The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-12-05
THE LITERARY TRADE IN NAMES.
Publishers Are Governed Chiefly by
Writer'S Regulations.
London Spectator.


Publishing nowadays is becoming prin-
cipally trade in names. Any of the dozen
well-established novelists can sell his work
years before line of it is written. He con-
tracts to furnish at such a date so many
thousand words at so much per thousand.
Nothing is specified as to the quality of the
article; there must be merely SO many thou
sand words, which can be sold to the world
as authentic John Smith or Mary Brown.
Magazines are valued not by the number of
good articles. which they contain. but by
the parade of familiar names on the title
page, and consequently they lose all per-
Sonality in themselves, they command
neither fidelity nor attachment. The OBJ
ject of every author is to secure a following
for himself, which he can practically trans
fer with him from one publication and one
publisher to another, for the constancy of
not on periodicals. The individual wakes,
and the magazine is less and less. There
why an author should have any more feel
ing for the periodical in which his work APP
pears than a Sheffield manufacturer would
feel for the fortunes of some cutler in Bond
street So long as there are cutters enough
to sell his wares and purchasers ready to
buy them, who cares for the middle man?
A good many paens have been sung over
the increased dignity and profits which ac-
crue to authorship from this direct rela-
ton between author and public. We are
cid-fashioned enough to doubt if the change
is wholly for the better; and we are by no
means convinced that authors are better
off than they We're. NO man has ever
and few minor poets are even so moderate
" fortunate as Hogg, who made $3.50 by
his first volume of versa sum which GER
tainly did not come up to his expectations.
However, this is an aspect of the matter
which we do not care to enter on to-day;
we merely desire to consider the question of
dignity Authors nowadays claim to be
simply the servants of the public, if indeed
we may, without offense, attribute to them
so humble a relation. They are no longer
employed by publishers; it is the author
who is good enough to employ the pub
Usher AS to being enrolled by editor
into a regiment or body of men, organized
under a sort of discipline to act for COM
mon purposes, that is a tradition of the bad
old days; it is degrading the free author
into the position. of journalist or common
hack The modern author writes for pos
terity and bitter indeed is his complaint
and fierce his resentment If the editor
should attempt to alter a line of his in
spired effuson. On the whole, he is right:
for in a signed contribution there is no
good reason that he should have his work
spOilt by some one elSe-Still less that he
should receive credit for some one else'S
cancellations. The editors role is being
rapidly reduced to one of mere acceptance
or rejection, and in our Judgment the pub
lie suffers The only things which still in
fluence popular opinion seriously are the
anonymous journals which represent the
intelligence. not of one man, but of a
picked body OF men who are made to pull
together Practically, anonymous writing is
limited nowadays to newspapers.