The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1896-04-08

manner Of expression In q set mold.
repeat. let style alone. 1t Is physically
given to no two Of the billions of hu-
man beings upon the face OF this earth
to look precisely alike: and In much the
same fashion Il should be the sovereign
privilege Of every one to form and cher
ish his own literary style. Given the
thought. the style will come. When
ever you see q writer trying to force his
words to fashion themselves on paper
In a certain fixed way. after some par
ticular model. classic or otherwise. you
see an unfortunate. who deserves to be
pitied. What Is in q man will come
out, not forced, according to formula,
but spontaneously, Of its own sweet
will. and the freer 1t Is In coming the
better II will be when 1t gets out.
have no patience with the teacher who
thinks that style Is thing OF rote. or
that ShakesDeares are to be made by
putting diagrams on the blackboard.
II pupil has thing to say. let him
choose the manner Of it's saying. How
ever else you may feel in duty bound to
bend his plastic mind to the stereotyped
forms Of the school room. beg Of you
allow him that one freedom. untram-
meled.
style e-copying that reach the eye of the
editor Of literary manuscripts. Like a
needle in the hay stack Is the contribu-
| tion to the newspaper or the magazine
which betokens fresh. honest, uncon-
scious originality In form no less than
In substance of expression. Delicious
to the wearied taste Of the professional
reader Of manuscripts is the story, the
poem. the essay or the descriptive piece
which goes to its mark as swift and
| straight and true and withal with as
little fuss as the arrow that is shot from
the bow. When you put that kind of n
manuscript before the editorial optic
you make the heart glad.
Yet such manuscripts ought not to be
| scarce. The gift of telling a thing on
paper with as much brightness, spice
| and absence of self-consciousness as
| one Ia wont to tell 1t when speaking
| chattily with the tongue, ought not to
be so rare as II Is. Perhaps some of you
read the letters from London which
Miss Kaiser used to write for The
Tribune. They were nothing much
to brag Of. according to formal
standards. They probably took a
good many more liberties with
Goold Brown and Professor Hart
than one would care to take II sending
1 =
But there was q charm about them that
carried you along. You didn't stop to
apply the measurements of grammar
and rhetoric and all that. You Just
gave yourself over to them and let syn
| tactical propriety 60 where 1t listed.
Why? Because they were written Just
like q clever, jolly young woman would
rattle them off II talking to q group of
friends. That fine gift Of being natural.
Of being easy, Of being fluent without
affectation or redundancy. in short, of
writing English as IL to write were no
trick at all but simply the most matter
of-course thing In the world, is what we
editors find to be scarcer among the
graduates Of our common schools than
teeth In hens mouths or white diamonds
in culm dumps; and to a large degree
we charge you with being responsible
for the deficit.
when our chief writer's were school
bred men. The era Of the New England
goup-of Lowell, the finished scholar
| critic and poet; of Emerson the trans
| cendent seer: Of Whittier, sweet bard
F, Of simple ways, to whom nature re-
vealed her beauties at first hand; of
LongfellOw, rich In human sympathy
and ripe In classic lore; OF Hawthorne,
Of Ripley. of Dana, Of Thoreau-this
was time when American letters took
| their inspiration from the universities;
| a time when not to have been a son of
| Ell or of Cambridge almost meant for
feiture Of ones literary birthright. I
am not sure that can give q sufficient
reason for the fact that this condition
no longer exists; but that 1t does not
| exist can be established by a very brief