Thus you will see that my theory is that the young should write young. We all know the pleasure we derive from the fresh, natural, unaffected conversation of an unspoilt girl. Well, then, I want you to write as you talk, and remember this does not mean that you are to have no ambition; on the contrary, aim at the topmost point, or you will never rise. Neither do I mean the slipshod scribbling of ungrammatical nonsense which would offend the eye as much as it would the ear; but, starting with the supposition that you have well thought out your plot, have conceived your characters, and some of the situations in which they are to be placed, my advice is that you endeavour to give a graphic relation of your story in words to a friend, so that you may hear how the arrangement of the incidents and events stand, and bear in mind while doing this that it is not done so much for your friend’s criticism as it is for your own. And while dealing with this part of the subject, let me say in parenthesis that I know of few exercises more useful to the would-be novel-writer than the telling of stories. Many writers of romance have been distinguished in the nursery and in the schoolroom as delightful story-tellers, and most of us can recall some dear long-lost magician who kept us spell-bound with romances for which we had petitioned. “Make it up as you go.” We need not tax your imagination to this extent, it will answer every purpose if you repeat a story that you have read, and you may gauge your success by the interest which your hearers show. But to return to our embryo novel; suppose that from circumstances connected with your surroundings or your temperament you are not able to carry out this suggestion, then I would say, write out your plot as a short story, and so have clearly before you what you mean to tell. This done, try to divide it into chapters, and arrange your incidents and your dialogue; always bearing in mind the different dispositions and natures with which you invested your characters at starting, and endeavouring, as much as you possibly can, to let all they say and do push the story on to its climax.
The story completed
About the length of a novel it is best that you should not trouble. When you feel that you have told all you have to tell, the book should come to an end. New pens should know nothing of padding, which is distasteful to every good writer and reader. Later in your career the demands of a magazine or a circulating library may compel you to give a greater amount of copy than your story has strength to bear, but at starting you are not bound by any of these trammels, and, as a rule, young brains are very fertile and brimming over with incidents and plots, therefore you can afford to be generous. And now we may suppose that your story completed lies before you in manuscript, clearly and carefully written with the pains we bestow on a thing we value and feel is our very own. If you are a true author your creation will have become very dear to you, and in launching it into the world you will suffer a hundred hopes and fears, and, perhaps, disappointments. Your friends may have judged your efforts with their hearts rather than their heads. Few beginners are good critics of their own work, and true talent and modesty generally go hand in hand. The clouds of distrust are certain to cast their shadows over you, but if you have the assurance that you have spared no pains, that you have given your best, do not fear that they will overwhelm you; there is a moral satisfaction in having done good work which no one can rob us of. A dozen other reasons than want of merit lead to a MS. being rejected. Have patience and courage, and some day, when perhaps it is least expected, the success I heartily wish for all earnest young authors will most surely come to you.
THE NOVEL OF MANNERS
L. B. Walford
The fault of the age
Hurry and scamper, the result of a feverish desire to reap the fruits of every undertaking before the seed is well-nigh sown, is one of the characteristics of the times in which we live. Few can endure to bestow upon their work a moment more of time, or a hair’s-breadth more of pains than will carry it through to the goal on which their ambition—often a very poor and low one—is set; while, as for the greater proportion of our present day aspirants to fame, if they ever pause to reflect upon the infinitude of loving care and anxiety lavished upon the products of bygone days, it is with a sensation of contempt and a pluming of themselves upon their superior smartness and activity.
A mischievous mistake
Now there is of course a great deal to be said in favour of energetic composition, and it cannot be denied that many of the best things ever done, or written, or painted, have been flashed off, as it were, red-hot from the brain. We cannot believe, for instance, that Mr. Rudyard Kipling is ever long over his burning sketches of human life, wherein every word tells; and we know that Lord Byron penned canto after canto of Childe Harold with scarce a correction or a hesitation; but it is a mistake so mischievous for beginners in the fields of literature to fall into (and it is, moreover, one that so many do fall into), that of imagining that they too can dash down straightway their own crude thoughts—even when the thoughts themselves are good and original—and send them to the press, all unrevised and un-thought-out, that I am going to begin this brief paper addressed to young readers and would-be writers by the single word “Hold!” Pause. Consider what you want to do, and whether you have indeed strength and patience to do it.
An author’s experience