The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1892-12-10
TO YOUNG WRITERS
ReaLiSt Garland Gives
Advice.
HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY.
Then You Will Get Along Pretty
Well if You Can Really
Write.
Garland
Advice.
Gives

"One Of the first lessons that young
writers must learn is TO send the right mat
ter to the right publication" said Hamlin
Garland to a CALL reporter yesterday.
the editors do not Judge the availability
of the manuscripts they read nearly as much
by the name of the writer as Is generally
supposed. They are on the lookout con-
stantly for new and attractive matter.
Wien Mr. Glider # the Century took my
first story / was absolutely unknown to
him, and he told me afterward that he had
more than a hundred thousand dollars
worth of manuscript in hand then.
LAS TO the techncalities young author
should observe? They are more important
than most people would think. First of all
it is important TO have all manuscript type
written.
"rhen nothing shows the impractical
writer more pitifully than the lack Of proper
paragra phing in manuscript. The young
writer should study paragraphing aud para
graph his matter so that it is printed pre-
cisely as written. This gives an open
effect to the page and aids the weary editor
to see at ence what is in the manuscript.
"a bout the same is true OF punctuation.
Study punctuation if you mean to write.
almost every editor has to say, Please
don't roll the manuscript Perhaps this
seems like very trite matter. but the
Young author Will find Ii of much import
anee There is nothing more disagreeable
than to read manuscript that refuses to lay
fat. or course, the editor may take ii to
the press and flatten it out, but the chances
are against ii.
''These simple details are of much inn
portance where the writer is unknown TO
the editor.
''What is the great requisite to success in
literature? 1 am glad you asked me that.
for / am glad 10 have an opportunity TO an
swer II.
Il believe to succeed in literature man
must stand for something. He must be
identified with something that's human and
human in some direct and unequivocal
fashion.
''As an artist he must stand for an idea in
art true to himself and his outlook on hu-
mainly Ii he does this he is certain to
specialize. Yes; in this age a man must
specialize to succeed in literature.
THE advice l give to young authors when
asked for a fundamental principle is this
''5e true to things as you see them with
out any regard In the value the outside world
puts on them. Write of the thugs you know
best and think of most.
THE source of all real power in art to-
day is the statement of a personal relation
between some human soul and the social or
natural universe.
mo; you cannot preach in the novel.
Dung writers should be careful to avoid
that. But you can teach ANYTHING in fiction.
The way TO do it-and there is but the one
way | BELIEVES TO illustrate by concrete
example, not by reading between the lines.
You ask what my justification was for
the political novel in Jason Edwards'P 1t
was this:
"Being realist l would have been untrue
to life in attempting TO depict society had /
not used the thoughts and actions and So
cial movements OF our time as found them.
III to nit AF
upon the social western world, trying to
gloss nothing and to be true to myself at
each moment Of my artistic life.
Yes, there is a place in literature for the
man or woman who has ideas to express,
truths to teach and present.
Il will put it stronger. There is no place
in literature to-day for the man who has not
something vital to say. And the degree of
his success, from tie highest standpoint,
viii be measured exactly by the unflinchmg
fidelity with which he states his intimate
relation with the life around him?
rs there 81 mission in literature for
women? | believe there is. Women have
never stated themselves in literature. For
example. there is the chance for woman
to do great work if she will state honestly
and unfiinchingly her conception as a
woman of life and the relations OF life
which she personally or typicaliy sustains
to the actualities of the present day.
with all due respect to all the great
women names of literature, do not believe
this has been done.
Yes; will make one ption-Olive
SchreIner. In some degree she has given
Us tile statement oil a woman, scarcely In
the fctiOnal form. but with wonderful
force. There is nothing more terrible in
literature than the comment of little Lyn-
dali upon the difference in attitude of the
world toward herself as woman and to-
ward Waldo as a man.
Yes; woman has great work yet to do
in literature. l am convinced of that"
concluded the author of main Travelled
Roads" "And man cannot do it for her,
She must do it for herself.
What was the first thing / wrote? Well.
l suppose 1t didn't amount to much. for it
was returned mere than once and never did
see the light.
my first thing published? That's an
easier question. A poem that took up a
column In Harper's Weekly, and was called
Lost in Norther.' / had been sending
lots Of things around for FIVE or six years
before that came out.
Il began writing On the plane OF home
sick Westerner in Boston, who was too
poor to get back home. There would come
suggestions of my boyhood life in the wild,
free West. They stirred me, and write of
them 1 must and did.
After the poem Ia Harper's my Boys
Life series met with success. The one
about the corDhusking was accepted by the
New American Magazine. Its editor, Mr..
Wyekhoff, gave me The first encouragement.
He said they were true. That gave me a
clew to work on, and felt there was some
thing for me to say as a Western man. with
out encroaching upon the ground occupied
by ESgestoD, who was the pioneer In West
eTn literature, you know.
All this-and much more-Mr. Garland
spoke In quiet, conversational tones, lack
ing wholly the self-importanee conventional
TO the interviewed. He even failed to stroke
his R.ustache and look wise, when asked
what were the chances for young men and
women IN literature TODAY.
He is young man. not taller than most
people, bright and keen, but not wonder.
fully witty nor remarkably eloquent YET
you would like Hamlin Garland, for he
talks as well as he writes