Not all of the features of this picture, however, should be painted in rose-colors. A disconcerting and persistent rumor has it that what once was a by-product of fiction—the sale of "movie rights"—is now threatening to run off with the entire production. The side show, we are warned, is shaping the policy of the main tent. Which is to say that novelists and magazine fiction writers are accused of becoming more concerned about how their stories will film than about how the manuscripts will grade as pieces of literature. To get a yarn into print is still worth while because this enhances its value in the eyes of the producers of motion pictures. But the author's real goal is "no longer good writing, so much as remunerative picture possibilities."
We set this down not because we believe it true of the majority of our brother craftsmen, but because evidences of such influences are undeniably present, and do not appear to have done the art of writing fiction any appreciable benefit. If your trade is non-fiction, and you turn to fiction to improve your art rather than your bank account, good counsel will admonish you not to aim at any other mark than the best that you can produce in the way of literary art. For there lies the deepest satisfaction a writer can ever secure—"art makes living worth his while."
CHAPTER X
FOREVER AT THE CROSSROADS
Keep studying. Keep experimenting. Set yourself harder tasks. Never be content with what you have accomplished. Match yourself against the men who can outplay you, not against the men you already excel. Keep attempting something that baffles you. Discontent is your friend more often than your enemy.
From the moment that he is graduated out of the cub reporter class, every writer who is worth his salt is forever at the crossroads, perplexed about the next turn. Nowhere is smugness of mind more deadly than in journalism. To progress you must forever scale more difficult ascents. The bruises of rebuffs and the wounds of injured vanity will heal quickly enough if you keep busy. Defeated or undefeated, the writer who always is trying to master something more difficult than the work he used to do preserves his self-respect and the respect of his worth-while neighbors. The fellow with the canker at his heart is not the battler but the envious shirker who is too "proud" to risk a fall.
Swallow what you suppose to be your pride; it really is a false sense of dignity. Make a simple beginning in the university of experience by learning with experiments what constitutes a "story" and by drudging with pencil and typewriter to put that "story" into professional manuscript form. Get the right pictures for it; then ship it off to market. If the first choice of markets rejects you, try the second, the third, fourth, fifth and sixth—even unto the ninety-and-ninth.
Few beginners have even a dim notion of the great variety of markets that exist for free lance contributions. There are countless trade publications, newspaper syndicates, class journals, "house organs," and magazines devoted to highly specialized interests. Nearly all of these publications are eager to buy matter of interest to their particular circles of readers. Every business, every profession, every trade, every hobby has its mouthpiece.