Waterbury evening Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1887-1895, 1894-07-07
WRITERS OF FICTION.
What the Great Leaders Are Doing During
the Hot Season.
Especial Correspondencc.l

the Hot Season.
Especial Correspondence
NEW YORK, July 3.-The writers of flc
ton who are popular in this country and
in Europe arc taking advantage of the
summer vacation to revise some of their
old works and to touch up some new
stories which are to be issued in the fall.
1t is an interesting fact that some of the
best writer's of fiction are of the opinion
that they work better in the summer than
they do in the winter, provided they arc
in quiet country places
Mark Twain for years has done the
greater part of his original work in the hot
months. 1t was his custom to go to n
beautiful country place in western New
York state and there spend the summer in
working out his conceptions the line of his
stories and the development of his charac-
tors. Afterward, when he returned to his
delightful home in Hartford, he elaborated,
worked over, polished up and finished
what he had in the summer conceived.
No writer is more painstaking and none
sends forth to tho world the fruit of so
great toll and patience as Mark Twain
does.
Mrs. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward finds
the hot weather conducive to literary COM
position, although it is doubtful il she
could write IL she were penned up in the
city. She likes n room the windows of
which open upon the sea, and the breezcs
from the ocean seem to furnish her inspi-
ration.
When Bret Hartc was living in the
United States, he was accustomed to spend
the summer months In some one of the
cool suburban resorts within easy access
of New York, and being thus favorably
situated hc found that the summer sun
never caused him to become intellectually
weary. One OF the most perfect pictures
ever painted by Bret Harte in its realism
and vivid suggestion of atmospheric con-
ditions was n chapter in one of his stories
in which the hero suffers from the enervat-
ing heat of the city of Washington on a
midsummer day, and Mr.. Harte, being
once asked how he got that perfect climatic
condition and atmospheric suggestion, said
that he looked forth from his window and
saw it as he wrote.
lola, in n beautiful country retreat some
miles from Paris, pursues his literary work
| during the hot months without cessation,
and De Blowitz, the famous Paris corre-
spondent of the London Times, has beau
tiful chateau upon the northern coast of
Franco connected by telegraph and tcle-
phone with his Paris office and his assist
| ants and there writes the dispatches for
which all Europe waits the next morning.
Mr.. Crockett, that ScOtchman who is
| known as the favored scholar of Robert
Louis Stevenson, and who when past mid
| die age wrote a novel, 1.-The Raiders, +"
which gained popularity and is said to be
| worthy of Stevenson himself, is preparing
| n new novel, which will also be a tale of
! adventure, which he calls The Lilac Sun
| bonnet Those who have recently been
| in England and have been brought into
close touch with literary circles there say
| that it is believed that Mr.. Crockett will
| pass Barrie in popularity, who seems to
have written himself out and perhaps to
1 have been secured somewhat by his sue
ccsses.
Mr. Charles Dudley Warner, who won
fame 20 years ago when least expecting it
by his My Summer In n Garden" has
finished another novel to be called Tho
Golden House" Mr.. Warner began to
| publish if not to write fiction when past
| the age at which Thackeray is said to have
| declared a man should cease to write
stories. Yet Mr.. Warner. like the histo-
| rian Froudc, who wrote an Irish romance
| of adventure when he was past 60 years of
age. seems to have disprovcd the sound
ness of Thackcray's view.
Robert Lou Stevenson continues, how
EVER, to remain easily first in the list of
writers of romantic adventure. His 'Ebb
Tide for which he received $40, 900 for
the serial publication, is now ready in
book form, and his royalties from its sale
promise to he very large. While The
Ebb Tide was running serially Steven
son in faroff Samoa was busy with anoth,
or novel, the manuscript of which was
sent to his Scotch solicitor, who is his
agent for the negotiation of all his works
The negotiations for the sale of the serial
rights may be somewhat protractcd, SC
that it is quite likely that If 1t is publish.
] cd scrially Mt all Ii may not appear for
some time. The later novel, which is to be
called st. Ives" is historical romance,
and Stevenson is already ut work upon
another romance of thrilling incidents in
Scotch history which will probably be fin
ished in the winter. Reports from Mr.
Stevenson say that while he still remain,
something OF an invalid nevertheless he i.
: doing perhaps moro work than he has cvcl
done. Composition seems not to affect hi:
health at all. +. J. EDWARDS.