The Mentor: American Novelists, Vol. 1, No. 25

“A Wise and Faithful Guide and Friend”
AMERICAN NOVELISTS
By HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE
This group of distinguished novelists may be divided into four smaller groups, not only in time, but in selection and treatment of subjects. Mr. James and Mr. Howells are now the senior members of the literary fraternity in this country, and have not only American but European reputations. Only three novelists before them attained this distinction. The earliest of these, Cooper, is still read in many parts of the world, and in little German villages boys call themselves “Cooper Indians,” and play at oldtime savage warfare. The author of the “Leatherstocking Tales” wrote the first original American novel, and Hawthorne wrote the first American romance. The first described the manners and customs of a people whom he knew at first hand, but whom Europe knew only by hearsay; the second analyzed the motives and described the workings of the Puritan spirit, and showed how the consciousness of sin worked itself out in the Puritan character. The theme was new, and the manner of treating it was both effective and beautiful—and Hawthorne remains the most artistic writer this country has produced.

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE
The next novelist to whom Europe paid attention was Mrs. Stowe. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” was like a great torch held up over a fiercely disputed field; it showed men and women living under all conditions of slavery, paternal and humane on one hand, and commercial and cruel on the other. It made a drama of a political issue, and was read with bated breath by a million people. It interested Europe because it was a powerful story dealing with a situation that had attracted the attention of the whole Western world; it was at once translated into several languages, and could be found from London to Constantinople.
HOME OF HARRIET BEECHER STOWE. HARTFORD, CONN.
When Mr. James began writing a generation ago there had been no American fiction of a high order for twenty years or more, and the country had grown rapidly in experience and knowledge. Mr. James showed this more cosmopolitan attitude toward the world, and his style had a quality which was new in our fiction. It was clear in those days; it had great flexibility and capacity for conveying fine distinctions and delicate shadings of thought; it had a tone of maturity which was lacking in the earlier writers, and it was the medium of expression of a thoroughly trained man to whom writing was a fine art. The early short stories, of which “The Passionate Pilgrim” may serve as an example, arrested attention by reason of their insight into character and their fine workmanship. There was an air of romance about them; but it was the romance of human temperament, not of incident. The early novels were not popular in the sense of running into large editions; but “The American” found many readers who were quick to appreciate its penetrating and searching analysis of character, its sharp contrasts of American and European traits, and the refinement of a style which is both rich and restrained.