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How to Write a Novel

<h2>CHAPTER X</h2> <h3>IS THE SUBJECT-MATTER OF NOVELS EXHAUSTED?</h3> <h4>The Question Stated</h4> This is the way in which the question is most often stated, but the real question is more intelligently expressed by asking: Has the novel, as a form of literature, become obsolete? or is it likely to be obsolete in the near future? To many people the matter is dismissed with a contemptuous Pshaw!; others think it worthy of serious inquiry, and a few with practical minds say they don't care whether it is or not. Seven years ago Mr Frederic Harrison delivered himself of very pessimistic views as to the present position and prospects of the novelist, and not long ago Mr A. J. Balfour asserted that in his opinion the art of fiction had reached its zenith, and was now in its [139]decline. These critics may be prejudiced in their views, but it is worth while considering the remarks of the one who has the greater claim to respect for literary judgment. After exclaiming that we have now no novelist of the first rank, and substantiating this statement to the best of his ability, Mr Harrison goes on to inquire into the causes of this decay. In the first place, we have too high a standard of taste and criticism. "A highly organised code of culture may give us good manners, but it is the death of genius." We have lost the true sense of the romantic, and if "Jane Eyre" were produced to-day it "would not rise above a common shocker." Secondly, we are too disturbed in political affairs to allow for the rest that is necessary for literary productiveness. Thirdly, life is not so dramatic as it was—character is being driven inwards, and we have lost the picturesque qualities of earlier days. I am not at present concerned with the truth or error of these arguments; my object just now is to state the case, and before proceeding to an examination of its merits I wish to take the testimony of [140]another writer and thinker, one who is a philosopher quite as much as the author of "The Foundations of Belief" or the author of "The Meaning of History," and who has a claim upon our attention as an investigator of moving causes. Mr C. H. Pearson, in his notable book, "National Life and Character," has made some confident statements on the subject of the exhaustion of literary products. He is of opinion that "a change in social relations has made the drama impossible by dwarfing the immediate agency of the individual," and that "a change in manners has robbed the drama of a great deal of effect." He goes on to say that "Human nature, various as it is, is only capable after all of a certain number of emotions and acts, and these as the topics of an incessant literature are bound after a time to be exhausted. We may say with absolute certainty that certain subjects are never to be taken again. The tale of Troy, the wanderings of Odysseus, the vision of Heaven and Hell as Dante saw it, the theme of 'Paradise Lost,' and the story of Faust are familiar instances. . . . Effective adaptations of an old subject may [141]still be possible; but it is not writers of the highest capacity who will attempt them, and the reading world, which remembers what has been done before, will never accord more than a secondary recognition to the adaptation" (p. 299). There is a curious atmosphere of logical conclusiveness about these arguments. They carry with them, apparently, an air of certainty which it is useless to question. We know that the novelist has already exploited Politics, Socialism, History, Theology, Marriage, Education, and a host of other subjects; indeed, a perusal of Dixon's "Index to Fiction" is calculated to provoke the inquiry: "Is there anything left to write about?" We know that everywhere is springing up the "literature of locality," and it would seem as if the resources of this world's experience had been exhausted when writers like Mr H. G. Wells and the late George Du Maurier invade the planet Mars for fresh material. The heavens above, the earth beneath, and the waters under the earth have all been "written up." Is there anything new? [142] <h4>"Change" not "Exhaustion"</h4> There can be no doubt that fiction has undergone great changes during recent years. These changes are the result of deeper changes in our common life. Consider for a moment the position of the drama. What is the significance of the problem play on the one hand, and the cry for a "Static Theatre" on the other hand? It means that life has changed, and is still changing; that the national character is not so emphatically external or spontaneous as in those days when Ben Jonson killed two men, and Marlowe himself was killed in a brawl. We have lost the passion, the force, and the brutality of those times, and have become more contemplative and analytical. The simple law is this: that literature and the drama are a reflex of life; hence, when character has a tendency to be driven inwards, as is the case to-day, Maeterlinck pleads on behalf of a drama without action; and Paul Bourget in France and Henry James in England [143]embody the spirit of the age in the fiction of psychological minutiæ. Now there may be symptoms of decay in these manifestations of literary impulse, but the impulse is part of that new experience which the facts of an increasingly complex civilisation foist upon us. And, further, change is not necessarily exhaustion; in fact, it is more than surprising that anyone can believe all the stories possible have been told already, or have been told in the most interesting way. It is a very ancient cry—this cry about exhaustion. The old Hebrew writer wailed something about wanting to meet with a man who could show him a new thing. A new thing? "There is no new thing under the Sun." But we have found a few since those days, and the future will give birth to as many more. Men and women have written about love from time immemorial, but have we finished with the theme? Is it exhausted? Did Homer satisfy our love of recorded adventure once and for all? There is only one answer—namely, that human experience is infinite in its possibilities and its capacity for renewal. If human [144]experience—these vague and subtle emotions, these violently real but inscrutable feelings, these tremulous questionings of existence encompassed with mystery—if human experience were no more than a hard and dry scientific fact, well, our novelists would have a poor time of it. But life knows no finality; its stream flows on in perennial flood. Human nature is said to be much the same the world over, and yet every personality is absolutely a new thing. Goethe might attempt a rough classification by saying we are either Platonists or Aristotelians, but actually a great many of us are neither one nor the other, and there are infinities of degrees amongst us even then. New character is a necessary outcome of the advancing centuries, and new personalities are being born every day. No; the world still loves a story, and there are stories which have never been told. It is, perhaps, true, that the story-tellers have not found them yet. Why? [145] <h4>Why we talk about Exhaustion</h4> The answer is: We are becoming too artificial; we are losing spontaneity, and are getting too far away from the soil. Have we not noticed over and over again that the first book of a novelist is his best? Those which followed are called "good," but they sell because the author is the author of the first book which created a sensation. Speaking of the first work of a young writer, Anthony Trollope says: "He sits down and tells his story because he has a story to tell; as you, my friend, when you have heard something which has at once tickled your fancy or moved your pathos, will hurry to tell it to the first person you meet. But when that first novel has been received graciously by the public, and has made for itself a success, then the writer, naturally feeling that the writing of novels is within his grasp, looks about for something to tell in another. He cudgels his brains, not always successfully, [146]and sits down to write, not because he has something which he burns to tell, but because he feels it to be incumbent on him to be telling something. . . . So it has been with many novelists, who, after some good work, perhaps after much good work, have distressed their audience because they have gone on with their work till their work has become simply a trade with them."[146:A] There is often a good reason for such a change. The first book was written in a place near to Nature's heart; the writer was free from the obligations of society as found in city life; he was thrown back on his own resources, and fortunately could not spoil his individual view of things by multitudinous references to books and authorities. Do we not selfishly wish that Miss Olive Schreiner had never left the veldt, in the loneliness of which she produced "The Story of an African Farm"? Nearer contact with civilisation has failed to induce an impulse the result of which is at all comparable with this genuine story. It may or may not [147]be of significance that Mr Wells, the creator of a distinct type of romance, dislikes what is called "Society," but I fancy that a few of those who lament too frequently that "everything has been said" spend more time in "Society" and clubs than is possible for good work. Mr C. H. Pearson, in a notable chapter on "Dangers of Political Development," says: "The world at large is just as reverent of greatness, as observant of a Browning, a Newman, or a Mill, as it ever was; but the world of Society prefers the small change of available and ephemeral talent to the wealth of great thoughts, which must always be kept more or less in reserve. The result seems to be that men, anxious to do great work, find city life less congenial than they did, and either live away from the Metropolis, as Darwin and Newman did, or restrict their intercourse, as Carlyle and George Eliot practically did, to a circle of chosen friends." In further confirmation of the position I have taken up, let me quote the testimony of Thomas Hardy as given in an interview. Said the interviewer—"In [148]reading 'A Group of Noble Dames,' I was struck with the waste of good material." "Yes," replied Mr Hardy, "I suppose I was wasteful. But, there! it doesn't matter, for I have far more material now than I shall ever be able to use." "In your note-books?" "Yes, and in my head. I don't believe in that idea of man's imaginative powers becoming naturally exhausted; I believe that, if he liked, a man could go on writing till his physical strength gave out. Most men exhaust themselves prematurely by something artificial—their manner of living—Scott and Dickens for example. Victor Hugo, on the other hand, who was so long in exile, and who necessarily lived a very simple life during much of his time, was writing as well as ever when he died at a good old age. So, too, was Carlyle, if we except his philosophy, the least interesting part of him. The great secret is perhaps for the writer to be content with the life he was living when he made his first success. I can do more work here [in Dorsetshire] in six months than in twelve months in London."[148:A] [149]These are the convictions of a strong man, one who stands at the head of English writers of fiction, and therefore one to whom the beginner especially should listen with respect. A reader of MSS. told me quite recently that there was a pitiable narrowness of experience in the productions which were handed to him for valuation; nearly all were cast in the "city" mould, and showed signs of having been written to say something rather than because the writers had something to say. Mr Hardy has put his finger on the weak spot: more stories "come" in the country stillness than in the city's bustle. Of course, a man can be as much of a hermit in the heart of London as in the heart of a forest, but how few can resist the attractions of Society and the temptation to multiply literary friendships! Besides, it is always a risk to make a permanent change in that environment which assisted in producing the first success. Follow Mr Hardy's advice and stay where you are. Stories will then not be slow to "come" and ideas to "occur"; and the pessimists will be less ready to utter their laments over the decadence of [150]fiction and philosophers to argue that the novel will soon become extinct. I cannot do better than close with the following tempered statement from Mr Edmund Gosse: "A question which constantly recurs to my mind is this: Having secured the practical monopoly of literature, what do the novelists propose to do next? To what use will they put the unprecedented opportunity thrown in their way? It is quite plain that to a certain extent the material out of which the English novel has been constructed is in danger of becoming exhausted. Why do the American novelists inveigh against plots? Not, we may be sure, through any inherent tenderness of conscience, as they would have us believe; but because their eminently sane and somewhat timid natures revolt against the effort of inventing what is extravagant. But all the obvious plots, all the stories that are not in some degree extravagant, seem to have been told already, and for a writer of the temperament of Mr Howells, there is nothing left but the portraiture of a small portion of the limitless field of ordinary humdrum existence. So long as this is fresh, this also may [151]amuse and please; to the practitioners of this kind of work it seems as though the infinite prairie of life might be surveyed thus for centuries acre by acre. But that is not possible. A very little while suffices to show that in this direction also the material is promptly exhausted. Novelty, freshness, and excitement are to be sought for at all hazards, and where can they be found? The novelists hope many things from that happy system of nature which supplies them year by year with fresh generations of the ingenuous young." In this, however, Mr Gosse is very doubtful of good results: the fact is, he is too pessimistic. But in making suggestions as to what kind of novels might be written he almost gives the lie to his previous opinions. He asks for novels addressed especially to middle-aged persons, and not to the ingenuous young, ever interested in love. "It is supposed that to describe one of the positive employments of life—a business or a profession for example—would alienate the tender reader, and check that circulation about which novelists talk as if they were delicate invalids. But what evidence is there to show that [152]an attention to real things does frighten away the novel reader. The experiments which have been made in this country to widen the field of fiction in one direction, that of religious and moral speculation, have not proved unfortunate. What was the source of the great popular success of 'John Inglesant,' and then of 'Robert Elsmere,' if not the intense delight of readers in being admitted, in a story, to a wider analysis of the interior workings of the mind than is compatible with the mere record of billing and cooing of the callow young? . . . All I ask for is a larger study of life. Have the stress and turmoil of a political career no charm? Why, if novels of the shop and counting-house be considered sordid, can our novels not describe the life of a sailor, of a game-keeper, of a railway porter, of a civil engineer? What capital central figures for a story would be the whip of a leading hunt, the foreman of a colliery, the master of a fishing-smack, or a speculator on the Stock Exchange?"[152:A] Since these words were written, the [153]novel of politics, for example, has come to the fore; but does that mean that the subject is exhausted? It has only been touched upon as yet. There were plenty of dramas before Shakespeare but there were no Shakespeares; and to-day there are thousands of novels but how many real novelists? Once again let it be said that "exhausted subject-matter" is a misnomer; what we wait for is creative genius. <hr class="footnotes" /> <h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> <div class="footnote">[146:A] "Autobiography," vol. ii. pp. 45-6. There is no harm in telling stories as a trade provided the stories are good. </div> <div class="footnote">[148:A] Interview in The Young Man. </div> <div class="footnote">[152:A] "Questions at Issue," The Tyranny of the Novel. </div> <hr class="newchapter" /> [154] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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