Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1892-08-18

: But WOfuS are tuluSS, anu " Sihdil uIoP VI lin,
Falling, like dew upon a thought, produces
That which makes thousands perhaps mill
ions, think"
In the July number OF Lippincott's
Magazine appeared an article called
Geographical Fiction" by Mrs. Ger
trude Atherton, in which the value OF
fiction to literature is questioned. The
reason given for the writer's belief in it's
valuelessness as contribution to litera-
ture is that stories "Tell us little that we
do not already know, nothing that we
will not some day come into personal
knowledge Of" By this standard moth
ing is of value in literature that does not I
contribute new facts to the world. Poetry
is, however, admitted in the same para
graph as being of unquestionable worth
as a contribution to literature. In what
way does poetry add more than fiction to
our stock Of facts? evidently any distinc- |
ton between poetry and fiction upo n
this ground is purely arbitrary. If, on
the other hand, the worth of poetry is
allowed because Of its perfection Of style,
as the writer does allow it, a new stand
ard is Immediately established, and by
this criterian it is logically impossible to
exclude, for example, the prose of Haw-
thorne's, "Scarlet Letter."
In the course OF the unitarian argu-
ment against fiction the writer says: at
is doubtful if all the delightful stories
devoted to plot, characterization, and an
alysis have quickened the wheels Of the
world by one revolution" Ii by the
progress of the human race is meant a
material multiplication Of mechanical
contrivances for rapid transit, appliances
for making money, or for the piling up of
statistics, then poetry and fiction, love
and romance, the pictorial and plastic
arts, are all oil no value. What does the
Venus OF Milo or the Faun of Praxiteles
add to our knowledge Of life? In cult
waiting in us perception Of beauty, in
awakening the Imagination to the rich
ness and splendor of the old world, their
influence is no greater than that Of "The
Marble Faun." 1t is very late in the
day to reiterate that the education which
leads to progress, in any high sense, is
more than mere accumulation of useful
facts, and yet it is this rudimentary prin-
ciple that the author OF Geographical
Fiction" fails to grasp. Facts are but
the crude soil from which the mind of
man is nourished that it may bring forth
truth. 1t is only from wide range OF
apprehended facts that such book as
"Adam Bede" is possible. 1t bears the
same relation to the elements OF which it
was composed, as the Apollo bears to the
block of marble in which only the sculp-
tor saw the divine form. To discard fiction
as worthless because it is not fact, is to
toss away the flower because it is not the
clod from which it has been evolved.
Good fiction is the essence Of knowledge
SO cunningly distilled that its sweetness
is made manifest.
Taken apart from its aesthetic worth,
the practical value of fiction is inestima-
BILE in forwarding progress. The noblest
biography, full Of undigested facts as it
must be, is Of less value than the history
Of the pleasure loving Tito Melema or
Famine in "Les Miserable To fiction
We owe the opening Of our eyes in under
standing and the opening of our hearts in
sympathy. "Uncle Tom Cabin" stirred
men to action as all the essayists, and
philosophers (whose worth is so freely
granted) failed in doing. The fiction Of
Christ's parallels are still, through the
ages, welding power that "has shout
dered civilization from plane to plane"
a power that has "quickened the wheels
of the world" that it is not power to
run grist mill, we admit.
From the premise that literature exists
for the sole purpose of supplying text
books to an ignorant world, the writer
proceeds to the conclusion that if fiction
can be made to contribute information it's
value, in so far as it instructs, may be
conceded. Since Kipling, Gable, Page,
Bret Harte and other modern writer's,
fulfil this condition by increasing our
knowledge Of various localities, she
argues, their work is worth while as be-
ing true history of the manners, GUS
toms, speech of actual places. This is as
il she should say to an artist: "Your
landscape is of value only as an exact
copy OF my cow-pasture," not seeing that
it is he who has lent value to the cow
pasture, not the cow-pasture to him.
Her possession is but p:osaic bit of
common, while his creation speaks to all
the world Of sweet day in June. Facts
have but transient value until they have
been transmitted into deathless truth.
For all mankind the sun shines and the
birds sing, but it is the high Office OF art
to catch the essence OF fair and feeting
things and give them life immortal.
This conference of Immortality upon
what is perishing is the highest gift of
genius to the world; in comparison to it
geographical data "pales this Intellectual
fires"
That Kipling Gable, Mark Twain,
Black, Blackmore and all the writer's
who have ever written have been at their