Los Angeles herald., 1891-08-02
BOOK TALK.
Judge Tourgee Rough on
HOwells.
The Literary Stuffed Prophet
Handled in a Summary Way.
Publishers Now Playing Sort of
Literary Sawdust Game.
The Local Flood of Erotic Books-AIl
of Them Not What They Pretend
To Be-Notes and
Gossip.

ical called Brains, tells all about The
Art of Fiction. Judge Tourgee, early
in his literary career, turned certain
phases of his experiences as a carpet
bagger, into stories which for time
sold we'll, because of certain preju-
dices, and because the books were based
on new material. 1t is safe to say now
that not fifty copies OF A FOOLS Errand
are sold in a year. He then undertook
to manage magazine and managed to
kill it in about year. Altogether he
has little claim to be considered as a
literary arbiter. Still his article has
some good points. He sees fit to take
up the well worn contest between ''real-
lists" and "idealists" in fiction. The
public have passed the stage where this
question is of bawbee inter
est. Mr.. Howells is fast declining
into the obscurity in which Mr.. James
has fallen, and Zola is hardly heard OF
any more. People who have been bored
by Mr.. Howells and who, with the ma
jority of people who have good healthy
literary judgment, regard him as sort
of novelistic stuffed prophet, will enjoy
Judge Tourgee's summary treatment of
this great writer of the little. The fol-
lowing excerpts are to the point:
"Why are Scott and Dickens and
George Eliot and Hawthorne and Cooper
and a hundred others whose works have
lightened the burdens, salved the woes
and inspired the hearts of millions,
'romanclsts,' and only Howells and
James and Tolstoi and their imitators to
be dignifed with the name of novel
ists'? Why are so many of the Russian
and Spanish and French and Italian
writers of fiction 'realists,' and all but a
bakers dozen of English and American
writer's 'idealists?' What is 'romanti-
cism?' Is 'idealism' false and is only
realism true?"
''The naive and undoubting spokes.
of this curiously assorted band OF
claimants, not merely OF literary perfec
tibility, but of the right of sole and
final judgment with power to issue writs
of dispossession against all who do not
attorn to the syndicate of immortals he
| represents, is Mr.. w. D. Howells. In
his capacity as final arbiter of literary
fame and merit, he has recently declared
judgment of custer against all those sup
posed novelists of whose fame the An
glo-Saxon race has long been so proud,
whose works do not accord with his
ideas of what realistic novel ought
to be-"
"But what is this realism which Mr..
Howells so confidently vaunts? Simply,
a fad in which, most unfortunately, he
sincerely believes. Such a fad was
'estheticism,' but fortunately for the
world It's high-priest, Oscar Wilde, was
a fake who, when he had filled his
pockets with American dollars, was will
ing to sink into the obscurity he so well
adorns. Mr.. Howells apparently be-
lieves himself to be the discoverer-per-
haps we should say the rediscoverer-
of an exclusive, infallible method for the
concoction of the novel. The delusion
is unfortunate in one whose technical
skill is unsurpassed, and whose nicely
of detail gave hope that he might carve
out of the fine, strong marble of Amer
ican life, work of fiction so notable
that the literary world would rec
ognize at once a greater master than
had ever wrought before"
LITERARY sAwDUsT GAME.
Erotic books are apparently fast mono
policing the attention of local booksell-
ers. In the book stores cheap editions
OF the Heptameron, Decameron, Balza's Is
Contes Drolatique, Madamoiselle De
Maupin, and the like are scattered
among the shelves. side by side with
the filthy productions of Albert Ross
and poor translations of meretricious
French novels and copies of Reynold's g
stories. Some of these books are un-
doubtedly bad, and vitiating, but the
truth of the matter is that the buyer
who goes into store and purchases a
book because it has suggestive title,
and illustrations in which nude feminin-
ity is extensively portrayed, is nine
times out OF ten:swindled.
Publishers habitually play the trick
of embelhshing commonplace books in
such way as to lead a low-minded
person to think that they are something
''rich and racy,' and by such means
sell thousands of copies. Rousseau g
Confessions are to be found bound in a
flaming red cover, bearing the design of
young woman in very much dishev-
eled condition, apparently just getting
out of a bed on a housetop. Nothing
could be found more calculated to catch
the attention of seekers for forbidden
literature, ana nOJulnS cOulu EXCEED Jne
disappointment of the buyer OF that
class as he tries to read the contents
Karl Heinen's Rights of Women is an
other work which is exploited in the
same way, and which probably sells by
the thousand copies because the stupid
out of date old treatise is given sug
gestive appearance.
The appearance then, is worse thar
the real state Of things. Of all the pub
locations that lounger through one o
our book stores, who was not very famil
lar with books, would at first view, con
slider to be ''off color" probably to only
a very small percentage, could any valiC
objection be made on the score OF NOR
ality. The trouble is not with thu
reading public, but with publishers whit
are seking to force an uncleanly kind 0
books on the market, or kwho are pand
ering to the low taste OF certain clasl
| of people, and at the same time avoid
| ing any conflict with the law as to oh
scene books by sort Of literary saw
| duet game. The man who pays hi
money for package Of counterfeit
4" I| ..I.