St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-04-23
GOSSIP BETWEEN ACTS.
The Literary Fad Is Getting to Be
81 Painfully Common.

Chicago News.
Shea play without love story is a
new departure, isn't it?
He-Quite, and a refreshing one.
/ She-You agree with Bacon's estimate
OF shat weak passion?"
I He-You are quoting from the essay?
I Yes, I think that expresses my views, 1t
is quite true that ''the stage is more be-
{ holding to love than the lifeOf man." In
reality, love plays much less important
part in most peoples lives than the
poets and novelists and playwrights
would have us believe. And so it
should be. I thoroughly agree with
your friend Bacon that they do best
who, if they cannot but admit love, yet
make it keep quarter, and sever 1T
wholly from their serious affairs and
actions of life; for if it check once with
business it trOubleth mems fortunes,
and maketh men that they can no ways
be true to their own ends
She-This is not the time to revive
such sordid ideas. Don't you know it
is predicted that the twentieth century
is to be the age, par excellence, of senti-
ment? You should be studying Romeo
and Juliet, and Paul and Virginia, and
getting yourself into a proper frame OF
mind. By the way, what is your opin-
ion of Edgar Salter's last book?
He-NOw please don't.
She-Don't what?
He-Talk literature. l assure you
that I've no literary opinions of any
sort whatever: that I don't read Salter
and know nothing about Amelie Rives;
that l don't care what Stevenson is
going to write for the new weekly and
have no idea how much the Century
offered Stockton for his last tale. In
short, that Pm unutterably weary
of society's latest fad, and would
rather run mile than be tied
down for fifteen minutes to the
literary shop which every one
affects lust now. The worst of it is that
society is not only talking literature but
making it, or trying to; filling up her
bird's-eye maple escritOires with reams
of copy paper, and priding herself on
the ink stains which disfgure her care
fully manicured finger-tips. Of course
in England the scribbling mania is no
new thing: it's been raging there for
some years, but it didn't cross the
ocean till comparatively recently.
The Southern states were at
tackled first, then the East, and
now at last Chicago is bitten. And
we've got it bad. To us poor unfOrtu-
mates who make our living by writing.
life has been rendered burden this
winter. We've been in great demand
oh. yes! dined and wined and lunched
and breakfaSted and made much of gen.
orally. But the affection lavished on us
has been such palpable, cupboard love-
For instance, you are asked to luncheon
by some charming woman, who makes
herself intensely agreeable and by
little delicately delightful fattery
successfully reduces you to an
idiotically benign state Of mind.
Then she takes you off to a
corner and says something of this sort:
4 do hope, Mrs. Paidcontributor, you
won't think me frightful bore, but Pm
so anxious to have your opinion about
two or three things I've been scribbling.
Do you know, Ive quite set my heart on
getting into print, and little advice
from you would be of so much help,
quite invaluable, you know And then
she produces the little things and you
go home with heavy heart and
a big roll of spidery-loOking manu-
script under your arm! Or Jones,
whose fatherl deals In plebeian but
profitable pigs, and who can by no pos
sibility stand in need of filthy lucre, in
VlI6S you W ul1c db Ills CluUs dIu pICS-
emily betrays his longing after fame:
IL say, Paidcontributor. old chap, do
you think any of your editor friends
could do anything with series of articles
on ON such and such or SO and
SO. Or, you allow yourself to fall
comfortably in love with some pretty,
baby-faced girl, blissfully confident
that she, at least, is not intellectual
and 10! some fine day it turns out that
she, too, is viper whom you have
cherished in your bosom. See causes
your hair to stand ON end and thrills of
horror to run up and down your backbone
by producing sonnet and begging you
to help her make it scan! It's abso-
Iutely Iinbearable!"
"And then they write to you. Your
Aunt Fanny, on sheet of scented note
paper, sends you with this story
which she has translated from the Ger
man, and wonders if you will be kind
enough to tell her where she would be
likely to get it accepted?' And Miss