The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1878-01-31
WHAT 1T COSTS TO WRITE
WELL,

Excellence is not matured in day,
and the cost of it is AN old story. The
beginning of Piato's Republic, it IL
said, was found in old tablet written
over in variety of ways. Addison,
we are, told, wore ont t1he rat5snna6
his printer; frequently, when nearly
q whole impression OF the Spectator
was worked of, he would stop the
press to insert some new proposition.
Lambs most sportiye essays were the
result of most intense brain labor; he
used to spend week st time in
celebrating single humorous letter
to friend. Tennyson is reported to
have written "Come Into The Gard
Ell, Maud" more than fifty times over
before it pleased him; and "Lncksley
Hail." the first draught of which was
written in two days, he spent the
better part of six weeks, for eight
hours day, in altering aud polishing.
Dickens, when he intended to write q
Christmas story, shut himself up fer
six weeks, living the life of a hermit,
and came out as haggared as muir
derer. BaIzac, after he had thought
out thoroughly one of his philOsophi-
cal romances, and amassed his materi-
ais in most laborious manner, retir-
ed to his study, aud from that time
until his book went to press, society
saw him no more. When he appear
cd among his friends, he looked, said
his publisher, in the popular phrase,
like his own ghost. The manuscript
was afterward altered and copied,
when it passed into the hands of the
printer, from whose slips the book
was re written the third time. Again
it went into the hands of the printer
two, three, and sometimes four sep
arate proofs being required before the
authors leave could be got to send the
perpetually rewritten book 10 press
at last to have it done. He was liter
ally the terror of all printers and edi-
tors.
Moore thought it quick work If he
wrote seventy lines of I" Lalla Rookh''
in a week. Kinglakei g Eothen," we
are told, was rewritten five or six
times, and was kept in the authors
writing desk almost as long as Wads-
worth kept White Doe of Rylsone,"
and kept like that, to be taken out for
review and correction almost every
day. Buffon's "Story of Nature" cost
him fifty years of labor before he sent
it to the printer. "He composed it in
q singular manner, writing on large
sized paper, in which, as in a ledger.
Eve distinct columns were ruled. In
the first column he wrote down the
first thoughts; in the second he cor
rected, enlarged, and prnned it; and
so on until he reached the fifth COL
umn, within which he finally wrote
the results of his labor. But even af,
ter this he would compose sentence
twenty times, and once devoted four
teen hours to finding the proper word
to round off a period" john Foster
often spent hours on a single sentence.
Ten years elapsed between Gold
smiths Traveller and ats completion.
La Rochefoucauld spent fifteen years
in preparing his little book Of max
inns; altering some of them, Segaris
says, nearly thirty. times. We all
know how Sheridan polished his wit
and finished his jokes, the same things
being found on different bits of paper,
differently expressed. Rogers showed
Crabbe Robinson note to his F" Italy,"
which he said took him two weeks 10
write. 1t consists of a very few lines.
Printers Circular.