Idaho semi-weekly world. [volume] (Idaho City, Idaho Territory) 1875-1908, 1892-02-23
HE WRITES STORIES.
THIS MAN MANUFACTURES LirenA.
TuRE" As He SAWS WOOD.


he Makes $1,000 a Year and Is News,
''"thsred by the critIcs--F Fiction MADE
from Newspaper CIippipgs-How a..
A'"d 81 Harmless "Tra-h'' Is Gotten IN.
ran across New York friend 81 ,nina
tne other day who makes 5000 a wear
writlng novels, and who Is never botber.d
oy The critics. He writes his novels "a ~.
der, gets his pay promptly and doesn't care
. button for praise.
asked my friend to tell me little abopt
ms business, for business it il with him
just as much as journalism Is with the
average newspaper man, or saving boards
Is with the majority OF carpenters.
u 20 about my work, y he said. with Z.
much system as any other worker. WbiIe
at 1t write from eight to ten hours da .
when J have contract for a story on INV
hands, and generally keep at It tin Il i
finished. | began writing about twelve
years ago-indeed, even longer aoo Than
that. Yes, let's see. had Just got out ~ the
high school. began to feel within me he
promptings OF imitation as the natural 60
quence Of the admiration those stirriny
story tellers had aroused within me and I
wrote boys story which met with some
degree Of success -
put great deal OF blood and thunder
IN u, confess, but no wickedness Of heart
ana no immortality. | wrote other stories
q similar character and had them pub
lished In some Of the New York weekly
story papers of that day. experienced the
usual disappointments Of all rising young
authors, Of course, and found NOT q few
manuscripts tossed back upon my hands.
But l was too young to care much, and
consoled myself with the conviction that
the pigheaded publishers didn't know a
good thing when they saw tia conviction
lstill hold to with what ! am inclined to
regard rs a commendable degree Of ten
acity."
AN AUTHORS START.
asked my friend il he still sometimes
found himself among the great army of
the rejected.
Eyes, almost as often as when | was a
youth-that is, if send my manuscript to
new publishers and let them go on their
merits. This is world where there are
many men of many minds as there are
many fishes in the sea, and the editorial
mind is quite as diverse and cranky as the
average individuals. But with the pub
listers who know me well meet with no
| such modification. | generally wait for
them to give me an order. Sometimes my
tales 20 into their weekly papers, some
times they are printed in pamphlet form. .
But you started out to tell me- said,
| "jnst how you manufacture your novels
and romances"
You use the proper word, manufac-
ture," he laughed, ''for they are literally
made by hand, as it were. 1t does require
some little intelligence, however, and not
few literary men of some reputation but
meager incomes essay the blood and thun-
der novel and completely fail at it. They
can surpass me in diction, felicity of ex-
| preston and beauty of thought, but they
lack the life, the constant dramatic pose of
the characters and the swift movement of
the actors which have become the natural
characteristics of all | write Let me tell
| you my method: In the first place, keep
a scrapbook: not such voluminous tome
as Charles Reade kept, to be sure, but still
a book filed with many hundreds of news
paper clippngs-an inexhaustible mine,
into which | delve for plots, exciting ad-
ventures, queer happenings of all kinds,
names for my characters and places, and
even for striking titles for my chapters.
HOW HE PROCEEDS
Truth is really stranger than fiction,
and all these clippings tell a story of actual
occurrences. find it is hardly ever neces-
sary to exaggerate. | jot down names of
| all sorts as | meet them in reading. There
is great suggestiyeness in name Take
such a name as Paggles or Bippus or Bob
| let-all actual cognomens which | have
seen on signs or met in newspapers-and
| they present "A distinct character to my i'm
| agination at once. Then, on the other
hand, take the name of Gertrude or Flor
ence, or the stately name of Eleanor,
which became her well, as an old time
romancer put it, or of simple Mary, Kate
or Sue. Each belongs to particular style
of being and fits like a garment. The
| average voracious novel reader has great
taste and discrimination for the opposite
ness of these things.
well, start out and select title for
my story. 1t must be startling or sensa
tional or interesting, just as the display OF
scare head of the newspaper is intended to
arouse the interest of the reader. | take
many of my best titles bodily from the
headlines of some newspaper sensation lii
the next place make a table of contents
Chapter |, The Strange Arrival at Chef
wyn Hall;' Chapter II, The Strangers
Sudden Death Chapter Ill, The Mysteri
Gus Woman in Black Chapter ", Or
Juien's Discovery Chapter V, Put to q
Terrible Test;' Chapter vi, The Flight 10y
Night; Chapter VII, In Loves Fetters,
and so on to the end Of the tale.
'Of course, get II central idea to work
out, and my chapter headings indicate IL
| 81 ha 2 hot m. la
described; but the rule of the great novel
lists, never to undertake to tell story til
Won have a story to tell, does not hold with
me, My story is never anything like com
plete in my mind until have written tel
chapters of it. make it up as go along
as the children would say. 1t moves for
ward steadily, of course, but not with thai
consummate art that a Dickens or Bul
wer employed.
THE EVOLUTION OF THE PLOT
'The reader of trashy novels or of boys
books of adventure doesn't require it an.
more than the reader of an ordinary news
paper sensation. | have some little diffi
Guilty with my opening chapter often, for i
must be decidedly thrilling. and when
come to the point where the wise puoiishe
quietly adds, 80 be continued in our next,
must make the situation positively cleo
trifying. often do that without knowing
how under the sun am going to extricat
the unfortunate individuals whom | ma.
have left facing brace of burglars revol
yers, or in burning building, or on
sinking ship, or even before the breakfas
fire of merciless cannibals But my scrap
book often comes to my aid, and theirs
too. and shows me what really occurs ii
life and am all right, and go on for an
other chapter or two till get the poo
creatures of my brain into more embar
easements" n,