XLII—MR. BOK'S AMERICANIZATION
If ever you should feel important enough to write an autobiography to give to the world, and dislike to say all the nice things about yourself that you feel really ought to be said, just write it in the third person. Edward Bok has done this in "The Americanization of Edward Bok" and the effect is quite touching in its modesty.
In "An Explanation" at the beginning of the book Mr. Bok disclaims any credit for the winning ways and remarkable success of his hero, Edward Bok. Edward Bok, the little Dutch boy who landed in America in 1870 and later became the editor of the greatest women's advertising medium in the country, is an entirely different person from the Edward Bok who is telling the story. You understand this to begin with. Otherwise you may misjudge the author.
"I have again and again found myself," writes Mr. Bok, "watching with intense amusement and interest the Edward Bok of this book at work.... His tastes, his outlook, his manner of looking at [pg 217]things were totally at variance with my own.... He has had and has been a personality apart from my private self."
The only connection between Edward Bok the editor and Edward Bok the autobiographer seems to be that Editor Bok allows Author Bok to have a checking account in his bank under their common name.
Thus completely detached from his hero, Mr. Bok proceeds and is able to narrate on page 3, in the manner of Horatio Alger, how young Edward, taunted by his Brooklyn schoolmates, gave a sound thrashing to the ringleader, after which he found himself "looking into the eyes of a crowd of very respectful boys and giggling girls, who readily made a passageway for his brother and himself when they indicated a desire to leave the school-yard and go home."
He can also, without seeming in the least conceited, tell how, through his clear-sighted firmness in refusing to write in the Spencerian manner prescribed in school, he succeeded in bringing the Principal and the whole Board of Education to their senses, resulting in a complete reversal of the public-school policy in the matter of handwriting instruction.
The Horatio Alger note is dominant throughout the story of young Edward's boyhood. His cheerfulness [pg 218]and business sagacity so impressed everyone with whom he came in contact that he was soon outdistancing all the other boys in the process of self-advancement. And no one is more smilingly tolerant of the irresistible progress of young Edward Bok in making friends and money than Edward Bok the impersonal author of the book. He just loves to see the young boy get ahead.
It will perhaps aid in getting an idea of the personality and confident presence of the Boy Bok to state that he was a feverish collector of autographs. Whenever any famous personage came to town the young man would find out at what hotel he was staying and would proceed to hound him until he had got him to write his name, with some appropriate sentiment, in a little book. In advertising the present volume the publishers give a list of names of historical characters who feature in Mr. Bok's reminiscences—Gens. Grant and Garfield, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Longfellow, Emerson and dozens of others. And so they do figure in the book, but as victims of the young Dutch boy's passion for autographs. Still, perhaps, they did not mind, for the author gives us to understand that they were all so charmed with the prepossessing manner and intelligent bearing of the young autograph hound that they not only were continually [pg 219]asking him to dinner (he usually timed his visit so as to catch them just as they were entering the dining-room) but insisted on giving him letters of introduction to their friends.
Only Mrs. Abraham Lincoln and Ralph Waldo Emerson neglected to register extreme pleasure at being approached by the smiling lad. Both Mrs. Lincoln and Emerson were failing in their minds at the time, however, which satisfactorily explains their coolness, at least for the author. In Mrs. Lincoln's case an attempt was made to interest her in an autographed photograph of Gen. Grant. But "Edward saw that the widow of the great Lincoln did not mentally respond to his pleasure in his possession." Could it have been possible that the widow of the great Lincoln was a trifle bored?
The account of the intrusion on Emerson in Concord borders on the sacrilegious. Here was the venerable philosopher, five months before his death, when his great mind had already gone on before him, being visited by a strange lad with a passion for autographs, who sat and watched for those lucid moments when then sun would break through the clouded brain, making it possible for Emerson to hold the pen and form the letters of his name. Then young Edward was off, with another trophy in his belt and another stride made in his progress toward [pg 220]Americanization. Lovers of Emerson could wish that the impersonal editor of these memoirs had omitted the account of this victory.
Americanization seems, from the present document, to consist of, first, making as many influential friends as possible who may be able to help you at some future time; second, making as much money as possible (young Edward used his position as stenographer to Jay Gould to glean tips on the market, thereby cleaning up for himself and his Sunday-school teacher at Plymouth Church), and third, keeping your eye open for the main chance.
In conclusion, nothing more fitting could be quoted than the touching caption under the picture of the author's grandmother, "who counselled each of her children to make the world a better and more beautiful place to live in—a counsel which is now being carried on by her grandchildren, one of whom is Edward Bok."
Could detachment of author and hero be more complete?[pg 221]