Drama: Its Law and Its Technique Part 1 Ch 5

CHAPTER V – THE NATURE AND SOURCES OF COMIC EFFECT

Perhaps nothing in the province of literary forms is so baffling as comedy. Considered objectively, as an art-product, it trenches on the realm of the grotesque, confessedly one of the most difficult problems of aesthetics, while in its subjective aspect it requires an analysis of our intellectual processes which has not yet been satisfactorily given us by psychologists. Moreover, in considering concrete literary examples of comedy we are constantly checked by the conviction that the perception of what is comic is something very unstable, subject to change with process of time, and showing wide divergence among different classes of society living at the same time. This is, of course, partly true also of our perception of the tragic, but by no means to the same extent. For tragedy, as we have seen, deals with phases of human nature which are relatively eternal and unchanging. We cannot, of course, affirm that our perception of the tragic in the Oedipus is exactly the same as was that of Sophocles’ contemporaries; but certainly time has made far less difference here than it has in the understanding and appreciation of Aristophanes, and this quite aside from the inevitable obscurity of the comic poet’s political allusions. Apparently, the feelings to which tragedy appeals attained a high degree of development at an earlier time than did those to which comedy appeals, and they have therefore undergone less change.

Especially in the last few centuries has the comic sense been undergoing a modification intimately connected with the development of that group of feelings which may be roughly classed as the philanthropic. At the end of the sixteenth century, the sweetest-natured gentleman of his age could, without argument, class physical deformity among the legitimate sources of laughter. [1] To-day such a sentiment would at once stamp the holder of it as lacking in fine feeling and sympathetic instincts. It has only recently occurred to Shakespeare students that many of his scenes which to us are tragic or pathetic were perhaps comic or partly comic to his audience, and, right or wrong in the given instances, the suggestion is extremely interesting as a recognition of the instability of the comic sense, and as a step toward the study of its evolution. [2]

[1 Sidney, Defense of Poesy, ed. Cook, p. 51.]

[2 Cf. John Corbin, The Elizabethan Hamlet, and Barrett Wendell, William Shakespeare.]

Such a study is here inadmissible; all we can do is to recognize that the problem exists, and admit that what is to be said in this chapter must necessarily be subject to modification when the subject shall have been worked out further.

It is generally agreed that the sense of the comic arises from a perception of incongruity. The incongruity may be physical or spiritual, or both; it may be perceptual or conceptual, or both; it may exist in space or in time, or in both; and, according as it is one or another of these, there results one or another variety of comic effect. It may be helpful to make a rough scheme of these classes of comic effects, always remembering that any such scheme can only approximate completeness and only suggest truth.

A. The incongruity is purely conceptual, as in the various forms of wit. Here we may class puns, double meanings, irony, hyperbole, etc. An example is the well-known question, addressed to a servant carrying a roasted hare, “Is that your own hare or a wig?”

B. The incongruity is perceptual as well as conceptual.

I. It is based on a perception of successive events. The source of the comic effect may be stated in general terms as the contrast between expectation and fulfilment. A simple example of this is the case of a man who goes to sit down in a chair, the chair is drawn away, he sits on the floor. Such an occurrence is almost certain to raise a laugh, and the comic in our modern variety show is largely of this character.

In comedy of a higher type, the cases are less simple, but the principle is the same. The occurrences are partly or wholly in the realm of the intellectual or social, rather than the physical life. Examples of this are the relations between Rosalind and Orlando in As You Like It, and the development of the main plots of any of Plautus’ or Terence’s comedies. [1] These last, however, contain much of the simpler comic, of the variety-show type; so also does Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors. The case in As You Like It, on the other hand, affiliates with the next group. Indeed, nearly all comedy of intrigue, though its main plot may be reduced to this type, involves some character-treatment, and must therefore be referred in part to the following group.

[1 Cf. infra, pp. 139 ff.]

II. The incongruity is based on a perception of appearances, simultaneous rather than successive. An example is the effect produced by the juxtaposition of a very tall and a very short man, or a very fat and a very thin man. The case is a good one to take, because it is so easily analyzable. The two members of the comparison are here supplied to perception, while a third element – the conception of the normal man – exists in the mind of the percipient as the standard from which both deviate. That this conceptual norm must exist, and must be a norm common to both members of the comparison presented, is shown by the fact that the contrast between a tall man and a child is usually not funny to us, because we apply different standards to the two; whereas, if the child attempts to take on a man’s ways, he brings upon himself the application of the man’s standard, and gets laughed at. Similarly, we laugh when a man adopts a child’s manner. Again, the sight of a big tree and a small one side by side is not usually funny, because we have no definitely established standard of size for trees in general. The examples might be multiplied indefinitely, showing the necessity for a common standard, and a definite one.

Starting from these simple cases, we find comic effects ranging all the way up to those of very great complexity. The cases of actual physical deformity, of drunkenness, of the milder forms of insanity, all of which have ceased to be funny to many people, still are highly comic to many, and must be classed here; also instances like the use made of Falstaff’s huge size, in King Henry IV, or of Ursula’s in Bartholomew Fair. Our modern comic stage has much of this sort of thing. More complex, but essentially akin, are the cases where the emphasis is laid upon eccentricities of character. The standard applied may be a moral one, as often in Jonson, or an intellectual one, as perhaps in the case of Osric or Polonius in Hamlet, or a social one, as in many of Molière’s plays. Here we must class all the so-called “Comedy of Humors.” Here belong all the effects to which Meredith has exclusively applied the term “Comedy,” his standard of reference being the standard of common sense of the well-trained social man considered primarily as in society. [1]

[1 Cf. George Meredith, An Essay on Comedy.]

C. There appears to be yet another source of comic effect, which is, however, fortunately growing less and less important. That, namely, which arises from the mere sight of pain, especially pain involving violent movement. To take, as usual, a simple instance, the sight of a man getting a beating is apt to appear funny to some people, even to-day, and any one who reads Aristophanes and Plautus and Terence, or even the Elizabethan and pre-Elizabethan drama, is almost forced to conclude that beatings were esteemed funny per se. Of course the comic effect in these cases may often be interpreted as lying not in the beating qua beating, but in the beating qua surprise, as, for instance, in the Comedy of Errors, IV, 4, where Dromio enters, with the rope’s end his master had sent him for, and, instead of thanks, gets a taste of it himself. But, placing the most charitable construction on such instances, we are still forced to suspect that, in the comic incident as in case of roast pig, the beating may have helped to “impart a gusto.” And this suspicion is strengthened if we note that in all comic surprise the surprise is almost always somewhat disagreeable for the person at whom we laugh, which only means that such comic denouements are, so to speak, beatings in disguise. Perhaps, then, Hobbes was right, at least in his estimate of the natural man, when he calls the comic sense “a sudden glory arising from some sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves by comparison with the inferiority of others, or with our own formerly.”

Leaving out of account this last group, which is partly provided for in group B, we have two main classes of comic effects, of which the second falls into two parts, according as the contrasts occur; simultaneously or successively, and so have to do respectively with plot and with character. But of course, though these groups are separable in thought, they are not so in experience, and the scheme just given makes, we must repeat, no claim to subtlety of discrimination. For in dealing with anything so shifting and elusive as the comic sense, any schematic statement imposing, as it does, hard and fast limits where no such really exist, must of necessity be inadequate and partly false. But it is nevertheless useful if it be taken as merely indicating the main lines of comic effect. It will be found that most literary comedy can be easily put in one or another or in several of the above categories.

The first division, A, may be disregarded in this discussion, since it is only incidental in the drama. Group B, I and II are essential, as they concern the treatment of life in its two aspects: character (physical or spiritual) and plot. For it is with these that the drama essentially deals.

It is evident that all the cases suggested in the scheme just given have certain things in common; they imply a certain attitude on the part of the percipient quite different from the serious or tragic attitude. Every case makes an appeal to the intellect primarily, and to the emotions only secondarily, if at all. The very word “incongruity” implies a process of comparison, which implies the reference to some standard or norm. A fat man is funny, not in virtue of his fatness per se, but because most men are not fat. One may ask, “But why is that funny?” which is merely to ask why any incongruity is comic. There is as yet no answer, any more than there is to the question why laughter rather than any other bodily contortion should be the physical expression of amusement. We must take these as ultimate facts, and leave their further explanation to the physiological psychologists.

To return, the whole matter is seen to be dependent on perception of relations and the assumption of a standard, of reference.

But further, the incongruity will be perceived as comic only if the attention be held closely to the particular contrast to be made. If it is allowed to wander, to take into consideration other aspects of the subject presented, the sense of the comic may give place to some other feeling. The appeal has thus far been to the intellect merely, and to the intellect working along a narrow and definitely prescribed line. But if the emotions are called in, or if the mind breaks over the prescribed limits of the treatment, the comic incongruity may be forgotten in more serious thoughts. If, for instance, after smiling at the sight of our very tall man walking beside our very short one, we approach them, and suddenly perceive that the short man is a cripple and deformed, the smile vanishes. Why? Because a whole set of feelings are called into activity of such a nature and strength as quite to overwhelm the intellectual perception of contrast. We perceive the contrast, indeed, all the more vividly, but our thought dwells not on the contrast per se, intellectually considered, but on what it involves to the cripple himself. Our emotions are aroused, our sympathy is evoked.

Thus it may be said that the perception of the comic has in it something arbitrary and limited. It requires a point of view which shall cut off from the mental vision the real issues of life and its vital substance, – the emotions and susceptibilities that make it subject to pleasure or pain. If the view be changed, so as to include these, the comic usually vanishes. [1] The distinction is one of treatment, of attitude, not of original material, and this is why the same material may be either comic or tragic according to its treatment – why even the same treatment may appear to us comic or tragic according as we fix our attention upon one or another aspect of it; for this reason two people may watch the same occurrence, and one may smile and the other be saddened by it.

[1 But cf. infra, p. 65-66.]

Take as further illustration an instance from life and one from literature:

A boy stands convulsed with laughter as he watches the wild contortions of two cats whose tails have been wired together; another boy, too small to interfere, may be suffering actual pain at the same sight. What is the difference? In a sense, both boys are right, for, though they are looking at the same occurrence, what they see is not the same: the thing the big boy sees is funny; the thing the little boy sees is painful. The little boy feels the pain of the tightly wound wire as it cuts into the animals’ flesh, he feels the frenzy of the helpless creatures, he resents the brute strength that can willingly cause such tortures. The big boy, on the other hand, simply does not see or feel anything of all this: he sees merely the contortions of the animals, their total failure to comprehend the real cause of their difficulty, and the inadequacy of the means they take to meet it. At the present time society, on the whole, stands with the small boy and condemns the big one; three centuries ago it would have done precisely the reverse; and each position is intellectually explicable though to us only one seems morally justifiable.

Take now an instance from literature:

In Lear the subject-matter is the treatment of an old, helpless father by his daughters, and it is so handled as to be one of the most terrible tragedies ever written. But is this the only possible treatment? Turn to Aristophanes, and find in The Clouds precisely the same theme made the basis of a comedy – of comedy, indeed, to appreciate which we must divest ourselves of some modern preconceptions, but genuine comedy nevertheless, and not cruel, simply because it is out of the realm of the emotions entirely.

There is, then, this fundamental difference between tragedy and comedy: a difference in point of view – a difference not in the thing as perceived by the eye, but in the thing as conceived by the mind. We may say that tragedy interprets life by emphasizing its vital realities; comedy reconstructs it by emphasizing certain aspects of it, selected so as to make good contrasts, striking incongruities. Each is eminently selective, but the principle of selection is different. And the comic standpoint may be assumed toward almost any subject: it may be momentary, and we have its light playing over the situation for an instant and then going out, as when Hamlet rouses himself from his bitter melancholy to make sport of Polonius or Osric; or it may be pervasive, affecting the entire conception of life as represented by the artist, as in Shakespeare’s early comedies (Love’s Labour’s Lost, Comedy of Errors) and Jonson’s typical ones; or it may single out certain characters for comic treatment in the midst of an otherwise serious presentation of a subject, as in Shakespeare’s later comedies. And according as it is more or less pervasive do we get all the gradations between unmixed comedy or pure farce at the one extreme and the tragedy with comic lights at the other.

To return now to our classification of comic effects. It has thus far been based on differences in subject-matter, and we have distinguished the comedy whose main point lies in the incongruities of men’s character, from the comedy which emphasizes mainly the incongruities in the things that happen to men. And if The Comedy of Errors is a purer example of the second class than King Henry IV is of the first, this is because, dramatically, character can scarcely be presented save through action, and Aristotle’s assertion – difficult to explain as it stands – is unquestionably true if we change its application and read: “Without action there cannot be a comedy; there may be without character.” [1]

[1 Cf. Poetics, VI, “Without action there cannot be a tragedy; there may be without character.”]

But in the group of character comedies there is another basis of distinction. For incongruity of character implies – it springs from – imperfection of character. If a man’s character were in perfect poise, if it were absolutely symmetrical, it would not be comic. Comedy, then, is really based on imperfections in character, but considered from the comic, not the tragic standpoint.

Now it is evident that one may view these imperfections in one of several ways: one may simply enjoy them as such, without forming a judgment of the moral or intellectual level of the person in whom they are manifested. Or one may, without losing sight of the comic, regard the person with sympathy, or even love. Or one may, consciously or unconsciously, make a judgment, and there is added to our perception of the comic, and modifying this perception, a feeling of superiority, moral or intellectual or both, while we may express this judgment in terms varying from the gentlest irony to the severest condemnation, according to our mood and the nature of the subject. This was the sort of comedy of which Sidney was speaking when he said, “The comedy is an imitation of the common errors of our life, which he representeth in the most ridiculous and scornful sort that may be, so as it is impossible that any beholder can be content to be such a one.” [1] The significant thing here is the use of the two words “scornful” and “ridiculous.” “Ridiculous” carries with it a notion of superiority on the part of the percipient which is not so palpably implied in other words for the comic; “scornful” still further emphasizes this, leaving out the notion of the comic altogether; and the concluding phrase of the passage makes the writer’s standpoint yet clearer.

[1 The Defense of Poesy, p. 28.]

Such a passage, especially coming from Sidney, is highly significant. What he would have said if he had lived to see the Shakespearean comedy we can only surmise. Perhaps he might then have seen the possibility of anothher kind of comic perception, wherein we laugh at the folly and love the fool. But, as it stands, the passage fairly represents the type of comedy we have termed judicial.

Jonson’s is a stronger statement of the same view:

 “But, with an armed, and resolved hand,
  I’ll strip the ragged follies of the time
  Naked as at their birth...
  ... and with a whip of steel,
  Print wounding lashes in their iron ribs.
  .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .
 “... Well, I will scourge those apes,
  And to these courteous eyes oppose a mirror,
  As large as is the stage whereon we act;
  Where they shall see the time’s deformity
  Anatomized in every nerve and sinew.
                     ... my strict hand
  Was made to seize on vice...” [1]

[1 Every Man out of His Humour; Induction.]

And Meredith’s description of Molière’s comedy gives us only another aspect of this kind of comedy:

“Never did man wield so shrieking a scourge upon vice, but his consummate self-mastery is not shaken while administering it. Tartuffe and Harpagon, in fact, are each made to whip himself and his class, the false pietists, and the insanely covetous. Molière has only set them in motion. He strips Folly to the skin, displays the imposture of the creature, and is content to offer her better clothing... The source of his wit is clear reason: it is a fountain of that soil; and it springs to vindicate reason, common sense, rightness and justice.” [1]

[1 Meredith: An Essay on Comedy, pp. 27, 28.]

These two attitudes, the non-judicial and the judicial, though of course neither one is ever adopted with perfect consistency by any given writer, make a convenient basis for distinguishing the two main tendencies of comedy. If we seek for literary types, we shall find the one predominating in Shakespeare, Dickens, George Eliot; the other predominating in Jonson, Molière, Thackeray, Meredith; while Addison and Goldsmith are on the border line between.

We have called the second sort satiric comedy, because its tendency is toward satire. This will be apparent if we make a mental survey of the two fields of comedy and satire, and see how difficult it is at some points to distinguish them. Making Shakespeare one end of the scale, and Juvenal the other, we find next Shakespeare, but with satiric qualities, Addison and Thackeray; close to Juvenal, but with comic qualities, Swift, with Pope and Dryden as subordinate types; between these would come Jonson and Molière, while Aristophanes verges rather on satire, and Rabelais rather on comedy, though a rigid classification of either of these last is beyond possibility.

On the other hand, the pure comedy shades off into other forms. It is, we have said, non-judicial, but one of the reasons why it is non-judicial is because it is sympathetic. Now we have seen that keen sympathy is usually incompatible with comic perception. That it was inevitably and invariably incompatible we expressly did not affirm. For here, as in the case of satiric comedy, there is no hard and fast line drawn, but the two things may shade off the one into the other. We may have the purely comic, where the sympathies, in this sense, are not invoked, as in the Launce episodes of The Two Gentlemen of Verona; or as in Sir John Falstaff, – the pure comic preponderating, but enough sympathy so that transition to the pathetic is possible, as hinted in the scene of Falstaff’s rebuff at the hands of the young king, and the account of his death. [1] Accentuate the sympathy farther, retaining the comic, and you get Cervantes’ comedy; accentuate it still farther and you get the Fool in Lear.

[1 King Henry IV, Part II, Act V, Scene 5, King Henry V, Act II, Scenes 2 and 3. Probably the first of these Scenes was intended by Shakespeare to be comic.]

Thus we find that the comic sense tends to vary in one of these two directions, – toward the pathetic or even the tragic on the one hand, and toward the satiric on the other. And it is evident that in the case of comedians like Jonson and Molière, who stand part way on the road toward satire, any discussion which does not take into account the satiric as well as the comic aspect must necessarily be inadequate.

One more quality of comedy must be mentioned here, though its purport will be more fully shown in the chapter on comic plot-structure. It is this: comedy, from the arbitrariness, the narrow limitation of its view, leaves out much of life; moreover, the things it leaves out are those things that we are accustomed to call the serious realities of life, – the realities of pain and death, and the inexorable sway of law. Hence, comedy is not bound, as is tragedy, to base itself on law; it may make a much freer use of what we call chance; the events and people with which it deals may, if we may use a figure, all be largely external. As an actual fact, comedy does do this, and compared with tragedy, the emphasis on causality, on law, is slight.

Summing up: we have seen that comic effects have a common basis in incongruity, contrast; that the incongruity may lie principally in the realm of events, and we have comic intrigue, or in the realm of appearances, and we have comic character; while usually both these are found in conjunction, but with preponderating emphasis on one or the other, which gives us farce or intrigue comedy on the one hand and character comedy on the other. We have seen, too, that comedy differs from tragedy not so much in subject-matter as in point of view and treatment. Finally, we have noted that comedy itself varies according to the attitude of the author or the percipient, tending, where it becomes judicial, toward satire; where it becomes sympathetic, toward pathos and tragedy.

Drama: Its Law and Its Technique Part 1 Ch 4

CHAPTER IV – THE NATURE AND SOURCES OF TRAGIC EFFECT

The word “tragic,” as commonly used, denotes anything sad, especially something having the qualities of suddenness and finality. It is scarcely distinguished from the pathetic, and, though when the two words are brought together a difference is felt, it is a difference rather of intensity than of quality. But for our purposes the word must be interpreted more narrowly, to mean the kind of effect produced by the sight of a losing struggle carried on between a strong but imperfect individuality and the overpowering forces of life. This will do as a rough beginning, as a trial definition, to be corroborated or modified as it is applied to those tragedies which are by universal consent held to be among the greatest. Choosing almost at random, let us take for this purpose the tragedy Macbeth, the tragedy Othello, and the tragedies whose centre of interest is the figure of Orestes.

In Macbeth we have a double protagonist, for a treatment of Lady Macbeth as subordinate involves one in great difficulties. We have here a man in whom are mingled great strength and great weakness: he is a brave and able soldier, but is incapable of prolonged and consistent effort; his thinking is superficial and his morality is therefore not vital and durable; a man of generous and kindly impulses, but open to influence either for good or evil if another stronger and steadier force be brought to bear upon him. Such a force is found in Lady Macbeth. Her mind is cool and steady, and her effectiveness in carrying out any policy she may take up, whether that policy be good or bad, is therefore greater than his could ever be. The occurrence of favorable opportunity, and her ambition for her husband determine her toward evil. Macbeth, morally unsound but wavering in his policy, is upheld by his wife, and together they enter upon the series of acts which end in the ruin of both. The tragic effects are found in their struggles to do that which is impossible to escape the consequences of their own acts.

Othello presents, stated briefly, a struggle between two natures: the one impulsive, passionate, generous, endowed with tremendous power to love and hate, but not well poised, without controlling judgment; the other cold, intellectually agile, self-sufficient and self-controlled, able to use himself and others as tools with a skill founded in an accurate though limited understanding of human motives. In this struggle, Othello’s weakness brings about his fall, but Iago’s success is not complete because his understanding is thus limited – because the world is not, after all, wholly moved by the motives which he understands and counts upon. Each falls a victim to the laws of society which are based in human nature.

In Orestes we have the spectacle of a man who, through no fault of his own, is placed in a position where he must choose between two evils, and, whichever he chooses, he will be contravening some of the most sacred laws of religion and of nature. He chooses, and bears the retribution which his act, though necessary, necessarily involved.

In these instances we find certain constant elements which had been already implied in our trial definition. There is always a struggle, there is the fighter, and there is the opposing force. Let us examine these elements.

And first, the fighter. Our definition said, a strong but imperfect individuality. It has already (chap. III) been suggested that the dramatic person must be vital and positive. Not that he must necessarily act positively; the colorlessness of much of Hamlet’s outer activity is quite different from that of his two friends, Rosenkranz and Guildenstern. It is not the result of forcelessness, but the resultant of conflicting forces within him. The hero must be imperfect, because, for one reason, a perfectly poised character is usually too nearly invulnerable for the opposing force to get a firm hold. Aristotle clearly saw this when he said that the hero must not be a perfectly good man, but, as we shall see, this provision has to be accepted with some reservations. [1] The deepest reason for it is found in the nature of the opposing force.

[1 Cf. infra, pp. 117 ff.]

For the best form of tragedy is found, according to Hegel, when the opposing force is closely united with the soul of the fighter himself – when it has effected a lodgment in the enemy’s trenches and fights from within as well as from without. Such is the case in Macbeth, such is Orestes’ case, such is the case in Othello, such is preeminently the case in Hamlet and in Wallenstein. The hero is, as it were, his own worst enemy. So that one is almost inclined to state categorically that the hero must be thus imperfect, because the tragic struggle must be within him in order to be truly tragic.

But tempting as it is to generalize from these supreme examples, we must be careful not to construct such a theory of the tragic as will exclude such plays as Antigone, and Romeo and Juliet. Here we have another class of effects which we cannot ignore, and in which the tragic element is certainly of a different kind from that found in the other group. We have, in each of these cases, a tragic hero or heroes whose struggle is with outer circumstances, and whose fall is necessitated, not by inner weakness, but by the brute strength of external fact. Thus, Antigone is, so far as her tragic end is concerned, a perfect character. But a combination of circumstances suddenly arises, because of which she is forced to choose between conformity to a social or political law and obedience to a spiritual or religious law. Her brother’s corpse lies unburied outside her native city. Her king and uncle – having over her since her father’s death also a father’s authority – imperatively commands that the body shall not be buried. This command Antigone feels bound, by all the sacredness of family ties and religious custom, to contravene. She chooses to break the law of the state, and by the state she dies. The story of Orestes might, of course, be similarly interpreted, and thus brought within this group of tragedies.

It may indeed be said that such a death in such a cause is not defeat but triumph, and so it is, from one standpoint. But such a standpoint is not one from which we can judge drama with any practical helpfulness. It would involve us in endless subtleties, probably ending in the assertion that the only thing truly tragic is the moral ruin of a soul, – which would cut out nearly everything in drama except Macbeth and Browning’s A Soul‘s Tragedy, or at least would swing around the whole emphasis in the tragedies we know, transferring the interest from the so-called “heroes” to the so-called “villains,” who, having power only to “kill the body” of their victims, kill, in so doing, their own souls.

Evidently this will not do, and we must return to a simpler and perhaps a somewhat more external way of judging. Antigone may be spiritually a conqueror, – her death is surely amply avenged, – but considered simply as a woman, as a human being with but one earthly life to live, she is conquered. This, indeed, she herself recognizes when she answers the chorus, who have been trying to show her the heroic aspect of her fate:

“Chorus. But ‘tis great renown for a woman who hath perished that she should have shared the doom of the godlike, in her life, and afterward in death.

Antigone. Ah, I am mocked! In the name of our fathers’ gods, can ye not wait till I am gone, must ye taunt me to my face, O my city, and ye, her wealthy sons? Ah, fount of Dirce, and thou holy ground of Thebe whose chariots are many; ye, at least, will bear me witness, in what sort, unwept of friends, and by what laws I pass to the rock-closed prison of my strange tomb, ah me unhappy! who have no home on the earth or in the shades, no home with the living or with the dead... From what manner of parents did I take my miserable being! And to them I go thus, accursed, unwed, to share their home. Alas, my brother, ill-starred in thy marriage, in thy death thou hast undone my life!” [1]

[1 Antigone, trans. Jebb, pp. 155 ff.]

To change the instance: – the end of the prison-scene in Faust means that the girl has won for herself the great spiritual victory:

 “Marguerite. Gericht Gottes! Dir hab’ ich mich
       übergeben!
  Dein bin ich, Vater! Rette mich!
  Ihr Engel! Ihr heiligen Schaaren,
  Lagert euch umher, mich zu bewahren!
  Heinrich! Mir graut’s vor dir.

  Mephistopheles. Sie ist gerichtet!

  Stimme. [von oben] Ist gerettet!”

But her drama is none the less a tragedy, and while the “voice from above” proclaims her “saved,” Mephistopheles is, humanly speaking, entirely right in deeming her “lost.” The two judgments here thus opposed may be taken as representative of the two standards – the standard which judges a human life by itself, and sees in death an ultimate fact; and the standard which looks beyond and above to a different set of spiritual values, in which death is a comparatively unimportant element, or important only as it acts upon the hero’s nature as a motive. The second standard may or may not be the true one; the first seems the only practicable one to apply to art. For, as we have already said, the artist works with phenomena only; life has for him only what it seems to have for those who live it, and death for him is ultimate because it ends our known activity. [1]

[1 Cf. supra, pp. 32-34, and infra, pp. 88-90.]

Remembering, then, that there is another way of judging, we may once more return to our definition of tragedy: as a losing struggle wherein the opposing and victorious forces may lie either chiefly within the hero’s own nature, in which case we have a conflict which is chiefly spiritual – Hamlet, Orestes; or they may lie chiefly outside, in which case we have a struggle more or less external, the hero remaining unmoved – Antigone, Romeo, and Juliet; or it may be both internal and external – Othello, possibly Wallenstein. Of course in one sense it must always be both, for the spiritual forces of the inner struggle will always have some outward and material embodiment, the outer conflict will always have an answering inner phase. [1] Here, as always, it is a question of proportion, of relative emphasis, and there is no possibility of strict demarcations of classes.

[1 Cf. infra, pp. 129 ff.]

One other element there is which these all have in common, besides the necessity of there being a struggle and a losing one: the element, namely, of causality. Aristotle saw this clelirly and laid great emphasis upon it:

“Tragedy is an imitation ... of events terrible and pitiful. Such an effect is best produced when the events come on us by surprise; and the effect is heightened when, at the same time, they follow from one another. The tragic wonder will then be greater than if they happened of themselves or by accident; for even accidents are most striking when they have an air of design.” [ Poetics, IX.]

“These last [reversal of fortune and recognition] should arise from the internal structure of the plot, so that what follows should be the necessary or probable result of the preceding action. It makes all the difference whether one event is the consequence of another, or merely subsequent to it.” [ Ib., X.]

“It is therefore evident that the unravelling of the plot, no less than the complication, must arise out of the plot itself, it must not be brought about by the Deus ex Machina. Within the action there must be nothing irrational.” [ Ib., XV.]

That is to say, the opposing force must derive its power, not only really but evidently, from what has gone before. Aristotle even goes so far as to say that if the event be not really probable, it should at least, by a kind of sleight of hand, be made to seem so. [1] But, if such jugglery is necessary, it means weakness. The drama should be the place where we may see, more easily recognizable than in actual life, the universal operation and validity of irresistible law. Othello is not a great tragedy because a husband mistakenly kills his wife, but because he is seen to be, in so doing, the victim and the agent of absolute and remorseless law. Wallenstein is not a great tragedy because the general is assassinated, or even because he is a traitor, but because these things are seen to be the inevitable conclusion of the given series of events. The thing which we must be made to feel is, in Amiel’s phrase, “The fatality of the consequences which follow upon every human act, – the leading idea of dramatic art and the most tragic element of life.” [2]

[1 Poetics, XXIV.]

[2 Journal, 6th April, 1851.]

To take an opposite instance, the following is a true story of our Civil War: A young Confederate soldier had, after months of service, obtained leave to go home for a few weeks. His companions crowded around him, giving him messages to friends, and letters to be sent when he reached a safe district. As he was ready to start he turned back, with the words, “Guess I’ll have one more look at the Yanks,” and went out again to the intrenchments. He leaned forward on the ridge, raised his head above it, and a bullet from the Union ranks struck him. He fell forward, dead.

Such an event appeals to us with more than common force, by virtue of its grim irony. It is one of those accidents which Aristotle would have said have an air of design, but it is not available for tragedy – at least, not for the chief event of tragedy – because it is, after all, accident. It may, indeed, be said that nothing is accidental, everything is the result of unvarying law, and this is certainly true. But not all events bear upon them the recognizable stamp of this causality, and there are therefore in our experience a vast number of occurrences which go by the name of accidents. The dramatist may be able by his insight and power of presentation to take some of these occurrences out of this category. If he can, they are his to use. If he cannot, they are not fit material for tragedy; their appearance in drama is a sign of decay, it is one of the distinguishing characteristics of the “melodramatic.” If examples of this kind of abuse are wanted, they may be found in almost any of the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher.

Such an incident as that just given, if not strictly speaking tragic, is certainly pathetic, and we are now ready to return to the distinction, suggested at the beginning of the chapter, between these two classes of effects. That is pathetic which involves suffering, unmerited, or out of proportion to guilt, or at least considered without reference to the guilt of the sufferer. It implies a certain passivity on his part, or a resistance so manifestly inadequate as to amount to the same thing. Thus, the sufferings of animals under abuse are pathetic, the sufferings of sick people are so, so is much spiritual suffering which is recognized as inevitable and endured as such. Thus, Ophelia and Desdemona may be called pathetic, while Hamlet and Othello are tragic, and we might multiply examples indefinitely. This is perhaps the reason why children have never been used as tragic heroes. To themselves, their world is great and their emotions intense, and, suffering being a wholly subjective matter, their actual sufferings are doubtless often as great as those of adults. But the dramatist is concerned with act as well as feeling, with struggle as well as pain, and the child has not the command of himself and of the world to meet these requirements. Occasionally the treatment of children in literature, by some singular combination of good fortune and skill and sympathy, does approximate the tragic; it does this in Kipling’s remarkable story, The Drums of the Fore and Aft. But the means by which the author has attained this result, so far as they are discoverable, only go to prove the truth of the general rule. An interesting instance of its validity may be found in the three Theban plays of Sophocles. In the Oedipus Rex Antigone and Ismene are simply pathetic figures, used to enhance the effect of their father’s fall. In the Oedipus Coloneus Antigone is rising out of this passivity, but she is still in the main pathetic in this sense. In the Antigone she has become truly tragic, though retaining a certain pathetic tone, by virtue of the quietness of her resistance. [1]

[1 It is not meant to imply that the three plays were written in sequence or regarded as a trilogy. They were written at long intervals, and probably not in the order of the story, and were not performed together. Cf. Jebb’s introduction to his translation of Antigone, §§ 22, 23.]

It is, then, not enough that an incident be pathetic that the recital of it saddens us. It must not be merely

             “a tale of things
  Done long ago, and ill done,”

but must involve action and reaction, blow and counterblow, the conflict of forces.

It has become a commonplace of dramatic criticism to say that the Greek tragic differs from ours in that their tragic force was a resistless fate, while with us it springs from recognized antecedents, usually to be found in the voluntary acts of the hero himself. Thus Freytag says:

“The dramatic ideas and the dramatic actions of the Greeks dispensed with a rational world-order, dispensed, that is, with an interlinking of events that is completely accounted for by the conditions and the onesidedness of the characters represented. We are become freer men, we recognize on the stage no other fate than such as arises out of the essential nature of the hero himself.” [2]

[2 Die Technik des Dramas, p. 81. And cf. pp. 119-20.]

Such phrases are, however, apt to be misleading. Whatever be the difference in the form of statement, the underlying tragic motive in Oedipus, and in Lear or Hamlet or Othello, is really the same, namely, “the fatality of the consequences which follow upon every human act.”

It has been assumed that much of Ibsen’s work is in this respect Greek rather than modern. But even in Ghosts, where the idea of an overpowering fate is most prominent, this idea affords the tragic material only, and neither in Ibsen nor in Sophocles is the victim of this “fate” regarded, per se, as the tragic hero. In Ghosts the victim, Oswald, is not the hero at all – he is a passive sufferer under what the dramatist, mistakenly or not, represents as unalterable law. The real protagonist is Oswald’s mother, and the tragic effect is found in the spectacle of her heroic struggle against a power that she finally discovers to be unconquerable.

There is, as has been suggested, a type of tragedy which does not entirely conform to the principles we have been deducing. We have examples of it in Shakespeare’s Richard III, in Jonson’s Catiline and Sejanus, in Massinger’s The Roman Actor. In these cases the hero is an absolutely vicious character who holds his place as hero at all only by reason of high intellectual powers. The tragedy presents to us the spectacle of his downfall, it presents the vengeance taken by society upon one who has done violence to all its laws. It does not portray an inner struggle, it does not present a spiritual problem; it shows the means by which a moral monster is prevented from permanent enjoyment of the fruits of his vices and his crimes.

Such a theme can, it is evident, never be treated so as to attain the highest tragic effect. It may contain much pathos in the subordinate characters – it usually does contain this. When it is great at all its greatness is intellectual solely. It might be better to call this group satiric tragedies, with emphasis on the “satiric,” for it possesses the grim irony of satire and its judicial attitude, and thus affiliates with one group of satiric comedy. The differences between Richard III and Sejanus on the one hand, which are called tragedy, and Volpone on the other, which is called comedy, are superficial; their kinship is essential.

Thus far we have been considering the elements of the tragic in themselves, and, so far as is possible, apart from their effect on the spectator. Aristotle chose the other point of view and defined the tragic solely in terms of its effect. [1] The two elements of this effect he made pity and fear, with a third element which may be here disregarded because, despite the efforts of philosophers and commentators, it is still not quite clear what he meant, nor are we sure that his statement, if we do understand it, is true for us moderns. But pity and fear will be found to be readily convertible into the terms we have used. “Pity” corresponds to the suffering and the struggle, “fear” corresponds to the causality. For Aristotle elsewhere distinguishes pity from fear by saying that pity is caused by the perception of suffering which we do not think of as affecting ourselves; fear is caused by the perception of suffering which we realize may be ours. Now this last element is exactly what is involved in causality, it is the element of universal law, whose universality involves us in its sweep, and the perception of which produces, according to our mood, either an enlargement of spirit or a sense of oppression which is probably another name for Aristotle’s fear.

[1 Poetics, VI.]

Thus we may sum up the elements of tragic effect in three words: suffering, struggle, causality. Suffering alone is pathetic merely; struggle alone may be heroic merely (note the Heracles of Euripides’ Alkestis); causality alone gives us the rational merely: the union of the three produces the tragic.

Drama: Its Law and Its Technique Part 1 Ch 3

CHAPTER III – SERIOUSNESS – ΣΠΟΥΔΗ

“Tragedy,” said Aristotle, “is an imitation of an action that is serious.” The word he uses here, σπουδαίας, is explained by Butcher as uniting the two notions of grave and great; it has been paraphrased by Arnold in the expression “high and excellent seriousness,” and these phrases come as near as any to indicating a certain quality of greatness which we all recognize as indispensable to the serious drama.

To begin with, one must carefully guard oneself against the mistake of confusing greatness of subject with greatness of treatment. Only the second can produce greatness in the art-product, yet these two things have been, and still are, constantly confounded. Donne’s poems, we are told, are sublime because their theme is so. Milton’s Paradise Lost is greater than Virgil’s Aeneid by the whole difference in grandeur between the conceptions of the two poems, one dealing with the founding of Rome, the other with the fall of man from his first state. It is easy to see the absurdity of such judgments, taking them individually, and nearly as easy to fall into similar absurdities on one’s own account. The reason may be that there is in such notions a root of truth. For, if the subject does not make the poem, at least subject and poem have a common source, the one being chosen, the other created, by the poet; and it is quite probable that if a “sublime” subject genuinely appeals to a poet, he has in him elements of sublimity, although these may not be accompanied by the power to create a sublime poem.

And we must make another distinction, between the subject-matter as it exists apart from the artist in the actual world of experience, and the subject as recognized by the artist, recreated in his mind as his theme. Sometimes one of these is truly great when the other is not. Thus, a jealous man does not usually impress us as having any elements of greatness, yet Othello is great, because greatly conceived; querulous and impotent old age seems unpropitious for drama, as do the half-crazed murmurs of an old clown, yet Lear and his fool are among the greatest dramatic creations. Such greatness is due, not to the original subject-matter, but to the poet who, whatever his theme, views it so truly and deeply that he reaches its inner significance as human life – and it is in the depths of human life that greatness will be found, if found anywhere.

The necessity that tragedy and the serious drama shall possess an element of greatness or largeness – call it nobility, elevation, what you will – has always been recognized. The divergence has come when men have begun to say what they mean by this quality, and – which is much the same thing – how it is to be attained. Even Aristotle, when he begins to analyze methods, sounds, at first hearing, a little superficial. The hero must be, he says, “one who is highly renowned and prosperous, – a personage like Oedipus, Thyestes, and other illustrious men of such families.” [1] Now we are used to seeing tragic effects produced in the treatment of characters who are neither renowned nor of noble family. Yet, for his own time, Aristotle was right. For dramatic action means struggle, and struggle of the most intense kind; the dramatic agent must therefore possess, not only latent passion and potential energy, but opportunity which shall make this energy kinetic. Such opportunity came in the past chiefly to such men as by birth or fortune were placed in positions of power, who were forced to take part in affairs having large issues and demanding positive and individual activity. They had, as others did not have, opportunity for self-expression in action; they had greatness thrust upon them, while the average man of their times was lost in the corporate body. For, even in Greece, society had not yet wholly freed itself from the tradition of tribal solidarity and tribal responsibility, and the individual appears in half-relief, epic rather than dramatic, controlled by events rather than originating action. This the Greek dramatists felt, and it was one of the reasons why they sought their heroes in the rolls of kings and their actions in the annals of nations. They were right, and Aristotle merely stated, in his somewhat bare way, a generalization from their practice. What is wrong is the assumption made by later theorists and dramatic artists that, because the Greeks had found their tragic heroes among kings, therefore royalty was sufficient to constitute a tragic hero, and a great national issue was, as such, fit subject for a tragic action. Thus Racine, in Athalie, has chosen a crisis in Hebrew history. He has not, however, presented to us actions in themselves of great tragic import – or rather, he has not interpreted to us the tragic import of the actions which he presents. A vicious queen, who has won her throne by murder, retains it by force. By a successful coup d’état of the minority, she is deposed and put to death. This theme has historical importance; it lacks dramatic importance because the sources of the action are not rooted in the spiritual nature of the heroine or of any other of the actors. Yet two points in the action might have furnished a theme that would have been truly dramatic. One is the conflict between the queen’s ambitious lust of power and her impulse of love for the boy who proves her rival. Another is the conflict of impulses in the old general, Abner, whose instinctive patriotism bids him free his country from an oppressive and unrighteous rule, but whose military training enjoins him to render unquestioning obedience to his sovereign. Each of these themes is suggested in Racine’s drama, and as each suggestion occurs the reader awaits its further development, but awaits it in vain. The author evidently had in mind the historical importance of his action rather than its spiritual import.

[1 Poetics, XIII.]

Compare the way in which Shakespeare has treated a similar subject. Julius Caesar, like Athalie, is concerned with a crisis in a nation’s history, where a tyrant is overcome by a small but steadfast minority. But the tragic interest does not depend upon our knowledge that the fate of Rome hung upon the result of Brutus’ conspiracy. This fact, kept in the background, or used as a motive force in the half-prophetic consciousness of Brutus himself, does indeed enhance the appeal to our interest, but the nearer and stronger appeal is made through the individuality of the men Caesar, Antony, Brutus, Cassius, while the tragic theme is found in the spiritual experiences of Brutus, torn by a double and conflicting allegiance. Thus, in Brutus, Shakespeare has done exactly the thing that Racine missed doing, and Julius Caesar has in this respect a greatness that Athalie wholly lacks.

That the spiritual issue might have been made yet clearer may be acknowledged; it will certainly be recognized if we extend our field of comparison, and consider Browning’s use of a similar theme in Strafford. As in Athalie, as in Julius Caesar, there is in Strafford the tyrant, the oppressed people crying for relief, the reluctant, sad-hearted leaders shrinking from the issue, yet forced to meet it. But here, as in Julius Caesar, the greatness of the interests involved does not constitute the tragedy, though it furnishes the occasion for it and makes for it a background of sombre grandeur. The tragic interest gathers about the three figures Pym, Charles, Strafford; it centres in the spiritual experiences of the great statesman who is forced by fate to do violence to one-half of himself in being true to the mandates of the other half. All the powers of the dramatist are exerted toward this one end – toward laying bare the inner life of the man, the mortal pain of a great soul forced to be untrue to itself. To say that Strafford is a greater drama than Julius Caesar would be at least venturesome; it would probably be a mistake, for there are many considerations to be taken into account in the final judgment of a drama. The three plays are here presented as a group to illustrate the way in which political eminence in the actor and national issues involved in the action may be used or abused by the dramatist. [1]

[1 The three, or more particularly the last two, would well repay study from other points of view. The characters and motiving of Caesar as compared with Charles, and of Brutus as compared with Strafford and Pym, the use made of historical background, the treatment of the subordinate characters, all these are subjects that could be so treated as to illuminate the questions of dramatic effect in general.]

It is apparent that a proper use of these elements, as subsidiary aids to dramatic effect, is entirely legitimate. It is equally apparent that they must be recognized as subsidiary only, that they must not be given first place as factors of this “greatness” which we have been discussing. The essential requirement is that the dramatic hero be free to express himself in action, that he be given scope first to develop and then to express his individuality; and material power, social and political eminence are valuable only because they furnish these things, and only when they do so. What is required lor great drama is not great political or religious or social issues as such, but the enlargement of soul and stress of passion that sometimes accompanies great issues. What is needed for the tragic hero is not the crowned head, but the royal nature. “Royal” by a figure only, for such a nature is not now necessarily found among monarchs; and kings, once singularly fit subjects for dramatic treatment, are becoming singularly unfit, The monarch, bound and shackled by constitutal provisions, loses his personality, though in his private capacity he may still keep his freedom. The very eminence that once gave scope to his individuality now tends to repress it, and, private individuality and official greatness being thus dissevered, the special dramatic meaning of this greatness is gone; there is no longer the identity expressed in the significant title, “Oedipus, King.”

On the other hand, this freedom and scope for individuality, no longer the concomitant of royalty as such, is in modern times often found in the status of the so-called “private” man. The “royal” nature that is developed by power and opportunity, and which in turn uses power and opportunity for its self-expression, may be found in a man whose eminence is social or political; it is even conceivable that a great tragic hero may be found in one who has no apparent “eminence” of any kind. Such a one, it may be said, is Beatrice Cenci, but the case is not clear enough to prove the point. Certainly our modern stage-drama, with its love of “middle-class” subjects, has not yet produced anything really great. On the other hand, it is significant that the greatest classic dramas – those of Shakespeare and of Sophocles, those of Schiller, Euripides, Corneille – all conform to this seemingly superficial rule of Aristotle, as do the greatest English dramas of this century, those of Shelley, of Tennyson, of Browning, and of Swinburne. The German “familiendrama” and the French society drama lack this element of greatness, or where they possess it they too will be found to be in conformity.

There is another consideration which might have motived Aristotle’s remark, though it probably did not do so. Dramatic action is not merely action as seen in the outer event, but action viewed in relation to its source in passionate emotion and in relation to its reactionary emotional effect. It is therefore necessary that we understand the spiritual states of the agent, and this is in the main brought about only through his own words. For the medium of the drama is self-expression by the actors, not description by the writer, and self-expression principally in words. But such power of self-expression implies in the agent a large degree of culture of a certain kind, as well as a certain bent of character; in general, men must reach rather a high level, intellectually, before they become sufficiently conscious of their own spiritual states to express them.

In the modern drama, owing to the increased complexity and subtlety of the dramatic motiving, it is increasingly important that we understand the thought as well as the acts of the persons involved. Consider what the play of Hamlet would be if its hero were not endowed with the most marvellous power of self-expression, counterbalancing his power of self-repression. Our appreciation of the play depends upon our understanding of the relation between his apparently meaningless acts and his spiritual states, which are deeply significant; and it is because, whether intentionally or not on the author’s part, Hamlet does not, after all, adequately express these spiritual states [1] that the drama still remains not perfectly clear in its motiving.

[1 Possibly the reason why he does not is because these spiritual states were not clearly conceived by the author himself. He seems to have been working away from an earlier, traditional Hamlet, toward a new conception of the character, but never to have quite freed himself from the earlier tradition. Cf. Corbin: The Elizabethan Hamlet.]

A very recent attempt to introduce’ the uneducated classes into the drama as its central figures seems only to bear out the principle just developed. Hauptmann, in Die Weber, presents a society of working people degraded by crushing labor and hopeless poverty almost to the level of brutes. The result is not satisfying. There are scenes of keen pathos, there are scenes with tragic lights, but the participants have not sufficient power of self-expression: they need a spokesman. We know they are hungry, sick, dying, and we pity them; but they are incoherent, and their incoherence is none the less baffling because we know that in reproducing it the author is giving us a faithful portrait of actual conditions. The same material might have been used with great effect in another literary form – in the story, for instance, or the novel, for this form would have given the author a chance to interpret his characters to the reader, to speak for them where they cannot speak for themselves. But they are not suitable for dramatic treatment – at least it yet remains to prove them so.

Summing up, then: Aristotle’s generalization from Greek usage is seen to have been borne out by later dramatic writers, but the reasons for its validity must be recognized, or there is danger of a superficial and conventional interpretation. The use of great national issues is right so long as the dramatist does not rely for his great effects upon our knowledge of the great issues involved. It is well that the hero be outwardly great as well as inwardly, – the two things will usually go together, – but the dramatist must not be content to substitute the outward for the inward greatness.

But if this quality of “greatness” does not essentially consist in these things, in what does it essentially consist?

Shelley, in another connection, says:

“The highest moral purpose aimed at in the highest species of the drama is the teaching the human heart, through its sympathies and antipathies, the knowledge of itself.” [1] And an answer to the question just propounded would be, that a drama, which deals truly and – which is the same thing – vitally with the human heart in its struggles with itself and with the outer world, will possess greatness and seriousness. Such an answer may seem utterly hackneyed, but it is, in the end, the only one that can be given. For the artist has to do with phenomena, and in the world of phenomena the human spirit – whatever we may think of it absolutely – is relatively the greatest thing we know. There are ideas metaphysical which bring with them a kind of enlargement of mind technically known in Aesthetic as the feeling of sublimity: such are the conceptions of God as found in the Hebrew religion and in some of the religions of the far East, the conception of the soul, or of a future life. Such ideas as these are found in the writings of Dante and of Milton, and it is occasionally suggested that their writings are for this reason greater than, for example, Shakespeare’s. In reply, we may say that it is at least doubtful whether it is the metaphysics of Milton that give him his greatness, while we may be sure it is not this which gives Dante his. But, even if it were so, Shakespeare’s defence is clear. With metaphysical notions as such the dramatist has nothing to do. His concern is, first and last, with the human spirit, and these ideas concern him, not directly, but only in so far as they appeal to and influence the men and women whom he is portraying. It is not his province to

[1 Preface to the Cenci.]

 “Assert eternal providence
  And justify the ways of God to men,”

but rather to show the ways of men toward God, or whatever stands to them for God, and toward each other. Dante may say:

 “Varamente quant’io del regno santo
  Nella mia mente potei far tesoro,
  Sara ora materia del mio canto.” [1]

[1 Paradiso, XXXIII.]

The dramatist approaches such subjects only indirectly, through his created persons. It is thus that Hamlet gazes out into

 “That undiscovered country from whose bourn
  No traveller returns.”

It is thus that Antigone faces death, firm, but hopeless, in those last words of hers:

“Ah, fount of Dirce, and thou, holy sons of Thebe whose chariots are many; ye, at least, will bear me witness, in what sort, unwept of friends, and by what laws I pass to the rock-closed prison of my strange tomb, ah me unhappy! who have no home on the earth or in the shades, no home with the living or with the dead... Unwept, unfriended, without marriage-song, I am led forth in my sorrow on this journey that can be delayed no more. No longer, hapless one, may I behold yon day-star’s sacred eye; but for my fate no tear is shed, no friend makes moan.” [1]

[1 Antigone, trans. Jebb, pp. 161 ff.]

It is thus that Beatrice looks over the brink, shuddering:

 “My God! can it be possible I have
  To die so suddenly? So young to go
  Under the obscure, cold, rotting, wormy ground!
  To see no more sweet sunshine; hear no more
  Blithe voice of living being; ...
    .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .
 “What! O, where am I? Let me not go mad!
  Sweet heaven forgive weak thoughts! If there should be
  No God, no Heaven, no Earth in the void world;
  The wide, gray, lampless, deep, unpeopled world!
  If all things then should be my father’s spirit, ...
    .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .
                  ... “Who ever yet returned
  To teach the laws of death’s untrodden realm?
  Unjust, perhaps, as those which drive us now,
  O, whither, whither?” [1]

[1 Shelley: The Cenci, V, 4.]

This is the sublimity of the dramatist. [1] But such passages as these show also, better than any exposition can do, the source of the dramatic σπουδη in the poet’s interpretative portrayal of human souls. We might say that any human soul, so long as it be strong and positive, – that is, truly alive, – might, if deeply viewed, be a “great” subject. He might not possess the kind of qualities that become dramatic; his story might not have the kind of unity necessary in a play; but simply in this one quality of greatness and seriousness he would be fit. The quality is not, of course, confined to drama; hardly, even, to so-called “serious” writing. It is possessed by Dante and Shakespeare and Sophocles, it is true, but it also underlies Rabelais and pervades Cervantes. It marks every line of Browning’s writing, while to take examples somewhat at random – Tennyson seldom shows it, Byron almost never. But while other forms of writing may possess this quality, the serious drama must possess it. There are other sources of greatness and seriousness: a poem may have it by virtue of its sweep and velocity of thought, as in Byron’s Cain; or of its nobility of thought and its majestic sound and rhythm, as in Milton; or by a certain large simplicity, as in Keats’ Hyperion. The serious drama may have all these; it must have the greatness that springs from a wise and vital treatment of human nature.

[1 Cf. infra, pp. 40-42.]

Drama: Its Law and Its Technique Part 1 Ch 2

CHAPTER II – DRAMATIC UNITY

Few sayings have been the occasion of such bitter and long-continued controversy as Aristotle’s remarks on the unity of the drama. For this reason, and because they furnish a convenient point of departure, it may be well to quote his own words:

“Tragedy is an imitation of an action, that is complete, and whole, and of a certain magnitude... A whole is that which has beginning, middle, and end. A beginning is that which does not itself follow anything by causal necessity, but after which something naturally is or comes to be. An end, on the contrary, is that which itself naturally follows some other thing, either by necessity, or in the regular course of events, but has nothing following it. A middle is that which follows something as some other thing follows it. A well-constructed plot, therefore, must neither begin nor end at haphazard, but conform to the type here described.” [Aristotle, Poetics, VII.]

“Unity of plot does not, as some persons think, consist in the unity of the hero. For infinitely various are the incidents in one man’s life, which cannot be reduced to unity; and so, too, there are many actions of one man out of which we cannot make one action... As therefore, in the other imitative arts, the imitation is one, when the object imitated is one, so the plot, being an imitation of an action, must imitate one action and that a whole, the structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed.” [Aristotle, Poetics, VIII.]

“Epic poetry agrees with Tragedy in so far as it is an imitation in verse of characters of a higher type... They differ, again, in length: for Tragedy endeavors, as far as possible, to confine itself to a single revolution of the sun, or but slightly to exceed this limit; whereas the Epic action has n limits of time.” [Aristotle, Poetics, V.]

The first two passages quoted, emphasizing the need for what is technically known as “unity of action,” will be seen to have permanent and essential validity. The last passage is evidently a passing generalization made from the usage of Aristotle’s contemporaries. It was, however, taken up by the French of the early sixteenth century and, under the title “unity of time,” exalted to the position of a chief canon in dramatic art. A third requirement, that of “unity of place,” though not even suggested by Aristotle, was taken for granted, partly as a corollary of the unity of time, partly in imitation of Greek and Senecan usage. These three canons, supported by the authority of the French Academy, and, after some resistance, accepted and defended by Corneille, determined the form of French drama until the beginning of this century, when Victor Hugo, in Hernani, broke bounds, and the “Romantic” reaction became powerful. In Germany the drama for a time slavishly followed French models, but the break with the unities came somewhat earlier than in France, and may be taken as dating from Lessing’s notes on dramatic writing, published between 1767 and 1769. In England the period of great drama fell so much earlier than in France or in Germany, that it escaped almost altogether the tyranny of “classic” tradition. To Shakespeare, Aristotle can have been little more than a name, and though Seneca’s tragedies were translated in his lifetime, their influence was only one of the factors which determined the form of the national drama. [1]

[1 For the blending of the Senecan and the national tradition, cf. R. Fischer, Zur Kunstentwicklung der Englischen Tragödie.]

Yet, relatively small as was their influence in our own literature, the “unities” have been too important elsewhere to be passed over in a discussion of the drama. Moreover, the very absurdities into which they led their adherents are instructive as to the true basis of dramatic theory. Nothing, for example, could be more suggestive than the treatise in which Corneille [1] defends The Three Unities, of Action, of Time, and of Place. A few extracts will indicate his position.

[1 P. Corneille, Discours III, Des Trois Unités.]

“The rule regarding the unity of time is based upon this remark of Aristotle, ‘that the tragedy ought to confine the duration of its action within one revolution of the sun, or to try to exceed this but slightly.’ [1] These words have given occasion to this famous controversy, whether they ought to be understood to mean a natural day of twenty-four or an artificial day of twelve... For my part, I find that there are subjects which it is so inconvenient to reduce within so brief a time, that not only would I grant them the entire twenty-four hours, but I would even avail myself of license allowed by the philosopher to exceed this number a little, and would without scruple extend it to thirty.”

[1 Note Corneille’s mistranslation of Aristotle, which really begs the whole question. Compare Butcher’s translation, quoted above.]

In support of the rule he argues thus:

“The dramatic poem is an imitation, or, better, a portrait of the actions of men; and there is no doubt that portraits are the more excellent in proportion as they the more closely resemble their original. The representation [of a drama on stage] lasts two hours, and the verisimilitude would be perfect if the action which it presented did not demand more for its actual occurrence. Let us not, then, fix upon either twelve hours or twenty-four, but let us compress the action of the poem into as brief a space as we possibly can, in order that its representation have the greater verisimilitude and be the more perfect.”

As to unity of place, he admits that the rule is not found either in Horace or in Aristotle, but he nevertheless holds it binding, and characterizes as “un peu licencieuse” the interpretation of it which would allow a single drama to represent such places as a man could go to and return from in a day. He goes on:

“I could wish, in order not to offend the spectator in any way, that what we represent before him in two hours could actually take place in two hours, and that what we make him see, on a stage that is immovable, could confine itself to one room, or one hall, according to choice; but often this is so inconvenient, not to say impossible, that it is necessary, for place as for time, to admit some enlargement of the limits.”

He concludes that in cases of absolute necessity it is sufficient that the action be confined within the walls of a single city. At the close of his treatise, however, the common sense of the practical playwright overcomes for a moment the conventionality never quite genuine of the Academician, and asserts itself in the impatient remark:

“It is easy for the theorists to be rigid; but if they were to give to the public six or a dozen poems of this sort, they would perhaps widen their rules even more than I have done, when they had seen by experience what restraint their precision causes, and how many beautiful things it banishes from our stage.”

Evidently the trouble here arises from a misuse of the word “imitation,” and a misconception of what “truth to nature” really is. Art does not copy nature, it follows and interprets it, and Corneille’s first proposition, about which he says “there is no doubt” – namely, that the more closely the stage presentation copies the actual events the more perfect is the drama – this proposition is false and subversive of good art; if he had followed it consistently, he would not have been the great artist he was.

On the other hand, the practice of “following these rules at a distance” has something to be said for it. Shakespeare’s dramas would have been better if they had not taken quite so much license. The structure of Lear is marred by the too frequent changes of scene, not because these destroy the illusion, but because every such change demands a fresh adjustment of the reader’s mind to the new conditions, and such use of his energies is waste of his energies unless there is some compensating gain. In Antony and Cleopatra we have an illustration of the way in which bad artistic form may almost nullify the effectiveness of the artist’s real perceptions; for the noble scenes scattered through the play do not wholly atone for the sprawling, helter-skelter character of the treatment.

In modern plays the elaborateness of the scenery has taken the place of the “classic” tradition as a check on frequent changes of scene, and, except in plays that are chiefly spectacular, the tendency is to cut down scene-shifting, especially within the act. The greater emphasis, too, on the inner rather than the outer aspects of the dramatic situation [1] may have had something to do with the simplification of setting and compactness of treatment that marks the work of at least some groups of modern dramatists. It may be noted in the plays of the young German writers, Sudermann, Hauptmann, Fulda; it is yet more striking in the dramas of Ibsen, some of which preserve the same scene throughout, while two, Ghosts and John Gabriel Borkman, observe the unity of time in almost Corneille’s strictest interpretation. The same is true of Sudermann Die Heimath, [2] and it is interesting to note that these two plays, which have roused more than common interest on the stage as well as among the reading public, show such conformity to the standards of a past age. But it is also significant that all three of these plays resemble the Greek drama in presenting to us the culminating point of an action that has been going on for years; the plays themselves include little more than would be found in the last act of a Shakespearean drama, and their likeness to the classic form may be taken as a natural result of this essential similarity of theme.

[1 Cf. for an expansion of this, the comparison between Shakespeare and Browning, pp. 129-133.]

[2 Acted by Duse and by Bernhardt under the title Magda.]

The gain in these cases, however, is not due, as Corneille would have said, to the greater accuracy with which the facts can be copied, but to the greater economy of attention made possible by concentration in the treatment and by elimination of distracting features. Ibsen’s Ghosts, which presents the occurrences of a single day in Mrs. Alving’s drawing-room, is not, because of this, a whit more “true” than Shakespeare’s Macbeth, whose action covers at least months and ranges between England and Scotland. Except when they are of importance for other reasons than those Corneille gives, the unities of time and of place may be set aside as non-essential. The dramatist cannot copy his subject, – he ought not to do so, and the extent to which he copies its outer setting cannot be rigidly prescribed to him. Since he must often make us feel, by means of a few phrases, a soul’s long-drawn agonies, why may he not also make us feel, by means of a two hours’ play, a soul’s life-history? Surely, if he can, he may.

But if these requirements concerning time and place were conventional rules imposed upon drama from without, that concerning action is a vitally grounded law, growing out of the very nature of the art-form; and it is characteristic of the directness and truth of Aristotle’s thought that he is not content with a casual mention of this point, as in the matter of the time-limit, but pauses to emphasize and elaborate his idea, – reverts to it now and again to add some further comment from another point of view.

What he means by unity of action he makes very clear. It is organic unity, he explains, not formal or verbal, that he wants, and this is not necessarily attained by making the actions all centre about one man. He hits the point exactly when he says that it is the action chosen, which must be a whole. It must, that is, be such an action as can be adequately set forth, with its “beginning, middle, and end,” during the two hours allotted to the poet, and by the means at his command. This effectually cuts him off from treating certain themes. National issues, for instance, cannot be handled by him, except as they touch upon individual human lives. They may, indeed, have a certain large unity, they are as truly controlled by laws, and as open to philosophic treatment as is the life of a single man, but the drama cannot handle them. Gibbon’s Decline and Fah of the Roman Empire may, by a figure of speech, be called a magnificent drama. It has, on a gigantic scale, complete and organic unity; it has, in the true sense, a beginning, a middle, and an end. It does for the Roman Empire what Shakespeare does for Macbeth – portrays a process of disintegration and ruin, and traces it to its source in contravention of the laws of human life and intercourse. But Gibbon’s subject-matter is outside the dramatist’s realm. He may touch upon it, as Shakespeare does in Julius Caesar, but the centre of interest will be not the state, but the man, as here it is Brutus. Where this is not the case, as in several of Shakespeare’s historical plays, Henry VIII, or Henry V, or King John, the play is in so far imperfect. That even Shakespeare erred thus often is not surprising. Such plays appealed to the patriotism of his audience and ministered to their inherent Teutonic love of incident and spectacle; they were to those times what the plays based on Napoleon’s life have within recent years been to ours. But such productions are not good dramatic art. The play must have, not merely a running story that can be told, but a centre, and a determined line of development. Shelley expressed this when he wrote, in his preface to The Cenci, “Such a story, if told so as to present to the reader all the feelings of those who once acted it, their hopes and fears, their confidences and misgivings, their various interests, passions, and opinions, acting upon and with each other, yet all conspiring to one tremendous end, would be as light to make apparent some of the most dark and secret caverns of the human heart.” It is this “conspiring to one tremendous end” that is the test of the plot and of the characters.

But it is a test that cannot be applied by rule of thumb. Aristotle, indeed, speaks, in his cool, definite way, of “the structural union of the parts being such that if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed.” [1] Such a test can well be applied to the dramas of Sophocles: try to “cut” the Antigone or the Oedipus, either by reducing the number of characters or by removing incidents; it is like hewing away a limb from a living creature. But, with modern plays, it is another matter. It is true the French of the sixteenth century, following a perverted classic tradition, attempted to attain this same kind of unity: their plays have few under-plots, the number of characters is kept as low as possible. But to the Teutonic mind, these productions lack the power that comes of unified complexity, while they have not, on the other hand, the lyric intensity and vitality of the Greek drama. Schopenhauer puts this feeling perhaps over-vigorously, as is his way, but effectively, when he says that the French tragedies “in general observe this [unity] so strictly that the course of the drama is like a geometrical line without breadth. There it is always a case of ‘Only get on! Pensez à votre affaire!’”

[1 Poetics, VIII.]

In the modern French drama, however, as in all English, we have to face the question of episode and subordinate characters – problems which virtually did not exist for Aristotle, since the severely narrow limits of tragedy did not admit of any episode in our sense of the word, and minor characters scarcely appeared. Shakespeare’s dramas, on the contrary, abound in episodes that have little apparent connection with the main plot, many of which could be cut out without “disjointing” or “disturbing” the structure of the play. In actual stage presentation some of these actually are left out, and, unless we sit book in hand, we are not likely to notice the omissions. This is less true of the tragedies, however, and in the greatest of these we shall usually find that many of these seemingly trifling incidents are set there with a purpose, and make toward the main end. “Almost too copiously and with apparent carelessness, the great artist fastens his golden ornaments in all parts of his piece; but he who goes to unclasp them finds them grown iron-fast into the texture of the whole.” [1]

[1 Freytag, Technik des Dramas, p. 45.]

That a given scene may be omitted without leaving the story of the action incomplete is, of course, no indication that such a scene is superfluous, or runs counter to true unity. Many scenes are needed to give shading to character, to supply contrast, or background. Here, again, nothing can be decided by rule, and even about the greatest of the plays we find that opinion differs. The underplot in Lear is, according to one critic, a blemish, since it is “connected but loosely with the main action,” and “retards the movement and needlessly renders the whole more bitter.” Others [1] regard this same underplot as a source of strength, since it furnishes a reflection of the main action and thus heightens the total effect, as the subordinate theme in a symphony may be a reflection or variant of the principal theme, or as the subordinate lines of a picture may follow the lead of the main color masses. It matters less which judgment we finally adopt than the manner in which we arrive at the judgment. The only tribunal of appeal is taste, but it should be taste that has been trained by long and thoughtful familiarity with the best art.

[1 Vide Ulrici: Shakespeare’s Dramatic Art, I, 437 ff.; Brandes: William Shakespeare, II, 135.]

Drama: Its Law and Its Technique: Part 1 Ch 1

PART I – LAW

CHAPTER I – POETIC TRUTH

All art, said Aristotle, is imitation. That he did not mean by this the mere copying or mirroring of facts is sufficiently clear from his remarks about the ideal and philosophic character of poetry: “Tragedy represents men as better than they are,” [1] “It should preserve the type and yet ennoble it.” [2] In the light of such passages, the word “imitation” takes on another significance from that we might at first be inclined to give it, but it is still misleading, and it seems better to substitute the broader term, “poetic truth.” What does this mean, and what does it imply?

[1 Poetics, II.]

[2 Ib., XV.]

All art, and hence all great drama, is in its nature both universal and personal, both general and selective. The painter cannot, for example, paint every leaf of a tree, and if he did so his painting would certainly be more unsatisfactory to us than if he had worked with less minuteness. His art lies in determining which of the impressions into which the infinitely complex total which we call “tree” may be resolved – which of these is to be preserved as essential, which may be rejected. No two artists would ever make quite the same choice, yet each might be, artistically, true to the subject. Each would, if he were a great artist, give us something better than the landscape itself, he would interpret it to us – make it mean more than it had before. Millet once said, in effect, “A flock of sheep must be regarded by the painter, not as a collection of animals, but as one single huge animal, moving on many feet, and it must be so painted.” And it is because Millet himself painted sheep in this way that his work is really art. To take another illustration, there is a certain living artist who has wonderful power in drawing the urchins of London’s streets, conveying, with a few seemingly careless strokes, the very life and movement of the boys. It is said that he first makes a rather detailed drawing of his subject, then goes over his work, eliminating line after line, until he has reduced it, as it were, to its lowest terms, and there remains no line not absolutely necessary. The finished product, with its appearance of carelessness, is really the result of the most careful selection. It is conceivable that such a process should all have been mental, and nothing have appeared on paper but the final result; conceivable, too, that it might be partly or wholly unconscious on the part of the artist; but the process, or something like it, is characteristic of all art, and in proportion as the artist is great will his selective power be true and unerring, never rejecting the significant and retaining the unessential. To this end, however, he needs large and deep knowledge of his subject. Wordsworth said that a simple recital of the facts of a given phenomenon might be at once formally accurate and essentially untrue because it had been made either mechanically or ignorantly, noting the unessential and the significant without discriminating between them. Such discrimination comes with knowledge, which enables us to check our observation of particular instances by a knowledge of the universal, gained through observation of other particular instances.

It will now be evident what was meant by saying that art is in its nature both universal and personal or selective. It becomes the one by means of the other, for the selection will reject the accidental and temporary and retain the essential and permanent. In this selective process the personality of the artist is tested; upon his personality depends the value of his work to others. If it is deep enough and big enough to be in unison with the individuality (if the expression is legitimate) of humanity, he will see in his subject, be it landscape or human soul, the things that all humanity must see when it looks deeply enough, though it may need his quickened vision to point them out. Thus the artist must be at once different from his fellow-man, and like him. “Once in a while an individual Ideal, when expressed, enlightens the world of art, and then we have the artistic genius; he is the prophet who shows to others an ideal field which they at once recognize as effective for themselves, although but for him it would have been unknown to them. To express his own ideal must be the artist’s work.” [1] Of the ideal in this sense Amiel’s remark is true: “The ideal, after all, is truer than the real; for the ideal is the eternal element in perishable things: it is their type, their sum, their raison d’être, their formula in the book pf the Creator, and therefore at once the most exact and the most condensed expression of them.” [2]

[1 H.R. Marshall, Aesthetic Principles, p. 97.]

[2 Amiel, Journal, p. 105.]

The danger in this selective art-process is evident, especially if we note some phases of it in painting. The extremists of the so-called “impressionist” school are simply carrying this process to its farthest issue. They reproduce of a landscape only a single aspect. All its possibilities of suggestion, its complexity and shading, are swept away to make room for the artist’s single impression. The result is rather remarkable. If one happens to approach such a picture from the right direction, with exactly the right light, and in a peculiarly receptive mood, one may receive from it an impression startlingly vivid. If, on the other hand, these conditions are not fulfilled, the picture may be absolutely meaningless to us. The reason is plain enough. The artist has so narrowed his presentation of impressions that it appeals to but few besides himself – it has become personal past the point of contact with others.

The same thing occurs in literature, though it is not so easily demonstrable. Schopenhauer is a case of the too narrowly selective, the viciously personal. He attempts satire, let us say; what results? Often enough, it is not satire, but invective, more or less hysterical. He is giving us things as they appear to him, but they appear to him as they do not appear to a sane man, and his work becomes interesting, not as art, but as pathology. If one would see the difference between satire and anger, that is, between legitimate and illegitimate personality, compare him with Juvenal or Swift at their best, or compare the fourth part of Gulliver’s Travels with the first three parts.

It is in finding the mean between this personal narrowness that is too selective, and the photographic impersonality that is not selective at all, that the individuality of the artist, his training and his ideals, are tested. It is this that determines how much his work shall possess of what we may call poetic, or artistic, truth. The difference between such truth and the truth of philosophy is not so much in the final result as in the means employed to reach it. The philosopher seeks to discover the essential and universal, and to state it in terms of the universal. The artist seeks to state it in terms of the particular. If he wishes to present the contrast between the misguided human heart, preoccupied with its gloomy or ghastly criminal purposes, and the sane and kindly standards of the world of freer men, the philosopher will state this in terms of universal application; the poet may symbolize it by the rough and sudden knocking at a castle gate, and the drowsy murmurs of a sleepy porter.

Such a selective process is forced upon the dramatist, also, by the practical conditions of his problem. A play must, when acted, not exceed three hours, but this is an extreme estimate, and includes the time for scene-shifting and other waits; the business of the play itself ought not to use more than two-thirds of this time. He has, then, two hours in which to present his action, with its causes and results. Obviously, there are in real life few cases where such an action occupies so short a time; it is more apt to stretch over months or years, and its links are “the little, nameless, unremembered acts” of our daily life. The artist cannot possibly reproduce all these, and he must, therefore, be in a sense “untrue” to his model. [1] Yet, if he could reproduce them, he would not. For life, nature, in itself, as distinguished from nature as seen by us, is unemphatic. Its so-called contrasts, its humor, its varying emphasis, its “meaning,” have their existence, not in the things themselves, but in the mind of the observer. It is, therefore, the artist’s part to supply these, to mould his material, impressing upon it the stamp of his mind, and thus giving it emphasis, proportion, perspective, – which brings us back again to the selective process. Out of the infinite series of occurrences he chooses such links as seem to him most important, or such as may be made to symbolize more than themselves. These critical moments he emphasizes, the rest he lets go, trusting that from what we see we will infer what we do not see. [2]

[1 Cf. infra, pp. 14-16.]

[2 Cf. the discussion of “the unities” in the following chapter, especially pp. 14-19.]

Take Macbeth. The dramatist must present to us the moral ruin, – the spiritual disintegration of a man, with its inner causes. What does he do? He selects his moments, presents these, and lets them stand for all that goes between. We first hear of our hero as a high-minded and courageous soldier. Then we see him, fresh from victory, receive the first suggestion of greater honors to be won; we see how the idea takes hold of him, and we suspect that one so easily touched must have been less sound at heart than we and others had supposed. What goes on in his mind immediately after this we are not told, but after the scenes with Lady Macbeth, we can look back and imagine. That is, we find ourselves responding to the poet’s demand, we are become co-workers with him. After the murder, again, we get no insight into Macbeth’s inner life until after he has been made king. Then comes the banquet-scene, which, brief as it is, throws a blaze of light backward over the interval. We recognize with perfect certitude the disintegration that has been going on in a spirit that we now see to have been never really strong, either for good or evil. And now our mind can go forward without teaching, we shall expect from the harassed king no firmness of touch, we know his spirit is fevered, that he is the slave of his past. For Lady Macbeth we are given no clews through the course of the play until, at the end, we are allowed, for one brief glimpse, to see her off her guard, when her will of steel is relaxed in delirious sleep. But those few lurid moments reveal to us a whole life-history, and it is enough.

If one would realize the tremendous compression of the play, and get the full significance of its method, let him note how another artist has treated a similar theme. Dostoiefsky, in Crime and Punishment, gives us the history of a few days in a young man’s life, during which he commits a crime, and afterwards, hovering on the verge of madness, undergoes spiritual tortures of the most exquisite kind. His mental processes are given almost from minute to minute, not an hour is unaccounted for. The effect of the whole is, it is true, tremendous; but it is not the kind of effect that art ought to produce, it is not the purified “pity and fear” which makes a subject beautiful in art which is merely terrible in nature. The writer certainly possessed such knowledge of the human soul as is given to few; had he possessed also the power to wield this knowledge, his book would have been one of the grandest art-productions to which a man ever gave being. But one feels that he is not master of his inspiration, he is mastered by it, and the book has upon it the taint of madness from which the author, if we may trust report, was not wholly free. And thus it happens, that while Shakespeare had probably a less profound understanding than Dostoiefsky of the inner life of a sin-darkened soul, we feel that his drama is a great artistic creation, whereas of Dostoiefsky’s story we feel that it might have been this, but is not.

The discussion has led us to the verge of that never-dying controversy concerning the merits of the realistic and the idealistic in art. To enter upon it would carry us beyond the limits of our subject. Be it suggested, however, that the antithesis between the two terms is not absolute and fixed, for all true art is, as we have seen, ideal, and all true art is based in reality. The difference between the two schools is quantitative, it is a difference in the proportionate emphasis they lay upon these two aspects of art, and their divergence should never be so great as to lead them, the one beyond the limits of art into the photographic, the other beyond the limits of art into the over narrowly personal.

Drama: Its Law and Its Technique: Frontmatter

THE DRAMA ITS LAW AND ITS TECHNIQUE

BY
ELISABETH WOODBRIDGE, PH.D.

ALLYN AND BACON

Boston and Chicago

Copyright, 1898,
By Lamson, Wolffe and Company.

PREFACE

Freytag’s Technik des Dramas, written thirty-five years ago, remains up to this time the best work of its kind. Yet its defects of manner and of arrangement are apparent even to the casual reader, and they become yet more evident when the book is subjected to the test of the college class-room. Such a test – one for which the book was never intended – obscures its merits, which are many, and emphasizes its defects, which might appear few and superficial, but which are peculiarly irritating to both teacher and student. Yet the need of such a book is indicated by the number of treatises on the drama which have appeared since Freytag wrote. All of these that I have seen, however, are either too exclusively philosophical, and in their theorizing about the art ignore the practical details of the craft, or they are not philosophical enough, and in their preoccupation with the craft lose sight of the fundamental principles, the absolute standards, of the art.

In this, as in all other essentials, Freytag was sound; his proportionate emphasis is right, and when I first began to realize the defects of the book, I thought that by making some changes it could be rendered more practically available while no less suggestive. I soon discovered, however, that it was not possible to fit Freytag’s discussion into the Procrustean framework of my own plan. His book lacks system, but it does possess the unity that must always characterize the utterances, however careless, of an honest and conscientious thinker. My book, I saw, might rectify some of the faults of the original, but would fall short of its merits. So I laid Freytag quite aside, and wrote the following chapters with as little regard as possible to the discussions in the Technik. “As little as possible,” – for to make any claim to entire independence would be preposterous. No one can read the utterances of a thoughtful critic and veteran in stage-craft like Freytag without being influenced by them. Even if one has arrived independently at the theories and the judgments therein contained, the formulation and illustration of these theories and judgments by another mind must affect him, if not by altering his thought, at least by enriching its subject-matter. I wish, therefore, to make a comprehensive acknowledgment of my indebtedness to the Technik. Comprehensive and general it must be, for just because his book, despite its diffuseness and its desultoriness, is vital and fundamental, it is impossible to lay a finder on the exact places where I am in its debt.

One of the chief merits of Freytag’s work is its mass of illustrative comments on ancient and modern dramas. More especially was his use of the Greek dramatists valuable and suggestive, and I hesitated before determining to omit from this treatment any such detailed discussion. Without a sympathetic familiarity with Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides for tragedy, and with Aristophanes for comedy, no one can claim the right to “judge righteous judgment” in things dramaturgic. When Freytag wrote, such a familiarity was scarcely to be gained without years of toil; since his time, modern classical scholarship has experienced a wonderful growth, bearing fruit in a number of critical treatises whose profound learning is informed by philosophic insight and delicate taste, is directed by a sense for historic proportion, is dominated by just aesthetic standards. With such works at hand as the treatises of Jebb, of Butcher, of Haigh, any detailed treatment of the ancient drama would be presumptuous, not to say superfluous, and its place is more fittingly taken by the bibliography at the end of the volume, which points out to the student some of the guides to whom he will commit himself when he shall explore this part of the field.

Of Freytag’s illustrations from modern drama, many are based on German plays, and are thus less illuminating to the average American reader – even the college student – than to the German audience for whom they were intended; hence they greatly increase the bulk of the book without adding proportionately to its effectiveness. I have confined my illustrations more strictly to English literature, using the drama of other nations only where it is needed for comparison. Such a method is theoretically lawful as well as practically expedient, since English drama was in its formative period – that is, up to Dryden – scarcely at all influenced by any other drama save the Roman and, chiefly indirectly, the Greek. With our own contemporary drama it is different. It is not possible to set up a language-barrier when our English and American stages are occupied with the plays of Italian, French, German, and Scandinavian writers.

Of contemporary drama Freytag’s book takes almost no account. Indeed, when he wrote, the renaissance, if we may venture to call it so, of drama had only just set in. Ibsen had been writing plays only a few years, and his greatest were yet to come; Sudermann was six years old; Hauptmann was an infant; Fulda was not yet born, nor was Maeterlinck, nor Rostand, the brilliant actor-dramatist who is now hailed by some of his countrymen as their young Shakespeare; in England a few critics were hopelessly hoping that the drama was not really so dead as it seemed. Small wonder that Freytag’s mention of modern work had rather the character of an exhortation and a warning than of a critical judgment. But in the last thirty years many good plays, many brilliant ones, some great ones, have been written, and it is well not to ignore them. In the ordinary college courses it is, indeed, scarcely possible to lay much emphasis on these, yet it is unfortunate to treat the drama as though it came to an end, for England in 1616, and for Germany in 1832. Such an attitude lends color of truth to the assertion that the drama is no longer a living art form. One of the signs of its life is that it is changing; and we must not be deceived by the frequent presentations of Shakespeare’s plays into thinking that our stage is like the Elizabethan, or that our Shakespeare is the Shakespeare of Elizabeth and of James. In the study of drama Shakespeare must be our centre, but just as we cannot arrive at the truest judgment if we leave out the Greeks, so too we cannot if we ignore our own contemporaries.

Finally, there is one great section of the drama which Freytag left untouched, – comedy. Yet it is present as an element in every one of Shakespeare’s plays, it is the predominant element in many of them, and a discussion of the drama which ignores this is, not Hamlet with Hamlet left out, but something more preposterous – Henry IV with Falstaff left out.

For an exhaustive, or even a fairly satisfactory, discussion of dramatic comedy an entire volume is needed; such a volume ought to be written. In the three chapters here devoted to the subject I have tried merely to make a survey of the field, to suggest points of view whence it may be studied, to point out lines along which it may be explored. So little has it been investigated that I cannot offer the student even the nucleus for a bibliography. My hope is that others may come to realize the fascination of this branch of dramatic theory, and that more may be done to illuminate this, at present the most complex and the least adequately treated subject in the realm of literary criticism.

INTRODUCTION

A drama is a presentation of an action, or closely interlinked series of actions, expressed directly by means of speech and gesture. It is, however, distinguished from other literary species, not only by its form, but by its subject-matter and its point of view. Its subject-matter is the action and reaction of human will, and it is treated with a view, not to the sequence of events, but to their essential relations as causes and effects. The drama is like the epic in that it deals with events of human life; it differs from it by emphasizing more strongly the volitional and_subjective rather than the incidental and objective elements in such events: it is like the lyric in that it is concerned with emotional, or, more broadly, with spiritual states; it differs from it by emphasizing, not the emotional or spiritual state considered in itself, but this considered as issuing from or developing into volition. Thus, though it has a closer connection with the inner life than has the epic, and a closer connection with the outer life than has the lyric, it trenches upon the realm of both epic and lyric, and every great drama has in it each of these elements, though their relative proportions may vary.

Vary, indeed, they do. The Greek drama, developing out of the choral ode, always kept a strongly lyric cast; the Teutonic drama is as strongly epic in character. The Greek type, as we get it in Seneca, degenerates into the rhetorical monologue, from which the French classical drama never wholly freed itself; the Teutonic type easily lapses into the presentation of a series of events without inner unity, as in some of Shakespeare’s historical plays which are little more than chronicles thrown into dramatic form. Within the limits of art, however, there is possibility of wide divergence in the proportionate values of the two elements, and the Oedipus Tyrannus does not exclude Macbeth from the number of great dramas.

In the following discussion it has been assumed that, beneath the differences of form that distinguish the ancient drama from the modern, there is enough identity in their informing spirit and underlying motive to justify a treatment of them as one. Differences there are, nor are they merely those of form, and Freytag states one side of the truth when he says: “Since Aristotle formulated some of the chief laws of dramatic effect, the culture of the human race has grown older by more than two thousand years. It is not merely the artistic forms – the stage and the manner of presentation – which have altered, but, what is more important, the spiritual and moral nature of man, the relation of the individual to the race and to the highest forces of life, the idea of freedom, and the conception of the divine being, all these have undergone great changes.” This is true, yet the more familiar one grows with the Greek drama the more one comes to realize that in the fundamental constitution of human nature there has been little change, and that in proportion as the drama is great it is the same for all ages. Or, if there are in this respect great essential differences, as there are certainly great superficial ones, we English are closer to the Greeks in sympathy than we are to some peoples of more recent times, for example, the French of the seventeenth century, and are more at one with the writer of Oedipus Tyrannus than with the writer of Athalie.

The two elements that are emphasized in dramatic treatment of human nature are, broadly speaking, free will and causality. It is a commonplace of criticism to say that the Greek drama presented the latter, the modern drama the former, and indeed the Greek and the modern use of these two elements is different. But the doctrine of the freedom of the individual is not new, it is as old as the words, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” The doctrine which sees the individual borne remorselessly forward to his fate by forces which he did not initiate is not confined to Greece, it is as old as the first commandment in the Decalogue, or the words, “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge”; but it is also as modern as Ibsen. The ancient world laid greater stress on the second of these two truths, the modern world on the first, but it is only the proportionate emphasis that has changed: nothing old has been wholly lost, nothing really new has been added.

§

In discussing any art it is possible to treat it in two ways, according as one considers the principles or laws that underly it as an art, or the rules of technique that govern it as a craft. In the first aspect it is brought into more or less close relation with all art; in the second aspect it needs a narrower and more detailed treatment of those things which mark it off from the other arts. The following discussion has attempted to open up the subject first in the more general aspect, and then in the more specific.

Like all art, the drama, to be of value at all, must have truth; to be coherent and effective, it must have unity; to command our veneration, it must have that quality which the Greeks called σπουδη, and which we call greatness, seriousness, nobility. In one sense, any one of these qualities, deeply interpreted, includes the others, but it is possible also to separate them in thought. It has seemed best to take them thus separately and then to try to follow up the two main lines, the tragic and the comic, along which dramatic art has developed.

A New Lit Theory Book Post Series

Here we begin The Drama: Its Law and Its Technique, by Elisabeth Woodbridge.

Woodbridge taught dramatic theory about 100 years ago. She loved Freytag and his theories, but in teaching his text, found it lacking as a classroom appendage. So she produced this book as a way of presenting Freytag to her students.

In other words, she cashed in on Freytag and hoped that other professors would also compel their students to buy her book for their courses.

Woodbridge’s book is quite good however. You can find it in the altogether on archive.org, as image files, PDF, OCR raw text, and the html version I will serialize.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 26 and advertisements

XXVI.
PATRONS AND PROFITS FOR TWENTY-TWO YEARS

On the 20th of this month (September, 1911) it will be just twenty-two years since Edwards received payment for his first story. On Sept. 20, 1889, The Detroit Free Press sent him a check for $8. On that $8 the Fiction Factory was started.

Who have been the patrons of the Factory for these twenty-two years, and what have been the returns?

A vast amount of work has been necessary in order to formulate exact answers to these questions. Papers and other memoranda bearing upon the subject were widely scattered. During Edwards’ travels about the country many letters and records were lost. The list that follows, therefore, is incomplete, but exact as far as it goes. More work was realized upon, by several thousands of dollars, than is here shown. For every item in the record Edwards has a letter, or a printed slip that accompanied the check, as his authority. The errors are merely those of omission.

Titles of the material sold will not be given, but following the name of the publication that purchased the material will be found the year in which it was either published or paid for.

     Adventure
     The Ridgeway Company,
     Spring & Macdougal Streets, New York City
1911 – 1 novelette                             $ 250.

     All-Story Magazine
     The F.A. Munsey Co.,
     176 Fifth Ave., New York City
1904 – 1 serial                                  225.
1906 – 2 short stories, 1 serial.                255.
1906 – 2 serials                                 950.
1908 – 3 serials                               1,000.

     American Press Association,
     45 & 47 Park Place, New York City
1905 – 2 Short stories                            80.

     The Argosy,
     F.A. Munsey Co.,
     176 Fifth Ave., New York City
1900 – 1 serial                                  250.
1901 – 1 serial                                  200.
1902 – 1 serial                                  260.
1903 – 1 novelette, 4 serials                  1,050.
1904 – 1 short story, 1 novelette, 4 serials     975.
1905 – 3 serials, 1 novelette                    925.
1906– 2 serials.                                 600.
1911 – 1 serial                                  260.

     Boston Globe,
     Boston, Mass.
1897 – 1 short story                               4.

     Boyce's Monthly,
     Chicago, Ills.
1901 – 1 short story                              10.

     Banner Weekly, The,
     Beadle & Adams, New York City
1889 – 1 short story                               4.

     Blue Book, The,
     Chicago, Ills.
1907 – 1 novelette                               220.
1908 – 2 novelettes                              400.
1910 – 1 short story, 1 novelette                240.
1911 – 1 novelette, 3 short stories              350.

     Chips,
     Frank Tousey's Publishing House,
     New York City
1901 – 1 short story.                              4.

     Chatter,
     12 Beekman St., New York
1890 – 1 short story                               5.
     – 1 short story                               5.

     Chicago Inter-Ocean,
     Chicago, Ills.
1898 – 1 article, space rates                      2.50

     Chicago Record,
     Chicago, Ills.
1897 – 1 short story                               5.
1898 – 1 short story                               7.
     – 1 short story                               4.
1901 – short story                                 6.

     Chicago Dally News,
     Chicago, Ills.
1898 – 1 short story                               3.
1899 – 1 short story                               3.50
1899 – 4 short stories                            14.50
1901 – 1 short story                               5.

     Chicago Blade,
     Chicago, Ills.
1891 – 2 articles, space rates, 1 short story     10.

     Chicago Ledger,
     Chicago, Ills.
1891 – 3 serials                                 120.
1892 – 2 serials                                  55.
1896 – 1 serial                                   50.
1904 – 1 serial                                   75.
1905 – 2 serials                                  80.
1906 – 2 serials                                 100.
1907 – 1 serial                                   75.

     Columbian Magazine,
     New York City
1910 – 1 short story                              15.

     Demorest's Monthly,
     New York City
1899 – 1 article                                   5.

     Dillingham Co., G.W.,
     New York City
1903 – royalties                                  96.60
1906 – royalties                                  10.20
1908 – royalties                                   1.50
1909 – Cloth book rights                         100.

     Detroit Free Press, The,
     Detroit, Michigan
1889 – 1 short story                               8.
     – 1 short story                               7.
1890 – 2 serials                                 203.
1889 – 2 short stories                            23.
1891 – 1 short story, space rates                 95.
1892 – 6 short stories                            48.50
1893 – 1 short story                              10.
1894 – 1 space rate                               20.
1895 – 1 space rate                               22.
1896 – 1 short story                               1.50
1899 – 2 short stories                             7.
1900 – 1 short story                               3.

     Essanay Film Manufacturing Company,
     Chicago, Illinois
1910 – M.P. scenario                              25.

     Figaro,
     170 Madison St., Chicago,
1890 – 1 space rate                               30.
1891 – 1 space rate                               90.
1892 – 1 space rate                               10.

     Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly,
     110 Fifth Ave., New York City
1891 – 1 short story                               8.

     Gunter's Magazine,
     Street & Smith, New York City
1910 – 1 short story                              40.

     Harper's Weekly,
     New York City.
1911 – 1 short story                              75.

     Illustrated American,
     1123 Broadway, New York City
1896 – 2 verses                                   10.

     Kellogg Newspaper Co., The A.N.,
     71–73 W. Adams St., Chicago
1903 – 1 serial                                  115.

     Life, New York City
1897 – 1 short story                               3.

     Ledger Monthly,
     Ledger Building, N.Y.
1899 – 1 short story                              10.

     Lubin Mfg. Co.,
     Philadelphia, Pa.
1910 – M.P. scenario                              30.

     Ladies' World, The,
     New York City
1890 – 2 short stories                             8.
1891 – 1 verse                                     2.
     – 1 verse                                     2.
1892 – 2 verses                                    4.
1894 – 1 verse                                     2.
1898 – 1 short story                               2.

     McClure'e Newspaper Syndicate, The,
     116 Nassau St., New York City,
1901 – 2 short stories, 2 serials                295.
     – 1 serial                                  200.

     McC's Monthly,
     Detroit, Michigan
1898 – 2 short stories                            10.

     Munsey's Magazine,
     New York City,
1896 – 1 short story                              10.
1904 – 1 short story                              40.
1910 – 1 short story                              75.

     New York World,
     New York City,
1894 – 1 short story                               5.64
1897 – 2 short stories                            15.02
1898 – 1 short story                               4.68
1899 – 1 short story                               5.50

     Overland Monthly,
     508 Montgomery St., San Francisco
1897 – 1 short story                              10.

     Ocean,
     F.A. Munsey Co., New York City
1907 – 1 serial                                  450.

     People's Magazine, The,
     Street & Smith, New York
1906 – 1 serial                                  200.
1907 – 1 serial                                  250.
1908 – 2 serials                                 600.

     Popular Magazine, The,
     Street & Smith, New York City
1904 – 2 novelettes                              265.
1909 – 1 serial                                  200.

     Puck,
     Keppler & Schwartzmann,
     Puck Building, New York City
1891 – 2 short stories                            20.
1892 – 1 short story                               5.
1893 – 2 short stories, 1 verse                   14.
1896 – 1 short story                               6.
1897 – 2 short stories, 1 verse                   22.
1899 – 2 short stories                            17.

     Railroad Man's Magazine,
     F.A. Munsey Co.,
     New York
1906 – 2 serials                                 700.
1907 – 1 serial                                  500.
1908 – 2 serials                                 650.
1909 – 2 short stories                            70.

     Red Book,
     Chicago, Ills.
1906 – 1 short story                              75.
1909 – 1 short story                              40.

     Scrap Book,
     F.A. Munsey Co., N.Y.C.
1905 – 1 serial                                  200.
1908 – 1 serial                                  300.
1910 – 1 serial                                  400.
1911 – 1 serial                                  400.

     Saturday Times, The,
     Chicago, Ills.
1907 – 1 serial                                   60.

     Southern Tobacco Journal,
     Winston, N.C.
1897 – 1 verse                                     2.

     Short Stories,
     Current Literature Pub. Co.,
     New York City
1891 – 1 short story                               5.
1898 – 2 short stories                            10.
1900 – 2 short stories                            30.

     San Francisco Chronicle,
     San Fran.
1896 – 1 short story                               6.

     Saturday Night,
     James Elverson Pub.
     Philadelphia, Pa.
1890 – 1 serial                                   75.
1891 – 1 serial, 8 short stories                 166.
1892 – 5 short stories                            10.
1893 – 1 serial, 5 short stories                 160.

     Truth,
     203 Broadway, New York City
1893 – 1 short story                               3.50
1897 – 7 short stories                            57.

     Top-Notch Magazine,
     Street & Smith, New York City
1911 – 1 serial                                  150.

     Translation Rights
1908                                              40.

     Vitagraph Company of America, The,
     Brooklyn. N.Y.
1909 – M.P.                                       10.

     Wayside Tales,
     Detroit Monthly Publishing: Co.,
     Detroit, Mich.
1901 – 3 short stories                            23.
1902 – 2 short stories                            35.
1903 – 1 short story                              15.

     White Elephant,
     Frank Tousey's Pub. House,
     New York City
1897 – 2 short stories                            30.

     Western World,
     Chicago, Ills.
1900 – 2 serials, 7 short stories, 1 space rates 308.80

     Woman's Home Companion,
     New York
1905 – 1 serial, space rate                      205.

     Yankee Blade,
     Boston, Mass.
1890 – 2 short stories                            20.
1891 – 3 short stories, 2 verses                  13.
1893 – 1 short story                               6.50
     – 1 short story 4.

     Powers Company,
     New York City
1910 – M.P.                                       25.

     Street & Smith,
     New York City
1900 – 34 issues "Motor Boys"                  2,550. 
1908 – 7 paper-book rights                       700.
1909 – 21 paper-book rights                    2,100.
1910 – 2 paper-book rights                       200.
1911 – 5 paper-book rights                       500.

     Dodd, Mead & Co.,
     New York City
1904 – Cloth book rights                         200.

     Harte & Perkins,
     New York
  Nickel Novels:                    $ 23,964.44
1893 –  4 @ $ 50 each                            200.
1894 –  3 @ $ 50 each                            150.
     – 31 @ $ 40 each                            960.
1896 – 24 @ $ 40 each                            960.
1897 –  2 @ $ 40 each                             80.
1898 – 16 @ $ 40 each                            640.
1899 – 33 @ $ 40 each                          1,400.
1900 – 51 @ $ 40 each                          2,040.
Completing Story                                  20.
1901 – 10 @ $ 30 each                            300.
     –  8 @ $ 50 each                            400.
     – 16 @ $ 40 each                            640.
1902 – 31 @ $ 40 each                           1,240.
1903 – 44 @ $ 40 each                           1,760.
1904 – 26 @ $ 40 each                           1,040.
     –  4 @ $ 50 each                             200.
1905 – 10 @ $ 50 each                             500.
1906 – 18 @ $ 50 each                             900.
1907 – 33 @ $ 50 each                           1,650.
1908 – 45 @ $ 50 each                           2,250.
1909 –  9 @ $ 60 each                             540.
1910 – 54 @ $ 60 each                           3,240.
1911 – 54 @ $ 60 each                           3,240.
  Ten-Cent Novels:
1893 – 13 @ $100 each                           1,300.
1894 – 10 @ $100 each                           1,000.
1895 –  2 @ $ 40 each                             100.
  Serials for "Guest;"
1894 –  2 @ $300 each                             600.
     –  2 @ $500 & $400                           900.
1897 –  1                                         300.
1895 –  2 @ $300 & $200                           500.
1898 –  2 @ $300                                  600.
1899 –  1                                         300.
1906 –  1                                         250.
1907 –  1                                         300.
  Juvenile Serials:
1893 –  2 @ $100 & $75                            175.
1894 –  1                                         175.
1894 –  1                                         100.
1901 –  4 @ $100 each                             400.
1902 –  4 @ $100 each                             400.
  Miscellaneous:
1897 –  4 magazine sketches                        40.
     –  1 magazine sketch                           6.16
1900 – 10 magazine sketches                       100.
1901 –  9 trade-paper sketches                    100.
1902 –  1 trade-paper sketch                       10.
                                                 ___________
     Total                                   $ 65,859.60

The finest music in the room is that which streams out to the ear of the spirit in many an exquisite strain from the hanging shelf of books on the opposite wall, every volume there is an instrument which some melodist of the mind created and set vibrating with music, as a flower shakes out its perfume or a star shakes out its light. Only listen, and they soothe all care, as though the siiken-soft leaves of poppies had been made vocal and poured into the ear. – James Lane Allen.

§

When William Dean Howells occupied an editorial chair in Harper’s office, a young man of humble and rough exterior one day submitted personally to him a poem. Mr. Howells asked:

“Did you write this poem yourself?”

“Yes, sir. Do you like it?” the youth asked.

“I think it is magnificent,” said Mr. Howells. “Did you compose it unaided?”

“I certainly did,” said the young man firmly. “I wrote every line of it out of my head.”

Mr. Howells rose and said:

“Then, Lord Byron, I am very glad to meet you. I was under the impression that you died a good many years ago.”

ADVERTISEMENTS

Announcement

In addition to “The Fiction Factory,” The Editor Company are publishers at Ridgewood, New Jersey, of THE EDITOR, (The Journal of Information for Literary Workers), which has been published solely in the interests of writers for eighteen years, and of the following books:

THE WRITER’S BOOK $2.50

Compiled by William R. Kane.

PRACTICAL AUTHORSHIP 1.50

By James Knapp Reeve.

1001 PLACES TO SELL MMS 1.00

(The American Writer’s, Artist’s and Photographer’s Year Book) in its ninth edition.

POINTS ABOUT POETRY .60

By Donald G. French.

RHYMES AND METERS .50

By Horatio Winslow.

THE FICTION WRITER’S WORKSHOP .50

By Duncan Francis Young.

HOW TO WRITE A SHORT STORY .50

THE EDITOR MANUSCRIPT RECORD (loose leaf) .50

ESSAYS ON AUTHORSHIP .25

THE WAY INTO PRINT .25

THE EDITOR COMPANY

RIDGEWOOD, NEW JERSEY

THE EDITOR

IF you write, or if you have an itching to write, we want to talk to you.

THE EDITOR, we may explain, is “The Journal Of Information For Literary Workers.” It is not at all pretentious, and not at all dull. It is a matter-of-fact little magazine, always filled with good, readable articles on the technique of writing. Sometimes they are contributed by authors and sometimes by editors.

We aim to show our patrons, so far as such things may be taught, how to write fiction, poetry, articles and the like, and then how to sell them, provided they are up to the standard demanded by editors. We have been assured so many times that it wearies us, that our magazine has been the lever that pried open the editorial doors of pretty nearly every publication in the country. In addition to our articles we present our Literary Market department in which we list monthly the complete report of editorial needs, announcements, policies, changes, prize-contests, etc. This enables the writer to keep his finger on the magazine pulse; he knows what to write, when to write it, how to write it, when to submit it, what payment will be made, and countless other points. Authors such as George Allan England, who is selling regularly to McClure’s, Red Book, Bohemian, etc., have been good enough to say that this department alone is worth the subscription price. Now add to the foregoing a spice of good verse, bright editorial comment, and you’ll know why every editor and very nearly every author of note sends his writer-friends to us.

Why you can’t write and do without the authors’ trade-journal! You will always find something between the covers of the magazine that drives you to work, that spurs you to greater efforts, that puts you on the high road to success.

We pride ourselves on the fact that THE EDITOR is a good, live text-book. It is a pretty sort of a teacher, you know, who never sees an educational journal; new methods and systems are cropping out constantiy. And no writer – we leave this to you – likes to send a manuscript to a magazine that suspended a few months ago; nor allow an article to go unread that may cover just the point on which his or her rejections cling. The writer wants hints, helps, and as many of them as possible; everybody does. There is no magazine that better meets this want than THE EDITOR.

We’ve succeeded in pleasing and making famous the promising writer-folk of this country since 1894. Mayn’t we have you?

15 cents a copy … $1.00 a year

THE EDITOR COMPANY

RIDGEWOOD, NEW JERSEY

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 25

XXV.
EXTRACTS GRAVE AND GAY, WISE AND OTHERWISE

Cigars on the Editor:

“The berth check came to me this morning. I suppose the cigars are on me. At the same time, there is another kind of check which you get when you buy your Pullman accomodation at the Pullman office in the station. It was that which I had in mind. I suppose the one you enclosed is the conductor’s check. I don’t believe I ever saw one before.”

How “Bob” Davis hands you a Lemon

“The first six or seven chapters of ‘Hammerton’s Vase’ are very lively and readable – after which it falls off the shelf and is badly shattered. Everybody in the yarn is pretty much of a sucker, and the situations are more or less of a class. I think, John, that there is too much talk in this story. Your last thirty pages are nothing but.

What struck me most was the ease with which you might have wound the story up in any one of several places without in any way injuring it. That is not like the old John Milton of yore. You used to pile surprise upon surprise, and tie knot after knot in your complications. But you didn’t do it in ‘Hammerton’s Vase’ – for which reason I shed tears and return the manuscript by express.”

How Mr. White does it:

“I am very sorry to be obliged to make an adverse report on ‘The Gods of Tlaloc.’ For one thing the story is too wildly improbable, for another the hero is too stupid, and worse than all the interest is of too scrappy a nature – not cumulative. You have done too good work for The Argosy in the past for me to content myself with this…. When I return Aug. 9, I shall hope to find a corking fine story from your pen awaiting my perusal. I am sure you know how to turn out such a yarn.”

A tip regarding “Dual-identity”:

“The story opens well, and that is the best I can say for it. I put up the scheme to Mr. Davis and he expressed a strong disinclination for any kind of a dual-identity story.” – Matthew White, Jr.

How Mr. Davis takes over the Right Stuff:

“We are taking the sea story. Will report on the other stuff you have here in a day or two. In the meantime, remem-ber that you owe me an 80,000-word story and that you are getting the maximum rate and handing me the mmimum amount of words. You raised the tariff and I stood for it and it is up to you to make good some of your threats to play ball accordmg to Hoyle. It is your turn to get in the box and bat ‘em over the club-house. And remember, I am always on the bleachers, waiting to cheer at the right time.”

How Mr. White lands on it:

“‘Helping Columbus’ pleases me very much, and on our principle of paying for quality I am sending you for it our check for $350.”

During the earlier years of his writing Edwards made use of an automatic word-counter which he attached to his Caligraph – the machine he was using at that time. He discovered that if a story called for 30,000 words, and he allowed the counter to register that number, the copy would over-run about 5,000 words. At a much later period he discovered by actual comparisons of typewritten with printed matter just the number of words each page of manuscript would average in the composing-room. From his publishers, however, he once received the following instructions:

“To enable you to calculate the number of words to write each week, we make the following suggestions: Type off a LONG paragraph from a page of one of the weeklies that has been set solid, so that the number of words in each line will correspond with the same line in print.

When you have finished the paragraph you can get the average length of the typed line as written on your machine, and by setting your bell guard at this average length you will be able to fairly approximate, line for line, manuscript and printed story.

A complete story should contain 3,000 lines. Calculating in this way, you will be able to turn in each week a story of about the right length. Our experience shows us that the calculated length of a story based on a roughly estimated number of words usually falls short of our requirements, and although to proceed in the manner suggested above may involve a little extra work – not above half an hour at the outside and on one occasion only – by it alone are we convinced that you will strike the right number of words for each issue.”

“Along the Highway of Explanations”:

“I cannot see ‘The Yellow Streak’ quite clear enough. You whoop it up pretty well for about three-quarters of the story, and then it begins to go to pieces along the highway of explanations.” – Mr. Davis.

Concerning the “Rights” of a Story:

“Unless it is otherwise stipulated, WE BUY ALL MANUSCRIPTS WITH FULL COPYRIGHT.”– F.A. Munsey Co.

And again:

“The signing of the receipt places all rights in the hands of the Frank A. Munsey Company, but they will be glad to permit you to make a stage version of your story, only stipulating that in case you succeed in getting it produced, they should receive a reasonable share of the royalties.

The Last Word on the Subject:

“Mr. White has turned over to me your letter of October 12, as I usually answer letters relating to questions of copyright. I think, under the circumstances, if you want to dramatize the story we ought to permit you to do so without payment to us. The only condition we would make would be that if you get the play produced, you should print a line on the program saying, – ‘Dramatized from a story published in The Argosy,’ or words to that effect.” – Mr. Titherington, of Munseys.

Paragraphing, Politics and Puns:

“Your paragraphs are pretty good, so far. But SHUN POLITICS AND RELIGION in any form, direct or indirect, as you would shun the devil. And please don’t pun – it is so cheap.”– Mr. A.A. Mosley, of The Detroit Free Press.

Climaxes, Snap and Spontaneity:

“We don’t like to let this go back to you, and only do so in the hope that you can let us have it again. The sketch is capitally considered, the character is excellent, the way in which it is written admirable, the whole story is very funny, and yet somehow it does not quite come off. The climax – the denouement – seems somewhat labored and lacks snaps and spontaneity. Can’t you devise some other termination – something with more ‘go?’ This is so good we want it to be better.” – Editor Puck.

Novelty and Exhilarating Effect:

“We have no special subject to suggest for a serial, but would cheerfully read any you think desirable for our needs. The better plan always is to submit the first two installments of about four columns each. Novelty and exhilarating effect are desirable.” – Editor Saturday Night.

Saddling and Bridling Pegasus:

“We are very much in need of a short Xmas poem – from 16 to 20 lines – to be used at once. Knowing your ability and willingness to accomodate at short notice, I write you to ask if you can get one to us by Saturday of this week, or Monday at latest. I know it is a very short time in which to saddle and bridle Pegasus, but I am sure you can do it with celerity if any one can.” – Editor The Ladies’ World.

Carrying the Thing too Far:

“We regret that we cannot make use of ‘The Brand of Cain,’ after your prompt response to our call, but the title and story are JUST A LITTLE BIT too sensational for our paper, and we think it best to return it to you. It is a good story, and well written, but we get SO MUCH condemnation from our subscribers, often for a trifle, that we are obliged to be very careful. Only a week or two ago we were severely censured because a recipe in Household Dep’t called for a tablespoon ful of wine in a pudding sauce, and the influence of the writer against the paper promised if the offense were repeated.” – From the editor of a woman’s journal.

And, finally, this from Mr. Davis:

“We are of the non-complaining species, ourself, and aim only to please the mob. Rush the sea story. If it isn’t right, I’ll rush it back, by express…. Believe, sir, that I am personally disposed to regard you as a better white man than the average white man because you a larger white man, and, damnitsir, I wish you good luck.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 24

XXIV.
WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH IT?

Edwards wrote only one serial story during 1910, and turned his hand to that merely to bring up the financial returns and leave a safe margin for expenses. Nickel novels, a few short stories, a novelette for The Blue Book and the lengthening of two stories for paperbook publication comprised the year’s work. He “soldiered” a little, but when a writer “soldiers” he is not necessarily idle. Edwards’ thoughts were busy, and the burden of his reflections was this: Heaven had endowed him with a small gift of plot and counter-plot, and a little art for getting it into commercial form; but were his meager talents producing for him all that they should? Was the purely commercial aim, although held to with a strong sense of moral responsibility, the correct aim? After a score of years of hard work did he find himself progressing in any but a financial direction? Forgetting the past and facing the future with eyes fixed at a higher angle, how was he to proceed with his “little gift of words?” What should he do with it?

In the bright summer afternoons Edwards would walk out of his Fiction Factory and make a survey of it from various points. He was always so close to his work that he lost the true perspective. He was familiar with the minutiae, the thousand and one little details that went to make up the whole, but how did it look in the “all-together,” stripped of sentiment and beheld in its three dimensions?

Paradoxically, the work appeared too commercial in some of its aspects, and not commercial enough in others. The sordid values were due to the demand which came to Edwards constantly and unsolicited, and which it was his unvarying policy always to meet. “All’s fish that comes to the writer’s net” was a saying of Edwards that had cozzened his judgment. He was giving his best to work whose very nature kept him to a dead level of mediocrity. And within the last few years he had become unpleasantly aware that at least one editor believed him incapable of better things. This was largely Edwards’ fault. Orders for material along the same old lines poured in upon him and he hesitated to break away from them and try out his literary wings.

Years before he had faced a similar question. The same principal of breaking away from something that was reasonably sure and regular for something else not so sure but which glowed with brighter possibilities, was involved. Vaguely he felt the call. He was forty-four, and had left behind him twenty-odd years of hard and conscientious effort. As he was getting on in years so should he be getting on with some of his dreams, before the light failed and the Fiction Factory grew dark and all dreaming and doing were at an end.

One evening in Christmas week, 1910, he mentioned his aspirations to a noted editor with whom he happened to be at dinner. The book that was to bring fame and fortune, the book Edwards had always been going to write but had never been able to find the time, was under discussion. “Write it,” advised the noted one, “but not under your own name.”

Edwards fell silent. What was there in the work he had done which made it impossible to put “John Milton Edwards” on the title page of his most ambitious effort? Were the nickel novels and the popular paperbacks to rise in judgment against him? He could not think so then, and he does not think so now.

“Why don’t you write up your experiences as an author?” inquired the editor a few moments later. “You want to be helpful, eh? Well, there’s your chance. Writers would not be the only ones to welcome such a book, and if you did it fairly well it ought to make a hit.”

This suggestion Edwards adopted. Having the courage of convictions directly opposed to the noted editor’s, the other one he will not accept.

The reflections of 1910 began to bear fruit in 1911. With the beginning of the present year Edwards gave up the five-cent fiction, not because – as already stated in a previous chapter – he considered it debasing to his “art,” but because he needed time for the working out of a few of his dreams.

Presently, as though to confirm him in his determination, two publishing houses of high standing requested novels to be issued with their imprint. He accepted both commissions, and at this writing the work is well advanced. If he fails of material success in either or both these undertakings, by the standards elsewhere quoted and in which he thoroughly believes, the higher success that cannot be separated from faithful effort will yet be his. And it will suffice.

Even in 1910 Edwards had been swayed by his growing convictions. Almost unconsciously he had begun shaping his work along the line of higher achievement. During 1911 he has been hewing to the same line, but more consistently.

Edwards has demonstrated his ability to write moving picture scenarios that will sell. But is the game worth the candle? Is it pleasant for an author to see his cherished Western idea worked out with painted white men for Indians and painted buttes for a background? Of course, there are photoplays enacted on the Southwestern deserts, with real cowboys and red men for “supers,” but somewhere in most of these performances a false note is struck. One who knows the West has little trouble in detecting it.

This, however, is a matter of sentiment, alone. The nebulous ideas most scenario editors seem to have as to rates of payment, and the usually long delay in passing upon a “script,” are important details of quite another sort. And, furthermore, it is unjust to throw a creditable production upon the screen without placing the author’s name under the title. Of right, this advertising belongs to the author and should not be denied him.

In 1910 a moving picture concern secured a concession for taking pictures with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West and Pawnee Bill’s Far East Show, and Edwards was hired to furnish scenarios at $35 each. He furnished a good many, and of one of them Major Lillie (Pawnee Bill) wrote from Butte, Montana, on Sep. 2;

“Friend Edwards:

I saw one of the films run off at a picture house a few days ago and I think they are the greatest Western scenes that I have ever witnesed – that is, they are the truest to life. I had a letter from Mr. C—– yesterday, and he thinks they are fine.

Your friend,
“G.W. Lime,”

For a time Edwards thought his faith in the moving picture makers was about to be justified. But he was mistaken. He received a check for just $25, which probably escaped from the film men in an unguarded moment, and no further check, letter or word has since come from the company. The proprietors of the Show had nothing to do with the picture people, and regretted, though they could not help the loss Edwards had suffered.

When the moving picture writers are assured of better prices for their scenarios, of having them passed upon more promptly and of getting their names on the films with their pictures, the business will have been shaken down to a more commendable basis. Possibly the film manufacturers borrow their ideas of equitable treatment for the writer from some of the publishing houses.

The “hack” writer, in many editorial offices, is looked down upon with something like contempt by the august personage who condescends to buy his “stuff” and to pay him good money for it. Perhaps the “hack” is at fault and has placed himself in an unfavorable light. Writers are many and competition is keen. Among these humble ones there are those who have suffered rebuff after rebuff until the spirit is broken and pride is killed, and they go cringing to an editor and supplicate him for an assignment. Or they write him: “For God’s sake do not turn down this story! It is the bread-line for me, if you do.”

Did you ever walk through the ante-room of a big publishing house on the day checks are signed and given out? Men with pinched faces and ragged clothes sit in the mahogany chairs. They have missed the high mark in their calling. They had high ambitions once – but ambitions are always high when hope is young. They are writing now, not because they love their work but because it is the only work they know, and they must keep at it or starve (perhaps and starve).

A taxicab flings madly up to the door in front, and a stylishly clad gentleman floats in at the hall door and across the ante-room to the girl at the desk. They exchange pleasant greetings and the girl punches a button that communicates with the private office of the powers that be.

“Mr. Oswald Hamilton Brezee to see Mr. Skinner.”

Delighted mumblings by Mr. Skinner come faintly to the ears of the lowly ones. The girl turns away from the ‘phone.

“Go right in, Mr. Brezee.” she says. “Mr. Skinner will see you at once.”

Mr. Brezee’s “stuff” has caught on. Dozens of magazines are clamoring for it. Mr. Brezee vanishes and presently reappears, tucking away his check with the careless manner of one to whom checks are more or less of a bore. He passes into the hall, and in a moment the “taxi” is heard bearing him away.

The lowly ones twist in their chairs and bitterness floods their hearts. Like the author ot “Childe Harold,” Brezee awoke one morning to find himself famous. These others, with the dingy Windsor ties and the long hair and pinched faces never awake to anything but a doubt as to where the morning meal is to come from.

After hours of waiting in the ante-room, checks are finally produced and passed around to the lowly ones and they fade away into the haunts that know them best. Next pay-day they will be back again, if they are alive and have been given anything to do in the meantime.

Is this game worth the candle? What shall these men do with their “little gift” but keep it grinding, merciless though the grind may be? They cannot all be Oswald Hamilton Brezees.

Before a young man throws himself into the ranks of this vast army of writers, let him ponder the situation well. If, under the iron heel of adversity, he is sure he can still love his work for the work’s sake and be true to himself, there is one chance in ten that he will make a fair living, and one chance in a hundred that he may become one of the generals.

The Factory returns for 1910 and for part of 1911 are given below. Edwards believes that, in its last analysis, 1911 will offer figures close to the ten-thousand dollar mark – but it is a guess hedged around with many contingencies.

    1910:

54 nickel novels @ $60 each,    $ 3240.00
Short story for Munsey's,           75.00
Short story for The Blue Book,      40.00
Novelette for The Blue Book        200.00
Moving picture, Essanay Co,         25.00
Short story for Gunter's            40.00
Short story for Columbian           15.00
Paper-book rights,                 200.00
Serial story for Scrap Book,       400.00
Moving picture,                     25.00
                                   ______
          Total                 $ 4260.00

    Part of 1911:

5 paper-book rights,            $  500.00
Serial for All-Story               400.00
Novelette for Adventure,           250.00
Serial for The Argosy,             250.00
Novelette for The Blue Book,       200.00
Short stories for The Blue Book,   150.00
Short story for Harper's Weekly,    75.00
Serial for "Top-Notch,"            150.00
                                   ______
          Total                 $ 1975.00

George Ade asked an actress, who was one of the original cast of “The County Chairman,” to whom he had just been introduced, “Which would you rather be – a literary man or a burglar?” It is related that the actress, who was probably as excited as Ade, answered, “What’s the difference?” And this is supposed to be a humorous anecdote!

§

The man who tells stories, sometimes fiction and sometmes stories, about the Harper publications, evolves the following realistic story about “The Masquerader,” originally published in The Bazaar. Well, it seems that one morning, the editor sat her down and found the following letter, which is truly pathetic and possibly pathetically true: “You may, and I hope you have, some little remembrance of my name. But this will be the very oddest letter you have ever received. I am reading that most clever and wonderfully well-written novel, “The Masquerader.” I have very serious heart trouble and may live years and may die any minute. I should deeply regret going without knowing the general end of that story. May I know it? Will be as close as the grave itself if I may. I really feel that I may not live to know the unravelling of that net. If I may know for reason good and sufficient to yourself and by no means necessary to explain, may I please have the numbers as they come to you, and in advance of general delivery?” The editor sent on the balance of the story, but it was never revealed whether it made the person well again or not. Edwards imagines that the whirl of action in books would not be good for the heart – or, for the matter of that, the soul.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 23

XXIII.
THE INJUSTICE OF IT

The commercial world may hearken sentimentally to that plaintive ballad, “Silver Threads Among the Gold,” as it floats into the Emporium from a street organ, but the commercial world never allows sentiment to interfere with business. When a man presents himself and asks for a job, he is examined for symptoms of decrepitude before his mental abilities are canvassed. The wise seeker for place, before making the rounds of the Want Column, will see to it that his hair is of a youthful color, for there is nothing so damned by the octopus of trade as hoary locks. A bottle of walnut juice, carefully administered, may bridge the gap and lead from failure to success.

“New blood!” that’s the cry. “Age is too conservative, too partial to the old and outworn standards, too apt to keep in a rut. Give us the mop of black hair and the bright, snappy eye! Give us energy and brilliant daring and a fresh view-point! We’ll be taking a few chances, but what of that? We must follow the fashion.”

Some of the publishers have gone to the extreme of the prevailing mode. The yearling from the football field, if he happens to have been sporting editor of the college journal, is brought to the sanctum, shoved into the chair of authority, and given $50 a week and the power to go ahead and be ruthless. He rarely disappoints his employer. Whenever he does, his employer is to be congratulated. Usually, however, he sticks to his schedule. He thinks he is Somebody, and attempts to prove it by kicking all the old contributors out of the office and forwarding invitations for manuscripts to every member of the Class of ‘10.

There is no writer of experience who has failed to meet this sort of editor. For years a publishing house may have steadily increased in power and prestige through the loyalty and labor of the old contributor, only to give some darling of the campus a desk and the authority to begin oslerizing faithfulness and ability.

This injustice would be humorous were some of its aspects not so tragic. The smug publishers themselves may have something to answer for. They have wrung their ratings in Dun and Bradstreet from the old contributor, and when they abandon a policy that has brought success they are steering through troubled waters and into unknown seas.

For anything short of incompetence this casting aside of the old in order to try out the new is reprehensible. To weather a decade or two of storm and stress a writer must have been versatile. Versatility increases with his years, and he is as capable of brilliant daring and a fresh viewpoint as any youth in the twenties.

Times out of number this has been made manifest. Stories disguised with a pen-name and a strange typewriter have won welcome and success where the old name and the old typewriter would have insured rejection. Note this from one who has been twenty-five years at the game:

“In the near-humorous line I may mention the fact that I once tried to get the editor of a certain paper to let me furnish him a serial, but he didn’t think I could write it. Soon afterward a friend who had been contributing serials to that particular paper was asked by the editor to furnish a serial. As it chanced, the writer happened to be engaged in other work. So he came to me and wanted to know if I could not write the desired serial. When I informed him that the editor had turned my offer down, he then suggested that I write the serial and let him send it in under his own name. It was a chance to try the sagacity of that particular editor. I salved my conscience, wrote the serial, and my typewritten copy was submitted to the editor under the name of my friend. The serial was accepted, with medals thrown all over it – my literary friend being informed that it was just the thing the editor wanted, and that he had hard work to get authors who could suit his view as to what was available for his particular publication. My friend got the honor, if there was any, of seeing the serial run under his name; and I got the money for doing the work.”

If an author ever suffers an editor’s contempt, what must the editor suffer on being caught red-handed in such a way as this? It is the worm’s prerogative to turn whenever it finds the opportunity.

Illustrating this point, and several other points with which this chapter is concerned, the following letter from another writer, who has been turning out successful manuscripts for upward of twenty years, is reproduced:

“Dear Bro. Edwards:

You certainly DO put a poser to me. At the present time I have difficulty in seeing anything that has happened to me in the twenty-odd years of my following the literary game in anything but a tragic light. I believe my success, such as it was, was tragic. At least, it has rivetted my reputation to a certain class of literature – heaven save the mark! – and makes it almost impossible for me to sell anything of a bettter quality. I might tell you of plenty of cruel things that have been done to me by publishers and editors when they knew or suspected that I was hard up; and plenty of silly things done to me by the same folk when they thought I didn’t particularly NEED their money. But funny things–?

It’s the point of view makes the thing funny. The child pulling the wings off a fly to see the insect crawl over the window pane is amused; but I don’t suppose the fly sees the humor of the situation. I could tell you tales of submitting the same manuscript three times to an editor whom we both know well, having it shot through with criticism the first two times and then having it accepted and paid for at extra rates within two years of the first submission, and without even a word of the title changed! Is THAT the kind of an incident you want?

One of the funniest things that ever happened to me was that an editor of a popular magazine used to say that my stuff resembled Dickens, and when I wrote half-dime novels the readers used to write in and say the same. The quality of mind possessed by the scholarly editor and the street boys who read ‘Bowery Billy’ must be somewhat the same – eh?

There was once a magazine that bore as its title the name of a publisher as famous as any American ever saw, and the editor bought a story of me at the rate of half a cent a word, and owed me two years for it. Finally, one time when I was very hard up I went to the office and hung around until I could see the ‘boss’ and put it up to him to pay me. He did. He knocked off 33-1/3 per cent for ‘cash.’ Pretty good, eh?

I tell you, Edwards, there’s nothing funny in the game that I can see – not for the so-called literary worker. The gods may laugh when they see a man with that brand of insanity on him that actually forces him to write. But I doubt if the writer laughs – not even if he writes a ‘best seller.’ For success entails turning out other successes, and that is hard work. Excuse me! I am going back to the farm. I will write only when I have to, and only as long as my farm will not support me. I’ve got hold of a pretty good place cheap, down here with the outlook of making a good living on it in time. No more the Great White Way, with the Dirty Black Alley behind it, in mine! I am not going to carry my hat in my hand around to editors’ offices and take up collections for long. Besides, most of the editors blooming now are just out of college and are not dry behind the ears yet. They think that Johnny Go-bang, who edited the sporting page in the Podunk University Screamer, knows more about writing fiction than the old fellows who have been at it a couple of decades. And I reckon they are right. They are looking for ‘fresh’ material; some of it is pretty ‘raw’ as well as fresh. I fooled an editor the other day by sending a manuscript on strange paper, written on a new typewriter, and with an assumed name attached. Sold the story and got a long letter of encouragement from the editor. Great game – encouraging ‘new’ writers! About on a par with the scheme some rum sellers have of washing their sidewalks with the dregs of beer kegs. The spider and fly game. Now. if I told that editor what an ass he had made of himself, would he ever buy another manuscript of me again? I fear not!

Perhaps I am pessimistic, Brother Edwards. There’s no real fun in the writing game – not for the writer, at least. Not when he is forty years old and knows that already he is a ‘has-been.’ Good luck to you. Hope your book is a success, and if I really knew just what you wanted I’d try to whip something into shape for you. For you very well know that, if other fiction writers give you incidents for your book, they’ll mostly be fiction! That is the devil of it. If a fiction writer cuts a sliver off his thumb while paring the corned beef for dinner, he will make out of the story a gory combat between his hero and a horde of enemies, and give details of the carnage fit to make his own soul shudder.

I hope to meet up with you again some time. But pretty soon when I go to New York I’ll wear my chin-whiskers long and carry a carpet-bag; and you bet I’ll fight shy of editor’ offices.”

Another example of injustice to writers which, however, happened to turn out well for the writer:

“I offered a short serial to a certain newspaper syndicate. Soon I received a lettter saying they could pay me $200 for the serial rights. Before my letter accepting the offer reached them, I had another letter from the syndicate withdrawing the offer. The editor stated pathetically that the proprietor had returned and had asked him to withdraw it. I then sent the serial to a Chicago newspaper, which paid me $200 for serial rights – BUT NEVER PUBLISHED THE STORY. Finally I rewrote the story, had it published as a book by a leading Eastern publishing house, and it sold well.”

Here, again, is injustice of another kind:

“Once a certain Eastern magazine authorized me to go to Santa Fe, New Mexico, and write a description of a Pueblo dance and of Pueblo life, and send the manuscript on with photographs for illustration. I did the work. And I was rewarded by the generous editor with a check for $20! You can imagine how profitable that particular stunt was, for I took a week’s time and paid my own expenses. But not out of that twenty. There wasn’t enough of it to go ‘round.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 22

XXII.
NEW SOURCES OF PROFIT

The out-put of the Fiction Factory brought excellent returns during the years 1908 and 1909. Industry followed close on the heels of opportunity and the result was more than gratifying. The 1908 product consisted of forty-four nickel novels for Harte & Perkins, two novelettes for The Blue Book, four serials for the Munsey publications, and one novelette for The People’s Magazine. This work alone would have carried the receipts well above those of the preceding year, but new and unexpected sources of profit helped to enlarge the showing on the Factory’s books.

The rapidity with which Edwards wrote his serial stories – sometimes under the spur of an immediate demand from his publishers, and sometimes under the less relentless spur of personal necessity – seemed to preclude the possibility of profit on a later publication “in cloth.” Only a finished performance is worthy of a durable binding. Realizing this, Edwards had never made a determined effort to interest book-publishers in the stories. In the ordinary course of affairs, and with scarcely any attention on his part, two serials found their way into “cloth.” “Danny W.,” accepted and brought out by Dodd, Mead & Co., was written for book publication, and serialized after it had appeared in that form. It fell as far short of a “best seller” as did the two republished serials.

Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that additional profit through publication in cloth seemed out of the question, Edwards wondered if there were not something else to be gained from the stories besides the serial rights.

His stories were dramatic and, in several instances, had appealed to play-writers. For a time he had hopes that dramatic rights might prove a source of additional income. His hopes, in this respect, have not been completely dashed, inasmuch as competent hands are at this date (September, 1911) fitting some of his stories for the stage. Something may come of it, but his experience has made him wary and he is not at all sanguine.

Eliminating book and dramatic rights from the equation, and what remained? A letter from Waltham, Mass., dated April 23, 1908, uncovered possibilities of which Edwards had never dreamed. Most of these possibilities, as it transpired, were a dream, but, as in the matter of dramatic rights, some day the dream may come true in a large and substantial manner. Here is the letter:

“Dear Sir:

If you have not yet disposed of the sole and unrestricted rights of translation into the GERMAN language of your books: ‘The Billionaire’s Dilemma’ and ‘The Shadow of the Unknown,’ will you permit me to submit them to my GERMAN correspondents – some of the best known GERMAN PUBLISHERS – with the idea of effecting a sale?

I shall require a single copy of ‘The Billionaire’s Dilema,’ but not of ‘The Shadow of the Unknown’ having preserved the story as it appeared first in the POPULAR, [] to send abroad, with a statement of the best terms you will make for the *cash out-right purchase of both book and serial rights.

If the serial rights of translation in GERMAN belong to the POPULAR, you will have to come to a satisfactory understanding with them, in order to legally assign to me the SERIAL, as well as your own individual, book-rights, because all GERMAN publishers insist on serial rights, although they seldom or never use them, as MAGAZINES are not good and little used there.

My experience has been, that the MAGAZINE COMPANIES are very broad in their treatment of their writers, and usually willing to re-transfer their SERIAL rights of translation, in order to facilitate a sale, and make them universally known.

Of course less is paid for translation rights of stories that have only appeared in SERIAL form in the STATES.

If any of the publishers I represent purchases your stories, you have the best possible guarantee of perfect translation and speedy publication.

Awaiting the courtesy of an early reply and the necessary copy of ‘The Billionaire’s Dilemma,’ I have the honor to be, dear Sir,

Yours very truly,

“Eugene Niemann.” [*]

[* A mistake, the story appeared in The Blue Book.]

[* Edwards uses a ficticious name for this correspondent.]

Several guns were fired during this invasion of Germany, but only one shell “went home.” This was not the fault of Mr. Niemann. In Edwards’ brief experience with him he found him always a scholar and a gentleman. Sincerity and courtesy were his never-failing traits. The pleasant little twists he gave his English, and the occasional naive expression that struggled through his typewriter, along with the prodigal use of “caps,” will perhaps excuse a further offering from the correspondence. Here is the shot that hit the mark:

“May 12, 1908.

“Dear Sir:–

Before I have even had time to forward ‘The Billionaire’s Dilemma’ and ‘On the Stroke of Four’, and to await your other announced stories, a letter comes from one of my German correspondents, saying he had run through your short story: “The Shadow of the Unknown’ and would purchase the rights of translation if you will accept an offer of FORTY DOLLARS.

Perhaps you will say, “such an offer is absurd,” but first let me state to you, that the best books placed in GERMANY bring at the most ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS, and oftener anywhere from FIFTY to ONE HUNDRED, that the chief profit, is not a monetary one, rather the spreading of the writer’s name and fame.

‘The Shadow of the Unknown,’ writes the publisher, is a very short story, and if you will be guided by my long experience, dear Sir, you will accept the offer, in order to make our name popular and facilitate a better sale of your following stories, which I shall take double pleasure in forwarding, feeling surer of a good offer.

Were I guilty of business indiscretion, you would be surprised to know the names of the already published ‘BOOKS’ I have sold and am daily selling the GERMAN rights of, for hardly a monetary consideration at all, and yet the literary satisfaction quite out-balances all other considerations, does it not?

I enclose the customary form of assignment, which you can sign and have duly witnessed by a NOTARY PUBLIC, if you see fit to accept the offer, and which you will please then send me per AMERICAN EXPRESS C.O.D. subject to examination to avoid every possible chance of error.

The personal receipt need not be signed before the NOTARY PUBLIC, your signature without witness suffices.

Hoping to do much better for you with your other fine stories and appreciating your confidence, I remain, dear Sir,

Very truly yours,

“EUGENE NIEMANN.”

After the dust had settled, and the invasion was finally completed, $40 had been added to the year’s receipts of the Fiction Factory; but Edwards clings to the hope that some day more of his “fine stories” may be greedily bought by the German publishers. These German publishers are honorable enough to buy, where they might pirate, and there are a few American publishers who might take lessons from them in business probity. With a small tidbit from a letter of May 18, the pleasant Mr. Niemann will be dismissed:

“Later, with your permission, I will take up the stories I sell in GERMANY for sale in FRANCE, DENMARK, NORWAY and SWEDEN?

The monetary remuneration in the SCANDINAVIAN countries is yet smaller than in GERMANY, but the people are fine readers, and that for all, who truly LOVE their ART is the chief standpoint I take it?!”

During the latter part of July and the earlier part of August Edwards was in New York for a couple of weeks. As usual when in the city he worked even harder than he did at home. Two nickel novels were written, a serial was put through the Factory for Mr. Davis, and he collected $200 for a novelette which he sold to People’s. There was an interesting, almost a humorous, circumstance connected with the serial.

Edwards called the story “The Man Who Left.” When the manuscript was completed he took it in to Mr. Davis, and two or three days later called again to learn its fate.

The Munsey offices are up close to the roof in the Flatiron building. The lair of the editor who presides over the destinies of The All-Story Magazine, The Railroad Man’s Magazine and The Scrap Book [*] is flanked on the side by a prospect of space that causes the occasional caller to hang on to his chair. Across from this dizzy void is a partition hung with framed photographs of contributors – a rogues’ gallery in which Edwards, when he last saw the collection, had a prominent place. North of an imaginary line drawn between the window and the partition sits the editor, grimly prominent against a motto-covered wall. As the caller faces the editor he is, of course, confronted by placards reminding him that “This is My Busy Day – Cut it Short,” and “Find A Man for the Job not A Job for the Man,” and others cunningly calculated to put him on tenterhooks.

[* Now no more as The Cavalier, the former monthly, now a weekly has “absorbed” The Scrap Book.]

To this place, therefore, came Edwards, proffering inquiries about “The Man Who Left.” He read fateful things in the august countenance, and he was not surprised when Mr. Davis handed him a lemon, but he was surprised when he took the lemon back.

“Rotten,” said Mr. Davis, “r-r-rotten! When I’m out for peaches, Edwards, I side-step the under-ripe persimmons. ‘The Man Who Left’ ought to have made his get-away along about line one, paragraph one, chapter one; and then if he had staid out plumb to the place where you have written ‘Finis’ this gorgeous but unconvincing tale would have been vastly improved. Am I a Jasper that you seek thus to inveigle me into purchasing a gold-brick? Here, take it away! Now let me have it again. I am going to give you three hundred for it and tuck it away in the strong-box. Later you are to evolve, write and otherwise put upon paper a fictional prize for which ‘The Man Who Left’ will be returned to you in even exchange. Do you get me? ‘Nuff said. I think you’re out of mazuma, and that’s why I’m doing this. My friends’ll ruin me yet!”

Now the humor, if there is any, fits in about here: Edwards went back to Michigan and wrote a serial which he sent on to replace “The Man Who Left.” Here is the letter in reply:

My dear Edwards:

While I was away on my vacation, some one spilled a pitcher of milk. In other words, they put “The Man Who Left” to press for The All-Story Magazine, and it is now too late to yank it back. That’s the trouble of leaving anything in the safe that should not be there. You and I, however, being practical men, can understand the facility with which the yarn was nabbed up.

Now, the point is, I can use the “Mydus” yarn and get a check off to you next week, provided I have some basis on which to operate. What’s the lowest price for which you will give me ‘Mydus,’ call all previous arrangements equal, and let things stand as they are. The way to trim me and square accounts is to come back with a quick, short, sharp, cheap reply, and let it go at that.

Hurry up this ‘Mydus’ business and we’ll see what we can do. Sincerely yours,

“R. H. DAVIS.”

The spilling of that “pitcher of milk” while Mr. Davis was away on his vacation had netted Edwards just an even $300.

Another source of profit from the serial stories which the Fiction Factory had been turning out for years was revealed to Edwards in a letter dated Nov. 19, 1908. This, like the matter of translation rights, came to Edwards as a pleasant surprise; but, unlike the “German invasion,” it was to prove vastly more profitable. Here is the letter:

“Dear Sir:

Upon looking over the files of The Argosy we find that you have written the following serial stories. Are the book rights of these your property? If not, can you get Mr. Munsey to give them to you? If you can, and will lengthen the stories to about 75,000 words, we will pay you $100 each for the paper book rights of same.

We cannot offer you more, as we would put these out in cheap paper edition, but this publication would do a great deal toward popularizing your name and work with the class of readers who buy The Argosy and other fiction magazines.

The stories are as follows: (Here were listed the titles of seven Argosy serials.)

Very truly yours,

“STREET & SMITH.”

Edwards caught at this opportunity. He failed to realize, at the time, just how much work was involved in lengthening the stories for paper-book publication. In his reply to Street & Smith he offered a list of forty-five serials, and promised others if they could use so many. He was requested, on Dec. 4, to forward copies of all the stories for reading. The same letter contained this paragraph:

“I note that your letter is dated December 2nd and that you state you expect to be in New York inside of three weeks. I think it might be to our mutual advantage if you could come on in a week or ten days, for there is a new line of work which I think you could do for us about which I would like to talk with you.”

Just before Christmas Edwards and his wife arrived in New York. On some of the serials which had appeared in the Munsey magazines Edwards owned all but serial rights, but there were many more wherein all rights were held by the publishers.

The folly of a writer’s selling all rights when disposing of a story for serial publication dawned upon Edwards very strongly, at this time. The conviction was driven “home” at a little dinner which Edwards tendered to several editors and readers. During the course of the dinner one of the guests – an editor in charge of a prominent and popular magazine – averred bluntly that “any writer who sells all rights to a story to a magazine using the story serially, is a fool.”

With Edwards this sale of all rights had resulted from carelessness more than anything else, and had he not been dealing with friends like Mr. White and Mr. Davis he might have suffered financial loss because of his folly. Two or three interviews with Mr. Davis secured the paper-book rights, but with the understanding that if any of the lengthened stories were brought out in cloth, one-half of the royalties were to go to The Munsey Company.

In the whole list there were only seven stories long enough for immediate issue in paper-book form. These were paid for, at once. The other stories fell short of the required ntunber of words all the way from 5,000 to 30,000 words. There was no profit to Edwards in lengthening the stories at the price of $100 each. What benefit he derived – and is now deriving, for the work continues – was in the advertising which the wide circulation of the paper-covered books afforded him. Also, Edwards considered the value of cementing his friendship with the old-established publishing house of Street & Smith, a house noted for the fairness of its dealings with contributors and for the prompt payment for all material upon acceptance. “Making good” with publishers of such high standing is always of inestimable value to a writer.

One of Street & Smith’s editors, at this time, was St. George Rathborne, author of “Dr. Jack” and dozens of other popular stories that have appeared in paper covers. Here was another author who had become an editor, bringing to his duties an experience and ability that made for the highest success. Mr. C.A. MacLean, another member of the Street & Smith editorial staff, was also a gentleman with whom Edwards had occasional dealings. Mr. MacLean, beginning at the lowest rung of the ladder, had mounted steadily to the post of editor of The Popular Magazine and Smith’s Magazine, by sheer force of his own merit pushing those publications to the forefront of magazines of their class. To these gentlemen, and particularly to Mr. Rathborne, [*] Edwards is indebted for unfailing kindness and courtesy, and takes this means to acknowledge it.

[* Mr. Rathborne has recently given up his editorial duties and has retired to what seems to be the ultimate goal of writers and editors – a farm. He is somewhere in New Jersey.]

The special work which was mentioned in Street & Smith’s letter of Nov. 19 consisted of a new weekly publication for which Edwards was to furnish the copy. Seventy-five dollars each was to be paid for these stories.

With all this work ahead of the Fiction Factory, the year 1909 dawned in a blaze of prosperity. During 1909 Edwards found himself so busy with the paperbooks and the other publication that he had no time for serial stories. After thirty-four issues the new publication was discontinued, and Edwards went back to writing novels for Harte & Perkins, at $60 each.

During 1909 Edwards tried his hand at moving pictures. The alluring advertisements under the scare-head, “We Pay $10 to $100 for Picture Plays,” caught his eye and fired his ambition. He wrote a scenario, sent it in, and waited expectantly for his $100. He had been only two hours preparing the “photoplay” and it looked like “easy money.” When the check arrived it was for $10! He wrote in to ask what had become of the remaining $90? Thus answered The Vitagraph Company of America, Oct. 27, ‘09:

“In regard to the payment for a manuscript of this character, we never give more than ten dollars, for two or three reasons.

In the first place, we only use the idea. The manuscript has to be revised in almost every instance in order to put it in practical shape for the directors.

Again, they contain an idea which is more or less stereotyped or conventional and cannot be claimed as entirely original only as applied to the action of the play.

Regarding your own idea, I will frankly say that the same idea has often been embodied in other plays, but the general suggestion of it gives a new phase to the action of the idea.

THE EDITOR merely surmises, or so we think, that a thoroughly original manuscript in practical shape would be worth at least $25, but we seldom get one of that kind. We would welcome one at any time and would pay its full value.,

The members of our staff, who are obliged to write practical working scenarios, appreciate the above facts because they know what it means to perfect a scenario with the synopsis of the story, the properties, settings, &c., &c.

We merely state these things so you will understand that we are thoroughly fair in your case and will certainly be so in every instance.

Ideas, if they are entirely original, would be worth more than ten dollars, but they are scarcer than hen’s teeth at any price.

We find most of the ideas which we receive, and we receive hundreds of them, are nothing but repetition or old ones in new guises.

Again we will say, if we can get original ideas we will pay their full value.”

Another case of sic transit – this time, sic transit masuma.

Here follows a transcript from the Factory’s books for the two years with which this chapter has dealt:

    1908:
Dillingham, last royalities on "Tales of Two Towns"  $     1.50
45 nickel novels @ $50 each                             2250.
"The Shadow of the Unknown"                              200.
"The Shadow of the Unknown," translation rights           40.
"Parker & O'Fallon"                                      300.
"In the Valley's Shadow"                                 200.
"The Man Who Left,"                                      300.
"Trail of the Mydus,"                                    350.
"Just A Dollar,"                                         350.
"Frisbie's Folly,"                                       350.
"The Man Called Dare,"                                   300.
"The Streak of Yellow,"                                  200.
7 paper-book rights at $100 each,                        700.
                                                      ________
                        Total,                        $ 5541.50

    1909:
34 issues "Motor Boys" @ $75 each                     $ 2550.
21 paper-book rights @ $100 each                        2100.
9 nickel novels @ $60 each,                              540.
"The Stop on the 'Scutcheon," short story                 35.
Moving-picture,                                           10.
"Brealong Even," short story                              40.
"Divided by Eight," short story                           35.
                                                      ________
                        Total                         $ 5310.

The following advertisement from an English paper, which is vouched for, once more illustrates the truth of the statement that fact is stranger than fiction. The owner of the houses, it may be mentioned, was ill in bed, far away, and the neighbors evidently did not question the right of the men to do as they did. The advertisement is as follows:

LOST. – Three fine cottages have mysteriously disappeared from the property Nos. 296, 298 and 300 High road, Willesden Green, London. Please communicate with J.M. Godwin, 71 Bank Street, London, W.C.

§

O. Henry told a whimsical tale of what he considered unfair competition in the short story field. He was in the office of a big magazine, when he witnessed the return to a dejected looking young fellow of a couple of manuscripts. “I am sorry for that fellow,” said the editor. “He came to New York from New Orleans a year ago, and regularly brings some stories to our office. We can never use them. He doesn’t make a dollar by his pen, and he is getting shabby and pale.” A month or so later O. Henry saw the same writer in the same office, and the editor was talking to him earnestly. “You had better go back to New Orleans,” said that gentleman. “Why?” said the young man. “Some day I may write a story you may want.” “But you can do that just as well in New Orleans,” said the editor, “and you can save board bills.” “Board bills,” ejaculated the young man. “What do I care about board bills! I have an income of twenty thousand a year from my father’s estate.’

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 21

XXI.
A WRITER’S READING

That old Egyptian who put above the door of his library these words, “Books are the Medicines of the Soul,” was wise indeed. But the Wise, ever since books have been made, have harped on the advantage of good literature, and have said all there is to be said on the subject a thousand times over. If one has any doubts on this point let him consult a dictionary of quotations. No intelligent person disputes the value of books; and it should be self-evident that no writer, whose business is the making of books, will do so. To the writer books are not only “medicines for the soul” but tonics for his technique, febrifuges for his rhetorical fevers and prophylactics for the thousand and one ills that beset his calling. A wide course of general reading – the wider the better – is part of the fictionist’s necessary equipment; and of even more importance is a specializing along the lines of his craft.

“Omniverous reader” is an overworked term, but it is perfect in its application to Edwards. From his youth up he has devoured everything in the way of books he could lay his hands on. The volumes came hap-hazard, and the reading has been desultory and, for the most part, without system. If engaged on a railroad story, he reads railroad stories; if a tale of the sea claims his attention, then his pabulum consists of sea-facts and fiction, and so on. The latest novel is a passion with him, and he would rather read a story by Jack London, or Rex Beach, or W.J. Locke than eat or sleep – or write something more humble although his very own. He is fond of history, too, and among the essayists he loves his Emerson. Nothing so puts his modest talents in a glow as to bring them near the beacon lights of Genius.

Edwards has a library of goodly proportions, but it is a hodge-podge of everything under the sun. Thomas Carlyle “keeps company” with Mary Johnston on his bookshelves, Marcus Aurelius rubs elbows with Frank Spearman, “France in the Nineteenth Century” nestles close to “The Mystery” from the firm of White & Adams, and four volumes of Thackeray are cheek by jowl with Harland’s “The Cardinal’s Snuff-Box.” A most reprehensible method of book keeping, of course, but to Edwards it is a delightful confusion. To him the method is reprehensible only when he wants a certain book and has to spend half a day looking for it. Some time, some blessed time – he has promised himself for years and years, – he will catalogue his books just as he has catalogued his clippings.

Books that concern themselves with the writer’s trade are many, so many that they may be termed literally an embarrassment of riches. If a writer had them all he would have more than he needed or could use. Books on the short by J. Berg Eisenwein and James Knapp Reeve, Edwards considers indispensable. They are to be read many times and thoroughly mastered. “Roget’s Thesaurus” is a work which Edwards consulted until it was dogeared and coverless; he then presented it to an impecunious friend with a well-defined case of writeritis and has since contented himself with the large “Thesaurus Dictionary of the English Language,” by F.A. March, LL.D. This flanks him on the left, as he sits at his typrewriter, while Webster’s “Unabridged” closes him in on the right. The Standard Dictionary is also within reach. Dozens and dozens of books about writers and writing have been read and are now gathering dust. After a writer has once charged himself to the brim with “technique,” he should cease to bother about it. If he has read to some purpose his work will be as near technical perfection as is necessary, for unconsciously he will follow the canons of the art; while if he loads and fires these “canons” too often, they will be quite apt to burst and blow him into that innocuous desuetude best described as “mechanical.” He should exercise all the freedom possible within legitimate bounds, and so acquire individuality and “style” – whatever that is.

No sane man in any line of trade or manufacturing will attempt to do business without subscribing to one or more papers or magazines covering his particular field. He wants the newest labor-saving wrinkle, the latest discoveries, tips on new markets, facts as to what others in the same business are doing, and countless other fresh and pertinent items which a good trade paper will furnish. A writer is such a man, and he needs tabulated facts as much as any other tradesman or manufacturer. Periodicals dealing with the trade of authorship are few, but they are helpful to a degree which it is difficult to estimate.

From the beginning of his work Edwards has made it a point to acquire every publication that dealt with the business of his Fiction Factory. In eariy years he had The Writer, and then The Author. When these went the way of good but Tiiiprof iuWe things, THE EDITOR fortunately happened along, and proved incomparably better in every detail.

From its initial number THE EDITOR has been a monthly guest at the Factory, always cordially welcomed and given a place of honor. Guide, counsellor and friend – it has proved to be all these.

Edwards subscribes heartily to that benevolent policy known as “the helping hand.” Furthermore, he tries to live up to it. What little success he has had with his Fiction Factory he has won by his own unaided efforts; but there were times, along at the beginning, when he could have avoided disappointment and useless labor if some one who knew had advised him. Realizing what “the helping hand” might have done in his own case, he has always felt the call to extend it to others. Assistance is useless, however, if a would-be writer hasn’t something to say and doesn’t know how to say it. Another who has had some success may secure the novice a considerate hearing, but from that on the matter lies wholly with the novice himself. If he has it in him, he will win; if he hasn’t, he will fail. Edwards first advice to those who have sought his help has invariably been this: “Subscribe to THE EDITOR.” In nearly every instance the advice has been taken, and with profitable results.

This same advice is given here, should the reader stand in need of a proper start along the thorny path of authorship. Nor is it to be construed in any manner as an advertisement. It is merely rendering justice where justice is due, and is an honest tribute to a publication for writers, drawn from an experience of twenty-two years “in the ranks.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 20

XX.
THE LENGTHENING LIST OF PATRONS

During the year 1906 the patrons of the Fiction Factory steadily increased in number. The Blue Book, The Red Book, The Railroad Man, The All-Story, The People’s – all these magazines bought of the Factory’s products, some of them very liberally. The old patrons, also, were retained, Harte & Perkins taking a supply of nickel novels and a Stella Edwards’ serial for The Guest.

Edwards’ introduction to The Blue Book came so late in the year that the business falls properly within the affairs of 1907. The first step, however, was taken on Aug. 13, 1906, and was in the form of the following letter:

“My dear Mr. Edwards:

Why don’t you send me, with a view to publication in The Blue Book, as we have renamed our old Monthly Story Magazine, one or more of those weird and fantastic novelettes of yours? If you have anything ready, let me see it. I can at least assure you of a prompt decision and equally prompt payment if the story goes. Anything you may have up to 6,000 words I shall be very glad to see for The Red Book.

Yours very truly,
“Karl Edwin Harriman.”

Here was a pleasant surprise for Edwards. He had met Mr. Harriman the year before in Battle Creek, Michigan. At that time Mr. Harriman was busily engaged hiding his talents under a bushel known as The Pilgrim Magazine. When the Red Book Corporation of Chicago, kicked the basket to one side, grabbed Mr. Harriman out from under it and made off with him, the aspect of the heavens promised great things for literature in the Middle West. And this promise, by the way, is being splendidly fulfilled.

When you take down your “Who’s Who” to look up some personage sufficiently notorious to have a place between its red covers, if you find at the end of his name the words, “editor, author,” you may be sure that there is no cloud on the title that gives him a place in the book. You will know at once that he must have been a good author or he would never have been promoted from the ranks; and having been a good author he is certainly a better editor than if the case were otherwise, for he knows both ends of the publishing trade.

Having been through the mill himself, Mr. Harriman has a fellow-feeling for his contributors. He knows what it is to take a lay figure for a plot, clothe it in suitable language, cap it with a climax and put it on exhibition with a card: “Here’s a Peach! Grab me quick for $9.99.” Harriman’s “peaches” never came back. The author of “Ann Arbor Tales,” “The Girl and the Deal,” and others has been successful right from the start

No request for material received at the Edwards’ Factory ever fails of a prompt and hearty response. A short story and a novelette were at once put on the stocks. They were constructed slowly, for Edwards could give them attention only during odd moments taken from his regular work. The short story was finished and submitted long in advance of the novelette. This letter, dated Sept 18, will show its success:

“My Dear Old Man: Why don’t you run on here and see me, now and again. Oh, yes, New York’s a lot better, but we’re doing things here, too. About ‘Cast Away by Contract,’ it’s very funny – such a ridiculously absurd idea that it’s quite irresistible. How will $75 be for it? O.K.? It’s really all I can afford to pay for a story of its sort, and I do want you in the book. Let me hear as soon as possible and I will give it out to the artist.

Very truly yours,
“K.H.”

And so began the business with Mr. Harriman. He still, at this writing (1911), has a running account on the Factory’s books and is held in highest esteem by the proprietor.

A letter, written May 13, 1905, (a year dealt with in a previous chapter), is reproduced here as having a weighty bearing on the events of 1906. It was Edwards’ first letter from a gentleman who had recently allied himself with the Munsey publications. As a publisher Mr. F.A. Munsey is conceded to be a star of the first magnitude, but this genius is manifest in nothing so much as in his ability to surround himself with men capable of pushing his ideas to their highest achievement. Such a man had been added to his editorial staff in the person of Mr. R.H. Davis. Mr. Davis, like Mr. Bryan, hails originally from Nebraska. Although he differs somewhat from Mr. Bryan in political views, he has the same powers as a spellbinder. He’s Western, all through, is “Bob” Davis, bluff, hearty and equally endowed with stories, snap and sincerity.

“Dear Sir:

We would like to have a few pictures of those writers who have contributed considerably to our various magazines. It is obvious that this refers to you. Therefore, if you will send us a portrait it will be greatly appreciated.

Very truly yours,
“R.H. Davis.”

Mr. Davis got the picture; also a serial or two and some short stories for new publications issued by the Munsey Company of which he was editor. Late in 1905 he called for a railroad serial, and he wanted a particularly good one.

Edwards had never tried his hand at such a story. He knew, in a general way, that the “pilot” was on the front end of a locomotive, and that the “tender” was somewhere in the rear, but his technical knowledge was hazy and unreliable. The story, if accepted, was to appear in The Railroad Man’s Magazine, would be read by “railroaders” the country over, and would be damned and laughed at if it contained any technical “breaks.”

Here was just the sort of a nut Edwards liked to crack. The perils of the undertaking lent it a zest, and were a distinct aid to industry and inspiration. He resolved that he would give Mr. Davis a story that would bear the closest scrutiny of railroad men and win their interest and applause. To this end he studied railroads, up and down and across. He absorbed what he could from books, and the rest he secured through personal investigation. When the story was done, he submitted the manuscript to a veteran of the rails – one who had been both a telegraph operator and engineer – and this gentleman had not a change to suggest! Mr. Davis took the story aboard. While it was running in the magazine a reader wrote in to declare that it must have been written by an old hand at the railroad game: the author of the letter had been railroading for thirty-five years himself, and felt positive that he ought to know! “The Red Light at Rawlines” scored a triumph, proving the value of study, and the ability to adjust one’s self to an untried situation.

Edwards had imbibed too much technical knowledge to exhaust it all on one story, so he wrote another and sent it to Mr. White. The latter informed him:

“I turned ‘Special One-Five-Three’ over to The Railroad Man’s Magazine at once, without reading it, and they are sending you a check for it this week, I understand. This does not mean that I did not care to consider it for The Argosy. I certainly have an opening for more of your stories, but when you took the railroad for your theme and treated it so intelligently, I think it better that you give The Argosy some other subject matter.”

Another story, written this year to order, also serves to show that facility in handling strange themes or environments does not always depend upon personal acquaintance with the subject in hand. Intelligent study and investigation can many times, if not always, piece out a lack of personal experience. Blazing a course through terra incognita in such a manner, however, is not without its dangers.

Harte & Perkins wished to begin the yearly volume of The Guest with a Stella Edwards serial. This story was to have, for its background, the San Francisco earthquake. Nearly the whole action of the yarn was to take place in the city itself. Edwards had never been there. He had vague ideas regarding the “Golden Gate,” Oakland and other places, but for accurate knowledge he was as much at sea as in the case of the railroad story. He set the wheels of industry to revolving, however, and familiarized himself so thoroughly with the city from books, newspapers and magazines that the editor of The Guest, an old San Francisco newspaper man, had this to say about the story:

“It will please you to learn that we think ‘A Romance of the Earthquake’ a very interesting story, with plenty of brisk action, picturesque in description, and DISPLAYING A THOROUGH KNOWLEDGE OF CALIFORNIA’S METROPOLIS AND VICINITY.”

Although these are interesting problems to solve, yet Edwards, as a rule, prefers dealing with material that has formed a part of his own personal experiences.

His “prospecting” trip for the year brought him into New York on Monday, Nov. 12. On Tuesday (his “lucky day,” according to the Coney Island seer of fateful memory), he called on Mr. White, and Mr. White took him across the hall and introduced him to Mr. Davis. The latter gentleman ordered four serials and, for stories of a certain length, agreed to pay $500 each.

Next day Edwards dropped in at the offices of Street & Smith and submitted a novelette – “The Billionaire’s Dilemma” – to Mr. MacLean, editor of The Popular Magazine (Mr. Lewis having retired from that publication some time before). Mr. MacLean carried the manuscript in to Mr. Vivian M. Moses, editor of People’s, and the latter bought it. This story made a hit in the People’s and won from Mr. George C. Smith, of the firm, a personal letter of commendation. Result: More work for The People’s Magazine.

About the middle of December, Edwards and his wife left for their home in Michigan. They had been in the city a month, and during that time Edwards had received $1150 for his Factory’s products. The year, financially, was the best Edwards had so far experienced; but it was to be outdone by the year that followed.

During 1907 a great deal of writing was done for Mr. Davis. Among other stories subpiitted to him was one which Edwards called, “On the Stroke of Four.” Regarding it Mr. Davis had expressed himself, May 6, in characteristic vein:

“My dear Colonel:

Send it along. The title is not a bad one. I suppose it will arrive at a quarter past five, as you are generally late….

Now that spring is here, go out and chop a few kindlings against the canning of the fruit. This season we are going to preserve every dam thing on the farm. In the meantime, put up a few bartletts for little Willie. We may drop in provided the nest contains room.”

He received an urgent invitation to “drop in.” But he didn’t. He backed out. Possibly he was afraid he would have to “pioneer it” in the country, after years of metropolitan luxury in the effete East. Or perhaps he was afraid that Edwards might read some manuscripts to him. Whatever the cause, he never appeared to claim the “bartletts,” made ready for him with so much painstaking care by Mrs. Edwards. But this was not the only count in the indictment. He sent back “On the Stroke of Four!” And this was his message:

“Up to page 106 this story is a peach. After that it is a peach, but a rotten peach, and I’d be glad to have you fix it up and return it.”

After Edwards has finished a story he has an ingrained dislike for tampering with it any further. However, had he not been head over ears in other work, he would probably have “fixed up” the manuscript for Mr. Davis. In the circumstances, he decided to try its fortunes elsewhere. Mr. Moses took it in, paid $400 for it, and pronounced it better than “The Billionaire’s Dilemma.”

At a later date, Mr. Davis wanted another sea story for Ocean which, at that time, was surging considerably. “On the Stroke of Four” had been designed to fill such an order. Inasmuch as it had failed, Edwards wrote a second yarn which was accepted at $450.

The sea, and the people who go down to it in ships, to say nothing of the ships themselves, were all out of Edwards’ usual line. He prepared himself by reading every sea story he could lay hands on, long or short. He bought text-books on seamanship and navigation, and whenever there were manoeuvers connected with “working ship” in a story, Edwards puzzled them out with the help of the text-books. With both deep-water serials he succeeded tolerably well. He is sure, at least, that he didn’t get the spanker-boom on the foremast, nor the jib too far aft.

Harte & Perkins again favored the Factory with an order for a “Stella Edwards” to begin another volume of The Guest. This was an automobile story, “The Hero of the Car,” and was accepted and highly praised.

Another novelette, “An Aerial Romance,” was bought by Mr. Moses for The People’s Magazine.

Beginning in March, Edwards had written some more nickel novels for Harte & Perkins – not the old Five-Cent Weekly, for that he was never to do again – but various stories, in odd lots, to help out with a particular series. On July 14 he was switched to another line of half-dime fiction, and this work he kept throughout the remainder of the year.

For the two years the Factory’s showing stands as follows:

   1906:
18 nickel novels @ $50 each     $ 900.00
Royalties on book, Dillingham      10.20
"The World's Wonder,"             300.00
"A Romance of the Earthquake,"    250.00
"The Sheriff Who Lost and Won,"   300.00
"The Reporter's Scoop,"            60.00
'The Deputy Sheriff,"              40.00
"The Red Light at Rawlin's,"      350.00
"Cast Away by Contract,"           75.00
"Special One-Five-Three,"         350.00
"The Disputed Claim,"             500.00
"Fencing with Foes,"              45O.00
"The Billionaire's Dilemma,"      200.00
                                --------
             Total             $ 3785.20

   1907:
"Under Sealed Orders,"         $  250.00
"The Pacific Pearlers,"           450.00
"Call of the West,"               200.00
"Wilderness Gold-Hunter,"         500.00
"Dupes of Destiny,"                75.00
"On the Stroke of Four,"          400.00
"The Hero of the Car,"            300.00
"An Aerial Romance,"              200.00
"West-Indies Mix-Up,"              60.00
33 nickel novels @ $50 each      1650.00
                                --------
             Total             $ 4085.00

In that remarkable group of authors who made the dime novel famous, the late Col. Prentiss Ingraham was one of the giants. These “ready “writers thought nothing of turning out a thousand words of original matter in an hour, in the days when the click of the typewriter was unknown, and of keeping it up until a novel of 70,000 words was easily finished in a week. But to Col. Ingraham belongs the unique distinction of having composed and written out a complete story of 35,000 words with a fountain pen, between breakfast and breakfast. His equipment as a writer of stories for boys was most varied and valuable, garnered from his experience as an officer in the Confederate army, his service both on shore and sea in the Cuban war for independence, and in travels in Mexico, Austria, Greece and Africa. But he is best known and will be most loyally remembered for his Buffalo Bill tales, the number of which he himself scarcely knew, and which possessed peculiar value from his intimate personal friendship with Col. Cody.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 19

XIX.
LOVE YOUR WORK FOR THE WORK’S SAKE

The sentiment which Edwards has tried to carry through every paragraph and line of this book is this, that “Writing is its own reward.” His meaning is, that to the writer the joy of the work is something infinitely higher, finer and more satisfying than its pecuniary value to the editor who buys it. Material success, of course, is a necessity, unless – happy condition! – the writer has a private income on which to draw for meeting the sordid demands of life. But this also is true: A writer even of modest talent will have material success in a direct ratio with the joy he finds in his work! – Because, brother of the pen, when one takes pleasure in an effort, then that effort attracts merit inevitably. If any writing is a merciless grind the result will show it – and the editor will see it, and reject.

There are times, however, when doubt shakes the firmest confidence. A writer will have moods into which will creep a distrust of the work upon which he is at that moment engaged. If necessity spurs him on and he cannot rise above his misgivings, the story will testify to the lack of faith, doubts will increase as defects multiply and the story will be ruined. THE WRITER MUST HAVE FAITH IN HIS WORK QUITE APART FROM THE MONEY HE EXPECTS TO RECEIVE FOR IT. If he has this faith he reaches toward a spiritual success beside which the highest material success is paltry indeed.

When a writer sits down to a story let him blind his eyes to the financial returns, even though they may be sorely needed. Let him forget that his wares are to be offered for sale, and consider them as being wrought for his own diversion. Let him say to himself, “I shall make this the best story I have ever written; I shall weave my soul into its warp and whether it sells or not I shall be satisfied to know that I have put upon paper the BEST that is in me.” If he will do this, he will achieve a spiritual success and – as surely as day follows night – a material success beyond his fondest dreams. BUT he must keep his eye single to the TRUE success and must have no commerce in thought with what may come to him materially.

To some, all this may appear too idealistic, too transcendental. There are natures so worldly, perhaps even among writers, as to scoff at the idea of spiritual success. They are overshadowed by the Material, and when the Spiritual, which is the true source of their power, is no longer the “still, small voice” of their inspiration, they will be bankrupt materially as well.

A writer cannot hide himself in his work. His individuality is written into it, and he may be read between the lines for what he is. A creation reflects the creator, and that the work may be good the writer should have spiritual ideals and do his utmost to live up to them. Let him have a purpose, be it never so humble, to benefit in some way his fellow-man, and let him hew steadily to the line. Love your work for the work’s sake and material benefits “will be added unto you.”

Years ago Edwards found an article in a newspaper that appealed to him powerfully. He clipped it out, preserved it and has made it of great help in his writing. It is a wonderful “Doubt-destroyer.” In the hope that it may be an inspiration to others, he reproduces it here:

STANDARDS OF SUCCESS.

At a time when material success is so generally regarded as the chief goal of human effort it is interesting to find a man in Professor Hadley’s position presenting arguments for a broader view of the question. In his baccalaureate sermon the president of Yale offered the graduates some advice which at least they should find stimulating. He does not discredit or discourage the ambition for practical success but he makes it plain that in his view there is danger in measuring success in life “by the concrete results with which men can credit themselves.” “We should value life,” he declares, “as a field of action.” We should care for the doing of things quite as much as for the results. Tried by this standard, aspiration and effort are to be more highly prized than achievement itself. The man who sincerely strives for a great object has succeeded, whether or not the object is attained or its attainment brings any tangible reward.

It is no novelty, of course, to hear a college president upholding ideal standards and rejecting utilitarian views of success, but few of the educators have cared to follow their theories, as President Hadley does, to their logical conclusion. Probably a majority of them would applaud Nansen’s courage in attempting to reach the north pole but would question the utility of the attempt. President Hadley admires Nansen simply “because he succeeded in getting so much nearer the pole than anybody before him ever did,” and thinks it is one of the most discouraging testimonies to the false standards of the nineteenth century that Nansen feels compelled to justify himself on the basis of the scientific results of his expedition. Furthermore, a man who tries to get to the pole is engaged in a glorious play, “which justifies more risk and more expenditure of life than would be warranted for a few miserable entomological specimens, however remote from the place where they had previously been found.”

The young man of to-day has no lack of exhortations to lead the life of strenuous effort. It is as well that he should be taught also that the reward for this effort will be barren if the whole object sought be material benefit to himself. Life is something to be used. Whether or not it has been successfully used depends not on the results so much as on the object sought and the earnestness of the seeking. It is somewhat novel to find an American college president expounding this philosophy to his students, but the philosophy is, on the whole, helpful. It will spur to effort in crises where the desire for more material success fails to provide a sufficient incentive.

§

A certain New York author is fond of his own work, and Robert W. Chambers is responsible for the story that he called at one of the libraries to find out how his latest book was going. He hoped to have his vanity tickled a little.

“Is —— in?” he said to the librarian, naming his book.

“It never was out,” was the reply.

§

What is a great love of books? It is something like a personal introduction to the great and good men of all past times. Books, it is true, are silent as you see them on your shelves; but, silent as they are, when I enter a library I feel almost as if the dead were present, and I know if I put questions to these books they will answer me with all the faithfulness and fullness which has been left in them by the great men who have left the books with us. – John Bright,

§

The spring poet has been much exploited in the comic papers. The would-be novelist has been plastered with signs and tokens until one could not fail to recognize him in the dark. But the ordinary, commonplace, experienced writer has been so shamefully neglected that few realize his virtues. The editor recognizes his manuscript as far off as he can see it, and seizes upon it with joy. The manuscript is typewritten and punctuated. It bears the author’s name and address at the top of the first page. It is signed with the author’s name at the end. It is NOT tied with a blue ribbon. No, the blue ribbon habit is not a myth. It really exists in every form from pale baby to navy No. 4 and in every shape from a hard knot to an elaborate rosette. – Munsey’s.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 18

XVIII.
KEEPING EVERLASTINGLY AT IT

Edwards had not visited New York in 1903, but he landed there on Friday, Jan. 1, 1904, – literally storming in on a train that was seven hours late on account of the weather. A cab hurried him and his wife to the place in Forty-fourth street where the pleasant landlady used to hold forth, but they found, alas! that the old stamping ground was in the hands of strangers. It was like being turned away from home.

Where should they go? Edwards remembered that, on one of his previous visits to New York, Mr. Perkins had recommended the St. George Hotel, over in Brooklyn. The St. George was within a few blocks of the south end of the bridge and the offices of Harte & Perkins were in William street, close to the north end. So Edwards and his wife went to the Brooklyn hotel and there established their headquarters.

On Jan. 2 Edwards called on the patrons of his Factory. The result was not particluarly encouraging. Harte & Perkins instructed him to stop work on the Five-Cent Library, but said that in about two months they would have a new library for him to take care of.

Edwards had brought with him to the city his dramatic version of “The Tangle in Butte,” the play which had come so near turning $5,000 into the Factory’s strong-box. It was Edward’s hope that he might be able to dispose of the play, but the hope went glimmering when he learned that there were 10,000 actors stranded in New York, and that things theatrical were generally in a bad way.

During 1903 Edwards had corresponded with Mr. H. H. Lewis, editor of The Popular Magazine, a recent venture of Messrs. Street & Smith’s. He had submitted manuscripts to Mr. Lewis but they had not proved to be in line with The Popular’s requirements. It is difficult, through correspondence, to discover just what an editor wants. The only way to get at such a thing properly is by personal interview. If the would-be contributor does nof then get the editor’s needs clearly in mind it is his own fault.

Edwards called on Mr. Lewis and had a pleasant chat with him. The assistant editor was Mr. A.D. Hall, a capable gentleman who had been with Messrs. Street & Smith for many years, and with whom Edwards was well acquainted.

At that time Louis Joseph Vance was writing for The Popular Magazine, among others, and Edwards met him in Mr. Lewis’ office. As Edwards was leaving, after outlining a novelette and receiving a commission to write it, he paused with one hand on the door-knob.

“I’ll turn in the story, Mr. Lewis,” said he, “and I hope you’ll like it and buy it.”

“Of course he’ll like it and buy it,” called out Vance. You’re going to write it for him, aren’t you?”

“Why, yes,” returned Edwards, “but–”

“You’re not a peddler,” interrupted Vance, “to write stuff and go hawking it about from office to office. We’re writers, and when we know what a man wants we deliver the goods.”

This was before the days of “The Brass Bowl” and “Terence O’Rourke,” but already Vance had found himself and was striking the key-note of confidence. Confidence – that’s the word. Back it up with fair ability and the writer will go far.

From The Popular’s editorial rooms Edwards went up Fifth avenue for a call on the editor of The Argosy. Much to his disappointment Mr. White was out of town for New Year’s and would not return until the following week.

The story which Edwards had presented to Mr. Lewis in its oral and tabloid form was one that had been written in 1903 and turned down by Mr. White. Before offering the manuscript to The Popular, Edwards intended to rewrite it and strengthen it.

A typewriter was ordered sent over to the St. George Hotel, and on Jan. 3 the rewriting of the novelette was begun. The story was called “The Highwayman’s Waterloo,” or something to that effect. On the following day twenty-four pages of the manuscript were submitted to Mr. Lewis, won his approval, and the rewriting proceeded.

Two chapters of a serial were also offered to Mr. White for examination. The story was called “The Skirts of Chance,” and had been begun before Edwards left home.

During 1902 and ‘03 Edwards had worked, at odd times, on what he designed to be a “high-class” juvenile story. It was 60,000 words in length, when completed in the Summer of 1903, and in September he had submitted it to Dodd, Mead & Company. Not having heard from the story, on this January day that saw him passing out fragments of manuscripts to The Popular and The Argosy he went on farther up Fifth avenue and dropped in to ask D., M. & Co., how “Danny W.,” was fareing at the hands of their readers. He was told that five readers had examined the story and that it was then in the hands of the sixth! Some of the readers – and this came to him privately – had turned in a favorable report. Because of this, the author of “Danny W.,” went back to Brooklyn considerably elated. It would be an honor indeed to have the book break through such a formidable brigade of readers and get into the catalogue of the good old house of Dodd, Mead & Company.

The “highwayman” novelette was finished and submitted in its complete form on Jan. 6. On the same day Mr. White informed Edwards that he was well pleased with the two chapters of “The Skirts of Chance” and told him to proceed with it.

Fortune was on the upward trend for Edwards, and he was sent for by Dodd, Mead & Company, on Jan. 15, and informed that they would either bring out “Danny W.,” on a royalty or pay a cash price for the book rights. Edwards, remembering his disastrous publishing experience with “A Tale of Two Towns,” accepted $200 in cash.

Mr. Lewis bought the novelette for $125, and Harte & Perkins, on the same day, gave Edwards a new library to do – 35,000 words in each story at $50.

Complete manuscript of “The Skirts of Chance” was submitted to Mr. White on Jan. 22, and on Jan. 27 Edwards received $300 for it.

By Feb. 8 Edwards had written and sold to Mr. Lewis another novelette entitled, “The Duke’s Understudy,” for which he received $140.

On Feb. 9 he and his wife returned to Michigan. Edwards had been in New York forty days and had gathered in $965. He left New York with orders for Argosy serials and with the new library, “Sea and Shore,” to be turned in at the rate of one story every two months.

In May he was requested to go on with the Old Five-Cent Library. These stories were forwarded regularly one each week, until November, when orders were again discontinued.

In September, “Danny W.,” appeared. As with “A Tale of Two Towns,” the reviewers were more than kind to “Danny W.,” and there is just a possibility that they killed him with kindness. The idea obtains, in supposedly well-informed circles, that the only way for reviewers to help a book is to damm it utterly. Be this as it may, although illustrated in color and put out in the best style of the book-maker’s art, “Danny W.,” did not prove much of a success. A California paper bought serial rights on the story for $50, and thus the book netted the author, all told, the modest sum of $250.

During this year, also, The A.N. Kellogg Newspaper Company sold serial rights on “Fate’s Gamblers” for $30, took 50 per cent. as a commission and presented Edwards with what was left.

A short story, “The Camp Coyote,” was sold to Mr. Titherington, for Munsey’s; and Edwards had opened a new market in Street & Smith’s magazines. Thus was brought to a close a fairly prosperous year.

In 1905 the returns slid backward a little. During this year, and the year preceding, some stories which had failed with Mr. White were received with favor by Mr. Kerr, of The Chicago Ledger – at the Ledger price, ranging from $30 upward to $75.

The Woman’s Home Companion, to which Edwards had vainly tried to sell serial rights on “Danny W.,” accepted a two-part story entitled, “The Redskin and the Paper-Talk,” and paid $200 for it. This is the story of which a chapter was lost in the composing room, and Edwards received an honorarium of $5 for having a carbon duplicate of the few missing pages.

In 1905, also, The American Press Association did business with Edwards to the amount of $30. Another market for the Edward’s product – worth mentioning even though the amount of business done was not large.

The returns for the two years were as follows:

   1904:
"The Highwayman's Waterloo,"            $  125.00
"Danny W.,"                                200.00
"Danny W.," serial rights                   50.00
"The Skirts of Chance,"                    300.00
"The Duke's Understudy,"                   140.00
"At Large in Terra Incognita"              175.00
"The Man from the Stone Age," short story   25.00
"The Honorable Jim,"                       250.00
"Fate's Gamblers" serial rights             15.00
"A Deal with Destiny,"                     150.00
"The Enchanted Ranch,"                      75.00
"The Camp Coyote,"                          40.00
"Under the Ban,"                            75.00
"A Master of Graft,"                       225.00
26 Five-Cent Libraries @ $40 each         1040.00
4 Sea and Shore libraries @ 50 each        200.00
                                         --------
                             Total      $ 3085.00

   1905:
"Cornering Boreas," short story           $ 30.00
"The Redskin and the Paper-talk,"          200.00
"The Redskin and the Paper-talk,"
                     additional pay't        5.00
"Mountebank's Dilemma," short story         25.00
"Helping Columbus,"                        350.00
"The Edge of the Sword."                   200.00
"Yellow Clique,"                           100.00
"A Mississippi Snarl,"                     200.00
"The Black Box,"                           200.00
"A Wireless Wooing," short story            15.00
"The Freelance,"                            50.00
"The Luck of Bill Lattimer,"                30.00
"Machine-made Road-agent," short story      15.00
"The Man from Mars,"                       275.00
10 Sea and Shore stories @ $50 each        500.00
                                         --------
                              Total     $ 2195.00

Good, philosophical Ras Wilson once said to a new reporter, “Young man, write as you feel, but try to feel right. Be good humored toward every one and everything. Believe that other folks are just as good as you are, for they are. Give ‘em your best and bear in mind that God has sent them, in his wisdom, all the trouble they need, and it is for you to scatter gladness and decent, helpful things as you go. Don’t be particular about how the stuff will look in print, but let’er go. Some one will understand. That is better than to write so dash bing high, or so tarnashun deep, that no one understands. Let’er go.”

§

There was once a poor man hounded to death by creditors. Ruin and suicide vied for his surrender. But he was a man of the twentieth century, and flippantly but with unbounded faith he collected a few odd pennies and hied him to a newspaper office. Stopping scarcely to frame his sentence he inserted a “want” advertisement, stating his circumstances and declaring he would commit suicide unless aid was proffered. Within twenty-four hours he had $250; before another sun his employer advanced as much more. Carefully advising the newspaper to discontinue the advertisement, he paid off his creditors – and lived happily ever afterward! No, this is not a fairy tale. The time was a few weeks ago, the city Chicago and the newspaper. The Tribune. The moral is, that originality in writing, coupled with a fresh idea, brings a check.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 17

XVII.
ETHICS OF THE NICKEL NOVEL

Is the nickel novel easy to write? The writer who has never attempted one is quite apt to think that it is. There are hundreds of writers, the Would-be-Goods, making less than a thousand a year, who would throw up their hands in horror at the very thought of debasing their art by contriving at “sensational” five-cent fiction. So far from “debasing their art,” as a matter of fact they could not lift it to the high plane of the nickel novel if they tried. Of these Would-be-Goods more anon – to use an expression of the ante-bellum romancers. Suffice to state, in this place, writers of recognized standing, and even ministers, have written – and some now are writing – these quick-moving stories. There’s a knack about it, and the knack is not easy to acquire. No less a person than Mr. Richard Duffy, formerly editor of Ainslee’s and later of the Cavalier, a man of rare gifts as a writer, once told Edwards that the nickel novel was beyond his powers.

So far as Edwards is concerned, he gave the best that was in him to the half-dime “dreadfuls,” and he made nothing dreadful of them after all. He has written hundreds, and there is not a line in any one of them which he would not gladly have his own son read. In fact, his ethical standard, to which every story must measure up, was expressed in this mental question as he worked: “If I had a boy would I willingly put this before him?” If the answer was No, the incident, the paragraph, the sentence or the word was eliminated. In 1910 Edwards wrote his last nickel novel, turning his back deliberately on three thousand dollars a year (they were paying him $60 each for them then), not because they were “debasing his art” but because he could make more money at other writing – for when one is forty-four he must get on as fast as he can.

The libraries, as they were written by Edwards, were typed on paper 8-1/2” by 13,” the marginal stops so placed that a typewritten line approximated the same line when printed. Eighty of these sheets completed a story, and five pages were regularly allowed to each chapter. Thus there were always sixteen chapters in every story.

First it is necessary to submit titles, and scenes for illustration. Selecting an appropriate title is an art in itself. Alliteration is all right, if used sparingly, and novel effects that do not defy the canons of good taste should be sought after. The title, too, should go hand in hand with the picture that illustrates the story. This picture, by the way, has demands of its own. In the better class of nickel novels firearms and other deadly weapons are tabooed. The picture must be unusual and it must be exciting, but its suggested morality must he high.

The ideas for illustrations all go to the artist days or even weeks in advance of the stories themselves. It is the writer’s business to lay out this prospective work intelligently, so that he may weave around it a group of logical stories.

Usually the novels are written in sets of three; that is, throughout such a series the same principal characters are used, and three different groups of incidents are covered. In this way, while each story is complete in itself, it is possible to combine the series and preserve the effect of a single story from beginning to end. These sets are so combined, as a matter of fact, and sold for ten cents.

Each chapter closes with a “curtain.” In other words, the chapter works the action up to an interesting point, similar to a serial “leave-off,” and drops a quick curtain. Skill is important here. The publishers of this class of fiction will not endure inconsistency for a moment. The stories appeal to a clientele keen to detect the improbable and to treat it with contempt.

Good, snappy dialogue is favored, but it must be dialogue that moves the story along. An apt retort has no excuse in the yarn unless it really belongs there. A multitude of incidents – none of them hackneyed – is a prime requisite. Complexity of plot invites censure – and usually secures it. The plot must be simple, but it must be striking.

One author failed because he had his hero-detective strain his massive intellect through 20,000 words merely to recover $100 that had been purloined from an old lady’s handbag. If the author had made it a million dollars stolen from a lady like Mrs. Hetty Green, probably his labor would have been crowned with success. These five-cent heroes are in no sense small potatoes. They may court perils galore and rub elbows with death, now and then, for nothing at all, but certainly never for the mere bagatelle of $100.

The hero does not drink, He does not swear. Very often he will not smoke. He is a chivalrous gentleman, ever a friend of the weak and deserving. He accomplishes all this with a ready good nature that has nothing of the goody-good in its make-up. The hero does not smoke because, being an athlete, he must keep in constant training in order to master his many dificulties. For the same reason he will not drink. As for swearing, it is a useless pastime and very common; besides, it betrays excitement, and the hero is never excited.

The old-style yellow-back hero was given to massacres. He slew his enemies valiantly by brigades. Not so the modern hero of the five-cent novel. Rarely, in the stories, does any one cross the divide. And whenever the villain is hurt, he is quite apt to recover, thank the hero for hurting him – and become his sworn friend.

The story must be clean, and while it must necessarily be exciting, it must yet leave the reader’s mind with a net profit in all the manly virtues. Is this easy?

Please note this extract from a letter written by Harte & Perkins Dec. 25, 1902 – it covers a point whose humor, Edwards thought, drew the sting of dishonesty:

Your last story, No. 285, opened well, had plenty of good incidents and was interesting; but there are several points in which it might have been improved.

Your description of Two Spot’s scheme of posing as a petrified boy is amusing, but the plan was dishonest and a piect of trickery. It was all right, perhaps, to let the boys go ahead without the knowledge of the Hero, but when he learned of it he should have put a stop to the plan immediately. It was all right to have him laugh at it, but at the same time he should have spoken severly to the boys about it and ordered them to return the money they had received through their trick. He did not do this in your story and it was necessary for me to alter it conciderably in the first part on that account.

The Hero is supposed to be the soul of honor, and in your story he is posed as a party to a deception practised on the citizens of Ouray, by which they were defrauded of the money they paid for admission to see the supposed “petrified boy.” Such conduct on his part would soon lose for him the admiration of the readers of th weeekly, as it places him on a moral level, almost, with the robbers whom he is bringing to justice.”

Consider that, you Would-be-Goods, who are not above putting worse things in your “high-class” work. And can you say “I am holier than thou” to the conscientious writer who turns out his 20,000 or 25,000 words a week along these ethical lines? Handsome is as handsome does!

Somebody is going to write these stories. There is a demand for them. The writer who can set hand to such fiction, who meets his moral responsibilities unflinchingly, is doing a splendid work for Young America.

And yet, as stated in a previous chapter, there are nickel novels and nickel novels – some to read and some to put in the stove unread. High-minded publishers, however, are not furnishing the careful head of the family with material for his kitchen fire.

It costs you nothing to think, but it costs infinitely to write. I therefore preach to you eternally that art of writing which Boileau has so well known and so well taught, that respect for the language, that connection and sequence of ideas, that air of ease with which he conducts his readers, that naturalness which is the true fruit of art, and that appearance of facility which is due to toil alone. A word out of place spoils the most beautiful thought. – Voltaire to Helvetius, a young author.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 16

XVI.
GROWING PROSPERITY

The years 1902 and 1903 were busier years than ever for the Fiction Factory. Nineteen-two is to be remembered particularly for opening a new departure in the story line in The Argosy, and for placing the first book with the G.W. Dillingham Company. Nineteen-three claims distinction for seeing the book brought out and for boosting the Factory returns beyond the three-thousand-dollar mark. But it must not be inferred that the book had very much to do with this. Edwards’ royalties for the year were less than $100.

In September, 1902, Edwards made one of his customary “prospecting” trips to New York. If there was anything in omens his stay in the city promised dire things. On the second day after his arrival he went to Coney Island with a friend. Together they called on the seventh son of a seventh son and had their palms read. The dispenser of occult knowledge assured Edwards that the future was very bright, that Tuesday was his lucky day and that Spring was the best time for him to consummate his business undertakings. That day, as it happened, was Tuesday. In the teeth of this promising augury, and within ten minutes after leaving the palmist’s booth, some Coney Island “dip” shattered Edwards’ confidence in Tuesday by annexing his wallet. The wallet, as it happened, contained all the money Edwards had brought from home, with the exception of a little loose change.

This was the second time Edwards had been all but stranded in the Metropolis, and this time the stranding was more complete. When he cast up accounts that evening he found himself with a cash balance of $1.63. Fortunately Mrs. Edwards was not along. He had left her at home with the understanding that she was to come on later. When a writer has come within hailing distance of the bread line there remains but one thing to do, and that is to start the Factory going with day and night shifts.

Edwards called on Mr. White, of The Argosy, and outlined a serial story. He was told to go ahead with it. For five days Edwards hardly stirred from his room. At the end of that time he had completed “The Desperado’s Understudy,” and had sold it to Mr. White for $250, spot cash.

After completing this serial, Edwards outlined to Mr. White a novelette which would furnish The Argosy with something new in the fiction line. The plot was based on a musical extravaganza which he had written, several years before, in collaboration with Mr. Eugene Kaeuffer, at one time connected with The Bostonians. Nothing had ever come of this ambitious effort, although book and musical score were completed and offered to Mr. McDonald of The Bostonians and to Mr. Thomas Q. Seabrooke. Mr. White liked the idea of the story immensely and gave Edwards carte blanche to go ahead with it.

This story, “Ninety, North,” paved the way for other fantastic yarns which made a decided hit in The Argosy and so pointed Edwards along a fresh line of endeavor which proved as congenial as it was profitable.

Several months before he visited New York Edwards had sold to The McClure Syndicate, a juvenile serial which may be referred to here as “The Campaign at Topeka.” For this he had been offered $200, which offer he promptly accepted. He had not received a check, however, and was at a loss to understand the reason. To this day the reason remains obscure, although later events pointed to a misunderstanding of some kind regarding the story between the Syndicate and one of its readers. Before Edwards left New York he was paid the $200. More than a year afterward he was informed that the serial had been sold to the Century Company for St. Nicholas, and that after publication in that magazine it was to be brought out in book form.

It was Mr. T.C. McClure who put Edwards in touch with the Dillingham Company and referred him to them as prospective publishers, in cloth, of the successful Syndicate story, “A Tale of Two Towns.” Edwards submitted galley proofs of the serial to Mr. Cook of the Dillingham Company, and ultimately signed a contract to have the book published on the usual royalty basis of ten per cent.

For Harte & Perkins, during the year, the Factory ground out nickel novels, juvenile serials, one sketch for the trade paper and a few detective stories. On Nov. 28, after he had returned home from New York, he was notified:

“Much as I regret to inform you of it, by a recent purchase of copyright stories we are placed in a position where we will not require any further material for any of our five-cent libraries for some time to come, so we must discontinue orders to you for all this material.”

Edwards, in a way, had become hardened to messages of this kind. The Argosy was an anchor to windward, and he resolved to give his attention to serials for Mr. White. In December, 1902, and January and February, 1903, he wrote and forwarded “Ninety, North,” a second fantastic story called “There and Back,” and the Arizona serial “Grains of Gold.” All three of these stories were sold at once, bringing in $700. In a letter dated Oct. 14, 1903, Mr. White had this to say about “There and Back:”

“Thanks for letting me see the enclosed letter regarding ‘Ninety, North.’ I am equally pleased with yourself at its significance. I am wondering whether you have heard much about your story ‘There and Back?’ My impression is that that has been one of the most popular stories you have ever written for The Argosy. When I see you I will tell you an odd little circumstance that occurred in connection with its run in the magazine.”

The circtunstances referred to by Mr. White took place in Paris. One of The Argosy’s readers happened to be in a café, looking over proofs of a forthcoming installment of “There and Back” while at her luncheon, when she heard the story being discussed, in complimentary terms, by a number of Frenchmen at an adjoining table. Strange indeed that Frenchmen should be interested in an American story, and stranger still that The Argosy’s reader should be reading an installment of the very same story while men in that foreign café were discussing it!

The first installment of “There and Back,” Mr. White informed Edwards, had increased The Argosy’s circulation seven thousand copies. [*]

[* “There and Back” went through the Fiction Factory in twelve days.]

On March 2 Harte & Perkins requested Edwards to continue work on the old Five-Cent Library. By taking up this work again he would be diminishing the Factory’s serial output, but he reflected that his fertility in the matter of serials would soon have Mr. White over-supplied. Therefore Edwards decided to go on with the nickel weeklies.

In March, as Mr. MacLean of The Popular Magazine once put it, Edwards “came out in cloth,” the Dillingham Company issuing “A Tale of Two Towns” on St. Patrick’s Day.

What are the feelings of an author when he opens his first book for the first time? If you, dear reader, are yet to “get out in cloth” for the first time, then some day you will know. But, if you value your peace of mind, do not build too gorgeous an air castle on the foundation of this printed thing. Printed things are at the mercy of the reviewers and, in a larger sense, of the great reading public. The reviewers, in nearly every instance, were kind with “A Tale of Two Towns.” In many quarters it was praised fulsomely, but the book did not strike that fickle sentiment called popular fancy. In six months, Mr. Cook, of the Dillingham Company, wrote Edwards that “A Tale of Two Towns” was “a dead duck.” In the December settlement, however, the remains yielded royalties of $96.60. For two or three years the royalties trailed along, and finally the edition was wound up with a payment of $1.50. Sic transit gloria!

During January, 1903, a theatrical gentleman requested Edwards to dramatize a book which Messrs. Street & Smith had issued in paper covers. “You can change the title,” the gentleman suggested, “and slightly change the incidents. In that way it won’t be necessary to write Street & Smith for permission or, indeed, to let them know anything about it.” Edwards knew, however, that nothing will so surely wreck a writer’s prospects as playing fast and loose with editors and publishers. He refused to consider the theatrical gentleman’s proposition. Instead, he forwarded his Argosy story, “The Desperado’s Understudy,” upon which Mr. White had given him dramatic rights, and offered to make a stage version of it. The offer was accepted and a play was built up from the story. The theatrical gentleman was pleased and said he would give $1,500 for the dramatization. Then, alas! the theatrical gentleman’s company went on the rocks at the Alhambra Theatre, in Chicago, and Edwards had repeated his former playwriting experience.

The two years’ work figured out in this wise:

    1902:
23 Five-Cent Libraries @ $40 each        $ 920.00
8 detective stories @ $40 each             320.00
4 juvenile serials @ $100 each             400.00
1 sketch for trade paper                    10.00
"The Desperado's Understudy,"              250.00
"The Campaign at Topeka,"                  200.00
Short stories                               67.00
                                         --------
    Total                               $ 2167.00

    1903:
42 Five-Cent Libraries @ $40 each       $ 1680.00
2 detective stories @ $40 each              80.00
"Ninety, North,"                           150.00
"There and Back,"                          250.00
"A Sensational Affair," short story,        15.00
"Grains of Gold,"                          300.00
"Fate's Gamblers," [*]                     100.00
"The Morning Star Race," short story,       15.00
"A Game for Two,"                          200.00
Royalties on book, "A Tale of Two Towns,"   96.60
"The Point of Honor,"                      150.00
                                         --------
     Total                              $ 3036.60

[* This story sold through Kellogg Newspaper Company, Chicago. The two short stories sold to the late lamented Wayside Tales, Detroit, Mich.]

As several gentlemen in these times, by the wonderful force of genius only, without the least assistance of learning, perhaps without being able to read, have made a considerable figure in the republic of letters; the modern critics, I am told, have lately begun to assert, that all kind of learning is entirely useless to a writer, and indeed, no other than a kind of fetters on the natural sprightliness and activity of the imagination, which is thus weighed down, and prevented from soaring to those high flights which otherwise it would be able to reach.

This doctrine, I am afraid, is at present carried much too far; for why should writing differ so much from other arts? The nimbleness of a dancing-master is not at all prejudiced by being taught to move; nor doth any mechanic, I believe, excercise his tools the worse by having learnt to use them. – Fielding, “Tom Jones.”

Pluripotency

How the law of symbols applies to tales of fantasy, and is the author’s best friend

One of the seminal works at all fantasy writers ought to read is Sigmund Freud’s book on dreams. In this book one of the primary truths about dreams that Freud announces, is that dreams show us things that are two things at once – or are even more than two things at one and the same time.

Of course, artists and madmen have long been aware of such things as symbols. And long, long ago – when all tales were fantasy tales, and the realistic and rational world that we live in today had not yet been invented – the notion that some object or person could beat itself and at the same time something entirely different was a commonplace. A burning bush was God, a young herald in the army was also the god Apollo, and so forth.

But then, alas, the realistic and rational world was invented, and we were all condemned to live in it from cradle to grave, without any choice or say in the matter. We who have thus been condemned to a life and the world in which each and every object, person, animal and plant can be nothing besides itself, have the most difficult time in imagining what our ancestors of ages past knew as easily as breathing. So we are impoverished in our imagination, and power attempts at fantasy are laughably simple and even I might say crippled, halt and lame. Some of us cannot even imagine a world of fantasy, and we are compelled to create ‘rules’ that govern our magical objects and powers, and are harshly critical of stories in which there are no ‘rules’ governing their magical objects creatures and powers.

This worst of all limits ourselves in the very mechanics of our tales. In a fantasy tale, because every single character, object, animal and plant can be both itself and something else – anything else – as well as a third thing, at one and the same time, any plot device and story turn is possible.

Remember this, the next time you have any trouble with your fantasy story. There is no story difficulty that cannot be solved with a little recourse to magic. More than this, when you tell a fantasy tale you can tell two stories at ones – or three or more. If you want your hair out to be a prince, he can be a prince; but if you would also like to tell the story where the prince is a pauper, you can do that as well – all in the same tale. If you want the heroine to end up with George, she can do so; if you also find yourself feeling a little sorry for Edgar, she can end up with him as well, because George and Edgar can be the same person.

This comes up as a result of a note from Bardelys, who for a long time struggled with one of his tales. He couldn’t decide whether his young hero should be in the end revealed as a prince, or a nobody who helped a prince. The ‘Prince’ model is the typical, what I call ‘American Superboy’ model. In America, all our heroes must be princes, and in the fantasy tales, any son-of-a-nobody will in the end be shown to be in truth the son of a king, or or some powerful magician, or to have unusual powers of his own, or to be the Fated or Destined One of Ancient Prophecy (or multiples of these combined).

How very different was Tolkien’s model of the humble Hobbit, who in both The Hobbit, or There and Back Again and in The Lord of the Rings had his hobbits as mere helpers, and not princes themselves. (We can argue that Bilbo had common-sense shrewdness and resisted better than Dwarves Men or Elves the madness of lust for Dragon’s Gold, and that Frodo had extreme powers to resist the commands of the Ring; but I imagine that Tolkien would have insisted that these are the virtues of the common English peasant and reveal more of a reverse snobbery than any insistence that Bilbo and Frodo were extremely virtuous in any way. Tolkien’s very point was that the hobbits had more in them than the great and wise could guess on first glance.)

So Bardelys, having already built up his structure with the boy as a revealed Prince, thought better of it, and asked himself, ‘Yes, but what if he is a nobody all the way through?’ He liked this notion, and set up a parallel structure. Along the way he had to give up some things, of course, and in the end, he grudgingly returned to the Prince model.

And yet he kept looking back with longing at the notion that the boy would be a nobody through and through… And so in the end he managed it, by having the boy both a Prince and a nobody all the way through. To see how he managed it, you must read the full tale … if he ever gets around to finishing it.

(Composed by dictation Sunday 5 April 2009)

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 15

XV.
FROM THE FACTORY’S FILES

A letter of commendation from the reader of a story to the writer is not only a pleasant thing in itself but it proves the reader a person of noble soul and high motives. Noblesse oblige!

The writer who loves his work is not of a sordid nature. The check an editor sends him for his story is the smallest part of his reward. His has been the joy to create, to see a thought take form and amplify under the spell of his inspiration. A joy which is scarcely less is to know that his work has been appreciated by others.

A letter like the one below, for instance, not only gives pleasure to the recipient but at the same time fires a writer with determination never to let his work fall short of a previous performance. This reader’s good will he must keep, at all hazards.

“Wayland, N. Y., March 22nd, 1905.

“Mr. John Milton Edwards,

Care The F.A. Munsey Co., New York.

My dear Sir:

I read the story in this last Argosy, entitled ‘Fate and the Figure Seven,’ and was in a way considering if it were possible that a man could act in the subconscious state you picture. Deem my surprise, last night, when I read of a similar case in the report of the Brockton accident

In case you should have failed to notice this item, I send you a clipping from a Buffalo paper.

I WISH INCIDENTALLY TO THANK YOU FOR YOUR SHARE IN MAKING LIFE PLEASANT FOR ME. I have enjoyed your works immensely from time to time on account of their decidedly original ideas. They are always refreshingly out of the ordinary rut.

Yours truly,

“A.F. V—-.”

There is one sentence in this letter which Edwards has put in capitals. If possible, he would have written it in letters of gold. In this little world, so crowded with sorrow and tragedy, what is it worth to have had a share in making life pleasant for a stranger? To Edwards it has been worth infinitely more than he received for “Fate and the Figure Seven.”

Another letter carries an equally pleasant message:

“Livingstone, Montana, Sep. 16, 1903.

Mr. John Milton Edwards,

Care The Argosy, New York City.

Dear Sir:

Having read your former stories in The Argosy on Arizona, and last night having commenced ‘The Grains of Gold,’ I trust you will pardon my expression of appreciation of said stories. I lived ten years in Arizona as private secretary to several of the Federal Judges, and also lived in Mexico, and am still familiar with conditions in that section.

I have enjoyed most keenly your handling of thrilling scenes on Arizona soil. It is an exasperation that they appear in serial form, as I dislike the month’s interval.

My only purpose in writing is to express my admiration of your plots and local color, and I remain.

Sincerely yours,

“Richard S. S—–.”

Edwards has always prided himself on keeping true to the actual conditions of the country which forms the screen against which his plot and characters are thrown. This is a gratifying tribute, therefore, from one who knows.

A letter which rather startled Edwards, suggesting as it did the Maricopa Indian incident which trailed upon the heels of “A Study in Red,” is this:

“Colorado Springs, Colo., 2-25-‘09.

Mr. John Milton Edwards,

Dear Sir: Through the kindness of the editor of the Blue Book I received your address. I am very much interested in your story entitled, ‘Country Rock at Kish-Kish,’ and know the greater part of it to be true to life, but would like to know if it is ALL true. Did Sager have a daughter? And where did Sager go when he left Arizona? Or is that just a part of the story? I am very much interested in that character, Sager. Can you tell me if he is still living, and where? Any information that you may be able to give me will be more than appreciated.

Thanking you in advance for the favor, I am,

Yours respectfully,

Mrs. James R. S—–.”

Edwards answered this letter – he answers promptly all such letters that come to him and esteems it a privilege – and received a reply. It appeared that Mrs. S—– was the grand-daughter of a man whom “Sager” had robbed of a large amount of money. “Country Rock at Kish-Kish” was built on a newspaper clipping twenty years old. This clipping Edwards forwarded to Mrs. S—– in the hope that it might help her in her quest for “Sager.” The letter was returned as uncalled for. Should this ever fall under the eye of Mrs. S—– she will understand that Edwards did everything in his power to be of assistance to her.

Now and again a letter, which compliments an author indirectly, will chasten his mounting spirit with the reminder of a “slip:”

“Rochester, N.Y., Nov. 17, 1905.

“Mr. John Milton Edwards:

Dear Sir: – Will you please tell me where I can get more of your stories than in the Argosy; and also, in reference to your story which concludes in December Argosy, how many large autos were in use in New York in 1892?

Yours respectfully,

“Howard Z—–.”

Carelessness in a writer is inexcusable. It is the one thing which a reader will not forgive, for it is very apt to spoil his pleasure in what would otherwise have been a good story. This is a sublimated form of the “gold-brick game,” inasmuch as the reader pays his money for a magazine only to find that he has been “buncoed” by the table of contents. If there is a flaw in the factory’s product, rest assured that it will be discovered and react to the disadvantage of everything else that comes from the same mill.

Many readers will be found whose interest in a writer’s work is so keen that they are tempted to offer suggestions. Such suggestions are not to be lightly considered. Magazines are published to please their readers, and they are successful in a direct ratio with their ability to accomplish this end. Naturally, the old doggerel concerning “many men of many minds” will apply here, and a single suggestion that has not a wide appeal, or that fails to conform to the policy of the magazine, must be handled with great care.

“Cincinnati, Ohio, Oct. 31, 1905.

“Mr. John Milton Edwards,

Care Frank A. Munsey Co., New York.

Dear Sir:

Because of the increasing interest in Socialism, would it not be a geod idea to write a story showing under what conditions we should live in, say, the year 2,000, if the Socialists should come into power?

You might begin your story with the United States under a Socialistic form of government, and later on Socialize the rest of the world.

Your imaginative stories are the ones most eagerly sought in the pages of The Argosy, and I think that a story such as I have suggested would serve to increase your popularity among the readers of fiction. Sincerely yours,

“J.H. S—–.”

It frequently happens that a comedian will get after a writer with a stuffed club or a slapstick. Some anonymous humorist, upon reading a story of Edwards’ in The Argosy, labored and brought forth the following:

“November 19,1904.

“John Milton Edwards,

Care Frank A. Munsey Co., New York.

My dear John:–

I have read with much pleasure and delight the first six chapters of your latest story, ‘At Large in Terra Incognita,’ as published in the December number of The Argosy.

I cannot understand why you failed to send me the proof-sheets of this story for correction, as you did with ‘There and Back.’ It is evident so far as I have read the person who corrected your proof-sheets was as ignorant as yourself.

Where you got the material for this story is not within my memory, retrospective though it is, and I am sure you must have been on one of your periodical drunks, otherwise the flights of fancy you have taken would have been more rational and not so far removed beyond the pale of the human intellect.

Now, my dear John, I beg of you to give up going on these habitual tears, because you are not only ruining your constitution but your reputation as a writer is having reflections cast upon it. I trust you will not take this letter as a sermon but rather in a spirit of friendly counsel.

I hope you will send me at once the remaining chapters of this great ‘At Large in Terra Incognita.’

Your Nemesis,

“Theo. Roosenfeldt,

Pres’t Trust-Busters’ Asso.”

Readers have usually the courage of their convictions and not many anonymous letters find their way into the office of the Fiction Factory. Edwards remembers one other letter which was signed “Biff A. Hiram.” At that time Edwards did not know Mr. Biff A. Hiram from Adam, but he has since made the gentleman’s acquaintance, and discovered how wide is his circle of friends.

If praise from a reader has a tendency to exalt, then how much more of the flattering unction may a writer lay to his soil when approval comes from a brother or sister of the pen? With such a letter, this brief symposium from the Factory files may be brought to a close.

“Mr. John Milton Edwards,

Dear Sir:–

Allow me to congratulate you upon your success with the novelette in a recent issue of the Blue Book. It is to my mind the BEST short story of its kind I have EVER read. As I try to write short stories I see its merits doubly. The modelling is splendid. Will you pardon my display of interest?

Very truly yours,

“K. B—–.”

Rules for Authors.

Dr. Edward Everett Hale, author of “The Man without a Country” and other notable books, gives a few rules which are of interest to the author and the journalist. Dr. Hale’s success in the literary world makes these rules, gleaned from the field of experience, especially valuable to young writers:

1. Know what you want to say.
2. Say it.
3. Use your own language.
4. Leave out all fine phrases.
5. A short word is better than a long one.
6. The fewer words, other things being equal, the better.
7. Cut it to pieces – which means revise, revise, revise.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 14

XIV.
FRESH FIELDS AND PASTURES NEW

So far in his writing career Harte & Perkins had been the heaviest purchasers of Edwards’ fiction. They had given him about all he could do of a certain class of work, and he had not tried to find other markets for the Factory’s product. Pinning his hopes to one firm, even though it was the best firm in the business, was unsatisfactory in many respects. For various reasons, any one which is good and sufficient, a writer should have more than one “string to his bow.” Harte & Perkins, jealously watching the tastes of their reading public, were compelled to make many and sudden changes in the material they put out. This directly affected the writers of the material, and Edwards was often left with no prospects at all, and perhaps at just the time when he flattered himself that his prospects were brightest.

In preceding chapters mention has been made of two serial stories in which Edwards had vainly endeavored to interest Harte & Perkins. One of these was “The Man from Dakota,” and the other, “He Was A Stranger.” These, and another entitled “A Tale of Two Towns,” written late in 1900, were ultimately to open new markets.

In a diary for the year 1900, Edwards has this under date of Tuesday, Jan. 2:

“Mr. Paisley called to see me this morning on a business matter. It appears that the proprietor of The Western World had ordered a serial from Opie Read and was not satisfied with it. [] As *The Western World goes to press in a few days they must have another story at once. Later in the day I talked with Mr. Underwood the (as I suppose) proprietor, and he asked me to get “The Man from Dakota” from Mr. Kerr, of The Chicago Ledger. I did so and took the manuscript over to Mr. Paisley. If it is acceptable they are to pay me $200 for it.”

[* What do you think of that!]

Mr. Paisley was a gentleman with whom Mrs. Edwards had become acquainted while attending Frank Holme’s School for Illustration, in Chicago. He was a man of much ability.

Under Thursday, Jan. 4, the diary has a memorandum to this effect:

“Mr. Paisley came out to see me at noon. They like ‘The Man from Dakota’ and will pay me $200 for it, divided into three payments of $50, $50 and $100.”

So, finally, “The Man from Dakota” got into print. While it was still appearing in The Western World; Mr, Underwood conceived the idea of booming the circulation of his paper by publishing a mystery story – one of those stories in which the mystery is not revealed until the last chapter, and for the solution of which prizes are offered. He asked Edwards if he would write such a story. Why should Edwards write one when he already had on hand the mystery story unsuccessfully entered in the old Chicago Daily News contest? He offered this to Mr. Underwood. He read it and liked it. Mr. Paisley read it and liked it. What was the very lowest figure Edwards would take for it?

Mr. Underwood, in getting around to this point, told how he had sent for Stanley Waterloo and asked him to write the mystery story. “What will you pay?” inquired Mr. Waterloo. “I’ll give you $100,” said Mr. Underwood. Whereupon Mr. Waterloo arose in awful majesty and strode from the office. He did not even linger to say good-by.

“Now,” said Mr. Underwood to Edwards, with a genial smile, “don’t you do that if I offer you seventy-five dollars for ‘What Happened to the Colonel.’”

“Cash?” asked Edwards.

“On the nail.”

“Give me the money,” said Edwards; “I need it.”

Now that the diary has been quoted with a reference to Opie Read, perhaps another reference to the same genial and talented gentleman may be pardoned:

Jan. 19, 1900. – “Opie Read made his ‘first appearance in vaudeville’ this week, and Gertie (Mrs. Edwards) and I went to the Chicago Opera House this afternoon to hear him. He was very good, but I would rather read one of his stories than hear him tell it.”

Later in the year Edwards “broke into” the papers served by the McClure Syndicate with “A Tale of Two Towns.” After using this serial in metropolitan papers, the McClure people sold it to The Kellogg Newspaper Union to be used in the “patents” sent out to country newspapers. The story was later brought out in cloth by the G. W. Dillingham Co., New York.

The third novel, “He Was A Stranger,” had already been refused by Harte & Perkins. Late in May, 1900, Edwards again went “prospecting” to New York. Feeling positive that Harte & Perkins had missed some of the good points in the story, he carried the manuscript with him and once more submitted it. Again it was refused, but Mr. Hall, editor of the “Guest,” informed Edwards that he had an excellent story but that it was impossible for Harte & Perkins to consider its purchase. Edwards asked if be knew of a possible market. “Mr. Munsey,” was the reply, “is looking for stories for The Argosy, and I’d suggest that you take the story over there and show it to Mr. White, The Argosty’s editor.” Edwards tucked the novel under his arm and strolled up Fifth Avenue to the offices of the Frank A. Munsey Company. There, and for the first time, he met Mr. Matthew White, Jr.

The impression of power, tremendous ability and a big, two-handed grasp of Argosy affairs which the editor made upon Edwards, at this time, has deepened with the passing years. An author, as well as a keen dramatic critic, Mr. White brings to bear on his editorial duties an intuition that closely approximates genius. He has proved his remarkable fitness for the post he occupies by making The Argosy, since Mr. Munsey “divested it of its knickerbockers,” the most widely read of all the purely fiction magazines. And withal he is one of the most pleasant editors whom a writer will ever have the good fortune to meet.

Mr. White was glad to consider “He Was A Stranger.” He thumbed over the pages, noted the length, and asked what price Edwards would put upon the manuscript in case it was acceptable. Edwards named $500, and told of “The Brave and Fair” which Harte & Perkins, a few years before, had bought at that figure. Mr. White replied that The Argosy, as yet, was unable to pay such prices, but that he would read the story and, if he liked it, make an offer. A few days later he offered $250 for serial rights. Edwards took into consideration the fact that the story would establish him in the columns of a growing magazine and, with an eye to the future, accepted the offer. He has never had occasion to regret his decision.

From the beginning of the year Edwards had been doing a large amount of five-cent library work for Harte & Perkins. A new weekly had been started, the writer who furnished the copy failed to get his manuscript in on time, and Edwards was given a story to finish and, a few days afterward, the entire series to take care of.

At the time he sold the serial to Mr. White, he was supplying weekly copy for two libraries – the old Five-Cent Library and the new weekly, which shall here be referred to as the Circus Series.

On the proceeds from the sale of “He Was A Stranger” Edwards and his wife had a little outing at Atlantic City. They returned to New York for a few days, and then went on to Boston. Here, comfortably quartered in a hotel, Edwards devoted his mornings to work and his afternoons to seeing the “sights” with Mrs. Edwards. They haunted Old Cambridge, they made pilgrimages to Salem, to Plymouth and to other places, and they enjoyed themselves as they had never done before on an eastern trip. Later they finished out the summer near Monterey, in the Berkshire Hills.

During all these travels the Fiction Factory was regularly grinding out its grist of copy – so many pages a day, so many stories a week. Two libraries, together with a sketch each month for a trade paper published by Harte & Perkins, kept Edwards too busy to prepare any manuscripts for The Argosy. Much of his work, while in the Berkshires, was done in longhand. On this point Mr. Perkins wrote, July 25:

“I should think you would miss your typewriter. I fear that I shall miss it, too, when I read your manuscript, although I find your writing easier to read than that of any of our other writers.”

In August the Edwards went West, visited for a time in Michigan and then in Wisconsin, finally returned to the former state and, in the little country town where Edwards was born, bought an old place and settled down.

As with the Golden Star Library, misfortune finally overtook the Circus Series. A telegram was received telling Edwards to hold No. 47 of the Circus Series pending instructions by letter. The letter instructed him to close up finally the adventures of the hero and his friends and bring their various activities to an appropriate end. The series was continued, for a while longer, with a brand-new hero in each story; but Edwards was requested to write but three of the stories in the new form.

The year, which opened auspiciously and proved a banner year financially, closed with a discontinuance of all orders from Harte & Perkins. Re-prints were being used in the old Five-Cent Library – stories that had been issued years before and could now be republished for another generation of boy readers. Under date of Dec. 1, 1911, Mr. Perkins wrote:

“I know of nothing, just at present, which you can do for us, but should anything develop I shall be very glad to inform you.”

This left Edwards with a sketch a month for the trade paper, for which he was paid $10 each. That “misfortunes never come singly” is an old saying, and one which Edwards has found particularly true in the writing profession. A letter of Dec. 27, informed him:

“We have decided to dispense with the sketches in our trade paper for the present, at least; therefore the February sketch we have in hand will be the last we will want unless we give you further notice.”

In a good many cases the tendency of a writer, when fate deals hardly with him in the matter of a demand for his work, is to take his rebuffs too seriously. Often he will lock up his Factory, leaving a placard on the door: “Closed. Proprietor gone to Halifax. Nothing in the fiction game anyhow.”

Edwards used to feel in this way. As he grew older he learned to take his disappointments with more or less equanimity, and to keep the Factory running. He thought, now, of Mr. White and The Argosy. Here was a good time to prepare an Argosy serial. He wrote it, sent it, and on Feb. 15, 1901, received this terse letter:

“My dear Mr. Edwards:

We can use your story, ‘The Tangle in Butte,’ in The Argosy at $200. Very truly yours,

Matthew White, Jr.”

This was less than the price paid for “He Was A Stranger,” but the story ran only 60,000 words, while the other serial had gone to 100,000. The acceptance went to Mr. White by return mail.

On the day following there came a letter from Harte & Perkins ordering work in the old Five-Cent Library – work that would keep Edwards busy for the rest of the year. Ten of the old stories which Edwards had written were to be revised and lengthened by 10,000 words. For this work he was to be paid $30 for each story. When the ten numbers had been revised and lengthened, he was to go on with the stories, writing a new one each week. Fifty dollars apiece was to be paid for the new stories.

There was an order, too, for more sketches for the trade paper, to be done in another vein.

On Aug. 5 the length of the Five-Cent Library stories was cut from 30,000 words to 20,000, and the remuneration was cut from $50 to $40. Another juvenile paper was started and Edwards was asked to submit serials for it. In fact, 1901 might be called a “boom” year for the Fiction Factory, although the returns, while satisfactory, were not of the “boom” variety.

Perhaps the reader may remember the serial, “A Vassar Girl,” referred to in a previous chapter as having been submitted to Harte & Perkins and rejected. Edwards had faith in this story and offered it to Mr. White. Mr. White’s judgment, however, tallied with that of Harte & Perkins. Under date of June 13 Mr. White wrote:

“I am sorry that ‘A Vassar Girl’ has not borne out the promise of the opening chapters. The interest in it is not sufficiently sustained for serial use. The story might be divided into several incidents, which do not grow inevitably the one out of the other. For this reason it has, as a whole, proved disappointing and I am returning the manuscript by express. We should be glad, however, to have you continue to submit work to us.”

With faith undiminished, Edwards forwarded the story to McClure’s Newspaper Syndicate. It was returned without an explanation of any kind. Again he prevailed upon Harte & Perkins to consider it. It came back from them on Sept. 13, with this message:

“I am sorry to say that we do not feel inclined to revise our judgement with reference to your manuscript story, ‘A Vassar Girl.’ I am inclined to think from looking over the review of the story that it would be well for you to sell it just as it is, and we hope you will be able to find a market for it somewhere. It would not pay us to publish.”

Edwards knew that the story, wrought out of his Arizona experiences, was true in local color and good of its kind, and he failed to understand why it was not appreciated. Then, on Sep. 14, came this from the S.S. McClure Company:

“During July we had under consideration a story of yours entitled, ‘A Vassar Girl.’ On July 31 we wrote you from the Syndicate, informing you that we hoped to be able to use the story as a serial in the very near future. The serial was taken back for consideration in the book department by one of the readers who wished again to examine it, and from there it was erroneously returned to you. Now if you have not disposed of the serial rights of ‘A Vassar Girl’ we should like you again to forward the story to us, and we will submit it to some of our papers as we had always intended to do. We will then give you a prompt decision.”

The story was purchased, and Edwards’ faith in it was confirmed.

It was during this year of 1901 that Edwards had a fleeting glimpse of fortune as a playwright. His story, “The Tangle in Butte,” had been read by an actor, a leading man in a Kansas City stock company, who wanted dramatic rights so that he might have a play taken from it and written around him. Edwards proposed to write the play himself. He did so, and was promptly offered $5,000 for the play, payable in installments after production. Following a good deal of correspondence it was decided to put on the piece for a week’s try-out in Kansas City. Edwards waived his right to royalties for the week, models of the scenery were made, rehearsals began – and then the actor was suddenly stricken with a serious illness and the deal was off. When he had recovered sufficiently to travel he went East, taking the play with him. For several months he tried to interest various managers in it, but without effect.

The year 1901 closed for Edwards with the sketches for the trade paper no longer in demand; but, otherwise, he faced a steadily brightening prospect for the Fiction Factory.

   1900:
Circus Series, 28 @ $40 each                $ 1120.00
Circus Series, Completing unfinished story      20.00
Five-Cent Library, 23 @ $40 each               920.00
Trade Paper Sketches, 10 @ $10 each            100.00
"He Was A Stranger,"                           250.00
"The Man From Dakota,"                         200.00
"What Happened to the Colonel,"                 75.00
                                              -------
        Total                               $ 2685.00

    1901:
Five-Cent Library, 10 rewritten @ $30 each   $ 300.00
Five-Cent Library, 8 @ $50 each                400.00
Five-Cent Library, 16 @ $40 each               640.00
Four Boys' Serials @ $100 each                 400.00
"The Tangle in Butte,"                         200.00
"Tale of Two Towns,"                           150.00
"A Vassar Girl,"                               100.00
Trade Paper Sketches, 9 @ $10 each              90.00
                                              -------
        Total                               $ 2280.00

Very Often.

Poeta nascitur; non fit. This has been somewhat freely translated by one who should know, as “The poet is born; not paid.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 13

XIII.
OUR FRIEND, THE T.W.

In some localities of this progressive country the pen may still be mightier than the sword; but if, afar from railroad and telegraph, holed away in barbaric seclusion, there really exists a community that writes with a quill and uses elderberry ink and a sandbox, it is safe to say that this community has never been heard of – and the cause is not far to seek. Just possibly, however, it is from such a backwoods township that the busy editor receives those rare manuscripts whose chirography covers both sides of the sheet. In this case the pen is really mightier than the sword as an instrument for cutting the ground out from under the feet of aspiring genius. Just possibly, too, it was from such a place that a typewritten letter was returned to the sender with the indignant scrawl: “You needn’t bother to print my letters – I can read writin’.”

Nowadays penwork is confined largely to signing letters and other documents and indorsing checks; to use it for anything else should be named a misdemeanor in the statutes with a sliding scale of punishments to fit the gravity of the offense.

It is not to be inferred, of course, that a man will dictate his love letters to a stenographer. Here, indeed, “two’s company and three’s a crowd.” Every man should master the T.W., and when he confides his tender sentiments to paper for the eyes of the One Girl, his own fingers should manipulate the keys and the T.W., should be equipped with a tri-chrome ribbon – red and black record and purple copying. Black will answer for the more subdued expressions, red should be switched on for the warmer terms of endearment, and purple should be used for whatever might be construed as evidence in a court of law. Even billets-doux have been known to develop a commercial value.

When a serviceable typewriter may be bought for $25 what excuse has anyone for side-stepping the inventive ingenuity of the day which makes for clearness and speed? How much does Progress owe the typewriter? Who can measure the debt? How much does civilization owe the telephone, the night-letter, the fast mail and two-cent postage? Even more than to these does Progress owe to that mechanism of springs, keys and type-bars which makes plain and rapid the written thought.

In the Edwards Fiction Factory the T.W., comprises the entire “plant.” The “hands” employed for the skilled labor are his own, and fairly proficient. His own, too, is the administrative ability, modest enough in all truth yet able to guide the Factory’s destiny with a fair meed of success.

Since the T.W., is so important, Edwards believes in always keeping abreast of improvements. The best is none too good. A typed script, no less than a stereotyped idea, is damned by mediocrity. If a typewriter appears this year which is a distinct advance over last year’s machine, Edwards has it. Keeping up-to-date is usually a little expensive, but it pays.

In the early days of his writing Edwards used the old Caligraph. It was a small machine and confined itself to capital letters. Whenever he wished to indicate the proper place for a capital he did it thus: HIS NAME WAS CAESAR, AND HE LIVED IN ROME. If he lost a letter – and letters in those days were not easily replaced – he allowed the unknown quantity “X” to piece out: HIX NAME WAX CAEXAR–. In due time he came to realize the importance of neatness and traded his first Caligraph for a later model equipped with letters from both “cases.” During twenty-two years he has purchased at least twenty-five typewriters, each the last word in typewriter construction at the time it was bought. At present he has two machines, one a “shift-key” and the other with every letter and character separately represented on the key-board.

There are many makes of typewriters, and operators are of many minds regarding the “best” makes. Edwards has favored the full key-board as being less of a drain upon the attention than the “shift-key” machine. For the writer who composes upon his machine the operating must become a habit, otherwise an elusive idea may take wings for good while the one who evolved it is searching out the letters necessary to nail it hard and fast to the white sheet. Edwards has recently discovered that he can change from his full key-board to a shift-key and back again without materially interrupting his flow of ideas.

The characters of the key-board used for ordinary business purposes and those in demand by the writer are somewhat different. Not always, on the key-board designed for commercial use, will the exclamation point be found. This, if wanted, must be built up out of a period and a half-ditto mark, – “.” plus “’” equals “!” Such makeshifts should be tabooed by the careful writer. Whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well, and once. Three motions, two at the key-board and one at the back-spacer, are two too many. By all means have the real thing in exclamation points–!

Another makeshift with which Edwards has little patience is the custom of using ditto marks for quotation marks, and semi-dittos for semi-quotes. These, and other characters, may be added to most machines by eliminating the fractions, the oblique mark or the per cent. sign.

It seems poor policy, also, to use a hyphen, or two hyphens, to indicate a dash. Why not have the under-score raised to the position of a hyphen and so have a dash that is a dash?

The asterisk, “*,” is a character valuable for indicating footnotes, and the caret is often useful in making typewritten interlineations. All these characters Edwards has on his full key-board machine. On the shift-key machine he must still struggle with the built-up exclamation point, the ditto quotes and the hyphen dash. No wonder he prefers a Smith Premier!

Even the best and most up-to-date typewriter cannot answer all the demands made upon it by writers, however. Some day the growing army of authors will receive due attention in this matter, and the manuscript submitted to editors will compare favorably with the printed story.

In “Habits that Help,” a very instructive article by Walter D. Scott, professor of psychology at Northwestern University, published in Everybody’s Magazine for September, 1911, appears this paragraph:

“Some time ago I could pick out the lettters on a typewriter at a rate of about one per second. Writing is now becoming reduced to a habit, and I can write perhaps three letters a second. When the act has been reduced to the pure habit form, I shall be writing at the rate of not less than five letters per second.”

The “pure habit form” is one for those who compose on the typewriter to acquire. It not only means ease of composition, but speed in the performance and perfect legibility.

Until a few years ago, Edwards always carried his typewriter with him on his travels. The machine was large and heavy and had to be handled with care, so its transportation was no easy matter. In course of time, and pending the invention of a practical typewriter to fit the pocket, he became content to leave his machine at home and rent one wherever he happened to be.

During one of his eastern “prospecting” trips, Edwards and his wife left New York for a few summer weeks in the Berkshire Hills. The T.W., remained temporarily in the city to be overhauled and forwarded. For a fortnight Edwards slaved with a pen, writing four manuscripts of 25,000 words each. He appreciated then, as he had never done before, the value of the typewriter in his work. Late in the first week he began writing and telegraphing for his machine to be sent on.

About the hotel it was known that Edwards expected a typewriter by every stage from Great Barrington. He had fretted about the non-arrival of the typewriter, and in some manner had let fall the information that his typewriter weighed sixty pounds. Speculation was rife as to whether the T.W., had blue eyes or gray, and as to what manner of dwarf or living skeleton could fulfill the requirements at sixty pounds. When the machine finally arrived and the square packing case was unloaded, a host of curious ladies received the surprise of their lives.

“Typewriter,” commonly used as a generic name for the machine that prints, as well as for the person who operates it, should have its double meaning curtailed. The young lady of pleasing face and amiable deportment, whose deft fingers hover over the keys of a senseless machine, is entitled to something more appropriate in the way of a professional title.

Let it be “typist,” after the English fashion; and instead of saying “the typist typewrote the letter,” why not say she “typed” it?

An editor once returned a manuscript with a note like this:

Dear Sir: – Put it into narrative form.

Yours truly, “The Editor.”

I did so. A week later came this:

“Dear Sir: – A little mystery would help. We like your style very much. Yours truly,
“The Editor.”

I put in the mystery. A week later,–

“Dear Sir:– You send us good verse. Why not turn the marked paragraphs into verse, with strong influence on story? Well written.
“Yours truly, etc.”

It was a good idea. The verse was acceptable. It was so acceptable that the editor sent back the story and a check for $5 in payment for the verse – which was all he kept!

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 12

XII.
FORTUNE BEGINS TO SMILE

Edwards’ literary fortunes all but reached financial zero in 1897; with 1898 they began to mount, although the tendency upward was not very pronounced until the month of April. During the first quarter of the year he wrote and sold one Stella Edwards serial entitled “Lovers En Masque.” His poor health continued, and he was able to work only a few hours each day, but the fact that he could drive himself to the typewriter and lash his wits into evolving acceptable work gave him encouragement to keep at it. Early in April, with part of the proceeds from the serial story for expenses, he made a trip to New York.

“Prospecting trips” is the name Edwards gives to his frequent journeys to the publishing center of the country. He prospected for ordrs, prospected for better prices, prospected for new markets. No fiction factory can be run successfully on a haphazard system for disposing of its product. There must be some market in prospect, and on the wheel of this demand the output must be shaped as the potter shapes his clay.

Edwards made it a rule to meet his publishers once a year, secure their personal views as he could not secure them through correspondence, and keep himself prominently before them. In this way he secured commissions which, undoubtedly, would otherwise have been placed elsewhere. With each succeeding journey Edwards has made to New York, his prospecting trips have profited him more and more. This is as it should be. There is no “marking time” for a writer in the fierce competition for editorial favor; for one merely to “hold his own” is equivalent to losing ground. The writer must grow in his work. When he ceases to do that he will find himself slipping steadily backward toward oblivion.

Edwards found that in reaching New York in early April 1898, he had arrived at the psychological moment. Harte & Perkins, already described as keeping tense fingers on the pulse of their reading public, had discovered a feverish quickening of interest for which the Klondike gold rush was responsible. The prognosis was good for a new five-cent library; so the “Golden Star Library” was given to the presses. Edwards, because he was on the spot and urging his claims for recognition, was chosen to furnish the copy. During the year he wrote sixteen of these stories.

For half of April and all of May and June, Edwards and his wife were at their old boarding place in Forty-fourth street. During this time, along with the writing of the Golden Star stories, a juvenile serial and a Stella Edwards serial were prepared. The title of the Stella Edwards rhapsody was “A Blighted Heart.”

On July 2, owing to the excessive heat in the city and a belief on Edwards’ part that the country would benefit him, the Fiction Factory was temporarily removed to the Catskill Mountains. Comfortable quarters were secured in a hotel near Cairo, and the work of producing copy went faithfully on. Edwards’ health improved somewhat, although he was still unable to keep at his machine for a union day of eight hours.

Under date of Aug. 1, Harte & Perkins wrote Edwards that on account of the poor success of the Golden Star Library they would have to stop its weekly publication and issue it as a monthly. Mr. Perkins write:

“I do not think that the quality of the manuscciipt is so much at fault as the character of the library itself, though it is very difficult always to know just what the boys want.”

Edwards was depending upon this library to support himself and wife, and the weekly check was a sine qua non. Summer-resorting is expensive, and he had not yet had his fill of the historic old Catskills. He wrote the firm and requested them to send on a check for “A Blighted Heart.” The blight did not confine itself to the story but was visited upon Edwards’ hopes, as well. Harte & Perkins did not respond favorably. The serial was not to begin in “The Weekly Guest” until the latter part of September, and upon beginning publication was to be paid for in weekly installments of $25. Wrote Mr. Perkins:

“This is a season when, with depressed business and the many accounts we have to look after, it is difficult for us to make advanced payments on manuscripts. You may rest assured that, if conditions were otherwise, I should have been giad to meet your wishes.”

This meant an immediate farewell to the stamping grounds of good old Rip Van Winkle. Forthwith the Edwards struck their tent and boarded a night boat at Catskill Landing for down river. In their stateroom that night, with a fountain pen and using the washstand for a table, Edwards completed No. 16 of the ill-fated Golden Star Library. He had begun this manuscript before the notification to stop work on the series had reached him. In such cases, Harte & Perkins never refused to accept the complete story.

December found Edwards again settled on the North Side, in Chicago. He had consulted a physician regarding his health, and after a thorough examination had been told that it would require at least a year, and perhaps a year and a half, to cure him. The physician was a young man of splendid ability, and as he had just “put out his shingle” and patients were slow in rallying “round the standard,” he threw himself heart and soul into the task of making a whole man out of Edwards. The writer helped by leasing a flat within half a block of his medical adviser and faced the twelve or eighteen months to come with more or less equanimity.

Edwards, of course, could not recline at his ease while the work of rehabilitation was going forward. The family must be supported and the doctor paid. Forty dollars a month from the Golden Star Library would not do this. It was necessary to run up the returns somehow and another Stella Edwards story was undertaken. The title of this story was “Won by Love,” and Harte & Perkins acknowledged receipt of the first two installemnts on Dec. 6. Inasmuch as “Won by Love” came very near being the death of its author, it may be interesting to consider the story a little further. The letter of the 6th ran:

“We have received the first two installments of ‘Won by Love’ and like them very much indeed, but before giving you a definite answer we would like to have four more instalments on approval, making six in all. Kindly send these at your earliest convenience and oblige.”

The four installments were sent and nothing more was heard from them until a telegram, dated Jan. 19, 1899, was received:

“Please send more of ‘Won by Love’ as soon as possible. Must have it Monday.”

Owing to the fact that the writer of the old Five-Cent Library, for which Edwards had furnished copy some years before, had been taken seriously ill, this work had been turned over to Edwards on Dec. 27, 1898.

At this time Edwards was confined to his bed, and there he woirked, his typewriter in front of him on an improvised table. He had just finished several hours’ work on a library story when the telegram regarding “Won by Love” was received. This was Saturday. Edwards wired at once that he would send two more installments on the following Monday. These 12,000 words went forward according to schedule, and on the night they were sent the doctor called and found his patient in a state of collapse. Cause, too much “Won by Love.” The young physician took it more to heart than Edwards did.

“I’m afraid,” said he gloomily, “that you have ended your writing for all time.”

“You’re wrong, doctor,” declared Edwards; “I’m not going to be removed until I’ve done something better than pot-boilers.”

“I want to call a specialist into consultation,” was the reply.

The specialist was called and Edwards was stripped and his body marked off into sections – mapped out with one medical eye on the “undiscovered country” and the other on this lowly but altogether lovely “vale of tears.” When the examination was finished, the preponderance of testimony was all in favor of the Promised Land.

“I should say, Mr. Edwards,” said the specialist, in a tone professionally sympathetic, “that you have one chance in three to get well. Your other chance is for possibly seven or eight years of life. The third chance allows you barely time to settle your affairs.”

Settle his affairs! What affairs had Edwards to settle? There was the next library to be written and “Won by Love” to finish, but these would have netted Mrs. Edwards no more than $340. And the smallest chance would not suffer Edwards to leave his wife even this pittance. Since his disastrous Arizona experience Edwards had not been able to save any money. He was only just beginning to look ahead to a little garnering when the doctors pronounced their verdict. He had not a dollar of property, real or personal, if his library was not taken into account, and not a cent of life insurance. After turning this deplorable situation over in his mind, he decided that it was impossible for him to die.

“I’m going to take the first chance,” said he, “and make the most of it.”

He did. The young physician gave up more of his time and worked like a galley slave to see his patient through. Now, thirteen years after the specialist spoke the last word, Edwards is in robust health – the monument of his own determination and the young doctor’s skill. Nothing succeeds – sometimes – like the logic of nil desperandum.

To regain a foothold with his publishers, following the disastrous year of 1897, had cost Edwards so much persistent work that he would not cancel a single order. He hired a stenographer and for two weeks dictated his stories, then again resumed the writing of them himself, in bed and with the use of the improvised table. Success awaited all his fiction, even when turned out in such adverse circumstances. This, perhaps, was the best tonic he could have. He improved slowly but surely and was able, in addition to his regular work, to write a hundred-thousand word novel embracing his Arizona experiences. This novel he called “He Was a Stranger.”

The title was awkward, but it had been clipped from the quotation, “he was a stranger, and they took him in.” The story was submitted to Harte & Perkins, but they were not in the mood for taking in strangers of that sort. But the year following the novel secured the friendly consideration of Mr. Matthew White, Jr., and introduced Edwards into the Munsey publications.

Another novel, “The Man from Dakota,” was returned by Harte & Perkins after they had had it on hand for a year. It was declined in the face of a favorable report by one of their readers because, “We have so many books on hand that must be brought out during the next year that we cannot consider this story.”

The year 1899 closed with Fortune’s smile brightening delightfully for Edwards, and the new century beckoning him pleasantly onward with the hope of better things to come. The returns for the two years, standing to the credit of The Fiction Factory, are summarized thus:

1898:
"Lovers En Masque,"                    $ 300.
"Golden Star Library," 16 at $40 each,   640.
Boys Serial,                             100.
"A Blighted Heart,"                      300.
                                       ______
    Total                              $1340.

1899:
"Won by Love,"                         $ 300.
3 "Golden Stars" at $40 each             120.
35 Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each,     1400.
                                       ______
    Total                              $1820.

Edwards lives in the outskirts of a small town, on a road much travelled by farmers. Two honest tillers of the soil were passing his home, one day, and one of them was heard to remark to the other: “A man by the name of Edwards lives there, Jake. He’s one of those fictitious writers.”

§

Edwards has few friends whom he prizes more highly than he does Col. W.F. Cody, “Buffalo Bill,” and Major Gordon W. Lillie, “Pawnee Bill.” While the Wild West and Far East Show, of which Cody and Lillie are the proprietors was making its farewell tour with the Last of the Scouts, Major Lillie had this to tell about Colonel Cody:

“You’d be surprised at the number of people who try to beat their way into the show by stringing the Colonel. The favorite way is by claiming acquaintance with him. A stranger will approach Buffalo Bill with a bland smile and an outstretched hand. ‘Hello, Colonel!’ he’ll say, ‘guess who I am! I’ll bet you can’t guess who I am!’ Cody will give it up. ‘Why,’ bubbles the stranger, ‘don’t you remember when you were in Ogden, Utah, in nineteen-two? Remember the crowd at the depot to see you get off the train? Why, I was the man in the white hat!’”

“Just this afternoon,” laughed the Major, “Cody came up to where I was standing. He was wiping the sweat from his forehead and his face was red and full of disgust. ‘What’s the matter?’ I inquired. ‘Oh,’ he answered, ‘another one of those d— guessing contests! Why in blazes can’t people think up something new?’”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 11

XI.
WHEN FICTION IS STRANGER THAN TRUTH.

We are told that “fiction hath in it a higher end than fact,” which we may readily believe; and we may also concede that “truth is stranger than fiction,” at least in its occasional application. Nevertheless, in the course of his career as a writer Edwards has created two fictional fancies which so closely approximated truth as to make fiction stranger than truth; and, in one case, the net result of imagination was to coincide exactly with real facts of which the imagination could take no account. Perhaps each of these two instances is unique in its particular field; they are, in any event, so odd as to be worthy of note.

In the early 90’s, when a great deal of Edwards’ work was appearing, unsigned, in The Detroit Free Press, he wrote for that paper a brief sketch entitled, “The Fatal Hand.” The sketch was substantially as follows:

“The Northern Pacific Railroad had just been built into Helena, Montana, and I happened to be in the town one evening and stepped into a gambling hall. Burton, a friend of mine, was playing poker with a miner and two professional gamblers. I stopped beside the table and watched the game.

Cards had just been drawn. Burton, as soon as he had looked at his hand, calmly shoved the cards together, laid them face-downward in front of him, removed a notebook from his pocket and scribbled something on a blank leaf. ‘Read that,’ said he, ‘when you get back to your hotel tonight.’

The play proceeded. Presently the miner detected one of the professional gamblers in the act of cheating. Words were passed, the lie given. All the players leaped to their feet. Burton, in attempting to keep the miner from shooting, received the gambler’s bullet and fell dead upon the scattered cards.

An hour later, when I reached my hotel, I thought of the note Burton had handed me. It read: ‘I have drawn two red sevens. I now hold jacks full on red sevens. It is a fatal hand and I shall never leave this table alive. I have $6,000 in the First National Bank at Bismarck. Notify my mother, Mrs. Ezra J. Burton, Louisville, Kentucky.’”

This small product of the Fiction Factory was pure fiction from beginning to end. In the original it had the tang of point and counterpoint which caused it to be seized upon by other papers and widely copied. This gave extensive publicity to the “fatal hand” – the three jacks and two red sevens contrived by Edwards out of a small knowledge of poker and the cabala of cards.

Yet, what was the result?

A month later the Chicago papers published an account of a police raid on a gambling room. As the officers rushed into the place a man at one of the tables fell forward and breathed his last. “Heart disease,” was the verdict. But note: A police officer looked at the cards the dead man had held and found them to be three jacks and two red sevens.

A week later The New York Recorder gave space to a news story in which a man was slain at a gaming table in Texas. When the smoke of the shooting had blown away some one made the discovery that he had held the fatal hand.

From that time on for several months the fatal hand left a trail of superstition and gore all over the West. How many murders and hopeless attacks of heart failure it was responisble for Edwards had no means of knowing, but he could scarcely pick up a paper without finding an account of some of the ravages caused by his “jacks full on red sevens.”

Query: Were the reporters of the country romancing? If not, will some psychologist kindly rise and explain how a bit of fiction could be responsible for so much real tragedy?

In this instance, fancy established a precedent for fact; in the case that follows, the frankly fictitious paralleled the unknown truth in terms so exact that the story was recognized and appropriated by the son of the story’s hero.

While Edwards was in Arizona he was continually on the alert for story material. The sun, sand and solitude of the country “God forgot” produce types to be found nowhere else. He ran out many a trail that led from adobe-walled towns into waterless deserts and bleak, cacti-covered hills to end finally at some mine or cattle camp. It was on one of these excursions that he was told how a company of men had built a dam at a place called Walnut Grove. This dam backed up the waters of a river and formed a huge lake. Mining for gold by the hydraulic method was carried on profitably in the river below the dam. One night the dam “went out” and a number of laborers were drowned.

With this as the germ of the plot Edwards worked out a story. He called it “A Study in Red,” and it purported to show how a lazy Maricopa Indian, loping along on his pony in the gulch below Walnut Grove, gave up his mount to a white girl, daughter of the superintendent of the mining company, and while she raced on to safety he remained to die in the flood from the broken dam.

The story was published in Munsey’s Magazine. Six years later the author received a letter from the Maricopa Indian Reservation, sent to New York in care of the F.A. Munsey Company. The letter was from a young Maricopa.

“I have often read the account of my father’s bravery, and how he saved the life of the beautiful white girl when the Walnut Grove dam gave way. I have kept the magazine, and whenever I feel blue, or life does not go to please me, I get the story and read it and take heart to make the best of my lot and try to pattern after my father.

I have long wanted to write you, and now I have done so. I am back from the Indian School at Carlisle, on a visit to my people, and am impelled to send you this letter of appreciation and thanks for the story about my father.”

Now, pray, what is one to think of this? The letter bears all the earmarks of a bona fide performance and was written and mailed on the Reservation. Edwards’ fiction, it seems, had become sober fact for this young Maricopa Indian. Or did his father really die by giving up his pony to the “beautiful young white girl?” And was Edwards’ prescience doing subliminal stunts when he wrote the story?

John Peter, should this ever meet your eyes will you please communicate further with the author of “A Study in Red?” It has been some years now since a letter, sent to you at the Reservation, failed of a reply. And the letter has not been returned.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 10

X.
THE WOLF AT THE DOOR

Perhaps very few men in this life escape a period as black and dispiriting as was the year 1897 for Edwards. If not in one way, then in another, it is the fate of a man to be chastened and subdued so thoroughly, at least once in his career, that a livid rememberance of it remains always with him. Edwards has always been an optimist, but those blows of circumstance of the year 1897 found many weak places in the armor of his philosophy.

In tangling and untangling the threads of a story plot Edwards had become tolerably proficient, but in straightening out the snarls Fate had made in his own life he was crushed with a feeling of abject helplessness. There is a vast difference, it seems, in dealing with the complications of others and those that beset ourselves. The impersonal attitude makes for keener analysis and wiser judgment.

In a story, the poverty stricken hero and his wife may exist for a week on a loaf of bread, ten cents’ worth of potatoes and a twenty-cent soup-bone; but let the man who creates such a hero attempt to emulate his fictional fancies and stark realism plays havoc with the equation. The wolf at our own door is one sort of animal, and the wolf at our neighbor’s is of an altogether different breed.

The thermometer in Southern Arizona was “eighty in the shade” when Mr. and Mrs. Edwards, during the Christmas holidays, set their faces eastward. New York City, the shrine of so many pilgrims seeking prosperity, was their goal; and the metropolis, on that bleak New Year’s Day that witnessed their arrival, was shivering in the grip of real, old-fashioned winter. The change from a balmy climate to blizzards and ice and a below-zero temperature brought Edwards to his bed with a vicious attack of rheumatism. For days while the little fund of $100 melted steadily away, he lay helpless.

The great city, in its dealings with impecunious strangers, has been painted in cruel colors. Edwards found this to be a mistake. On the occasion of their first visit to New York he and his wife had found quarters in a boarding house in Forty-fourth street. A pleasant landlady was in charge and the Edwards had won her friendship.

Here, forming one happy family, were actors and actresses, a salesman in a down-town department store, a stenographer, a travelling man for a bicycle house, and others. All were cheerful and kindly, and took occasion to drop in at the Edwards’ third floor front and beguile the tedious hours for the invalid.

Fourteen years have brought many changes to Forty-fourth street between Broadway and Sixth avenue. The row of high-stoop brownstone “fronts” has that air of neglect which precedes demolition and the giving way of the old order to the new. The basement, where the pleasant landlady sat at her long table and smiled at the raillery and wit of “Beaney,” and Sam, and “Smithy,” and Ruth, and Ina and the rest, has fallen sadly from its high estate. A laundry has taken possession of the place. And “Beaney,” the light-hearted one who laughed at his own misfortunes and sympathized with the misfortunes of others, “Beaney” has gone to his long account. A veil as impenetrable has fallen over the pleasant landlady, Sam, “Smithy,” Ruth and Ina; and where-ever they may be, Edwards, remembering their kindness to him in his darkest days, murmurs for each and all of them a fervent “God bless you!” …

Before he was compelled to take to his bed Edwards had called at the offices of Harte & Perkins. His interview with Mr. Perkins impressed upon him the fact that, once a place upon the contributors’ staff of a big publising house is reliniquished it is difficult to regain. Others had been given the work which Edwards had had for three years. These others were turning in acceptable manuscripts and, in justice to them, Harte & Perkins could not take the work out of their hands. Mr. Perkins, however, did give Edwards an order for four Five-Cent Libraries – stories to be held in reserve in case manuscripts from regular contributors failed to arrive in time. On Feb. 11 he received a letter from the firm to the following effect:

“When we wrote you day before yesterday asking you to turn in four Five-Cent Libraries before doing anything else in the Library line for us, we were under the impression that the gentleman who has been engaged upon this work for some time would not be able to turn the material in with usual regularity on account of illness, but we hear from him today that he is now in better health, and will be able to keep up with the work, which he is very anxious to do, and somewhat jealous of having any other material in the series so long as he can fill the bill. On this account it will be well for you to stop work on the library. When you have completed the story on which you are now engaged, turn your attention to the Ten-Cent Library work, which we think you will be able to do to our satisfaction.”

This will illustrate the attitude which some authors assume toward the “butter-in.” All of a certain grist that comes to a publisher’s mill must be their grist. If the mill ground for another, and found the product better than ordinary, the other might secure a “stand-in” that would threaten the prestige of the regular contributor.

In seeking to keep his head above water financially, Edwards attempted to sell book rights of “The Astrologer,” the serial published in 1891 in The Detroit Free Press. He had written, also 66 pages of a present-tense Gunteresque story which he hoped would win favor as had his other stories in that style. This yarn he called “Croesus, Jr.” Both manuscripts were submitted to Harte & Perkins.

On Jan. 28, when the Edwards’ exchequer was nearly depleted, “Croesus, Jr.,” was returned with this written message:

“It might be said of the story in a way that it is readable, but it does not promise as good a story as we desire for this series. ‘Most decidedly,’ says the reader, ‘it lacks originality, novelty and strength.’ This criticism, which we consider entirely competent, must deter us from considering the story favorably.”

This was blow number one. Blow number two was delivered Feb. 3:

“We have had your manuscript, ‘The Astrologer,’ examined, and the verdict is that it would not be suitable for any of our regular publications, and it is not in our line for book publication. The reader states that it very humorous in parts but rather long drawn out…. We return manuscript.”

Two Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each were accepted and paid for; also four sketches written for a small magazine which Harte & Perkins were starting. [*]

[*This magazine, by the way, which had an humble beginning, has grown into one of the high class “populars” and has a wide circulation.]

Although he grew better of his rheumatism, Edwards failed to improve materially in health, and late in March he and his wife returned to Chicago. They rented a modest flat on the North Side, got their household effects out of storage, and faced the problem of existence with a courage scarcely warranted by their circtmistances.

Edwards was able to work only half a day. The remainder of the day he spent in bed with an alternation of chills and fever and a grevious malady growing upon him. During this period he tried syndicating articles in the newspapers but without success. He also wrote for Harte & Perkins a “Guest” serial, the order for which he had brought back with him from New York. He made one try for this by submitting the first few chapters and synopsis of story which he called “A Vassar Girl.” These were returned to him as unsuitable. He then wrote seven chapters of a serial entitled, “A Girl from the Backwoods,” and – with much fear and trembling be it confessed – sent them on for examination. Under date of July 8 this word was returned:

“The seven chapters of ‘A Girl from the Backwoods’ read very good, and we should like to have you finish the story, and should it prove satisfactory in its entirely, we should consider it an acceptable story.”

Here was encouragement at a time when encouragement was sorely needed. But how to keep the Factory going while the story was being finished was a difficult question. There were times when twenty-five cents had to procure a Sunday dinner for two; and there was a time when two country cousins arrived for a visit, and Edwards had not the half-dollar to pay an expressman for bringing their trunks from the station! Pride, be it understood, was one of Edwards’ chief assets. He had always been a regal spender, and his country cousins knew it. How the lack of that fifty-cent piece grilled his sensitive soul!

It was during these trying times that the genius of Mrs. Edwards showed like a star in the heavy gloom. On next to nothing she contrived to supply the table, and the conjuring she could do with a silver dollar was a source of never-failing wonder to her husband.

Edwards remembers that, at a time when there was not even car-fare in the family treasury, a check for $1.50 arrived in payment for a 1,500-word story that had been out for several years.

During the latter part of July the demand for money pending the completion of “A Girl from the Backwoods” became so insistent, that Edwards wrote and submitted to Harte & Perkins a sketch for their magazine. It contained 1,232 words and was purchased on Aug. 3 for $6.16.

“A Girl from the Backwoods” was submitted late in September, and was returned on Oct. 13 for a small correction. The following letter, dated Oct. 27, was received from the editor of the “Guest:”

“The manuscript of ‘A Girl from the Backwoods’, also the correction which you have made, have been duly received. The correction is very satisfactory.

In regard to your suggestion about the heroine’s name being that of a well known writer, we would say that inasmuch as the name is rather appropriate and suits the character we do not see that the lady who already bears it would in any way find fault with your use of it, and at present we think it may be allowed to stand.”

As showing Edwards’ pecuniary distress, the following paragraph from a letter from Harte & Perkins, dated Oct. 28, may be given:

“In response to your favor of the 19th and your telegram of yesterday, [*] we enclose you herewith our check for $200 in full for your story ‘A Girl from the Backwoods.’ This is the best price we can make you for this and other stories of this class from your pen, and it is a somewhat better one than we are now paying for similar material from other writers. We believe this will be satisfactory to you.”

[* Telegram sent on same day letter was received saying story was satisfactory.]

The price was not saticfactory. Edwards and his wife had counted upon receiving at least $300 for the story, and they needed that amount sorely. A respectful letter at once went forward to Harte & Perkins, appealing to their sense of justice and fairness, which Edwards had never yet known to fail him. On Nov. 3 came an additional check for $100, and these words:

“Replying to your favor of Nov. 1st, at hand today, we beg to state that we shall, agreeably with your request and especially as you put it in such strong terms, make the payment on ‘A Girl from the Backwoods’ $300. The story is much liked by our reader and we do think it is worth as much if not more than the Stella Edwards material which, however, in the writer’s judgement was much overpaid. We shall take this into account when considering the acceptance of other stories from your pen, and while we do not say positively that we will not pay $300 for the next one, as we wrote you in our last letter this is a high price for this class of material and we will expect to pay you according to our views as to the value of the manuscript.”

The year closed with an order from Harte & Perkins for another story of the Stella Edwards sort; a very dismal year indeed, and showing Factory returns as follows:

Two Five-Cent Libraries at $40       $ 80.00
Four magazine sketches at $10          40.00
One magazine sketch                     6.16
"A Girl from the Backwoods,"          300.
                                      ______
    Total                            $426.16

Perhaps, after all, this was not doing so badly; for during this year, and the year immediately following, Edwards was to discover that he had had one foot in the grave. But his fortunes were at their lowest ebb. With 1898 they were to begin taking an upward turn.

Some one said that some one else, by using Ignatius Donnelly’s cryptogram, proved that the late Bill Nye wrote the Shakespeare plays. This, of course, is merely a reflection on the cryptogram; BUT if Shakespeare’s publishers had not been so slovenly with that folio edition of his plays, there would never have been any hunt for a cipher, nor any of this Bacon talk.

§

“In the early days, when I lived on the plains of Western Kansas on a homestead,” says John H. Whitson, well and favorably known to dozens of editors, “I was nosed out by a correspondent for a Kansas City paper, who thought there was something bizarre in the fact that an author was living the simple life of a Western Settler. The purported interview he published was wonderful concoction! He gave a descriptive picture of the dug-out in which I lived, and filled in the gaps with other matter drawn from his imagination, making me out a sort of literary troglodyte; whereas, as a matter of fact, I had never lived in a dug-out. On top of it, one of my homesteading friends asked me in all seriousness how much I had paid to get that write-up and picture in the Kansas City paper, and seemed to think I was doing some tall lying when I said I had paid nothing.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 09

IX.
RAW MATERIAL

Where does the writer get his plot-germs, the raw material which he puts through the mill of his fancy and finally draws forth as a finished and salable product? Life is a thing of infinite variety, and the plot-germ is a thing of Life or it is nothing. Being a mere basic suggestion of the story, the germs must come from the author’s experience, or from the experiences of others which have been brought to his attention. Unconsciously the germ lodges in his mind, and his ingenuity, handling other phases of existence, works out the completed plot

It follows that the richer an author’s experience and the more ardent his imagination the better will be the plot evolved, providing his fine sense of values has been adequately cultivated. But no matter how adventurous and varied a personal experience, or how warm the fancy, or how highly cultivated the mind in its adaptation of fact to fiction, the experience of others compels attention if a writer’s work is to be anything more than self-centered.

Newspapers, chronicling the everyday events of human existence, have not only suggested countless successful plot-germs but have likewise helped in the rounding out of the plot. An editor wrote Edwards, as long ago as March 30, 1893: “What we require in our stories is something written up to date, with incidents new and original. The daily press is teeming with this raw material.” This fact is universally recognized, so that very few authors neglect to avail themselves of this source of inspiration.

As a case in point, a few years ago one noted author was accused of appropriating the work of another noted author. Plagiarism was seemingly proved by evoking the aid of the deadly parallel. Nevertheless the evidence was far from being conclusive. Each author had done no more than build a similar story upon the same newspaper clipping! Neither was in the wrong. No one writer has a monopoly of the facts of life, or of the right to use those facts as they filter through columns of the daily press.

Fortunately for Edwards, he realized the value of newspaper clippings very early in his writing career. Twenty-five years ago he began to scissor and to put away those clippings which most impressed him. Until late in the year 1893 his clipping collection was either pasted in scrap-books or thrown loosely into a large box. During the winter of 1893–4 he felt the necessity of having the raw material of his Factory stored more systematically. The services of an assistant were secured and the work was begun.

Large manila envelopes were used. The envelopes were lettered alphabetically, and each clipping was filed by title. On the back of each envelope was typed the title of its contents.

This method was found to be wholly unsatisfactory. Frequent examination had given Edwards a fair working knowledge of his thousands of clippings, but he was often obliged to go through a dozen or more envelopes before finding the particular article whose title had escaped him.

In 1905 he bought a loose-leaf book and tried out a new system on an acctmiulation of several thousand magazines. This indexing was done in such a way as to suggest the character of the clipping (written in red), and the title of the article, the page number and number of the magazine (written in black). All the magazines had been numbered consecutively and placed on convenient shelves. The first page of “W,” for instance, appeared as shown below:

• Washington “A Job in the Senate” 771-3
• Wild Animal Story “The Rebellion of a Millionaire” 477-4
• Washington, Booker T. “Riddle of the Negro” 519-4
• White Cross “Work of the American W.C.” 129-5
• Waitress “Diary of an Amateur W.” 543-6
• Wall Street “The Shadow of High Finance” 336-8
• Woman Suffrage “Worlds Half-Citizens” 411-8
• Woman “How to Make Money” 495-9

The above is only part of one of many pages of W’s, and will serve to exemplify the advantages and disadvantages of the system in practical use. For instance, if it was desired to find out something about Booker T. Washington, all that was necessary was to take down old magazine No. 4 and turn to page 519.

This manifestly was an improvement over the old envelope method of indexing, but still left much to be desired. To illustrate, if Edwards wished to exhaust his material on Booker T. Washington it was necessary for him to hunt through all the pages under “W,” and then examine all the magazines containing the articles in which he was mentioned. It is patent that if the indexing were properly done, every reference having to do with Booker T. Washington should follow a single reference to him in the index; and, further, the various articles should be grouped together.

Two years later, Edwards discarded the loose-leaf for the card system. This, he found, was as near perfection as could be hoped for.

His first step was to buy a number of strong box letter-files. These he numbered consecutively, just as he had numbered the manila envelopes. Articles are cut from magazines, the leaves secured together with brass fasteners, and on the first page margin at the top are marked the file number and letter of compartment where the article belongs. Thus, if the article is kept out of the file for any length of time it can be readily returned to its proper place. Newspaper clippings are handled in precisely the same way.

The card index has its divisions and sub-divisions. Cards indexing articles on various countries have a place under the general letter, and another place in the geographical section under the same letter. So with articles concerning Noted Personages, Astronomy, Antiquities, etc. Below, for the benefit of any one who may wish to use the system, is reproduced a card from the file:

ARMY, U.S.

Hand Bill used to secure enlistments    "A"  1
Army Story "Knew It"                    "K"  1
Army Story "A Philippine Romance"       "P"  1
Army Story "He is Crazy Jack"           "C"  1
Army Story "Their Very Costly Meal"     "T"  1
Army Story "Siege of Bigbag"            "S"  1
"Fighting Life in the Phillippines"     "F"  1
Pay of Soldiers "Young Man–"            "Y"  2

In this system the character of the material is first indicated, as Pay of Soldiers. If there is a title it follows in quotation marks. Where the title suggests the character of the material sufficiently, the title comes first, in “quotes.” Then follows the letter under which the article is filed, and the number of the file. Suppose it is desired to find out what soldiers of the United States’ Army are paid for their services: File No. 2 is removed from the shelf, opened at letter “Y” and the information secured under title beginning, “Young Man–”

As a saver of time, and a guard against annoyance when fancies are running free, Edwards has found his card-index system for clippings almost ideal.

A friend of Edwards’ is what the comic papers call a “jokesmith.” Recently he concocted the following:

“You must be doing well,” said Jones the merchant to Quill the writer, meeting him in front of his house. “You seem to be always busy, and you look prosperous.”

“So I am, Jones,” answered Quill, “busy and prosperous. Come into the basement with me and I’ll show you the secret of my prosperity.”

They decended into the basement and Quill rang up the curtain on a ragman weighing three big bags of rejection slips.

“My stories all come back,” confessed Quill, triumphantly, “and I get three cents a pound for the rejection slips that come with them.”

This, of course, was not much of a joke, but the prepetrator sent it to Judge. Judge sent it back with about twenty blank rejection slips inclosed by a rubber band. On the top slip was written: “Here are some more. – Ed. Judge.”

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 08

VIII.
THE WOLF ON THE SKY-LINE.

For Edwards, the year 1895 dawned in a blaze of prosperity and went out in the gathering shadows of impending disaster.

Spring found him literally swamped with orders, and he tried the experiment of hiring a young man stenographer and typist to assist him. The young man was an expert in his line and proved so efficient an aide that Edwards hired another who was equally proficient. Two stenographers failing to help him catch up with his flood of orders, he secured a third.

One assistant put in his time copying manuscripts and cataloguing clippings, to another the library work was dictated, and the third was employed on “Stella Edwards” material.

Edwards was versatile, and he experienced no difficulty in passing from one class of work to another. He was able to chronicle the breathless adventures of the hero of the Five-Cent Library to one stenographer, then turn to the other and dictate two or three chapters of a serial of the class written by Laura Jean Libby, and then fill in the gaps between dictation with altogether different work on his own machine.

Although Edwards kept these three stenographers for several months, and although he has since frequently availed himself of the services of an amanuensis, yet he is free to confess that he doubts the expediency of such help. Successful dialect cannot be wrapped up in a stenographer’s “pothooks,” and so much dialect was used in the library stories that the young man at work on them had to familiarize himself with the contorted forms and write them down from memory. It took him so long to do this, and required so much of Edwards’ time making corrections, that the profit on his work was disappointing.

With such an office force grinding out copy, during the early months of 1895 the Fiction Factory was a very busy place. During January and February the cash returns amounted to $1,500. This, Edwards discovered later, was no argument in favor of stenographer assistance, for he has since, working alone, earned upward of $1,000 in a month.

In February Edwards was requested by Harte & Perkins to submit a story for a new detective library which they were starting, and of which they were very choice. The work was as different as possible from the two or three detective yarns Edwards had written in 1893. He wrote and submitted the story, and Mr. Perkins’ criticisms are given below by way of showing how carefully the stories were examined. The letter from which the excerpt is taken was written Feb. 13, 1895. The mythical detective, who has become known throughout the length and breadth of the land, shall here be referred to as “Joe Blake.”

“There is one point to which I would call your attention. On page 5, Chapter II opens in this way: ‘A young man to see Dr. Reynolds; no card.’ Joe Blake, otherwise ‘Dr. Reynolds,’ told the boy to show the visitor in. The place was Chicago. Scene in room in prominent hotel the second day after Joe Blake had had an tntenriew with Abner Larkin, 9 o’clock in the evening.’

This is too trite and not easily expressed. Such references to time, place, etc, impress the reader with the fact that he is reading a romance and not a real story of Joe Blake’s experiences. This particular point should be kept in mind. We want these stories to appear as natural as possible.

In the opening of the installment, where Mr. Larkin presents himself to Joe, you have duplicated the common-place method of most writers. There should be more originality in the way Joe Blake’s attention is called to various cases and not a continual repetition of calls at his office, which, though natural enough, become tiresome to the reader. In this same opening there is not enough detective flavor, and here, as well as in other places, Joe does not appear to be the man of authority, which he is usually found to be. These are little things, but I believe if you will take care of them they will help the story greatly.”

This will illustrate the care with which Harte & Perkins looked over the manuscripts submitted to them, to the end that they might be made to reflect their ideas of what good manuscripts should be. If a writer could not do their work the way they wanted it done he was not long in getting his conge. In the case of the story mentioned above, it was returned, rewritten, and made to conform to Mr. Perkins’ ideas.

On Jan. 9 Harte & Perkins had written Edwards:

“It is more than apparent that the library business is not very flourishing, and hereafter we shall only be able to pay $40 for these stories. I think this will be satisfactory to you, for I know you can do this class of work very rapidly.”

This meant a loss of $10 a week, and Edwards endeavored to make up for it by increasing his output. Particularly he wanted a chance to write another “Stella Edwards” story, just to show the firm that he could do the work. Mr. Harte gave him an order for the serial stating that the new story was to follow “The Bicycle Belle.” then running in The Weekly Guest. The story was to be in twelve installments of 5,250 words each, totalling some 63,000 words. For this Edwards was to receive $200. This hint was given him:

“Have plenty of romance, without too great extravagance, and make sure of at least one wedding and that in the beginning of the story.”

With the order came a picture which it was desired to use in illustrating the opening installment. Edwards was to write the installment around the picture. He completed the story, called it “Little Bluebell,” and received the following commendation after two installments had been received and read:

“I have just finished reading the first two installments of your story, ‘Little Bluebell,’ and I have to say that the same is entirely satisfactory, unquestionably the best thing you have given us in this line of work.”

Although he was turning out Five-Cent Libraries, Stella Edwards serials, short sketches for Puck and stories for other publishers than Harte & Perkins, Edwards was constantly on the alert for more work in order to keep his stenographers busy. He asked Mr. Perkins for orders for the Ten-Cent Library, and for juvenile serials for the boys’ paper. He was allowed to send in some “Gentlemen Jim” stories for the dime publication. The pay was not munificent, however, being only $50 for 37,000 words.

The “Little Bluebell” story was followed by another “Stella Edwards” serial entitled “A Weird Marriage.” This yarn hit the bull’s-eye with a bang. In fact, it was said to be the best thing ever done by “Stella Edwards.” And then, after scoring these two successive hits, Edwards tripped on a third story called “Beryl’s Lovers,” and he fell so hard that it was ten years before the firm ever asked him to do any more writing in that line.

In the Fall of 1895 Edwards discovered that he had been working too hard. A doctor examined his lungs, declared that he was threatened with tuberculosis and ordered him to the Southwest. In November he and his wife left Chicago, Edwards carrying with him his typewriter and a plentiful supply of typewriter paper. He transformed a stateroom in the compartment sleeper into his Fiction Factory, finishing two installments of the ill-fated “Beryl’s Lovers” while enroute.

These installments, forwarded from Phoenix, Arizona, by express, went into a wreck at Shoemaker, Kansas, and were delivered to Harte & Perkins, torn and illegible, two weeks after the story had been taken over by another writer. Edwards filed a claim against the express company for $300, and then compromised for $50 – all the express people were liable for by the terms of their receipt.

From November, 1895, until April, 1896, Edwards was located on a ranch near Phoenix, Arizona, writing Five-Cent Libraries for Harte & Perkins and sketches and short stories for other publishers. His health was steadily declining, and he could bring himself to his work only by a supreme effort of the will and at the expense of much physical torture. In May, 1896, he was told that he must get farther away from the irrigated districts around Phoenix and into the arid hills. To this end he interested himself in a gold mine, and went East to form a company and secure the necessary capital to purchase and develop it.

About the middle of July he returned to Phoenix, still writing but hoping for golden rewards from the mining venture which would ultimately make his writing less of a business and more of a pastime.

His health continued to decline and he was ordered to give up writing entirely and exercise constantly in the open. He at once telegraphed Harte & Perkins to this effect. On Oct 13 they wrote:

“We have heard nothing from you since receipt of your telegram to take all work out of your hands. This, of course, we attended to at once, but on your account, as well as our own, we were very sorry to learn that you found it necessary to give up the work, and trust that the illness from which you are suffering will not be lasting…. If, in future, you should be able to write again, we shall try to find a place for your work.”

So the old firm and Edwards parted for a time. A few weeks proved the mining venture a failure, and $10,000 which Edwards had put away out of the profits of his writing had vanished – gone to make the failure memorable. Nor had his health returned.

In some desperation, just before New Year’s of ‘97, Mr. and Mrs. Edwards entrained for New York, Edwards pinning his hopes to Harte & Perkins. He had less than $100 to his name when he and his wife reached the metropolis.

One hundred dollars will not carry a man and his wife very far in New York, even when both are in good health and the man can work. Ambition alone kept Edwards alive and gave him hope for the future.

The Factory out-put for 1895:

3 Five-Cent Libraries at $50 each        $  150.
29 Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each         1160.
 2 Detective stories at $40 each             80.
 2 Ten-Cent Library stories at $50 each     100.
"Little Bluebell," serial                   200.
"A Weird Marriage"                          300.
                                        ________
                                         $ 1990.

Detroit Free Press, Contributions            22.
                                       _________
    Total                                $ 2012.

For 1896:

24 Five-Cent Libraries at $40 each        $ 960.
Short fiction                                71.50
                                        ________
    Total                                $ 1031.50

For cold brutality perhaps the rejection slip worded as below is unequalled:

We are sorry to return your paper, but you have written on it.

Respectfully yours,

The Editor.

§

Before Mr. Karl Edwin Harriman, of The Red Book, had ventured into the editorial end of the writing trade, he wrote an article on an order from a certain Eastern magazine. Later, that magazine decided that it could not use the article, although it had been paid for, and, with Mr. Harriman’s permission, turned it over to an agent to market elsewhere.

The agent, not knowing Mr. Harriman had associated himself with a certain magazine, sent the manuscript to that publication, in the ordinary way.

It was up to Mr. Harriman, then, to consider it in an editorial capacity. He was unable to purchase the manuscript, and returned it to the agent with a reproof for having submitted such an article, and indicating that the author had a great deal to learn before he could feel justified in seeking a market among the best known magazines.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 07

VII.
INSPIRATION ALIAS INDUSTRY.

Jack London advises authors not to wait for inspiration but to “go after it with a club.” Bravo! It is not intended, of course, to lay violent hands on the Happy Idea or to knock it over with a bludgeon. Mr. London realizes that, nine times out of ten, Happy Ideas are drawn toward industry as iron filings toward a magnet The real secret lies in making a start, even though it promises to get you nowhere, and inspiration will take care of itself.

There’s a lot of “fiddle-faddle” wrapped up in that word “inspiration.” It is the last resort of the lazy writer, of the man who would rather sit and dream than be up and doing. If the majority of writers who depend upon fiction for a livelihood were to wait for the spirit of inspiration to move them, the sheriff would happen along and tack a notice on the front door – while the writers were still waiting.

More and more Edwards’ experience, and the experience of others which has come under his observation, convinces him that inspiration is only another name for industry. When he was paymaster for the firm of contractors, he went to the office at 8 o’clock in the morning, took half an hour for luncheon at noon, and left for home at half-past 5. When he broke away from office routine, he promised himself that he would give as much, or more, of his time to his Fiction Factory.

What he feared was that ideas would fail to come, and that he would pass the time sitting idly at his typewriter. In actual practice, he found it almost uncanny how the blank white sheet he had run into his machine invited ideas to cover it. After five, ten or fifteen minutes of following false leads, he at last hit upon the right scent and was off at a run. With every leap his enthusiasm grew upon him. A bright bit of dialogue would evoke a chuckle, a touch of pathos would bring a tear, an unexpected incident shooting suddenly out of the tangled threads would fill him with rapture, and for the logical but unexpected climax he reserved a mood like Caesar’s, returning from the wars and celebrating a triumph.

In the ardor of his work he forgot the flight of time. He balked at leaving his typewriter for a meal and went to bed only when drowsiness interfered with his flow of thought.

Whether he was writing a Five-Cent Library, a serial story or a novel which he hoped would bring him fame and fortune, the same delight filled him whenever he achieved a point which he knew to be worth while. And whenever such a point is achieved, my writer friend, there is something that rises in your soul and tells you of it in words that never lie.

No matter what you are writing, unless you can thrill to every detail of excellence in what you do, unless you can worry about the obscure sentence or the unworthy incident until they are sponged out and recast, it is not too much to say that you will never succeed at the writing game. Love the work for its own sake and it will bring its inspiration and its reward; look upon it as a grind and melancholy failure stalks in your wake.

There can be no inspiration without industry, and no industry without inspiration. Start your car on the batteries of industry and it will soon be running on the magneto of inspiration. Drive yourself to your work, and presently interest will be aroused and your eager energies will need a curb instead of a spur.

Edwards has written two 30,000-word stories a week for months at a time; he has written one 30,000-word story and one 40,000-word serial in one week; he has begun a Five Cent Library story at 7 o’clock in the morning and worked the clock around, completing the manuscript at 7 the next morning; and he has done other things that were possible only because industry brought inspiration, and inspiration takes no account of time.

Edwards knows a writer of short stories who is like a crazy man for days while he is frantically groping for an idea. When the idea comes, he figuratively sweats blood for a week in pulling it through his typewriter; and then, when the story is in the mails, he takes to his bed for a week from physical exhaustion. Result: Three weeks, one story, and anywhere from $50 to $75. He is conscientious, but his method is wrong. Instead of storming through the house and tearing his hair while the idea eludes him, he should roll in a fresh sheet, sit calmly down in front of the keys, look out of the window or around the room and start off with the first object that appeals to him.

There are writers who will have a Billikin for inspiration, or some other fetich that takes the place of a Billikin. Edwards has an elephant tobacco-jar that has occasionally helped him. Sometimes it is a pipeful of the elephant’s contents, and sometimes it is merely a long look at the elephant that starts the psychology to working.

Of course it isn’t really the Billikin, or the elephant, or the tobacco that does the trick. They merely enable us to concentrate upon the work in hand: from them we gather hope that work will produce results, so we get busy and results come.

The main thing is to break the shackles of laziness and begin our labors; then, after that, to forget that we are laboring in the sheer joy of creation with which our labor inspires us.

New York, Sept 2, 1911.

My dear Mr. Edwards:

You fairly have me stumped. With the greatest pleasure in the world I would give you what you ask for your book, but I am not certain that I can recall any humorous anecdotes; and as for “quips,” I look the word up and discover that it means: “A sneering or mocking remark; gibe; taunt.” And I am afraid I am not equal to evolving any of these…. All I can recall now is that in my early days an editor of the New York Herald wanted to kick me down the editorial stairs because I asked pay for amusement notes they had been printing for nothing. I fled, leaving my last Ms. behind me – which they also printed gratis. Now this wasn’t humorous to anybody at the time, and if there was any ‘quip,’ that editor uttered it, and I don’t remember now just the language he used.

Very truly yours,

Matthew White, Jr., Editor The Argosy.

The Fiction Factory: Chapter 06

VI.
MAKING GOOD BY HARD WORK.

With the beginning of the year 1894 Edwards was learning the knack of the nickel novel and its ten-cent brother, and making good with his New York publishers. During 1893 the work he turned in was of fair quality, but he was not satisfied with that and labored to improve. Each succeeding story came nearer and nearer the high mark. Believing that whatever is worth doing is worth doing well, he was constantly asking himself, “How can I make my next story better than the one I have just finished?” The publishers helped him. Every manuscript submitted was read personally by Mr. Perkins, and brought a letter dissecting the story and stating which incidents were liked, and why, and which incidents were not liked, and why. Edwards feels that he can never be sufficiently grateful to Mr. Perkins for this coaching in the gentle art of stalking a reader’s elusive interest

Had Edwards remained a paymaster in the employ of the contracting firm, he would have received $1,200 for his services in 1893. He severed his connection with his paymaster’s salary in June, and at the end of the year his Fiction Factory showed these results:

 4  Five-Cent Library stories at $50 each  $ 200.
 1  Juvenile serial                          100.
 1  Juvenile serial                           75.
13 Ten-Cent Library stories at $100. each   1300.
 1  Serial for Saturday Night                150.
                                            _____
    Total                                 $ 1825.

In other words, Edwards had taken out of his Fiction Factory $625 more than his salary as paymaster would have amounted to for the year. He felt vastly relieved, and his wife laughingly fell back on her woman’s prerogative of saying “I told you so.” This was a good beginning, and Edwards felt sure that he would be able to do even better during 1894. He was coming along splendidly with the Ten-Cent Library work. On Jan. 30 Mr. Perkins paid this tribute to his growing powers:

“I have just finished reading your story, “Dalton’s Double,” which I find to be as good as anything you have given us. I must compliment you upon the varied incident which you cram into these stories, of a nature that is well suited to them.”

It was Edwards’ custom to forward a Ten-Cent Library story every two weeks, and there were months in which he wrote three stories, taking ten days for each one. As these stories were 40,000 words in length, three in thirty days were equivalent to 120,000 words.

During 1893 he wrote his stories twice: first a rough draft and then the printer’s copy. In 1894 he began making his first copies clean enough for the compositor. Had he not done this he could never have accomplished such a large amount of work.

On April 10, when everything was going swimmingly and he was taking in $300 a month for the library work, he was brought up short in his career of prosperity. Mr. Perkins wrote him to finish the story upon which he was engaged and then to stop the library work until further orders. It had been decided to use “re-prints” in the series. This could very easily be done as the Library had been published for years and some of the earlier stories could be brought out again without injuring the sale. The letter, which was a profound disappointment to Edwards, closed as follows:

“I regret the necessity of curtailing your work, for I am entirely satisfied with it, and if we did not find it necessary to adopt the measure referred to above, with a view to decreasing expenses dnring the summer months and dull season, I should have wished to have you continue right along. I have no doubt that you will be able to find a place for your material in the meantime.”

This fell upon Edwards like a bolt from a clear sky. He began to regret his “paymaster crutch” and to imagine dire things. He had been giving his time almost exclusively to Harte & Perkins, and had lost touch with publications for which he had been writing previous to 1893. Where, he asked himself, was he to place his material in the meantime?

There is little sentiment in business. Harte & Perkins, whenever they find a line of work is not paying, will cut it off at an hour’s notice, by telegraph if necessary. The man receiving the telegram, of course, can only make the best of it. This is a point which Edwards has always disliked about the work for publishers of this class of fiction: the writer, no matter how prosperous he may be at any given time, is always in a state of glorious uncertainty.

But Edwards fell on his feet. It so happened that he had sent to Harte & Perkins, some time before, copies of Saturday Night containing two of his stories. He had done this in the attempt to prove to them that he could write for The Weekly Guest, their story paper. This little incident shows how important it is for a writer to get as many anchors to windward as possible.

Eight days after being cut off from the library work, Edwards received a letter from Mr. Harte. Mr. Perkins had left New York on business, but had turned over the printed work in Saturday Night for Mr. Harte’s inspection before leaving. Mr. Harte wrote, in part:

“I like your work in Saturday Night, and think we shall be able to give jou a commission for a Weekly Guest story, provided you can lend yourself successfully to our suggestions as to style, etc., and give us permission to publish under any of the pen names we use in the office.

We want a story of the Stella Edwards type. We send you to-day one or two samples of the class of work desired, so that you may be able to see just what it is. If you can do the work, we shall be pleased to send you a title and plot, with synopsis. You can then write us two installments for a trial, and, if satisfactory, I have no doubt we could arrange to give you a quantity of work in this line.

I feel, after reading the samples you submitted, that you will be able to meet our requirements in this class of story. The two stories we send you are the work of a masculine pen, and though not so easy to lose one’s identity in literary work, this class of story does not seem to present the ordinary difficulties; at least, that is the testimony of our authors who have tried it.”

Edwards was booked to attempt a gushing love story, to follow a copy and make it appear as though a woman had done the writing! Quite a jump this, from a rapid-fire Ten-Cent Library story for young men to a bit of sentimental fiction for young women. However, he went at it, and he went at it with a determination to make good. It was either that or go paymastering again.

On April 24 he received title, synopsis and plot of “Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl,” and began charging himself with superheated sentiment preparatory to beginning his work. The popular young lady authoress, “Stella Edwards,” whose portrait in a decollete gown had been so often flaunted in the eyes of “her” public, was a myth. The “stuff” supposedly written by the charming “Stella Edwards” was ground out by men who were versatile enough to befool women readers, with a feminine style. Edwards, it transpired, was able to do this successfully for a time, but ultimately he failed to round off the rough corners of a style too decidedly masculine for “Miss Edwards.” But this is anticipating. On May 3 he had sent the two trial installments, and from New York came the word:

“We like the two opening: installments of ‘Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl.’ The style is good, the action brisk and sensational and of a curiosity-arousing character.

It is our belief that you are capable of presenting a desirable variation from the former Stela Edwards’ stories, by introducing romantic incidents of a novel and more exalted character.

In most of the other Stella Edwards’ yarns there was little plot and the action was rarely varied. The action comprised the pursuit and capture, the recapture and loss of the heroine, she being constantly whirled, like a shuttle-cock, from the hero to the villain, then to the female villain, then back again to the hero for a few tantalizing moments, and so on to the end.

You can readily improve upon this by introducing scenes a little more fresh, and far more interesting.

It is about time for Stella to improve, and we believe you are just the man to make her do better work.

Go on with the story and force our readers to exclaim, ‘Well, that’s the best story Stella has written!’”

While Edwards was deep in the sorrows of “Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl,” he received from his publishers on May 10 orders which hurled him headlong into another “Stella Edwards” yarn.

“Owing to a change in our publishing schedule of Guest stories, it will be necessary to anticipate the issue of ‘Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl’ by another story of the same type, sixteen installments, same as the one you are now working on. The title of this new story will be ‘The Bicycle Belle,’ and will deal with the bicycle as the matter of central interest in the first installment or two. I send you a synopsis of the story prepared by one of our editors. This will simply give you an idea of one way of developing the theme. It does not, however, suit our plans, and we will ask you to invent something quite different.”

Always and ever Harte & Perkins kept their fingers on the pulse of their reading public. The safety bicycle was the fashion, in those days, and Harte & Perkins were usually first to exploit a fashion or a fad in their story columns. Whenever they had a story with a particularly popular and striking theme, it was their habit to flood the country with sample copies of The Weekly Guest, breaking off a generous installment of the serial in such a breathless place that the reader was forced to buy succeding issues of the Guest in order to get the rest of the story. So that is what the change in their publishing schedule meant. They wanted to boom the circulation of the Guest with a bicycle story.

Edwards shelved Bessie the beautiful at the 7th installment and threw himself into the tears, fears and chivalry of “The Bicycle Belle.” This was on May 12. Three days later, on May 15, he forwarded two installments of the bicycle story for Harte & Perkins’ inspection. On May 16, before these installments had reached the publishers, Edwards was requested as follows:

“As we shall not be able to begin, in the Guest, your story, ‘Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl,’ until after January the first, next, it will be well to change the scene to a winter setting. This can be very easily done in the two installments that we have on hand, if you will make a note of it and keep it up for the balance of the story. In the first installment we will show the girl leaping into the river with a few cakes of ice floating about, and in the scene where she is expelled from the house there will be plenty of snow. It will make a more effective picture and be more seasonable for the story.”

More trouble! Harte & Perkins had two installments, and did not seem to know that Edwards had five more installments on hand, pending the completion of the bicycle yarn. But he was ready to turn summer into winter, or day into night, in order to make good. On May 18 he received a report on the two installments of the bicycle story.

“The two installments of ‘The Bicycle Belle’ have been read and approved by our editor, who says that the story opens very well, with plenty of animated action, briefly yet graphically pictured. You seem to have caught our idea exactly, and we would be pleased to have you go ahead with the story, finishing it before you again take up ‘Bessie, the Beautiful Blhid Girl.’”

On June 3 Edwards sent installments three to sixteen of the bicycle story, which was the complete manuscript. Ten days later he was informed:

“‘The Bicycle Belle’ is crowded with dramatic action and is just what we want. In the next it would be well to have a little more of the female element just to demonstrate that ‘Stella Edwards’ is up-to-date.”

None the less pleasant was this news, contained in a letter dated June 18:

“We have placed to your credit, upon our books, the sum of three hundred dollars in payment for ‘The Bicycle Belle,’ which will be the figure for all this class of stories from your pen which are accepted for The Weekly Guest.”

Up to that time this was the most money Edwards had ever received for a serial story, and very naturally he felt elated. Under date of June 20 he wrote Harte & Perkins and told them that he was planning a trip East as soon as he had finished with “Bessie, the Beautiful Blind Girl.” He received a cordial invitation from the publishers to come on as soon as possible as they had something which they particularly wanted him to do for them.

The story of the blind girl was forwarded on June 30. A flaw was discovered in it and several installments were returned for correction – not a serious flaw, indeed, but one which necessitated a little revision. The revision made, the story passed at once to acceptance.

In July Edwards was in New York and called personally upon Harte & Perkins. He found them pleasant and capable gentlemen – all that his fancy had pictured them through months of correspondence. Inasmuch as it was Edwards’ first visit to the metropolis, he studied the city with a view to using it in some of his fiction.

The special work which Mr. Harte wanted Edwards to do for the firm was a story of which he gave the salient features. It was to be written in the best Archibald Clavering Gunter style.

As Edwards had imitated successfully the mythical “Stella Edwards,” he was now confronted with the more trying task of imitating the style of a popular living author. He read Gunter from “Barnes of New York” down; and then, when completely saturated with him, turned off two installments of “The Brave and Fair” and sent them on. He was visiting in Michigan, at the time, and a letter under date of August 20, reached him while he was still in that state.

“I have just finished reading the two installments of ‘The Brave and Fair.’ I think you have made a very good opening indeed. It reads smoothly and seems to me to be very much in Gunter’s light narrative style, which is what we are after. It remains to be seen whether you can get as close to Gunter in what might be called his tragedy vein as opposed to the comedy vein, which you have successftilly worked up in these two installments.”

“The Brave and Fair,” going forward to the publishers piece by piece, seemed to arouse their enthusiasm. “We have read up to installment eight. It is fine! Full of heroic action! Bristling with exciting scenes!” When the completed manuscript was in the publishers’ hands, on October 20, there came another compliment-ary letter.

“‘The Brave and Fair’ bristled with exciting action to the close.

The best incidents in it are those descriptive of Chub Jones’ heroic self-sacrifice. In our opinion, this stands out as the gem of the story, because it makes the reader’s heart bound with admiration for the little hero.”

Hundreds of thousands of sample copies of The Weekly Guest, with first chapters of this story, were scattered all over the land. Later, the book was issued in paper covers. Harte & Perkins paid the author $500 for the story, then ordered another of the same type for which he was given $450.

These stories were written under a nom de plume which Harte & Perkins had copyrighted. The nom de plume was their property and could not be appropriated by any other publisher. Edwards wrote three of the yarns, and a friend of his wrote others.

All the year Edwards had been patted on the back. On Dec. 14 came a blow between the eyes. He had been commissioned to write another “Stella Edwards” rhapsody, but was overconfident and did not take time to surround himself with the proper “Stella Edwards” atmosphere. Two installments went forward, and this letter came back:

“I have just finished reading ‘Two Hearts Against the World.’ I regret to say that the story will not do, and it would be as well for you not to attempt to remodel it. In other words, the way you are handling the subject is not satisfactory to us and is not a question of minor detail. We shall be obliged to give this work into other hands to do. The story, as far as it goes, is wildly improbable and has a lack of cohesion in the incident. I think you wrote it hurriedly, and without mature thought. These stories have to seem probable even if they deal with unusual events.”

There was bitterness in that, not so much because Edwards had lost $300 but because he had failed to make good. His pride suffered more than his pocket. Later, however, he wrote some more “Stella Edwards” stories for Harte & Perkins and they were highly praised; but that type of fiction was not his forte.

The year 1894 closed with Harte & Perkins giving Edwards a chance at a new five-cent weekly they were starting. It was merely a shift from The Weekly Guest back to the libraries again.

His work for Harte & Perkins, during the year, showed as follows:

10 Ten Cent Libraries at $100 each        $ 1,000.
Two "Stella Edwards" stories at $300 each     600.
"The Brave and Fair"                          500.
"The Man from Montana"                        450.
 2  Five-Cent Libraries at $50 each           100.
 1  Juvenile serial                           100.
                                            ______
    Total                                 $ 2,750.

The work tabulated above approximates 850,000 words, and takes no account of work sold to other publishers. By industry alone Edwards had secured a fair income.

W. Bert Foster, a friend of Edwards’, who for twenty-five years has kept a story-mill of his own busily grinding with splendid success, has this to say about a slip he once made in his early years:

“When I was a young writer I sold a story to a juvenile paper. It was published. And not until the boys began to write in about it did either the editor or I discover that I had my hero dying of thirst on a raft in Lake Michigan!”