The Republican., 1891-04-24
BREVITY IN FICTION,
The Reading Public -.hsOrbs Its Litera,
ture at BreaknecIl Pace.

The Reading Public -:hsOrbs Its Litera
ture at BreakhecS Pace.
The interminable novel belongs tc
ages less crowded and more leisurely
than ours. Our ancestors of 200 years
ago could enjoy those impossible folio
romances, as unreadable now as the
Bodies of Divinity with which they
shared the field, and after less mon
etrous bulk superseded the folios.
''Clarissa Harlow could lure weeping
admirers through eight Volumes and
"Evelina'' cnchain attention through
five.
But when stage-coaches gave way to
steam, the mind learned to travel as
rapidly as the body. The three-volume
novel still fingers in England, a sad
survival, by grace of Mudie.
When the circulating library gives
forth its long delayed fiat. this cum
brous form will give way to American
| compactneSs.
Half century back all our fiction,
alike the reprints of Scott and Bulwer,
and the originals of Cooper, Paulding
and Simms, appeared in too thinnish
volumes; but for generation or more
the demand has been for that which
can be held complete in the hand, if not
carried in the pocket.
Even the doubled-columned octave
practically ended with the war. The
thin paper quarto, which can be rolled
up in transit and tossed aside after
perusal, has lost its pre-eminence ten or
fifteen years ago. For preservation, or
even for sale at bool<stalls and on the
cars, the notable class of ''12mo ct mira"
carries all before it.
The need OF condensation has affected
the novel itself, as well as its integu-
ment; comparative brevity is felt to be
the soul of narration.
The shrinkage is not so great as in
poetry. for prose is the natural human
language, whereas most of us can now
take our verse in homeopathic doses.
The romance of three hundred thou
sand words is still tolerated, while the
epic of onefourth as many finds no pub
Usher or falls still-born from the press.
1t must be great writer who in our
day ventures on the Dimensions of "Cop-
perheld' or "Pendenais' or Middle
march, and our ablest authors of both
hemispheres find that they can usually
paint to advantage on q smaller canvas.
For obvious reasons the story that can
be read in an evening or two is displac-
ing it's elder brother, who requires the
leisure of weeks.
In the first place. life no longer laziiy
drags one foot after the other, but
moves on wheels at from five to fifty
miles an hour. To q dozen books worth
reading in Scott's time there are a hun
,dred now. Where few topics de-
manded attention, multitude are now
knocking at our doors.
Before this food of inventions and
improvements and contrivances came
in, a single pursuit might engross ones
energies; but the modern man must be
Argus-eyed-h brain is no longer a
private house, but q hotel.
The new order may not be wholly
welcome or benefcent, but it has ar
rived, and apparently to stay. We are
driven at this breakneck pace, whether
we will or not: and whoever has any
thing to say to us by way of instruction
or entertainment must know how to
say it in compact and businesS-likc fash
ion for we can give him only modi-
cum of our precious time. Even if it be
Meredith or Stevenson. other men and
other books also must have their chance.
-Lippincott's Magazine.