THE POWER OF THE PEN
The dignity of Literature is, or used to be, something more than a mere phrase. Days there were in the long-ago, when the thinkers and writers of a nation were held to be worthy of higher honour than trade-kings and stock-jobbers,—when each one that shone out was “a bright particular star” of genius, as frankly owned as an object of admiration in the literary firmament. At that time there was no “syndicated” press. The followers and disciples of Literature were not all herded together, as it were, in a kind of scribbling trades-union. The poet, the novelist, the essayist,—each one of these moved in his or her own appointed orbit, and their differing special ways of handling the topics of their time served to interest, charm and stimulate the intelligences of people who were cultured and appreciative enough to understand and honour their efforts. But now things are greatly changed. What has been generally understood as “cultured” society is rapidly deteriorating into baseness and voluntary ignorance. The profession of letters is so little understood, and so far from being seriously appreciated, that responsible editors will accept and publish magazine articles by women of “title” and “fashion,” who prove themselves as ignorant of grammar as they are of spelling. The printer’s reader corrects the spelling, but the grammar is generally left as its “aristocratic” writer penned it, in majestic incompleteness. The newspapers are full, not of thoughtful, honestly expressed public opinion on the affairs of the nation, but of vapid “personalities,” interesting to none save gossips and busy-bodies. A lamentable lack of strength is apparent in the whole “tone” of modern Literature, together with a still more lamentable lack of wit. All topics, say the pessimists, are exhausted. The quarrels of politicians have exhausted earth,—the recriminations of the Churches have exhausted Heaven,—and the bold immoralities of society have, almost, if not quite, exhausted Hell. Yet the topic which holds in itself a great many of the pleasures of earth and heaven—with perhaps a touch of the other nameless place also, is still the Power of the Pen. It remains, even in these days, the greatest power for good or evil in the world. With the little instrument which rests so lightly in the hand, whole nations can be moved. It is nothing to look at; generally speaking it is a mere bit of wood with a nib at the end of it—but when it is poised between thumb and finger, it becomes a living thing—it moves with the pulsations of the loving heart and thinking brain, and writes down, almost unconsciously, the thoughts that live—the words that burn.
To the power of the Pen we owe our laws, our government, our civilization, our very religion. For without it we should have no Bible—no New Testament. Our histories, our classics, our philosophies, our poetry, would all be lost with their originators. We should not know that Julius Cæsar ever walked on the shores of Britain, or that Nero fiddled while Rome was burning. In fact we should still be in the dark ages, without so much as a dream of the magnificent era of progress through which we have come, and in which we, of this present generation, have our glorious share. And so I think and venture to say that the power of the Pen is one which commands more millions of human beings than any monarch’s rule, and that the profession of the pen, called Literature, is the greatest, the highest, and the noblest that is open to aspiring ambition. Empires, thrones, commerce, war, politics, society—these things last but their brief hour—the Power of the Pen takes note of them as they pass—but outlives them all!
We should know nothing to-day of the grandeurs of old Egypt, or the histories of her forgotten kings, if it were not for the Rosetta stone—on which the engraver’s instrument, serving as a pen, wrote the Egyptian hieroglyphics beside the Greek characters, thus giving us the clue to the buried secrets of a long past great civilization. The classic land of Greece, once foremost in all things which make nations great, particularly in the valour and victorious deeds of her military heroes, has almost forgotten her ancient glory—she might perhaps be forgotten by other nations altogether in the constant springing up of new countries and peoples if it were not for Homer! The blind, despised old man, who sang her golden days of pride and conquest, still keeps her memory green. And let us not forget that other glorious poet, who laid his laurel-wreath and life upon her shrine—our own immortal Byron—whose splendid lyric, “The Isles of Greece” may stand beside the finest lines of Homer, and not be shamed.
What does all Italy, and particularly Florence, make chief boast of to-day? Not commerce, not wealth—simply Dante! In his lifetime he was made a subject for hatred and derision—he was scorned, cast out, and exiled by his fellow-townsfolk—yet now he is the great glory of his native city which claims respect from all the world for having been the birthplace of so supreme a soul. So, even after death, the Power of the Pen takes its revenge, and ensures its just recognition.
Yet there are many workers in Literature who say that the Power of the Pen gives them no joy at all,—that it is a “grind,”—that it is full of disappointment and bitterness, and that they never get paid enough for what they do. This last is always a very sore point with them. They brood on it, and consider it so often, that by and by the question of how much or how little payment they get, becomes the only way in which they regard their profession. It is the wrong way. It is the way that leads straight to biliousness and chronic dyspepsia. It is not my way. To me, what little power of the pen I possess, is a magic talisman which I would not exchange for millions of money. It makes life beautiful for me—it intensifies and transfigures all events and incidents—it shows me a whole history in the face of a child—a whole volume of poetry and philosophy in the cup of a flower. It enables me to see the loveliness of nature with keener and more appreciative gratitude—and it fills me with an inward happiness which no outward circumstance can destroy.
Of course just payment is to be demanded and expected for every kind of work. The rule of “give and take” holds good in all classes of employment. Each author’s power of the pen commands its price according to the value set upon it by the public. But I, personally, have refused many considerable sums of money offered to me if I would consent to “work up” or “bring forward” certain schemes and subjects with which I have no sympathy. The largest cheque would never tempt me to write against my own inclination. If I were given such a choice as this—to write something entirely opposed to my own feeling and conscience for a thousand pounds, or to write my honest thought for nothing, I would write my honest thought, and let the thousand pounds go. I am glad to say that some of my contemporaries are with me in this particular form of literary faith—but not as many as, for the honour of our calling, I could desire.
Then again, there is that vexed question of—the Public! I have often noticed, with a humility too deep for words, that all the great modern writers, or, I should say, all those who consider themselves the greatest, have a lofty contempt for the public. “‘He,’ or ‘she’ writes for the Public,” is a remark which, when spoken with a withering sneer, is supposed to have the effect of completely crushing the ambitious scribbler whose Power of the Pen has attracted some little attention. Now if authors are not to write for the Public, who are they to write for? Certain of the “superior” folk among them will say that they write “for posterity.” But then, Posterity is also the Public! I really do not see how either the great or the small author is to get away from the Public anyhow! There is only one means of escape, and that is—not to write at all. But if those to whom the Power of the Pen is given, wish to claim and use their highest privileges, they will work always for the public, and try to win their laurels from the public alone. Not by the voice of any “clique,” “club,” or “set” will Time accept the final verdict of an author’s greatness, but by the love and honour of an entire people. Because, whatever passing surface fancies may for awhile affect the public humour, the central soul of a nation always strives for Right, for Justice, and for final Good, and the author whose Power of the Pen helps strongly, boldly, and faithfully on towards these great ends, is not, and shall not be, easily forgotten.
I hope and I believe, that it is only a few shallow, ignorant and unsuccessful persons—fancying perhaps that they have the Power of the Pen when they have it not—who, in their disappointment, take a sort of doleful comfort in “posing” as unrecognized geniuses, whose quality of thought is too fine,—they would say too “subtle”—for the public taste. For, in my humble opinion, nothing is too good for the Public. They deserve the very best they can get. No “scamp” work should ever be offered to them. If a poet sings, let him sing his sweetest for them; if a painter paints pictures, let him give them his finest skill; if an author writes stories, essays or romances, let him do his very utmost to charm, to instruct, to awaken their thought and excite their interest. It is not a wise thing to start writing for “posterity.” Because, if the present Public will have nothing to do with you, it is ten to one whether the future will. All our great authors have worked for the public of their own immediate time, without any egotistical calculations as to their possible wider appreciation after death.
The greatest poet in the world, William Shakespeare, was, from all we can gather, an unaffected, cheery, straightforward Warwickshire man, who wrote plays to please the Public who went to the Globe Theatre. He did not say he was too good for the Public; he worked for the Public. He attached so little importance to his own genius, that he made no mention of his work in his will. So we may fairly judge that he never dreamed of the future splendour of his fame—when, three hundred years after his death, every civilized country in the world would have societies founded in his name; when, year after year, new discussions would be opened up concerning his Plays, new actors would be busy working hard to represent his characters, and, strangest compliment of all, when envious persons would turn up to say his work was not his own! For when genius is so varying and brilliant that a certain section of the narrow-minded cannot understand its many-sided points of view, and will not believe that it is the inheritance of one human brain, then it is great indeed! Three hundred years hence there will, no doubt, be other people to announce to the world that Walter Scott did not write, and could not have written, the Waverley Novels. For they are—in their own special way—as great as the plays of Shakespeare. He, too, was one of those who wrote for the Public. With his magic wand he touched the wild mountains, lakes and glens of his native land, and transfigured them with the light of romance and beauty for ever. Can we imagine Scotland without Walter Scott and Robert Burns? No! Their power of the pen rules the whole country, and gives it over the heads of monarchs a free fairy kingdom to all classes and peoples who have the wish and will to possess it. There are certain superior people nowadays who declare that Walter Scott is “old-fashioned,” and that they, for their parts, cannot read his novels. Well, I grant that Walter Scott is old-fashioned—as old-fashioned as the sunshine—and just as wholesome. He lived in a time when men still reverenced women, and when women gave men cause for reverence. I think if he could be among us now, and see the change that has come over society since his day, he would scarcely have the heart to write at all. The idolatry of wealth—the servile worship of the newest millionaire—would hardly inspire his pen, save perhaps to sorrow and indignation. But if he were with us and did write for us, I am sure he would employ some of his great power to protest against the lack of fine feeling, gentleness, forbearance and courtesy which unfortunately marks much of our latter-day society. I think he would have something to say about the school-girl who smokes,—I fancy his mind might revolt against the skirt-dancing peeress! I think he would implore women not to part with their chief charm—womanliness—and I am sure he would be very sorry to see children of ten and eleven so deplorably “advanced” as to be unable to appreciate a fairy tale.
And what of dear Charles Dickens—he, whom certain superfine persons who read Yellow Journalism presume to call “vulgar”? Is love, is pity, is tenderness, is faith “vulgar”? Is kindness to the poor, patience with the suffering, tolerance for all men and all creeds “vulgar”? If so, then Charles Dickens was vulgar!—not a doubt of it! Few authors have ever been so blessedly, gloriously “vulgar” as he! What marvellous pictures his “power of the pen” conjures up at once before our eyes!—pathetic, playful, humourous, thrilling—rising to grandeur in such scenes as the shipwreck in David Copperfield; or that wonderful piece of description in the Tale of Two Cities, when the tramping feet of the Spirit of the French Revolution sweep past in the silence of the night! Match us such a passage in any literature past or present! It is unique in its own way—as unique as all great work must be. There is nothing quite like it, and never will be anything quite like it. And when we “go” with such great authors as these—and by this I mean, when we are determined to be one with them—we shall win such victories over our hearts and minds, our passions and desires, as shall make us better and stronger men and women.
And this brings me to a point which I have often earnestly considered. One cannot help noticing that the present system of education is fast doing away with two great ingredients for the thorough enjoyment of life, and especially the enjoyment of Literature—Imagination and Appreciation. On the school-boy or school-girl who is “coached” or “crammed,” the gates of fairyland and romance are shut with a bang. I had once the pleasure of entertaining at my house a small gentleman of eleven, fresh from his London College—he was indifferent to, or weary of life; things generally, were a “bore,” and he expressed his opinion of fairy tales in one brief word, “Rot!” Now altogether apart from that most revolting expression, which is becoming of frequent use, especially in the “upper circles,” it seemed to me a real misfortune to consider, that for this child, Hans Andersen was a sealed book, and the wonders and beauties of the Arabian Nights a lost world. And in the same way I pity the older children—the grown men and women, who cannot give themselves up to the charm or terror of a book completely and ungrudgingly—who approach their authors with a carping hesitation and a doubtful preparatory sneer. By so doing they shut against themselves the gate of a whole garden of delights. Imagination is the supreme endowment of the poet and romancist. It is a kind of second sight, which conveys the owner of it to places he has never seen, and surrounds him with strange circumstances of which he is merely the spiritual eyewitness. One of the most foolish notions prevalent nowadays is that an author must personally go and visit the place he intends to describe. Nothing is more fatal. For accuracy of detail, we can consult a guide book—but for a complete picture which shall impress us all our lives long, we must go to the inspired author whose prescience or second-sight enables him to be something more than a mere Baedeker. Endless examples of this second-sight faculty could be given. Take Shakespeare as the best of them. He could never have personally known Antony and Cleopatra. He did not live in the time of Julius Cæsar. He was not guilty of murder because he described a murder in Macbeth. He could not have been a “fellow-student” of Hamlet’s. And where do you suppose, among the grim realities of life, he could have met those exquisite creations, Ariel and Puck, if not in the heaven of his own peerless imagination, borne to him on the brilliant wings of his own thought, to take shape and form, and stay with us in our English language for ever! Walter Scott had never seen Switzerland when he wrote Anne of Geierstein. Thomas Moore never visited the East, yet he wrote Lalla Rookh. Charles Dickens never fought a duel, and never saw one fought, yet the duel between Mr. Chester and Haredale in Barnaby Rudge is one of the finest scenes ever written. Because an author is able to describe a certain circumstance, it does not follow that he or she has experienced that very circumstance personally. Very often it may be quite the contrary. The most romantic descriptions in novels have often been written by people leading very hum-drum, quiet lives of their own. We have only to think of Jane Eyre, and to remember the prosy, dull days passed by its author, Charlotte Brontë.
To refer once more to Hans Andersen—we all know that he never could have seen a Dresden China shepherdess eloping up the chimney with a Dresden China sweep. We know he never saw that dainty little shepherdess weeping on the top of a chimney because the world was so large, and because all her gilding was coming off. But when we are reading that fantastic little story, we feel he must have seen it somehow, and we are conscious of a slight vexation that we never see such a curious and delightful elopement ourselves. This is a phase of the power of the pen—to make the beautiful, the quaint, the terrible, or the wonderful things of imagination seem an absolute reality.
But to get all the enjoyment out of an author’s imagination, we, who read his books, must ourselves “imagine” with him. We must let him take us where he will; we must not draw back and refuse to go with him. We must not approach him in a carping spirit, or make up our minds before opening his book, that we shall not like it. We should not allow our particular views of life, or our pet prejudices to intervene between ourselves and the writer whose power of the pen may teach us something new. And above all things, we should prepare ourselves to appreciate—not to depreciate. Nothing is easier than to find fault. The cheapest sort of mind can do that. The dirty little street-boy can enter the British Museum and find fault with the Pallas Athene. But the Pallas Athene remains the same. To be Pallas Athene is sufficient. The power of appreciation is a great test of character. To appreciate warmly, even enthusiastically, is generally the proof of a kind and sunny disposition; to depreciate is to be in yourself but a sad soul at best! For depreciation in one thing leads to depreciation in another; and by and by the daily depreciator finds himself depreciating his Maker, and wondering why he was ever born! And he will never find an answer to that question till he changes his humour and begins to appreciate; then, and only then, will life explain its brightest meaning.
Of course, when vulgarity, coarseness, slang, and ribaldry are set forward as “attractions” in certain books and newspapers, it is necessary to depreciate what is not the power of the pen, but the abuse of the pen. Such abuse is easily recognizable. The libellous paragraph, the personal sneer, the society scandal—there is no need to enumerate them. But we do not call the writers of these things authors, or even journalists. They are merely on a par with the anonymous letter-writer whom all classes of society agree in regarding as the most contemptible creature alive. And they do not come at all under the heading of the power of the pen, their only strength being weakness.
I have already said that I believe the Power of the Pen to be the greatest power for good or evil in the world. And I may add that this power is never more apparent than in the Press. The Press nowadays is not a literary press; classic diction and brilliancy of style do not distinguish it by any means. It would be difficult to find a single newspaper or magazine to which we could turn for a lesson in pure and elegant English, such as that of Addison, Steele or Macaulay. But in the Scott or Byron days, the Press was literary to a very great extent, and as a natural consequence it had a powerful influence on the success or failure of an author’s work. That influence is past. Its work to-day deals, not with books, but with nations.
National education, progressing steadily for years, has taught the Public to make up its own mind more quickly than ever it did before, as regards the books it reads. It will take what it wants and leave the rest; and the Press can neither persuade it nor repel it against its own inclination. So that the author in these days has more difficulties and responsibilities than in the past. He has to fight his battle alone. He has many more rivals to compete with, and many more readers to please. And the Press cannot help him. The Press may recommend, may even “boom” his work; but several instances have occurred lately where such recommendation has not been accepted. For, sometimes the Public fight shy of a “boom.” They think it has been worked up by the author’s friends, and they are not always mistaken. And they silently express the fact that they are quite capable of choosing the books they wish to read, without advice or assistance. This being the case, the Press is beginning to leave books and authors alone to shift for themselves as best they may, and is turning to other pastime. Nations, peoples, governments! These are the great footballs it occasionally kicks in the struggle for journalistic pre-eminence. And I hope I shall not be misunderstood if I venture to say that it is a somewhat dangerous game! Because, however powerful the Press may be, it is not the People. It is the printed opinion of certain editors and their staff. The People are outside it altogether. And if some one on the Press insults a monarch or a nation, that insult should not be taken as a People’s insult. It is the insult of the editor or proprietor who deliberately allows it to be printed in the particular journal he controls.
It is a thousand pities, for example, that a section of the lower boulevard press in Paris should be accepted in any quarter, as being representative of the feeling of the whole French people. When flippant and irresponsible newspaper scribes resort to calumny for the sake of notoriety, they prove themselves unworthy to be trusted with the Power of the Pen. In any case it can only be a God-forsaken creature who seeks to earn his living by scurrility. Such an one may excite individual contempt, but does not merit the notice of a great nation.
As an author and as a lover of literature, I care very much for the honour and dignity of the British Press, and I cannot but earnestly deprecate the too free exchange of petty or malicious innuendo between foreign and English writers on their various respective journals. Bismarck used to say, “The windows which our Press breaks we shall have to pay for.” The power of the pen is abused when such windows are broken as can only be mended by the sufferings of nations. If France or Germany sneers at us, or misreads our intentions, I do not see that we are called upon to sneer at them in return. That is mere schoolboy conduct. Our dignity should shame their flippancy. The Press of such an empire as Great Britain can afford to be magnanimous and dignified. It is too big and strong a boy to throw stones at its little brothers.
On such a subject as the Power of the Pen, one might speak endless discourses, and write endless volumes, for it is practically inexhaustible. It is a power for good and evil—as I have said—but the author wrongs his vocation if he does not always, most steadfastly and honestly, use it for Good. The Power of the Pen should define Right from Wrong with absolute certainty,—it should not so mix the two together that the reader cannot tell one from the other. In what is called the “problem” novel or the “problem” play, the authors manage so to befuddle the brains of their readers, that they hardly know whether virtue is vice or vice virtue. This is putting the power of the pen to unfair and harmful uses. And when a writer—any writer—employs his or her power to promote the spirit of Atheism and Materialism, the pen is turned into a merely murderous tool of the utmost iniquity. And whosoever uses it in this sense will have to answer at a Higher Tribunal for much mischief and cruelty wrought in the world.
Many people are familiar with Shakespeare’s town, Stratford-on-Avon, quaint and peaceful and beautiful in itself, and in all its surroundings. Outside it, many roads lead to many lovely glimpses of landscape; but there is one road in particular which winds uphill, and from which, at certain times, the town itself is lost sight of, and only the tapering spire of Holy Trinity Church—Shakespeare’s Church—can be seen. Frequently at sunset, when the rosy hue of the low clouds mingles with the silvery mist of the river Avon, all the houses, bridges and streets are veiled in an opaque glow of colour—and look like “mirage,” or a picture in a dream. And then, the spire of Shakespeare’s Church, seen by itself, rising clear up from the surrounding haze, puts on the distinct appearance of a Pen,—pointing upwards, as though prepared to write upon the sky!
Often and often have I seen it so, and others have seen it with me, glittering against clouds, or lit up by a flashing sunbeam. I have always thought it a true symbol of what the Power of the Pen should be—to point upwards. To point to the highest aims of life, the best, the greatest things; to rise clear out of the darkness and point straight to the sunshine! For, if so uplifted, the Power of the Pen becomes truly invincible. It can do almost anything. It can shame the knave—it can abash the fool. It can lower the proud,—it can raise the humble. It can assist the march of Science,—it can crush opposition. Armed with truth and justice, its authority is greater than that of governments,—for it can upset governments. It would seem impossible to dethrone an unworthy king; but it has been done—by the Power of the Pen! It is difficult to put down the arrogance of a county snob,—but it can be done!—by the Power of the Pen! It may seem a terrible task to root up lies, to destroy hypocrisies, shams, false things of every kind, and make havoc among rogues, sensualists, and scoundrels of both high and low degree,—but it can be done, by the Power of the Pen! And to those who are given this power in its truest sense, is also added the gift of prophecy—the quick prescience of things To Be—the spiritual hearing which catches the first sound of the approaching time. And beyond the things of time this spiritual sense projects itself, and hears, and almost sees, all that shall be found most glorious after death!
With the Power of the Pen we can uphold all noble things; we can denounce all vile things. May all who have that power so deal with it—and point us on—and upward! For as our great poet, Tennyson, says:—
What is true at last will tell;
Few at first will place thee well;
Some too low would have thee shine,
Some too high—no fault of thine!
Hold thine own and work thy will!