Two years ago Mr. Edward Bellamy wrote his “Looking Backward.” It was a thoughtful, able story, touching many of the nearest interests of humanity, but it sold only a few thousand copies, and seemed making its way to the backs of booksellers’ shelves, when two or three essays upon the general subject recalled attention to it. The people of a single city—which, of course, was Boston—took it up first as a fad, and afterwards as a serious study, and now the book is in general demand and promises to renew and widely stimulate public discussion of a very old subject which must come to the surface once in a little while until perhaps it becomes a recognized principle of human conduct and existence.
These are merely two of many books of great value, or at least great interest, which have been saved from the general literary deluge by means which seem merely accidental. Of the many which have been lost perhaps irrevocably the public has no idea. Hawthorne himself, to whom allusion has already been made, was not read one-twentieth as much by the people of his own day as now. Carlyle, who probably is more read in America than in Europe, owes his popularity here and the great sale of his works to the personal efforts of his friend, Mr. Emerson, who insisted that the book should be published in this country, but who would not have succeeded had not his own publishers had reasons for wishing to oblige him personally.
These facts regarding literature are not peculiar to America. Many years ago an Englishman named Charles Wells wrote a dramatic poem which did not pass its first edition of a few hundred copies. About a quarter of a century later Swinburne chanced upon a copy of the book, and wrote a review of it, which set all lovers of dramatic poetry to looking for the poem itself, and now it is making its way through edition after edition. Only ten years ago Browning’s latest long poem, whatever it may have been, was refused successively by nearly all reputable American publishers, yet the Browning craze is now a matter of history.
The meaning of all this is that books come from the press far more rapidly than people can read them, but the ease of circulation of literature in the United States promises to change all that. There is now scarcely a town of two thousand people in the United States which has not its circulating library, and which has not also some people who are thoughtful, intelligent and influential. A book getting into such a library is sure, sooner or later, to find a large number of readers. The individual reader is the best advertisement that either author or publisher can ask for, and though the first edition may be very small, so small that the publisher hesitates to reprint, nevertheless in time a book of any value is sure to be brought properly to the attention of the public.
There is every reason, therefore, to believe that our native authors, and many people who can write and should write but have not yet felt encouraged to do so, will yet be stimulated to do their best work. A prominent publisher in New York was once asked—the question being suggested by a poor book which he had published on a very interesting subject—why he did not secure a better man to write it? “For the best reason in the world,” said he; “the men who could do justice to the subject are all making their living in some other way and have to pay close attention to their business. They can’t afford to write books.” This lack of financial encouragement is rapidly disappearing. The man who has anything to say in this country and knows how to say it properly can now afford to give time and thought to his subject, with the assurance that, when he is ready to write and to print, he will find readers.
It does not follow that everything written with earnestness and sincerity of purpose is worth attention. “Great minds think alike,” but not all great minds are properly educated, and we get an immense number of books, supposed by their authors to be original, whose contents are mere skeletons of what has been better expressed by some one else. The publisher often finds himself in the position of the patent office examiner. It is well known that at the patent office applications in large numbers are received every week for letters patent on supposed inventions which were made long ago by some one else, but of which the latest applicant was entirely ignorant. Men of thoughtful and inventive minds reproduce each other in every clime. There is not a savage tribe on the face of the earth which did not find out for itself the art of making cutting tools, building houses, constructing boats, cooking utensils and whatever else might be necessary to domestic life and its many necessities. The same holds in literature. Certain self-evident truths of philosophy or ethics, certain plots and situations in fiction, are common to all classes of people; and the consequence is that our literature is burdened with material of every kind, from the highest theology to the lowest sensation, which seems mere plagiarism on something which has preceded. Even Longfellow, who is nearer the American heart than any other of our poets, was persistently accused of plagiarism because he expressed thoughts and ideas which had been said as well, sometimes better, by older poets; yet Longfellow was supposed to be a man of wide reading.
But American facilities for reading and for learning all that has been said by the wiser minds and more brilliant wits of other times is bound to change all that, and probably within the lifetime of the present generation. Besides from the incidents, peculiarities and necessities of our own national life, our literature is now extending into all fields heretofore monopolized by the wiser minds of the old world. American essays, poems and novels are now frequently reprinted in Europe and translated into many languages. Many American novels may now be found in several of the older languages of Europe, and the popular author of the present day does not consider his work done until he has sent copies of his original manuscript to at least two European publishers. The French Revue des Deux Mondes, which is supposed to be the most fastidious of foreign publications in its selection of material, has given a great deal of space to American novelists and poets, and again and again English novelists have complained that some upstart American was crowding their books off of the railway station news-stands. Emerson’s essays, Longfellow’s poems, and Howell’s novels may be found in any bookstore in England, and it is not hard to find them on the continent. There are half a dozen different editions of Poe’s poems in the French language alone. American historical works not entirely on American topics may be found in several European languages, and are held in high esteem by foreign historians. One historical work published in the United States two or three years ago has already been translated into every language of Northern Europe. How many more there may be deponent knoweth not.
All this is cheering, not only to national pride, but because there are features in American literature which are superior to those of any older nation. This is noticeably true of our fiction, in which there are elements of cheerfulness, hope and humor, which are almost entirely lacking in the light literature, so-called, of other countries. When one speaks of a foreign novel from any press but that of Great Britain the supposition naturally is that it relates entirely to the closer relations of the sexes; that the end of it will not be entirely pleasing; and that, however strong its plot and diction, it will not be what is called “entirely proper,”—it will not be a book which one can safely take home without reading and leave on the table of his sitting-room for wife, children and visitors to pick up at random.
Some of that sort of stuff has come from the American press of late years, more’s the pity, but it promises to be rather sporadic and accidental than a prominent feature of our literature. It resembles an outbreak of yellow fever in a Northern port—something which may get there by accident and do mischief for a little while, but which cannot effect a permanent lodgment. The mass of unclean stories which ventured into the daylight of print after the publication of Amelie Rives’ sensational novel is already beginning to disappear. When for a day or two a city chances to fall under mob law, the world seems turned upside down for the time being; but the better sense and strength of the community soon come to the rescue and the dangerous element is suppressed. A similar result is already being accomplished regarding pernicious fiction. Publishers who have hastily accepted stories which their professional readers pronounced “strong” are beginning to apologize for offering such stuff to the public.
American literature will be marked by a hopeful, cheerful, clean, energetic spirit, and as such it will give our people what they cannot easily obtain from the presses of foreign countries. We have faults enough, of which mention has frequently been made in this book, but lack of respectability and of hopefulness are not among them. Our novels are cleaner than those of any other land; our history in the main is decidedly cheering and stimulating in its influence; our poetry, although perhaps not as elegant as that of Europe, has a great deal more of inspiration in it for readers, and our fiction is based upon the life of our own people, which is in the main respectable. Incidents and scenes as bad as any that the world can supply may of course be found in American life by those who choose to look for them, but they are not likely to be written up or read to any extent, except by the vulgar classes. Books about which intelligent and cultivated people on the continent will talk freely in social circles are scarcely tolerated here; some of them are reprinted, but the editions as a rule are very small. Translations of continental novels have generally failed dismally in a commercial sense in the United States. There are a few exceptions, but the rule is so distinct that no one of literary taste, ability and intelligence now wastes his time in translating foreign novels in the hope of securing American publishers. The native writer as a rule is not as skilful as his foreign brother, but he successfully tells our people of what they wish to know. He is in sympathy with their thoughts, tastes, customs and aspirations, so his stories and essays are found in all our weekly papers and magazines, while more skilful productions of foreign pens, which might be had for nothing, are generally excluded. There is no longer any question as to whether we shall have a literature of our own. We have it. It is increasing in volume more rapidly than our people can follow it. It is a good sign. It means that we are a “peculiar people”—not perhaps in the sense in which the expression was used regarding the ancient Hebrews, yet in some respects it means the same. Conceit aside, it really means that we are better than other people. Long may we remain so!