Yes. I think all writers consider them as tools. They have to be considered in every story, as it is being written. There is the general style of the story to be considered, and following that, each situation. I think, "Now how can I get this effect or that; how can I make this fellow behave like a real man?" In fact, my stories so far have been a series of experiments. I nearly always try something new in each story, something I haven't tried before. Something that I hope will make the story more real and readable. Quite often the result is a rotten failure; but sometimes it isn't.
Julian Street: It depends on the author's ability to transmit the pictures he wishes me to see. I am always ready to do my share. My mouth does not literally water, except possibly over exceptionally fine descriptions of fine food and drink—which are rare. I do not think, however, that I get physical pain. My reactions are intellectual and emotional. Tarkington, for instance, can make me happy or unhappy or worried about his characters. He presses the buttons—we do the rest. The work of inferior observers and inferior writers of course reaches me less and less. I am fastidious in these matters.
When writing a scene, I "see" things vividly in color. In reading less so, though to a considerable extent if the author has the picture-making power.
No, thank God, I don't have standard stock pictures of scenes and persons. I depend on the author to give me his pictures, and if he is any good, he can do it. If he can't give me pictures, I don't want to read him.
I resent not having sufficient images made for me. I also resent images made in a conventional trite way—written out of the author's reading rather than out of his observation. I want my author to be a keen observer and artful interpreter. I want him, as Tarkington says, to "flush me with colors."
Yes, my imagination is most vivid when I am writing stories. The characters I read, however real to me, are never quite so real as those I create. Because those I read are other people's children, whereas those I create are my own. I love my children more than I love those of others, even though the others may be in every way better products. It amuses me that this should be so and I am a little ashamed to confess it.
T. S. Stribling: As I said, I almost never read a story. They bore me to death. It seems to me there are few things in this world as stupid as fiction.
When I am writing I see everything I write about. I never try to remember anything; I am simply looking at the thing and it is no more effort to describe it than it would be to describe the typewriter under my fingers now. Pictures are always in color, and the details are blurred except at the point I am describing and that is just as clear-cut as if I were looking at the real thing, not at a picture.
Yes I studied solid geometry; mathematics never gave me any trouble at all.
No, I don't have stock pictures for anything or at least I am not conscious of it. If I say a village church I will then have to decide what sort of village church I want. However when I get clear out of my experience, say into the Eskimo, the word Eskimo simply calls up a little fur-covered man; however if I should start writing about them, this generalization would instantly dissolve into scores of individuals.