The Arkansaw traveler., 1885-05-16
A HUMBLE REMoNsrRANcE.

Can2f PzSASuAeS nSAAAnks lu sonS oetau, i the opinion about the art they practice of . MT. Walter Besant and Mir. Henry James
 Two men certainly of very different cal ibre: Mr. James so precise of outline, so
 cunning of fence, so scrupulous of finish, and MT. Besant SO genial, so friendly, . vith so persuasive and humorous vein
 of whim !; Mir. James the very type of the 4 deliberate artist, Mir. Besant the imper- ] sonation of good nature. That such doc tors should differ will excite no great sur prise; but one point in which they seem to agree fills me, confess, with wonder. For they are both content to talk about the art of 6ction;" and MT. Besant, waxing exceeding giy bold, goes on to op- nose this so-called art of fiction to the art ol poetry" By the art of poetry he can mean nothing but the art of verse, an art of handicraft, and only comparable with the art of prose. For that heat and height of sane emotion which we agree to call by the name of poetry is but iber- tine and vagrant quality; present, at times, in any art, more often absent from them all !; too seldom present in the prose novel, too frequently absent from the ode and epic. Fiction is in the same case :; it is no substantive art, but an element which enters largely into all the arts but architecture. Homer, Wordsworth, Phid- jas, Hogarth and Salvini all deal in fc- ton and yet do not suppose that either Hogarth or Salvini, to mention but these two, entered in any degree into the scope of Mir. Besant's interesting lecture or Mir. James, charming essay. The art of fic- ton, then, regarded as definition, is
 both too ample aAd too scanty. Let me
 suggest another; lef me suggest that
 what both Mir. James and MT Besant had
 in view was neither more nor less than
 the art of ofnarrative.
 But Mir. Besant is anxious to speak
 solely of "the modern English novel" !"
 the stay and bread winner of Mir. Mudie :;
 and in the author of the most pleasing
 novel on that roll, "All Sorts and Condi-
 tons of Men," the desire is natural
 enough. l can conceive then, that he
 would hasten to propose two additions,
 and read thus the art of fictitious mar rative in prose.
 Now that the fact of the existence of the modern English novel is not to te denied; materially, with its three vol umes, leaded type, and gilded lettering, it is easily distinguishable from other forms of literature; but to talk at all fruilfully of any branch of art, it is need full to build our definitions on some more fundamental grounds than binding. Why,
 then, are we to add "in prose r The Odyssey" appears to me among the best of romances, the Lady of the Lake to stand high in the second order, and Chaucer's tales and prologues to contain more ot the matter and art of the modern English novel than the whole treasury of Mir. Mudie. Whether a narrative be written in blank verse or the Spenserian stapza, in the long period of Gibbon or the clipped phrase of Charles Reade, the principles of the art of narrative must be equally observed. The choice of a noble and swelling style in prose affects the problem of nayration in the same way, if not to the same degree, as the choice ofmeasured verse for both imply closer synthesis of events, higher key of dia- logue, and a more picked and stately strain of words. If you are to refuse "Don Juan," it is hard to see why you should include "Zanoni or (to bracket works of very different value) the Scar let Letter :" and by what di ,crimination are you to open your doors to the "Pil- grim's Progress and close them on the Faery Queen p To bring things closer home, l will here propeund to MT. Besant a conundrum. A na rative called Par adise Lost :" was written in English verse by one John Milton what was t then ? It was next translated by Chateaubriand into French prose and what was it then 2 Lastly, the French translation was, by some inspired compatriot of George Gil
 Allan (and of mine) turned bodily into an English novel and, ip the name of clearness, what was it then?
 But once more, why should we add "6ctitiousp" The reason why is obvious. The reason why not if something more recondite, does not want for weight. The art of narrative. in fact, is the same, whether it is applied to the selection and illustration of real series of events or of an imaginary series Boswell's "Life of Johnson !" Ia work of cunning and ini ni- table art owes its success to the same technical manGuues as Get us say)" Tom Jones ," the clear conception of certain characters of man, the choice and pre- sentation of certain incidents out of a great number that offered, and the inven- tion (yes, invention) and preservation of certain key in dialogue. In which these things are done with the more art-in which, with the greater air of nature- readers will differently judge. Boswell's is, indeed, very special case, and al- most generic; but it is not only in Bos- well, it is in every biography with any salt of life, is in every history where events and men rather than ideas are presented-iA Tacitus, in Carlyle, in Michelet in Macaulay-that the novelist will find maay of his own methods most conspicuously and adroitly handled. He will find besides that he, who is free who has the right to invent or steal missing incident, who has the right, more pre- cious still, of wholesome omission-is ire quentiy defeated, and, with all his ad- vantages, leaves less strong impression of reality and passion. MT. James utters