The Portland daily press., 1900-06-09
WAR BOOKS FATE.
Most of Them Failed to Sell
Well.
People Got All the Accounts They
Wanted la Papers.


There's tradition TO the contrary, but
its originator ever tried making books
about the Spanish war. Some
of the New York publishers will envy
him his luck. The fate of the war books
has been an interesting commentary upon
modern conditions and feeling, II one has
watched the process from the inside.
Don't say war book to me-" 81 Id n
well known publisher recently in the
New York Sun. I'D rather do the fight
ing than try to sell books about 1t. Mod
ern journalism has spoiled the market for
war literature. The public, while 1t Is at
fever heat with excitement, gets news
paper stories written by the cleverest men
in the profession. The work is done un-
der the pressure of intense enthusiasm
and is dramatic and direct to n degree
that not one man in ten thousand can at
tain when he sits down in coldblood to
write literary review of the war.
1.-THE public has had its appetite glut-
ted during the very storm of battle, and
the ordinary writer's best stuff has been
written then. Only a man whose per SON
ality wins readers, or whose literary in
stinct Is remarkable, can make n success
of war book published after the close
of the war.
"a few men who ground out wet towel
and student lamp volumes, in the early
days of the enthusiasm, found moderate
sale for their books, but nine-tenths of
the stuff published later fell nat. I'm
not afraid to admit that our ventures all
met a dead frost. Yet some of them We're
good and one would have thought their
chances excellent. Looking backward,I
can see the reasons for their failure.
Looking forward, l couldn't. I'm not
the only publisher in that fix. Our liter
airy Judgment was all right but our estl-
mate Of conditions and public sen timent
was wrong. Well know better another
time. Some OF the writers made fair
money-the men who sold their books
outright, that is They were on the mar
ket. Their regulations were excellent.
Most of them had already written good
war stories for journals and magazines
and attracted public attention. We pub
fishers thought they were safe PROPOSE
tions and bid against each other-to the
benefit of the writers and our own subse-
quent discontinue.
II suppose that the four most successful
books-successful from the publishers
point of view, were those OF Richard
Harding Davis, Roosevelt, Hobson and
Sigsbee.. and fancy they sold just about
in that order. We didn't publish any OF
them, 80 l can speak without prejudice.
DAVIS popularity with u certain class OF
readers and his literary instinct gave
him his lead Roosevelt's popularity and
Hobson and Sigsbee had won public at
tention to an exaggerated degree.
''Hobson's book would have had very
good run, If he hadn't killed himself and
everything connected with him, by that
Kissing Bee 1t was "A sweet death, but
the funeral was expensive for the publish
ers. It's dreadful thing for IA clever and
brave young man TO be absolutely devoid
of sense OF humor.
1.-THE human note was what the public
wanted. The writers who recognized
that fact got the public ear. Ninety nine
men out of hundred didn't care an
atom about the strategical conduct OF
the war or the weighty questions involved
in it, but they We're Accordingly interest
Ell in Individual dramatic experiences.
They didn't want to know about the
movements of great bodies of men. They
wanted TO know how one man behaved,
how he fought and suffered and laughed
and groaned and won or died. Realism
that's the thing the people who stayed
at home crayed and realism in Individual,
not general.
Davis and Roosevelt saw that little
fact and their books sold. A goOu many
newspaper men and writers of magazine
articies-the two were identical in this
case-grasped that fact, too. The great
est magazine hit of the war time was u
mans story of how it felt to be shot, a
vivid bit of personal experience. The
public jumped at it. They would have
Jumped just the same If it had had moth
ing to do with our own war. IL was
realistic drama brought down to indivfd-
ual sensation. The rest of the man 5
work didn't attract much attention, but
in that one thing he hit public taste
squarely between the eyes. It's a pity
more writers didn't understand the game
and that more publishers didn't.
''The really successful war books, II
you count success in dollars, have been
the Juveniles. Every writer for boys
knows that he skips the descriptions and
the technical discussions, 50 the men who
wrote war stories for boys, gave them In
dividual dramatic action-just what the
big children wanted, you see.
"As for the men who think they can
sell war books now-well, they better
keep the attempt in reserve for dog days.
1t viii cool on the temperature for them.