I immediately wrote and thanked the Chief Commissioner for his courtesy. I then wrote letters to the principal novelists of the day, asking their advice, for I could not myself sit in judgment upon one of Europe's greatest writers. In the meantime I have withdrawn the book from circulation.
It is only fair that I should put the trade in the possession of all the facts of the case. I took the book in good faith. I had seen that it was for months the best-selling book in America, the most puritanical of all countries. I should just as soon have thought of changing the text of Shakespeare, Ibsen, George Meredith, Mr. Hardy, Mr. Maurice Hewlett, and Mr. George Moore. I must give the trade the option of returning the book.
John Lane.
7, Chilworth Street,
Paddington, W.
December 14th, 1910.
Dear Mr. Lane,
The book is very outspoken and occasionally nasty, but I shouldn't call it obscene, and the reputation of the author is your justification for publishing it. Personally, I think the first half brilliant and the last half tedious and unpleasant. A great many authors not nearly so famous as Sudermann could write a somewhat bald catalogue or series of risqué episodes. It is a book, in my opinion, for the student of literature and the mature, certainly not for the young person; but the student, I take it, would be able to read it in the original.
I am,
Yours sincerely,