The Savannah morning news., 1902-08-03
THE LITERARY OUTLOOK.
FEW BOOKS BEING PUBLISHED
NOW-"THE CONQUEST OF THE
AIR" is TIMELY.


ing the Centennial of Alexandra
the Art of FictiOn-How Some
Great Men Become FamOus-Indi-
ana, the Home of Authors and of
"Fakes."
By Herbert Brewster.
A certain timeliness gives particular
interest to THE Conquest of the Air, ,"
by John Alexander, a book on aerial
navigation which has just been pub
lished in both England and America.
The young Brazilian, Santos-Dumont,
has recently arrived in this country
and is proposing to steer his air ship
around New York harbor in connection
with an exhibition at one of the big
shore resorts. There is also being
built, by an American aeronaut, Leo
Stevens, an airship in which much hope
is compas sed. Edison is said to be
working on the aerial problem and an
American Club has been organized for
the purpose of furthering matters as
much as possible by inviting the CO.
operation of all investigators of aerial
navigation. The problem has been
most attractive one, as well as most
battling, for almost a century, and
while the present volume will not give
the laymen precise directions as to
how to fly it will give him consider
able information as to what has been
done to that end. Sir Hiram Maxim,
who has been experimenting with aero
planes for several years, contributes
10 fhn
it may be understood that this book
teaches that little confidence is to be
placed in the solution of the aerial
problem by such investigators as
Santos Dumont, who are trying Ito
steer a feather through the air. 1t
seems to be a general belief of sclen-
tific men and those who have given the
problem much thought that the air will
never be conquered by air ships
Fighter than the air) and that sue
cessful aerial navigation will be ac-
complished-if at abby flying ma
chimes (heavier than the air). At any
rate it will doubtless be some time be-
fore Santosdumontobiles will come in
to general use, though, of course, each
of us hopes to live to see 'the heavens
filled with commerce and argosies of
magic sail"
When the volume of stories recently
published under the title of "a Prince
of Good Fellows was being made up
it was proposed to call them 1.-THE Jim
mic Stories The present title is
doubtless more attractive, though,
with some explanation, the former
would have been entirely appropriate.
for the tales are all concerned with
the young King James v, of Scotland,
and, if half of the stories are found
Cd Of &c he a G
merry a monarch as ever sat on
throne. The reading public may well
be grateful to Mr.. Robert Barr for
having given them this book, for not
since THE Border Tales of John Will
son christopher North) have better
stories been written about these char
acters and times. In "a Prince of Good
Fellows" Jamie is shown as one of
band of conspirators against himself,
as beggar, as poet, as a traveller
over his own Kingdom as an adventurer
at home, a lover abroad, etc.-in all of
which adventures he carries himself
well. Jamie was often going about
among his people, unknown TO them,
in order to discover what was going
on in his kingdom and to learn what
his subjects thought of their young
king. There is a good plot in each tale.
Last week ther2e was celebrated in
France the centennial of Alexandra
Dumas-a fact worthy of note, because
of the long continued popularity of
this great novelist. Critics will call
him as second-rate writer, just as
they have done for years, but III point
of demand for his work on the part
of the public and of attempt to supply
this demand on the part of the author,
Dumas surely ranked above all ether
writer's. So many tales are told of the
Dumas novel factory that it is proba-
bly, safe to put most of them down as
untrue, but assuredly it would have
been a physical impossibility for Du-
mas to have written by hand himself
all of the books which bear his name
on their title pages. Dumas admitted
that he employed collaborators, the
public supposing these persons to be
merely private secretaries to whom the
novelist dictated his stories. For a long
time a novel month was issued from
the novel factory and had not the pro-
prietor been SO prodigal with his mon
ey, he might have been immensely
wealthy, so popular was his work and
such good prices did he obtain. Dumas
was once asked about some inaccur-
acy in one of his books.
II never read the book he is said
to have replied. Let me see; who
wrote that story. All I
remember. 1t was the littla
Auguste Macquet. 1 must go and box
his ears.
Naturally enough. during his life
time Dumas was the object of bitter
criticism from his fellow craftsmen
One of them wrote the Dumas Novel
Factory (Fabrique de Romanst Maison
Dumas ct Cie):
Truly, it is difficult to define the
limits of a writer's fecundity, or to
compute the number of lines he can
write in a given time. The novel es-
pecially, being a frivolous work, has
the right to hurry and scatter vol
umes in profusion. Still, the subject
has to mature, the plan has to be
laid, the threads of an intrigue have
to be got in hand, the different parts
of work have to be co-ordinated
Very we'll Allowing for these prep
arations, supposing an author to take
no more rest than is absolutely neces-
sary, supposing him to eat hastily and
sleep little-all impossible conditions
on this hypothesis, 1 say, the most fe-
cund writer might produce fifteen vol
umes a year. Fifteen volumes, M. Du-
mas And even so he would have no
time to polish his style or to correct
his proofs.
Very well. Now, we will make the
following simple calculation:
The most skillful copyist, writing
twelve hours a day, hardly copies $500
letters an hour. AT the end of the