let us say, a body of strikers, to the employer’s -point of view, impelling them to forsake their -scheming leaders, tainted by European gold, -of course, and return to work will and does find -a ready market. Even the lack of story values -are frequently overlooked where such a fictive incident -occurs. The greatest of our national weeklies -and monthlies will open their columns to the padded -dissertation in story disguise on the unreasonableness -of workingmen, or the inefficiency of government -control of industries, or the blessings of a Big -Business Administration.</p> - -<p>What really determines the policy of exclusion of -certain topics or angles of presentation is the safe-guarding -of the interests of the big advertisers and -the personal prejudices of the publishers. Our -experienced writers, as well as the instructors of -student-writers who know their business, know these -prejudices perfectly. They know that popular views -“get by” even if the artistry is not so very obstrusive. -They know that unless one can fall in with -the established views of the great majority it is -best to leave social and political problems alone -and to write about the South Seas, or Alaska, or the -romantic story of John Jones, Jr., a son of a village<span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">[92]</span> -blacksmith, who, after many thrilling hardships -finally married Ivy Van Schyler, the pampered heiress -of noble lineage and a huge block of sound railroad -stock. They even know such small details as -that if a hero uses soap, it is best not to mention it -by an existing brand, for it may offend advertisers -trying to fasten upon the public rival brands; that -“talking machine” is safer than “Victrola” or “Grafonola” -or any other patented name; that, in a -word, no free advertising be given any company, -thus causing other advertisers to complain. They -know that it is dangerous to make a character intimate -that his health has been impaired as a result -of drinking too much ginger-ale, or taking headache -powders, or yeast, or tobacco, or anything else, for -that matter, that advertisers sell. It makes no -difference whether a writer has accumulated a fund -of personal observation to corroborate his statement. -There are people who are trying to sell -these products and will surely lodge a protest with -the advertising manager of the publication in which -such a story appears. In fact, numerous cases -where such inadvertent remarks have resulted in -diminished advertising space are on record.</p> - -<p>It is to the interest of these same all-powerful -advertisers to see that no aspersions be cast in our -magazine fiction upon the inalienable rights and -dignities of Business and that no dangerous views -be expressed which might sway a vigilantly guarded<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">[93]</span> -public mind in undesirable directions. Existing -social and political institutions may be defended in -our fiction but not attacked or criticized; their -merits may be extolled, but their demerits must not -be betrayed to an innocent world. Private property -is sacred; the State is always right—except -when it attempts to interfere with Property; then a -thinly veiled story decrying this interference as -autocratic, tyrannous and un-American might get by -and bring a fair price. Progress is a generality -that affects us but little; the laws of change are suspended -when applied to our literary reactions to -our social life. Other nations may develop new -schools of fictionists, young, virile, boldly speaking -their minds on the moot problems of the day. We -have no room for such impudence. Our literature -is “pure,” level-headed, conservative. Some isolated -muck-rakers appear here and there, but we -give them no outlet for their muck-raking, and they -must either reform or perish or, at best, when we -are helpless to prevent it, get a measure of barren -notoriety.</p> - -<p>An army officer, an advanced student, once -handed in a splendidly written story of army life, -in which he gave a graphic portrayal of court-martial -proceedings. The apathy and criminal nonchalance -with which helpless boys were sentenced to -long-term imprisonment, in the name of discipline, -was so artistically woven into a thrilling plot that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">[94]</span> -it made interesting reading even to the most avid -fiction devotees. Yet the story had gone the rounds -of nearly all the paying magazines without finding -a market. A few friendly editors wrote the author -personal letters, one editor going so far as to express -his appreciation of the work, but admitting -that the story was deemed “unavailable because it -does not meet with the policy of this publication.” -I supplied the discouraged author with a list of unconventional -publications—for fortunately we do -have a fighting number of them with us—that might -welcome his story but could afford to pay either -very little or not at all. He refused to waste his -work on the “freaks,” and wanted to know if he -could not revise the story to make it salable to a -standard magazine. I told him that elimination of -all incidents reflecting unfavorably upon the administration -of law in our army would undoubtedly -help. He protested that the incidents had been -taken from life and held out for a while, but finally -he succumbed to his intense desire to “get in.” -The story was revised and made perfectly harmless—“sweet” -and happy; it sold on its first trip. The -officer has never again attempted to use life as a -basis for fiction—indiscriminately. It was his first -altercation with policies—and probably his last. -It requires greater powers than he was blessed with -to put up a more valiant resistance.</p> - -<p>It is a sad comment on education that under existing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">[95]</span> -circumstances, instructors of writers are obliged -to help undermine this natural resistance a few rebellious -spirits occasionally display. One whose -entire stock in trade is a knowledge of markets and -policies and an ability to expound existing standards -is not in a very advantageous position to encourage -disregard of immutable taboos. We must say, on -reading a story which is off-standard, that it won’t -sell, and why. We must formulate and enforce -the rules that make for “success” in fiction writing. -We must be vestals of the sacred fires. I am aware -that “vestals” is not exactly the right word one -should use in this connection; perhaps another word -connoting less virtue would be more apt. But, -after all, most of us are honest, and zealously believe -that the fires are sacred and must not be allowed -to go out or be polluted. Vision? Well,—aren’t -the blind happy?</p> - -<h3>5. <i>Americanism</i></h3> - -<p>As applied to our literature the term American -has come to mean everything and anything. It -compliments the mediocre twaddle of mediocre -minds. To earn the compliment a story must be -neither sad nor “fresh” nor irreverent nor “red.” -It must not be burdened with too much thought or -sincere emotion. It must have no glimmer of an -original idea. It must “kiss the hand that feeds -it,”—which means in this case that it must breathe<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">[96]</span> -a sweet humility to all our institutions, from the -First Law of the land to the American Legion and -Babe Ruth. It must be “glad to be alive and carry -on”—everything that is old and respectable and -decrepit and green with mold.</p> - -<p>Let a piece of literary art reflect an unhackneyed -thought, let it break any one of our ancient taboos, -let it dare to belittle any one of our glorified generalities -and dogmas—and it is promptly howled -down as un-American. The literature of every -other country on earth affords an interpretative and -critical view of the psychology of the national mind -it reflects, while American literature is least reflective -of the American national mind, except in one -particular: its cringing fear of the truth. Were it -not for this fear to face the truth, and the inability -of the average American to stand criticism, the -great bulk of our “literature” would find no buyers -and its content would undergo a radical change. -It is this national trait that has given rise to the sublime -injunction, “Don’t knock!” We may have -heard of Matthew Arnold, but surely never of his -heretic doctrine that literature is a criticism of life. -To us literature is largely a matter of so many -words at so much per word, or so many hugs and -kisses and careers attained per magazine page.</p> - -<p>Is it to be wondered at that with us we have the -interminable problem: What shall we write about? -With one of the largest countries in the world in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">[97]</span> -which to live; with over one hundred millions of -people living and working and battling and dreaming -all about us; with a multitude of perplexing -problems, international, national, municipal, class, -clan, and individual, clamoring for solution; with a -rich, ever-shifting panorama of a young, virile, -national existence before us; with a million comedies -and a million tragedies avidly looking at our typewriter -keys—with all this to be had for the taking, -isn’t it pathetically absurd that we must voyage the -seven seas and scour all the corners of the earth in -search of material? Open any magazine any -month and note the proportion of stories located -in far, out-of-the-way places. Even our best writers -are following this romantic bent. Twenty-five per -cent. of the stories contained in O’Brien’s “Year-book” -for 1919 had a foreign setting; his “Year-book” -for 1920 contained over thirty per cent. of -stories with foreign settings—mostly exotic and -bizarre. No serious objections could be taken to -transcribing the life of foreign places, if we had -first become aware of our own. But we have not. -We hunt for foreign material simply because we are -afraid to sift our own. We are only now beginning -to realize that our young continent—this huge, -crude meltingpot—is filled with brass and copper -and gold, and that these metals are melting and -fusing into some homogeneous substance, which we -vaguely term America. We want this burst of consciousness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">[98]</span> - to grow and sweep us along to great -revelations, but a false pride and obsolete traditions -and hypocritical dogmas are blocking the way. -Parrot-like we shout from pulpit and rostrum and -cathedra the old banality: “Boost! All the world -loves a booster!” And because we like to be loved -we dare not touch upon the wounds of life—the hunger, -the passions, the buffets, the defeats that purge -its sordidness, gild its drabness, and actuate us to -nobler aspirations.</p> - -<p>We pride ourselves that we have developed the -short story to perfection. It has become our -national form of literary expression. It has -reached an unparalleled vogue. But, in truth, if we -are entitled to pride, it is on account of our remarkable -achievement of an ability to tell an entertaining -tale without telling anything worth while. -Paradoxically, we squeeze amusement out of -nothing. We have attained an excellence of workmanship -without the least depth of substance. But -I am anticipating. This phase of the subject is so -important that it deserves a chapter for itself, which -it will receive later on. The real perfection of our -short story is yet to come. The signs are that it is -having its birth pangs at this time. Writers of -rich promise have come to the fore recently—and -here and there a magazine, either new or an old -one with a new policy, to receive their product. -Our perfected short story will be bold, fearless,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">[99]</span> -vital; beating with the vigorous pulse of a giant -nation stretching its limbs. It will be truly American—optimistic, -with the rugged optimism of a -Walt Whitman; brave, with the courage of an impetuous -youth; rich, with the colors of a fertile soil -and a blending humanity. Perhaps our short story -is to fulfill the hopes H. G. Wells once had for the -novel:</p> - -<p>“The novel,” he wrote in <i>An Englishman Looks -at the World</i>, “is to be the social mediator, the -vehicle of understanding ... the criticism of -laws and institutions and of social dogmas and -ideas.... We are going to write ... -about the whole of human life. We are going to -deal with political questions and religious questions -and social questions ... until a thousand pretenses -and ten thousand impostures shrivel in the -cold clear air of our elucidations.... Before -we have done we will have all life within the scope -of the novel.”</p> - -<p>A lofty assignment, this, for a form of literature -that is rooted, as our short story always has been, -in the precept that to be interesting it must eschew -reality. But we can carry it out—and will. Our -pioneers are already on the trail—weak as yet, not -a full-grown Chekhov among them—but gaining in -hardihood, and singing. The hordes behind them -are waiting in safety; let the trail become a bit -smoother, the hardships lessened, and they will<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">[100]</span> -follow. In the meantime who that is filled with that -eternally human envious admiration for pluck can -keep back his “Good cheer!” and “Godspeed!”?</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">[101]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI - -<br /> - <span class="smcap">The Artificial Ending</span></h2></div> - -<p>One of the surest tags of the American short -story has been its happy ending. No matter what -vicissitudes the hero or heroine may have undergone, -what problems and tragedies may have overtaken -them, what unmendable exploits of circumstance or -fate they may have been subjected to, in the end -all must be well with them. The happy ending is a -direct result of our uplift optimism, of our Pollyanna -philosophy of life, of our fear of reality. We -have always justified it on the ground of our national -psychology, which, we claim, is buoyant and aggressive -and won’t accept defeat. We have insisted -that the American always “gets what he wants -when he wants it.” And even the cynics among us -did not dispute our last claim; they pointed to the -happy ending.</p> - -<p>It is true that of late, since it has become the -fashion to question everything, the happy ending -has come in for its share of blasphemous discussion. -Here and there views have been expressed that a -happy ending is not absolutely necessary to make a -story readable; some of these views are so decidedly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">[102]</span> - antagonistic as to maintain that a happy ending -is invariably inartistic, which simply proves, again, -that rebound is directed with equal force but in -opposite direction as the original bound. Even -aspiring story writers come in occasionally inoculated -with doubt of the very propriety of the happy -ending. To such, we the votaries of the perfect -short story, having exhausted all our erudite arguments -in a vain attempt at reconversion, finally -apply the one unfailing argument—the threat of -the editorial rejection slip. The happy ending, we -admit, may not always be artistic, and it may not -always bring an acceptance, but the unhappy ending -almost invariably brings a rejection.</p> - -<p>The fallacy of the happy ending clearly illustrates -the lack of any sound system of thought or reasoning -underlying the exposition and production of -American fiction. We have the support of venerable -theories and formulas and high-sounding -abstractions, but not of facts and logic. It is as if -we dared not examine the result of the application -of our theories and the filling of our formulas. -Glibly we state the psychology of the average American -reader, which we profess to know so well, but -do not care to assure ourselves whether our deductions, -and even our major premises are correct. For -if it were true that the average reader always -demands a happy ending, we would have no explanation -of the popularity of most of the works of Poe,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">[103]</span> -Bret Harte, Jack London, Kipling, Conrad, Maupassant, -and even the gray Russians. Doubtless -there are individual characteristics in the writings -of these gentlemen that have appealed to our happily -disposed readers, but how much of the appeal has -been due to a vogue created by official O. K.’ers? -The inchoate reversion to an insistence on the -unhappy ending, which is becoming apparent among -some layers of our reading public, tends to confirm -this suggestion. For it is not probable that -the same people who have never been able to enjoy -a story unless it ended happily should suddenly -have been seized with a passionate amour for the -“morbid” ending; and, from any rational point of -view, it is just as fallacious to accept the unhappy -ending as an invariable rule as it is to accept the -happy ending. One may be as artificial as the other.</p> - -<p>Manifestly there are kinks in the average reader’s -psychology of which we have not been aware, or -if we have, have paid little attention to. This psychology -which we have taken for granted and -builded upon is not after all so solid as we have -supposed it to be. It can be and is being molded. -It appears that the present-day average reader fears -nothing so much as the imputation of being average. -Here and there a brave soul may vociferously boast -of being a “low-brow,” thus betraying a troubled -consciousness of mediocrity, but on the whole the -tendency is to deplore the tastes of the average,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">[104]</span> -thereby imputing to one’s self, by implication of -contrast, the possession of tastes above those of -the average. Hence the sudden ability to enjoy an -unhappy ending. Hence also the distrust of the -average editor of this sudden growth in taste. He -knows its make-believe nature: the average reader -may learn to pretend a dislike for the good old -happy ending, but in truth he enjoys it as much as -he ever did. Hence the continued demand for -stories with happy endings.</p> - -<p>This may not be such a cheering view of the -average reader’s psychology, but neither is it -entirely cheerless. By exploiting its hypocritical -vein of pretended admiration for good literature, -we may hope ultimately to develop a genuine -admiration. People of habitual coarse tastes, for -beverages, delicacies, clothes or arts, usually begin -the refining process by affecting the tastes of those -whom they think their betters. The process itself -is rather long and tedious and often disheartening. -But the aping instinct helps measurably. We cannot -hope to have a discriminating reading public in a -day. Too long have we impressed upon our public -the blessings of a happy disposition and the artistry -of reflecting it in our literature. Too long have we -brazened about our pride in Pollyanna, Wallingford, -Torchy, and a hundred other fictive chasers of -the blues, who won’t take defeat but go on singing -on their way. The happy story, with its breezy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">[105]</span> -style, its giggling climax, and its smacking dénouement -has become a fixed type from which our -readers’ affection cannot be so quickly alienated.</p> - -<p>D. W. Griffith, one of the ablest producers of -moving pictures, is reported to have made the statement -that the average spectator of cinema drama -has the intelligence of a nine-year-old child.<a id="FNanchor_25" href="#Footnote_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> That -Mr. Griffith is justified in his statement may be -assumed from the huge success he has had in purveying -cinema entertainment. He has made millions -where others have made scanty half-millions. -Verily, he knows his public and is in a position to -estimate its mental powers with some measure of -accuracy. His contempt of its intelligence does him -credit....</p> - -<p>One of his greatest successes has been his production -of “Way Down East,” a spectacular melodrama -of the old angel-girl-Satan-man variety, -with a resulting illegitimate baby which happily -sees fit to die, leaving the little mother to find work -with a good Christian family. But her past is -against her and she is finally driven out into a -terrible snow-storm by a man who quotes the Bible -by the yard, and the women in the audience wet -their little handkerchiefs, and the men hawk and -cough and blow their noses. The big scene of the -picture, and which is probably responsible for -seventy-five per cent. of the picture’s phenomenal<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">[106]</span> -success, shows a whole river of ice floating down -toward a furiously-dashing waterfall. The poor -little heroine is on one of the huge cakes of ice fast -nearing the watery precipice, while the good boy -who loves her honestly is jumping like an acrobat -after her in the teeth of a raging storm.</p> - -<p>Now, all the moving-picture patrons in the country, -from the past experience of having witnessed -one thousand pictures and read ten thousand magazine -stories, ought to know that there is not one -chance in a million that the plucky lover will not -arrive in time to rescue his sweetheart—such things -have not happened and do not happen (in our -stories, of course!), yet they become wide-eyed and -panting with excitement, as if they were in doubt -about the outcome. Griffith uses the “cut-back” -every ten or twenty feet, showing the thundering -falls, the crashing ice with the limp figure of the -girl upon it, the boy precariously maintaining his -balance, then back again to the falls; thus prolonging -the agony until he thinks the public has got its -money’s worth; then the boy arrives, clasps the girl -in his arms, his erring Christian father asks her -forgiveness and welcomes her as a prospective -daughter-in-law, and the public file out in the lobby, -exclaiming ecstatically to one another: “What a -masterpiece!” Verily, this Mr. Griffith knew -whereof he spoke.</p> - -<p>Our public is still thrilled with a climax of whose<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">[107]</span> -outcome there ought to be not the slightest doubt. -Which merely proves that if our fiction still has a -measure of suspense it is not due to our clever technique -but to the almost fabulous stupidity of the -large mass of readers. We have evolved our tricks -of technique for the prime purpose of maintaining -a keen suspense, of keeping the outcome of the conflict -which every story must have in the balance, of -heightening the reader’s curiosity to follow the destiny -of the hero or heroine in whose behalf his -sympathies have been enlisted to a satisfactory end. -But if after, let us say, twenty years of reading -fiction, there should suddenly dawn upon our average -reader’s mind the idea that as the hero or heroine -of a story is always immortal and unconquerable -in the end, no matter how circumstances may -appear to be against him or her for the moment, -would not our skillfully woven suspense suffer a -severe jolt? Of what use would it be to fear for the -safety of the trapped little girl when a dogged confidence, -gained by profitable experience in reading, -would suggest that she is due at the altar on page -five and would inevitably keep her appointment? Of -what use would be taking seriously the pugilistic -encounters of the Man-Who-Can’t-Be-Knocked-Out? -Why thrill with anxiety over an overturned -automobile when it is certain that the hero pinned -underneath it will have sustained nothing more -serious than a few scratches that must heal before<span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">[108]</span> -the final sentence is completed? What would -become of all our tricks and ingenuity and inventiveness? -Would not this one convention of the invariably -happy ending then defeat all our efforts at -creating suspense? And if that happened would it -not be the direst calamity to all we have worked for, -to the entire mechanism of our “perfect” story?</p> - -<p>The preceding paragraph is prophetic of what -ultimately must happen. As yet that day may be -far off in the hazy distance, but when it comes the -philosophy of our short story must undergo a complete -metamorphosis. Its own glaring contradictions, -if not external influences, must ultimately bring -that about. To preach Suspense as the highest law, -then kill it at its very inception by another law of -the happy ending is an absurdity that cannot long -remain unapparent even to a nine-year-old intelligence.</p> - -<p>Meantime the reaction noted in some quarters -toward the invariably unhappy ending is just as -sinister an influence toward the rise of another -absurdity. Whether this reaction be sincere—as in -the case of those who have been fed with glucose -fiction ad nauseam—or merely fashionable—as in -the case of most of the Left Wing of our present-day -average reading public—if crystallized and perpetuated -as a dogma it is bound to constitute a -serious hindrance in the evolution of the short story. -Once and for all we must come to an acceptance of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">[109]</span> -the truth that there can be but one kind of an ending -to a story—whether happy or unhappy—and that -is the logical one, an ending which is a direct inevitable -outgrowth of the story itself. No law can be -made that would apply to all stories; each story -generates its own laws. The question of repugnance -or preferences of the reader does not enter here at -all. The question of cause and effect, of intelligent -probability gaged by a keen observation of the laws -or lack-of-laws of reality—this question alone must -become paramount and decisive.</p> - -<p>It is true that the noblest literary works, from the -dramas of Æschylus to the present day, have all -been tinged with sadness—Maupassant’s definition -of literature as being a mirror of life, proving a true -one. Also that other one—is it by Goethe?—that -literature is the conscience of the human race. In -the world of men, with the dark mystery of death -as an ever-present certainty, thus sowing a sense of -the futility of all human aspirations and achievement -in the hearts of even the most aggressive of -us; with a lurking consciousness of insurmountable -limitations besetting our fondest dreams; with a still -more pronounced consciousness that the maturing -of dreams frequently marks their decay, and almost -always marks the thawing of their dewy glitter—in -such a world, literature, welling up from the depths -of inner consciousness, cannot help being tinged with -sadness. In fact, the vast bulk of the world’s literary<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">[110]</span> - masterpieces consists of tragedies. The sooner -this fundamental fact is woven into the fiber of -American fiction the sooner will American fiction -become the mirror of American life and the conscience -of the American people.</p> - -<p>But this solemn historic consideration does not -justify the adoption of a rigid rule that an unhappy -ending of a story is artistic and that a happy one is -always inartistic. Least of all could it be justified -in its application to the short story, which frequently -deals with but a single incident in the life of a character -rather than with a complete history. There -are infinitely more probabilities of ultimate defeat -in a complete history than in a single experience. -Death is not always the price of an adventure, nor -disillusionment that of an undertaking. Conrad’s -“Youth,” melancholy as it is with the breath of -finiteness of all our glorious epochs, has no tragic -ending. The young commander has dared through -stress and storm and adversity, has pitted the -strength of his youth against that of the sea and has -come out victorious, glowing with the symbolic message: -“Do or Die!” And though, when he recounts -the narrative of that first command of his, -youth is far behind him, he is filled with lyric memories -of it far sweeter than his distant exploit itself. -Mary E. Wilkins Freeman’s “Revolt of Mother” -ends happily and yet logically and artistically. Perhaps -in her next encounter with her hard-hearted<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">[111]</span> -and hard-headed husband Mother won’t be as successful, -but in this one which Mrs. Freeman had -chosen to relate, she carries the day. Maupassant’s -“Moonlight” ends well. The old Abbé realizes -that “God perhaps has made such nights as this to -clothe with his ideals the loves of men,” and -the young couple can henceforth love unmolested. -James Branch Cabell’s “Wedding Jest” ends happily, -although satirically—the point of the story—not -a happy one by any means—being contained particularly -in the ending. An enumeration of all the -great short stories that have happy endings would -make a paragraph of considerable length.</p> - -<p>From any technical point of view the unhappy -ending, when canonized into a convention, will -defeat any skill and ingenuity or even natural artistry -in the maintenance of suspense. After a while -readers will learn that every story must end unhappily -and will be on their guard. Already the few -periodicals that have made a convention of the unconventional -ending are suffering a depressing monotony. -There really is no reason for following the -love illusions of the unsophisticated heroine when it -is certain that disillusionment awaits her in the end. -Nor is there reason for feeling elated over the success -of our hero when we know that it is temporary, -that it is only a matter of paragraphs or pages -before this success will be turned into defeat.</p> - -<p>If then we arrive at the conclusion that neither<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">[112]</span> -the happy ending nor the tragic ending is in itself -an indication of artistry, but must be considered in -its relation to the story it ends, we arrive at a -view which is at once rational and simple—so -simple, in fact, that it seems banal to emphasize it. -In the matter of endings we have been thinking in -terms of producing the greatest effect, totally ignoring -their inevitability as culminating points of given -sets of plot influences. We know that the end of -a story marks an emphatic place which leaves the -greatest impression upon the reader’s mind; it is, -rhetorically, a strategic point, and therefore we concentrate -all our surprises, our jugglery, our uplift -message and our disposition upon this point. We -want the reader to go away smiling, or pleasantly -startled, or, if we write for the conventionally unconventional -publication, unpleasantly satisfied. -The fact that a writer after having set his characters -in motion and allowing them to act and react -upon the various forces of the plot, to mold and be -molded, has no power over the ending other than -that of guiding the threads of his story—characters, -motives and circumstances—to the end they are -logically bound for, is as yet obscure among us. We -are associating the ending with its impressions upon -the reader, with its gallery value—rather than with -the soul of the story. As Mr. Carl Van Doren, -former literary editor of <i>The Nation</i> and now of -<i>The Century</i> has expressed it: “According to all<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">[113]</span> -the codes of the more serious kinds of fiction, the -unwillingness—or the inability—to conduct a plot to -its legitimate ending implies some weakness in the -artistic character.”<a id="FNanchor_26" href="#Footnote_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a></p> - -<p>This weakness that Mr. Van Doren refers to in -reality arises from our very conception of the function -of fiction and the motives that govern its -birth. In a majority of cases the prime motive for -writing a story is to obtain a check from a publisher; -the dazzling figures cited in our newspapers and -writers’ magazines as the incomes of some fictionists -exert an irresistible appeal. The constant hammering -upon literature as a commodity which can be -and is being produced as any other commodity at -such and such a price, the size being determined -upon its ability to perform the clownish function of -supplying a laugh or a thrill to the largest number -of T. B. M.’s or T. B. W.’s, is another influence -responsible for this weakness. That fiction is a -medium for the expression of a writer’s reactions -to his business of living is a view that mighty few -of our writers, editors, and literary savants seem -to hold. So that the fallacy of the happy ending, -and of the unhappy ending as well, is inevitably -bound up with the larger fallacy of mistaking the -manufacture of stories for the function of literature.</p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">[114]</span></p> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII - <br /> - - <span class="smcap">Form and Substance</span></h2></div> - -<p>Jack London in his confessions of his struggle for -recognition as a writer gives this formula for success -in literature: Health, Work, and a Philosophy of -Life. Health is necessary, of course, in order to -do any hard work, and in a world against which old -Malthus railed, nothing can be attained without -hard work. But it is the value of the third ingredient -which is most often overlooked and the absence -of which is responsible for the failure of most of -our literary output to rise above the level of mediocrity. -We have noted, in another place, that Jack -London himself, in the bulk of his production, failed -to strike more than an occasional deep and sincere -chord, but it was not because his ear was faulty; -it was simply because his audience rejected precisely -the deep chord.</p> - -<p>Let it be understood that by a philosophy of life -Jack London did not refer to any definite view on -economic reform or social regeneration. Narrow, -limited, prejudiced views have but little place in -literature; if presented by the hand of an artist, -they may appeal for a short time, but never for very<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">[115]</span> -long. Great writers there have been who were not -as actively engaged in the squabbles of the world as -Jack London was and who did not take definite -sides in the skirmishes of any generation but they -have all had a philosophy of life none the less, in -that they have all had a broad, philosophic comprehension -of the basic laws which govern human life -and actions; of causes and effects conducive to -human suffering and happiness; and of the reactions -of these basic laws upon the author himself so that -he is able to present them from a definite angle—his -angle.</p> - -<p>It is the possession of this individual angle upon -the everlasting panorama of life and death which -distinguishes the vital master from the flabby -mechanic. We might call it philosophy of life, -independence of mind, originality, idealism, or what -not, in all cases it makes for substance—the thing -by which a work of art lives.</p> - -<p>No slight is intended on the value of form in -literature. If the appropriate masterful form -clothes this vital substance, so much the better, of -course, but it is the substance that is the protoplasm. -Form follows fads and fashions, and is decidedly -mortal; substance alone illustrates the immutable -law of the indestructibility of matter. With all -their beautiful rhetoric and genial humor, the Spectator -and Tatler papers of Addison and Steele are -mildly entertaining dead matter today, but the tragedies<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">[116]</span> - and comedies of the Bard of Avon are as -appealing today as three centuries ago, even though -handicapped by a form no longer in vogue. Dostoyevsky’s -novels, to take a more modern example, -were written in a style as clumsy and uncouth as -ever novels could be written in, but their burning -pages sear the souls of men who read them. The -gift of substance is in them—a fiery miracle, an -Apocalypse.</p> - -<p>The one supremely outstanding feature in our -American fiction is its lack of substance. Some of -us have the O. Henry style and some of us have the -Henry James style and still others have the Washington -Irving or the Poe style; some of us can plot -and others can end a story with a flourish; some -possess a dazzling vocabulary and others are genii -of rhetoric—but how many have something sustaining -to impart to a world drowning in platitudes? -How much of worth has our fiction added to the -world’s sum of comprehension of beauty, of truth? -We have developed schools and systems of teaching -and learning how to say things; we have bent every -effort toward the evolving of a science of expression -only to find that we have been too busy expressing -to acquire what to express. American ethics has -always been a point of national pride, but we have -never applied it to the art of talking brilliantly when -one has nothing to say. As George Macdonald -once put it: “... If a man has nothing to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">[117]</span> -communicate, there is no reason why he should have -a good style, any more than why he should have a -good purse without any money, or a good scabbard -without any sword.”</p> - -<p>Again, the acquisition of nobility of form is not -to be discouraged, but the possession of something -to tell the world is the sublimest of gifts, and gains -the world’s everlasting gratitude; and the greatest -seeming anomaly in the conditions under which -American literature is produced is that this gift is -not only rated at a discount but fought, vilified, -grappled with. The only way the gift can be -acquired, if it can, is through an insatiable interest -in the stuff and forms of life; but such interest leads -to inquiry and inquiry leads to heresy; venerable -taboos are broken. The anomaly becomes a normal -result of an inferior conception of the rights and -functions of literature. Prejudices are placed above -art; policies above truth; words above meanings.</p> - -<p>Once, at a suffrage gathering, a young writer was -introduced by a friend to a famous writer whose -encouragement the beginner desired. At the end of -the evening the friend asked the famous writer for -his impressions of the budding genius. “I have not -read any of his work,” the famous writer answered, -“but I am afraid he has not the makings of a genius. -The way he snubbed the poor girl I introduced him -to merely because she is a salesgirl indicates that -he lacks the voracious interest in the human element<span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">[118]</span> -which marks the true artist. How is he ever going -to talk Man when he doesn’t know Man?”</p> - -<p>Voracious interest—that’s the path that leads to -the gift of substance, to the “philosophy of life,” -the original angle! Cæsar saw before he conquered. -And he had to come a long way before -he could see. But he wanted to see. And it is -wanting to see that is the whip of genius. Dickens -walked the streets of London for hours, through -rain and fog and slush and shine, because he wanted -to see it, all of it, every nook and corner of it. Balzac -tramped the length and breadth of Paris, -haunted parks and shops and drawing-rooms, because -the human comedy appealed to him. The -Russian Kuprin dressed himself in a diver’s suit -and had himself lowered many fathoms into the -Black Sea because he wanted to experience the -sensations of a diver. And Jack London -circled the globe because he wanted to see what -it is like.</p> - -<p>A little class-room episode comes to mind. In -the poetry class Carl Sandburg came up for discussion. -A few of his Chicago poems were read -when a fair would-be poet spoke up in protest. “I -have lived in Chicago all my life,” she said, “and -have never seen the things Sandburg sees!” But -there was another student in the room, a very unobtrusive -little girl sitting somewhere in the back of -the room, and she suddenly came to her instructor’s<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">[119]</span> - rescue. “That’s why you are not Sandburg!” -she exclaimed....</p> - -<p>The true artist is the perpetual explorer. He -cannot invent the substance of his work, but he can -discover it in the life of nature and his fellow-men. -And the more he sees the more he learns to see, for -to be able to see the new and unexplored in the old -and elemental is the highest art in itself. A hunchback -to a child in the streets is an object to throw -stones at, to a Victor Hugo he is a grand, heroic figure, -fierce and glorious in his pathetic grandeur. A -typhoon to a Chinese fisherman represents the wrath -of his god for the omission of a prayer or a sacrifice; -to Joseph Conrad it symbolizes the majestic resentment -of the Sea itself against man’s desecration of -its peace and beauty and mystery. Only the American -artist knows no symbols and is warned against -attempting to know.</p> - -<p>Our great cry has always been: “Acquire form!” -Grammar, rhetoric, metrics, technique—these have -been the indispensable tools of our writers. They -still are. But having acquired them our writers -find they can fashion nothing beautiful, nothing -lasting, nothing that will weather the storms of time. -For no tools, no matter how sharp or perfect, can -accomplish the feat of fashioning something out of -vacuum. The American story always has laid -claims to style—but it hasn’t lived. Writers have -come and had their vogue and gone. Even years<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">[120]</span> -back when style was more leisurely and rounded, -when the badge of haste was not upon it, Charles -Dudley Warner remarked: “We may be sure that -any piece of literature which attracts only by some -trick of style, however it may blaze up for a day and -startle the world with its flash, lacks the element of -endurance. We do not need much experience to -tell us the difference between a lamp and a Roman -candle.”</p> - -<p>This remark can be elaborated on, explained, -complemented. The truth is that there can be no -style without substance. These elements are not -separate entities; only superficially do they seem to -be. How much sweetness can a “sweet nothing” -contain? How much beauty can a work of “art” -contain which has emptiness of thought and ugliness -of conception? How much truth can be embedded in -a fundamental falsehood? Every great poet has -found the soul of his poem determining its form. -Great style grows from within—it is an off-shoot of -great substance. To the American writer this relationship -has never been apparent; and most of our -critics, professing a lofty æstheticism from the -shadows of their academies, have never paid attention -to it. Our literature cannot boast the possession -of a single lucid outline of this vital relationship -between form and substance such as the following -from Remy de Gourmont’s “Le Probleme du Style.” -I wonder how many authors of textbooks exhorting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">[121]</span> -American would-be authors to learn the cabalistic -lore of expression have ever read this:</p> - -<p>“A new fact or a new idea is worth more than -a fine phrase. A lovely phrase is a lovely thing and -so is a lovely flower. But their duration is almost -the same—a day, a century. Nothing dies more -swiftly than a style which does not rest upon the -solidity of vigorous thinking. Such a style shrivels -like a stretched skin; it falls in a heap as ivy -does from the rotten tree that once gave it -support....</p> - -<p>“It is probably an error to attempt to distinguish -between form and substance.... There is no -such thing as amorphous matter; all thought has -a limit, hence a form, since it is a partial representation -of true or possible, real or imaginary life. Substance -engenders form exactly as the tortoise and -the oyster do the materials of their respective -shells....</p> - -<p>“Form without a foundation, style without -thought—what a poor thing it is!...</p> - -<p>“If nothing lives in literature except by its style, -that is because works well thought out are invariably -well written. But the converse is not true. -Style alone is nothing....</p> - -<p>“The sign of the man in any intellectual work is -the thought. The thought <i>is</i> the man. And style -and thought are one.”<a id="FNanchor_27" href="#Footnote_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">[122]</span></p> -<p>If we were candid enough the proper answer to -make to this brilliant Frenchman would be: “Who -told you that literature is an ‘intellectual work’?” -But we are not candid enough. Only in our strictly -professional journals do we dare liken literature to -cobbling or tin-smithing or hod-carrying; in the -official world, in our lectures and book-reviews, we -consider it an art and talk of Muses and Pegasus -and all the artistic divinities of Mount Olympus -and Chillicothe.</p> - -<p>A simple confession will not be amiss here. This -discussion has been largely a plea for the man and -woman who would find in literature, and in the -short story specifically, the relief of a burdened -soul. The influences that would withhold this relief -are multitudinous and powerful. The struggle is -unequal and pathetic. But of the hundreds of -literary aspirants that have come to my personal -notice only an isolated individual here and there was -blessed with any kind of a burden. The vast multitude -of souls were cheerfully lightweight and unencumbered. -These aspirants came to study technique -so that they might learn how to write salable stories, -but they had no stories to tell. Some of them believed -they could become great story writers because -when at school they had received excellent marks in -composition; others claimed on more general -grounds a gift of expression and they wished to put -it to practical use. That it was necessary to have<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">[123]</span> -lived in order to write of life was a thought that had -never occurred to them. They were blissfully unaware -of such a necessity. They needed form, nothing -else, and applied themselves conscientiously toward -its acquisition. The irony of the whole matter -is that they actually estimated their deficiency accurately: -form was what they wanted, and nothing -else. After a while they began to sell. In all cases -the unhappy aspirants who were plagued with -thoughts and emotions have found it harder to sell, -no matter how much excellence of form they succeeded -in acquiring. In the field of the American -short story, the “lightweights” have it, so far.</p> - -<p>It is true, of course, that even a lightweight must -have something to clothe with his all-potent form—be -it a skeleton ever so rattling. But that has been -answered in Chapter IV on the Moving Pictures. -There are themes a-plenty, airy, optimistic, harmless -themes that no respectable editor, reader, or Board -of Censorship can object to. They can be adapted -and readapted an infinity of times, provided each -time a new twist or a “different” trick is introduced.</p> - -<p>All our themes seem to have divided themselves -into two grand classes: Stereotyped themes out of -which stories are made, and Life themes out of -which literature is made. The first class contains -an abundance of material that any one might have -for the taking, but which to make salable requires all -the tricks of form that we have so flamboyantly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">[124]</span> -evolved to disguise its hackneyed origin. The -second class contains all the substances of existence -that only those that feel their kinship thereto can -transmute into literature. All the style and form -that the science of writing can teach cannot hope -to produce one breathing story unless the theme is -eloquent with this kinship. Such is the story of -genius—the story that lives and endures. Such a -story may or may not have mechanical values; it -will captivate and thrill; ruffle and soothe; make -and destroy. Such a story will be found to have a -theme not chosen with an eye for gallery approval; -not even because the writer himself approves of it. -One cannot approve or disapprove of the stuff he -is made of. One merely accepts it. After all there -is only one theme—inexhaustible—out of which genuine -literature has always been and always will be -made, perhaps it is the simple theme of Tagore’s -court poet: “The theme of Krishna, the lover god, -and Radha, the beloved, the Eternal Man and the -Eternal Woman, the sorrow that comes from the -beginning of time, and the joy without end.”<a id="FNanchor_28" href="#Footnote_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a></p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">[125]</span></p> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII - <br /> - - <span class="smcap">Finale</span></h2></div> - -<p>There is more than a modicum of depression, -then, in a contemplative sweep of the literary product -we are instrumental in creating. Even the -most complacent members in my profession must -find it so. For one thing, the very lack of variety -in the finished product we so painstakingly cultivate -must occasionally become irksome, if nothing more -serious. Analyzing stories by a hundred different -writers, both successful and would-be, and all of -these stories with one puny soul must in the end -become a very tiresome routine indeed.</p> - -<p>It is true that we are not masters of the situation. -Who are we to set up standards and direct the footsteps -of the young toward them? We are but the -interpreters of existing standards and the formulators -and expositors of ways that lead to the meeting -of the exaction imposed by them. But if an -uneasy thought sometimes, at dusk, buzzes into our -incautious ear that the existing standards lead to -unregenerate mediocrity, should we not pause and -ask if perpetuating these standards is for the good -of our souls or even for the work we love (and a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">[126]</span> -great many of us really do love our work!)? Perhaps -a revision of our texts—if not a bonfire—might -result in fewer stories but more inspiring ones. -Perhaps the demolition of magazine standards -might result in the birth of literary standards. As -it is, should we not face the truth that all the masters -that have ever manipulated pen or typewriter -have disregarded our standards and set up new ones -of their own? They may not have gone to the -extent of a Kipling who wrote to a beginner that -“No man’s advice is the least benefit in our business, -and I am a very busy man. Keep on trying until -you either fail or succeed.” They all have looked -for and accepted intelligent advice of one kind or -another—from eminent contemporaries and from -those that had preceded them. But they have not -slavishly copied and imitated. They have not felt -that any advice had the power of divine commandment. -No real artist could be expected to create -anything in the environment of the rubrics and inhibitions -with which we have surrounded him.</p> - -<p>All the blame that can be heaped upon the public -and our magazine editors does not absolve the literary -clergy from the share of harm they have contributed -to the existing state of the American short -story. The cheapest form of advertising and the -most erudite and conscientious of our textbooks -combine in the creation of a peculiar psychology that -a story is some concoction that any one might learn<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">[127]</span> -to make up by mere exertion. Here is a typical -advertisement appearing on the back page of a current -magazine:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>HOW I MADE $350.00 ON ONE SHORT STORY -And How I Learned To Write, In Only a Few -Evenings, Stories That Actually Sell Themselves.</p> -</div> - -<p>Then follows a full-page testimony of some one who -has made a great success of story-writing by spending -the small sum of $5 on the course advertised. -The course itself was prepared by a leading professor -in a leading eastern university and whose -name is well-known in the literary world. And -almost every important textbook on the subject -abounds in statements such as the following taken -from one of the most intelligent works: “the events -which go to make up a fictional plot are artificially -arranged so as to bring about a particular result,”<a id="FNanchor_29" href="#Footnote_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> -besprinkled with numerous analogies to the various -trades and professions and how long it takes for -the average apprentice to become an accomplished -artizan. The psychology of tricks and twists and -points is foisted upon the writer, the reader, the -editor. By constant repetition we ourselves begin -to acquire it, if we had it not when we started....</p> - -<p>And yet this short volume is not wholly pessimistic. -I would not want to leave that impression. -For as already stated there have always been writers -with a real touch of divine afflatus who have never<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">[128]</span> -paid any attention either to our psychology or to -our tricks, or to our inhibitions. “Every fine artist -in American fiction will be seen to have discarded -both the technical and moral pattern of the magazine -tradition and to have developed one of his -own.”<a id="FNanchor_30" href="#Footnote_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> And the number of these heretics is growing—much -faster than some of us are aware. -They suffer obscurity and often poverty as all great -heretics always have suffered, but they have the fortitude -of their calling. Let us listen to the confession -of one of them:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> - -<p>“... However, you know that the short-story form has become -among us very much what I call corrupt. Publishers of short -stories sought what they called the story with a kick in it. Plots -for short stories were found and about these plots our writers -sought to hang a semblance of reality to life. The plot, however, -being uppermost in the writers’ minds, what we got was a -snappy, entertaining, artificial thing, forgotten completely an -hour after it was read.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps because of a native laziness, I found myself unable -to think up plots. To try to do so bored me unspeakably. On -the other hand, there were all about me human beings living -their lives and in the process of doing so creating drama....</p> - -<p>“I have tried to clutch at it and reproduce in writing some of -that drama....”<a id="FNanchor_31" href="#Footnote_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a></p> -</div> - -<p>When the problem involved is what to tell, the -sharpening of the faculty of seeing what is worth -while, the problem of how to tell becomes of secondary -importance. In fact the same literary heretic -believes that “An impulse needs but be strong -enough to break through the lack of technical training -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">[129]</span>... technical training might well destroy the -impulse....”<a id="FNanchor_32" href="#Footnote_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a></p> - -<p>Along with the author of “Winesburg, Ohio,” -and “The Triumph of the Egg,” there are a host of -other writers freshly reacting to life and honestly -striving to embody their reactions into stories. It is -strange to us, accustomed as we are to clever artificiality, -it is even grotesque—this simplicity, naturalness, -and daring, but it marks the birth of the American -short story—that colorful short form which is -destined to become the most perfect artistic expression -of our national life. After all, to the true artist -the public is no problem, it being composed primarily -of himself alone. As Sherwood Anderson expressed -it in another passage of the interview quoted above: -“I would like a little to understand myself in this -mixup, and I am writing with that end in view.” -The curse of catering to the public has been a fallacy -as great as that of our technique; we have -assumed that fiction is made to order for a public, -just as we have taught that technique comes first -and story substance next. The great writers have -all come before their public and have had to wait -for the public to catch up with them, but if they -hadn’t come first the public would never have caught -up. We in America have always striven to give the -public what it has wanted, but even in America the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">[130]</span> -time is fast coming when the gracious public will -be inquiring what stories our potent writers have to -tell. But not until our writers realize fully that -“The public is composed of numerous groups crying -out: Console me, amuse me, sadden me, touch -me, make me dream, laugh, shudder, weep, think. -But the fine spirit says to the artist: Make something -beautiful in the form that suits you, according -to your personal temperament.”<a id="FNanchor_33" href="#Footnote_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> This fine spirit -is now becoming evident; it is working its way to -the surface.</p> - -<p>In this period of awakening, of the real birth of -American literature, the genuine educator, always -an open-minded student, can do no better than revaluate -all his acceptances, all his hardened dogmas, -all his hereditary literary and educational -truths. If he is to help the confused multitude, -baffled by a sudden consciousness of the phenomena -of existence, to literary self-expression, he must first -realize that no formulas are of any avail in the -crises of life and therefore are of no avail in literature, -the artistic emanation or transmutation of life. -He must stimulate thought and independence of -thought—even to the point of experimentation—for -in such ways have all great contributions to the -world’s cultural treasury been made. He must -cultivate a genuine love of literature rather than of -its usual incentive, the emoluments involved, whatever -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">[131]</span> they be, and a critical appreciation of literary -values. Thus he may become a positive force in -the chariot of our literary progress—a leader, a -driver, a discoverer.</p> -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">[132]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX - <br /> - - <span class="smcap">Effect</span></h2></div> - -<p>Self-flattery is indigenous to man. We like to -flatter ourselves that our musings produce a desirable -effect but we do not often know the complexion -of this effect. What, for instance, shall it be in the -case of serious-minded men and women interested -in creating short stories and in the aspect of our literary -field generally who have read sympathetically -the preceding pages? If books are stimuli what -shall this particular reaction be?</p> - -<p>A few suggestions may not be amiss. They are -in a measure a recapitulation of the thoughts expressed, -but I like to think of them as formulated -by my ideal reader as his more or less conscious -artistic credo:</p> - -<p>1. I believe that the short story is first of all a -form of literature, not merely an article of manufacture.</p> - -<p>2. Literature is a form of self-expression. I -am a living entity, sensitive to the play and interplay -of forces in and all about me. Life in the form of -man, of institutions, of passions and ideas affects -me and I would reproduce and interpret it. I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">[133]</span> -would clarify it to myself; I would create for the -love of creating, for the beauty of it, for the gratification -of the creative urge within me.</p> - -<p>3. I recognize no plots that are not derived -from the life which I know, which is in and about -me; nor any characters which are not derived from -and tested by that life.</p> - -<p>4. In all my work I have a desire to be truthful, -rather than merely clever; simple rather than -pretentious; natural rather than surprising. I -would voice no thought nor emotion which is alien -to my mind and temperament.</p> - -<p>5. The genuineness of a view or an emotion is -its justification. Truth and spontaneity are more -to me than commercial artifice and success. There -is no shame in failure except in so far as it implies -a departure from standards of artistic honesty.</p> - -<p>6. I recognize no taboos. Every phase of life -is a worthy theme; every experience known to man -is a worthy plot. Things which have interested me -have interested other people and I seek to communicate -my personal vision to the world. I recognize -no valid reason for withholding any part of -my vision merely because it may prove unpleasant, -uncustomary or unprofitable to some reader. I do -not force him to read my work.</p> - -<p>7. Nor do I recognize that I have any right, -for any reason whatsoever, to color the stuff of life, -the reality of which I write. The measure of my<span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">[134]</span> -success is the measure in which I can make my reality -the reality of those who would read me.</p> - -<p>8. The standard of my opinions and emotions -is contained within me. I refuse to modify them, -to render them less objectionable, or more innocuous, -or more in conformity with the standard of the -moving pictures or the specifications of any editor, -critic, teacher or good friend.</p> - -<p>9. I recognize no subject which is rooted in life -as either moral or immoral. Every phase of existence -is a legitimate theme for the artist, and its -morality or immorality is a matter of the reader’s -own interpretation.</p> - -<p>10. I am not afraid of being either pessimistic or -optimistic. My moods and ideas are my own and -will not be changed to suit the buyer.</p> - -<p>11. I am not afraid of being either radical or -conservative, depressive or “exhilarating,” religious -or agnostic, constructive or destructive. The fearless -presentation of one’s honest views is a virtue -in itself.</p> - -<p>12. I have no fear of displeasing any one, of displeasing -even a majority of readers, editors, critics, -citizens. I have faith that there is always a fearless -minority willing to hear an honest word; that -there are always some avenues for the transmission -of the independent vision. Frequently this minority -in time grows to a majority—and another -rebellious minority takes its place.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">[135]</span></p> - -<p>13. I believe that all technique is but a means -toward effective expression. No tricks are of any -value in themselves. No puzzles or jugglings with -life’s experiences are of any avail, and no technique -is worthy of art except in so far as it furthers clarification -and artistic presentation of my message.</p> - -<p>14. I believe that all the instruction I can get -can only be in the way of developing facility of expression. -No teacher or textbook can teach me the -stuff out of which literature is made.</p> - -<p>15. I believe that style is “of the man himself,” -that it comes from within, that no amount of imitation -of O. Henry can give me O. Henry’s cleverness, -and that no amount of style, even my own, -can cover a lack of substance.</p> - -<p>16. There is only one ending that my story can -have. It may be happy or unhappy or merely -logical. Every problem imposes its own solution. -I can dictate no dénouement, for the characters involved -work out their own destiny acceptable to -them or to the inevitability of their problem.</p> - -<p>17. I believe that if I am myself I am original. -My life is different from the life of any one else. -Manufacturing startling or spectacular originality is -impossible. There is only one theme at bottom of -all stories and that is Life. It is only the way I -look at it which you do not know.</p> - -<p>18. Finally I believe that each artist after all -works in his own way. My way may be as good<span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">[136]</span> -as the ways of other writers and will surely suit -my moods and my thoughts better. Each of us in -his own way merely tries to state and to clarify the -tragedy and comedy, the ugliness and the beauty of -the things he knows and lives and feels.</p> - -<p>19. The short story is but another medium for -the expression of my reaction to the business of living. -I refuse to be a clown entertaining the gallery.</p> - -<p>20. If I depart from this credo and write what -commercial policy may dictate rather than my artistic -self I shall not be afraid to acknowledge the inferior -character of the product rather than label it -as literature. My conscience is no coward, even in -defeat.</p> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">The End</span></p> - -<hr class="chap x-ebookmaker-drop" /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">[137]</span> -<h2 class="nobreak" id="INDEX">INDEX</h2> -</div> - -<ul> -<li>Addison, Joseph, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li>Ade, George, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Admirable Crichton, The</i>, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li> - -<li>Aeschylus, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>.</li> - -<li><i>American Magazine, The</i>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li>Anderson, Sherwood, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, -<a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>; - <i>The Other Woman</i>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Atheist’s Mass, An</i>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Balzac, Honoré, de, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>; - <i>An Atheist’s Mass</i>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li> - -<li>Barnes, Djuna, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li>Barrie, J. M., <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li> - -<li>Bates, Arlo, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Beyond the Horizon</i>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li>Bierce, Ambrose, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li>Brandes, Georg, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.</li> - -<li>Brooks, Van Wyck, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.</li> - -<li>Brown, Alice, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li>Butler, Ellis Parker, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Cabell, James Branch, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>; - <i>The Wedding Jest</i>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li>Clay, Bertha M., <a href="#Page_79">79</a>.</li> - -<li>Chambers, Robert W., <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li>Chatterton, Thomas, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li>Chekhov, Anton, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>; - <i>Ward No. 6</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Chester, George Randolph, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Chwang-Tse, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> - -<li>Cohen, Octavus Roy, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li>Conrad, Joseph, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>; - <i>Youth</i>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.</li> - -<li>Crane, Frank, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">D’Annunzio, Gabrielle, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li> - -<li>Davis, Richard Harding, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Daudet, Alphonse, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Dial, The</i>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li>Dickens, Charles, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.</li> - -<li>Dostoyevski, Fyodor, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li>Dreiser, Theodore, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>, <a href="#Page_79">79</a>, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>; - <i>The Lost Phoebe</i>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Edwards, Jonathan, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li> - -<li>Emerson, Ralph Waldo, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.</li> - -<li>Esenwein, J. Berg, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>; - <i>Writing the Photoplay</i>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_90">90</a>; - <i>Writing the Short Story</i>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>Fall of the House of Usher, The</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li>Flaubert, Gustave, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>; - <i>Madame Bovary</i>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Four Million, The</i>, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>.</li> - -<li>Frank, Waldo, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li>Freeman, Mary E. Wilkins, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>; - <i>The Revolt of Mother</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Gerould, Katharine Fullerton, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li> - -<li>Glaspell, Susan, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li>Gorki, Maxim, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>; - <i>Her Lover</i>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li>Gourmont, Remy de, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>; - <i>Le Probleme du Style</i>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">[138]</span></li> - -<li>Griffith, David Wark, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Hall, Holworthy, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li>Hamsun, Knut, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li>Hardy, Thomas, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Harper’s Magazine</i>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li>Harte, Bret, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li> - -<li>Hawthorne, Nathaniel, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.</li> - -<li>Hearn, Lafcadio, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> - -<li>Hecht, Ben, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Her Lover</i>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li>Hergesheimer, Joseph, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>; - <i>Java Head</i>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> - -<li>Howells, William Dean, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>; - <i>Great Modern American Stories</i>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li>Hugo, Victor, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Hungry Hearts</i>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li>Hurst, Fannie, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>In the Moonlight</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li>Irving, Washington, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">James, Henry, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Java Head</i>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> - -<li>Jessup, Alexander, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li> - -<li><i>John Ferguson</i>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li>Johnston, William, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Kelland, Clarence Budington, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Kipling, Rudyard, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>; - <i>Without Benefit of Clergy</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Kling, Joseph, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> - -<li>Kuprin, Ivan, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Lawrence, D. H., <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li> - -<li>Leeds, Arthur, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.</li> - -<li>Lewisohn, Ludwig, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Literary Digest</i>, The, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Little Review, The</i>, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>.</li> - -<li>London, Jack, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>; - <i>Martin Eden</i>, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Lost Phoebe, The</i>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">McCardell, Roy L., <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.</li> - -<li>Macdonald, George, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Madame Bovary</i>, <a href="#Page_86">86</a>.</li> - -<li>Maeterlink, Maurice, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li> - -<li>Malthus, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li>Marden, Orison Swett, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Markheim</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Martin Eden</i>, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li>Masefield, John, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li>Mason, Walt, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li>Mather, Cotton, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>.</li> - -<li>Matthews, Brander, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Maupassant, Guy de, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>; - <i>Solitude</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>; - <i>In the Moonlight</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li>Mencken, H. L., <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>Nation, The</i>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>, <a href="#Page_128">128</a>.</li> - -<li><i>New Success, The</i>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">O’Brien, Edward J., <a href="#Page_15">15</a>; - <i>Best Short Stories of 1920</i>, <a href="#Page_81">81</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>; - <i>Best Short Stories of 1919</i>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li><a id="O_Henry"></a>O. Henry, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>; - <i>The Four Million</i>, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Our America</i>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Our Short Story Writers</i>, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>Pagan, The</i>, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Passing of King Arthur, The</i>, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li>Patee, Fred Lewis, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>.</li> - -<li><i>People’s Favorite Magazine</i>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>.</li> - -<li>Poe, Edgar Allan, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>; - <i>The Fall of the House of Usher</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li>Pollock, Channing, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> - -<li>Porter, William Sidney (See <a href="#O_Henry">“O. Henry”</a>).</li> - -<li><i>Probleme du Style, Le</i>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">[139]</span></li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>Revolt of Mother, The</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li>Rinehart, Mary Roberts, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Robbins, E. M., <a href="#Page_54">54</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Sandburg, Carl, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Sapho</i>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Saturday Evening Post, The</i>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Seven Arts, The</i>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>.</li> - -<li>Shakespeare, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Smart Set, The</i>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Solitude</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li>Spingarn, Joel Elias, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>.</li> - -<li>Steele, Richard, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li>Stevenson, Robert Louis, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>; - <i>Markheim</i>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Tagore, Rabindranath, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Tatler, The</i>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Times, The New York</i>, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Triumph of the Egg, The</i>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li> - -<li>Twain, Mark, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Van Doren, Carl, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>.</li> - -<li>Villon, François, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Walter, Eugene, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Ward No. 6</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Warner, Charles Dudley, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Wedding Jest, The</i>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li>Wells, H. G., <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li> - -<li>Whitman, Walt, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li> - -<li>Williams, Blanche Colton, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Winesburg, Ohio</i>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Without Benefit of Clergy</i>, <a href="#Page_33">33</a>.</li> - -<li>Witwer, H. C., <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Writer’s Monthly, The</i>, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Writing the Photoplay</i>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_90">90</a>.</li> - -<li><i>Writing the Short Story</i>, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Yezierska, Anzia, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>; - <i>Hungry Hearts</i>, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst"><i>Youth</i>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.</li> - -<li class="ifrst">Zola, Emile, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li> - -</ul> - -<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_1" href="#FNanchor_1" class="label">[1]</a> <i>Our America</i>, by Waldo Frank.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_2" href="#FNanchor_2" class="label">[2]</a> <i>Our Short Story Writers</i>, by Blanche Colton Williams, PH.D.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_3" href="#FNanchor_3" class="label">[3]</a> <i>The Case of “John Hawthorne,”</i> Ludwig Lewisohn, <i>The -Nation</i>, February 16, 1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_4" href="#FNanchor_4" class="label">[4]</a> Joseph Kling, editor of <i>The Pagan</i>, in symposium appended to -“The Best College Short stories.” The Stratford Company.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_5" href="#FNanchor_5" class="label">[5]</a> Both of these stories are to be found in William Dean Howells’ -“Great Modern American Stories: An Anthology.” Boni & -Liveright.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_6" href="#FNanchor_6" class="label">[6]</a> Houghton, Mifflin Co.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_7" href="#FNanchor_7" class="label">[7]</a> The Bookman, February 1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_8" href="#FNanchor_8" class="label">[8]</a> See “Best Russian Short Stories,” Modern Library.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_9" href="#FNanchor_9" class="label">[9]</a> “Our Short Story Writers.” Moffat, Yard and Company.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_10" href="#FNanchor_10" class="label">[10]</a> Fred Lewis Patee in <i>The Cambridge History of American Literature</i>, -Vol. II, p. 394. I find that Mr. Alexander Jessup has -drawn on the same source on O. Henry in his Introduction to -“The Best American Humorous Stories,” Modern Library.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_11" href="#FNanchor_11" class="label">[11]</a> Introduction to Ibsen’s “Master Builder, Etc.,” Modern Library.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_12" href="#FNanchor_12" class="label">[12]</a> <i>Photoplay Magazine</i>, August, 1919.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_13" href="#FNanchor_13" class="label">[13]</a> E. M. Robbins, in the 1919 Year Book issued by <i>Camera</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_14" href="#FNanchor_14" class="label">[14]</a> Arthur Leeds in <i>The Writer’s Monthly</i>, April, 1919.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_15" href="#FNanchor_15" class="label">[15]</a> Arthur Leeds in <i>The Writer’s Monthly</i>, May, 1920.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_16" href="#FNanchor_16" class="label">[16]</a> <i>Writing the Photoplay</i>, Esenwein and Leeds.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_17" href="#FNanchor_17" class="label">[17]</a> <i>Ibid.</i></p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_18" href="#FNanchor_18" class="label">[18]</a> Dr. Frank Crane to the Literary Novice, An Interview. -<i>Writer’s Monthly</i>, January, 1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_19" href="#FNanchor_19" class="label">[19]</a> <i>Letters and Leadership.</i></p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_20" href="#FNanchor_20" class="label">[20]</a> <i>Little Review</i>, May-June, 1920. Also included in E. J. O’Brien’s -“Best Short Stories of 1920,” Small, Maynard & Company, and in -Anderson’s “The Triumph of the Egg.” B. W. Huebsch.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_21" href="#FNanchor_21" class="label">[21]</a> Joel Elias Spingarn, “The Seven Arts and The Seven Confusions,” -<i>Seven Arts</i>, March, 1917.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_22" href="#FNanchor_22" class="label">[22]</a> George Brandes, <i>On Reading</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_23" href="#FNanchor_23" class="label">[23]</a> “All Else Will Pass,” <i>People’s Favorite Magazine</i>, January, -1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_24" href="#FNanchor_24" class="label">[24]</a> <i>Writing the Photoplay</i>, Esenwein & Leeds.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_25" href="#FNanchor_25" class="label">[25]</a> <i>Literary Digest</i>, May 14, 1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_26" href="#FNanchor_26" class="label">[26]</a> “Booth Tarkington,” <i>The Nation</i>, February 9, 1921.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_27" href="#FNanchor_27" class="label">[27]</a> From Ludwig Lewisohn’s translation in “A Modern Book of -Criticism.” Boni & Liveright.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_28" href="#FNanchor_28" class="label">[28]</a> “The Victory,” in <i>Hungry Stones and Other Stories</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_29" href="#FNanchor_29" class="label">[29]</a> <i>Writing the Short Story</i>, by J. Berg Esenwein, A.M., Lit.D.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_30" href="#FNanchor_30" class="label">[30]</a> Editorial Reviewer in <i>The Nation</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_31" href="#FNanchor_31" class="label">[31]</a> Sherwood Anderson in an interview for Brentano’s <i>Book Chat</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_32" href="#FNanchor_32" class="label">[32]</a> Sherwood Anderson advertising an exhibition of his paintings -in the <i>Little Review</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a id="Footnote_33" href="#FNanchor_33" class="label">[33]</a> Guy de Maupassant, in his preface to <i>Pierre et Jean</i>.</p> - -</div> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="transnote"><h3><a id="Corrections"></a>Corrections</h3> -<p>The first line indicates the original, the second the correction.</p> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_1">1</a></p> - - <ul><li>There as so many stories afloat</li> - <li>There <span class="u">are</span> so many stories afloat</li></ul> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_105">105</a></p> - -<ul><li>where others have made scanty half-millons</li> - -<li>where others have made scanty <span class="u">half-millions</span></li></ul> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_124">124</a></p> - -<ul> -<li>it -will captivate and thrill; ruffle annd soothe;</li> - -<li>it -will captivate and thrill; ruffle <span class="u">and</span> soothe;</li> -</ul> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_126">126</a></p> - -<ul> -<li>and accepted intelligent advice of one kind or -another—from eniment</li> - -<li>and accepted intelligent advice of one kind or -another—from <span class="u">eminent</span></li> -</ul> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_133">133</a></p> - -<ul> -<li>Truth and spontaniety are more to me than commercial artifice and success.</li> - -<li>Truth and <span class="u">spontaneity</span> are more to me than commercial artifice and success.</li> -</ul> - -<p>p. <a href="#Page_134">134</a></p> - -<ul> -<li>I have no fear of displeasing ony one,</li> - -<li>I have no fear of displeasing <span class="u">any one</span>,</li> -</ul> - -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHORT STORY-WRITING: AN ART OR A TRADE? ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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