Copyright, 1919
By SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)
PREFACE
In this foreword, I wish first of all to thank Captain Achmed Abdullah, Gertrude Atherton, Edwina Stanton Babcock, Barry Benefield, Thomas Beer, Katharine Holland Brown, Maxwell Struthers Burt, Francis Buzzell, Donn Byrne of Oriel, Charles Caldwell Dobie, Theodore Dreiser, George Gilbert, Susan Glaspell, Armistead C. Gordon, Fannie Hurst, Arthur Johnson, Fanny Kemble Johnson, Burton Kline, Mary Lerner, Sinclair Lewis, Jeannette Marks, Walter J. Muilenburg, Seumas O’Brien, Vincent O’Sullivan, Albert DuVerney Pentz, Lawrence Perry, Mary Brecht Pulver, Harrison Rhodes, Benjamin Rosenblatt, Fleta Campbell Springer, and Julian Street. Each of these authors very kindly gave data which no one could have gleaned; and in so doing they have contributed largely to the usefulness of this study.[1]
[1] I must add to this list a former student, Pearl Doles Bell, who interviewed Mrs. Irvin Cobb and who read her notes to my summer class of 1916. (The interview was published, subsequently, in The [New York] Sun, October 1, 1916.) My assistant, Miss Shirley V. Long, collaborated in the analysis of Miss Hurst’s “Get Ready the Wreaths.”
Only the other day a student demanded, “Why can’t I get an author to tell me every step in the development of one of his stories?” Although, as I tried to point out, such a thorough proceeding is neither desirable nor easily possible,[2] yet the essentially valuable part of the author’s progress may be most illuminative, and it is obtainable. As one of these writers has said, the artist is not analytical beforehand and is not so, of necessity, after completing his work. But even from those who progress only, as they assert, by inspiration come clear and helpful statements concerning their starting points and developing processes. This generosity of successful writers augurs well for the future of fiction.
[2] Poe seems to be the sole writer who has asserted that he could call to mind the progressive steps of any of his compositions.
Charles Caldwell Dobie has said:[3] “Any man who has made a success of his business or profession always seems to consider it his duty to warn others off the field. The advice of both failure and success appears to be embodied in one and the same word, ‘Don’t!’ This is a curious paradox, and I shall not attempt to explain it. Perhaps it is because the roads to success or to failure are hard to distinguish, the sign-posts at the parting of the ways almost undecipherable. Yes, I think it must be this realization of the nearness of defeat that makes the successful one so anxious to dissuade others from the struggle. And yet, after all, there is a bit of egotism back of the kindly advice we offer, rather patronizingly, to our friends.
[3] The Silhouette, February, 1917.