The San Antonio light. (San Antonio, Tex.) 1883-1886, 1883-04-04
MODERN NOVELS.
Address of MIR. Julian Hawthorne ON "Ths
Theory and Practice of the Novelist"

Theory and Practice of the Novelist"
Mr.. Julian Hawthorne spoke to the fol-
lowing effect at a recent meeting of the Nine
teenth Century club in New York.
Novels are the only books that are read
from no selfish motive, and they are the only
true books-thes "works of hction"-be-
cause they tell the vicisstudes of that only
great conservative, the human heart.
Shakespeare is fresh to-day, though Bacon is
left behind. Man against fate was the classic
pagan situation. Right against wrong the
predicament of the Christian era. In our
modern school of fiction the conflict perhaps
lies between culture and provincialism, with
the author on the side of culture. II the art
OF fiction be not a finer art in our day than at
former period, it is at all events more near
sighted one. We look more closely at people
and things, whether or not we see more deeply
into them. Until quite recently the plot re-
ceived more elaboration than the people-asif
man were to be absorbed into his own
skeleton. Now some OF our best writers in
their anxiety TO plot too much almost cease to
have any plot at all. Such a book, though
full OF art on every page, may fail entirely to
be a work OF art. The true alternative from
too much plot is not to no plot, but to n plot
OF higher and more interior kind. Take
number OF characters and bring them to bear
upon one another until an equilibrium is at
tanned, and you will find events occurring on
the inner plane of thought and emotion which
are not only of supreme interest ntrinsically,
but which apprise us that all external incident
is but a reflection as consequence of the
other, The depth from which our words we're
sp ken is the measure of the depth at which
they will be heard, and the deeper we lay the
movement Of our story the deeper and more
permanent will be its impression on the
reader. For the outward memory of eye and
ear is less retentive than that OF the emotions
and judgment.
AS regards characters, you may have noticed
of late certain timidity about using the old
fashioned heroes and heroines. They are
considered mot good lorm"-too demonstra-
tive Besides, art must draw from nature,
and where are the heroes and heroines of our
own little social circle, for example? There
fore, il is thought, we should put into our
stories such commonplace and familiar figures
as we are forever stumbling over in the hotels
and at our friends houses, and make up for
the unpretentiousness of our material by the
| brlliancy with which we describe and dissect
| it. The reader, moreover, will be more edited
and convinced by a lesson brought down to
the level of his daily experience than by lofty
oracles from the clouds.
This argument is plausible, but does it not
forget the fact that every human being, no
matter how mean and frail his uninspired per-
sonal quality, may at need draw illmitably
upon that vast ocean Of human nature which
flows beneath US and within us all What we
call great men, the heroes OF history, are only
.nctr ante nfD
ties, and, as Emerson says, they are the most
'indebted men," They are not great in
themselves. There is no ratio between theil
achievements and them. Our judgment is
misled; we do not discriminate between the
means and the cause and effect. We need
not be afraid, therefore, to put heroes in
our novels. Only let US be careful to provide
occasion for heroism, and the hero will attend
to the rest himself If the incidents and
occasions are insignificant, so must the char
acters be, no matter what exalted gifts the
novelist may ascrbe to them. When oui
civil war broke out, society certainly showed
no more noble lineaments than it does now
and yet before we had fought year we had
heroes by the thousand, and as many great
men as we needed. Human nature is Away
the same and it is always just as capable O.
rising to an ideal as OF sinking to a nonentity.
1t is the poets business, the novest's bust
ness to keep the ideal before us and tc
use the nonentty only as foil and mega
tive.
/ And this suggests the question, " How did
this fanaticism of realism come aboutG" II
was originally, no doubt, reaction from life
less sentiment and morbid humbug, which
had come down to us from an ill-educateo
and artificial past But the indignant literal.
lists who exposed and rdiculed its art6ciality
allowed their enthusiasm to carry them toe
far. Not all sentiment is vapid, norris al
fgurativeness false. There is class of mind!
which mistake discords for truth. They fine
discords everywhere. They find them con
Trajectory of harmony and idealism, and they
conclude that to lay to our souls the hatterinl