“A novelist of romance and adventure can never become a successful historian.”
Jim spoke those words, but it doubtless did not occur to him at the time that he was probably the greatest of all romantic historians on the Dominion of Canada. Through his novels of romance and history he painted a picture of the Canadian Northlands not only as they used to be years ago but as they really are today.
James Oliver Curwood was both a novelist and a historian even if he did not believe himself to be a recorder of both ancient and modern history. It was said of “The Ancient Highway” that this story of modern Quebec takes you down the old world highway of romance, while woodland beauty brings nature near in that communion which Curwood lovers find a healing and tonic force. “The Ancient Highway” is truly a fine piece of historical work and deserved the praise which it received.
It was about this time that Lewis Galantiere reported that James Oliver Curwood was by all odds the most popular of American writers among the French people. Where it once had been Jack London and Upton Sinclair it now was Curwood. Edith Wharton had attempted to establish herself as our literary ambassadress to France, but she had failed.
In England, Germany, Denmark, Norway and numerous other countries, Jim Curwood had built for himself a great reputation and his fame among the various peoples of the world was definitely assured.
CHAPTER TEN
TRAIL’S END
Unlike most authors of Jim Curwood’s day, thousands of people annually came to visit him and to see the fair city of Owosso, they came to meet him from all parts of the country, and to ask him countless, rather foolish questions. Being the well-bred, cultured man that he was, Jim complied by answering each question and replying to each letter written to him, to the very best of his ability.
During the morning hours, no one was allowed to see him or to interrupt his writing schedule in the slightest manner. For he had his daily writing stint of five hundred words to write and it must all be thoroughly checked. Jim never wrote more than five hundred words a day, for he felt that writing beyond that limit would tend to make his work slighty. In the afternoon, however, his duties were more numerous. The first part of the afternoon was devoted to the dictating of letters and to all general business that might be at hand. Then and only then would those people who wished to see him and ask him questions be admitted to his private study.
One of Jim’s greatest enjoyments was in the many letters he received daily from small children; letters that asked about only those things which small children could possibly want to know. He loved every one of those scrawled letters, for it not only showed him that people were reading his books, but that even small children loved his stories of his beloved northland.