Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-07-17
AN END TO NOVELS
A REMARKABLE PROPHECY BY
JULES VERNE.
Psychology Of the World Will Be Crys-
tallized in the Modern News
paper.

From the London Mall.
1 had not NJ. Jules Verne's address when
L arrived at Amiens station, but 1 soon
found that it was quite unnecessary, for
everybody knew M. Jules" as his fellow
townsmen call the veteran author. 1 found
him at his club and it will interest Eng
fish admirers of the man to know that in
appearance he is exactly what the author
of his books should be-
OF middle height, white-haired and ruddy-
faced, Jules Verne looks like a sea captain
who is spending the autumn of a well filled
life on shore. Although Seventy-four years
old, suffering from cataract and lame in
one leg Che was shot in the foot by a mad
man some years ago. the old gentleman is
hearty in manner and brightly interested in
all the worlds doings. He met me with an
expression of great interest in the phenom-
email circulation of the number of the Daily
Mall issued Immediately after the kings
operation, about which he had just been
reading, and for few moments | found it
very difficult to draw him on to talk about
himself, for he prefers getting information
to supplying it.
Jules Verne's Tooth Volume.
Il really would much rather interview
you than be interviewed ne said. Yes, 1
suppose I may consider my lifes work as
AN~its iAiiAoiiCo. dl hOIh HOW on
hundredth volume, and in the nature of
things 1 doubt whether I shall ever write
another. In fact, my feeble eyesight pre-
vents me from doing more than q page or
two of 1t day just now II l want to keep
up with the worlds news as we'll Only
eighty-four of my 100 volumes have bee n
published so far, and they will continue to
appear at six monthly intervals, so that of
course, ten or twelve of them are very
likely to be posthumous I work extremely
quick when l am in health, and if the CD
Grafton for cataract which ] must shortly
undergo restores my eyesight for me- as
the doctor hopes 1t will, 1 may after ali.
go on into my second century of volumes
For l am quite untfred, and work either at
my books or at the municipal business of
Amiens, is my chief recreation
Field of Romance.
The field of the romance writer of the
future? You're quite right. the question is
an interesting one, and I'm inclined to
think my answer to it will astonish YOU
Where do 1 think will the novelist Of the
future seek the plots and the environment
for his noveIsp"
Jules Verne leaned forward, and drummed
gently on the table. II do not think there
will be any novels or romances, at ali
events in volume form, in fifty or a hundred
years from now" he said And the old
gentleman laughed at my surprise
NO, l do not think there will be anv
novels. They will be supplanted altogether
by the daily newspaper, which has already
now taken such grip of the lives of the
progressive nations"
But the romance?" I said. "the novel
the descriptive story. the story historic, and
the story psychological?'
The Newspaper as Novel.
"They will all disappear" said NJ. Verne.
They are not necessary, and even now
their merit and their interest are fast de-
Ginning. AS historic records, the world will
file its newspapers. Newspaper writer's have
learned to color everyday events so well.
that to read them will give posteritv a
truer picture than the historic or descrip-
tive novel could do, and as for the novel
psychological, that will soon cease to be,
time
Here M. Jules Verne got excited ct am
second to no living man." he cried 'in INV
admiration of the greatest PSYCHOLOGIST the
world has ever known-Guy de Maupassant,
and he, like all true geniuses, foresaw the
trend of human ideas and deeds and wrote
his stories in the smallest possible connass
Each one Of De Maupassant's soul studies
Is concentrated lozenge Of psychology.
Truth In News.
1.-THE De Maupassants who will delight the
world in years to come will do so in the
newspapers of the day, and not in volumes.
and they will. as you newspaper men ex-
press It. crystalline the psychology of the
world in which they live by writing up' the
day-to-day events. The real psychology of
life is in its news. and more tr.uth-truth
with big Team be gathered from the
police court story, the railway accident
from the everyday doings of the crowd
and from the battles of the future, than
can be obtained If an attempt is made to
clothe the psychological moral in a garb of
fiction"
You mention battles. You do not think.
then, that in the fullness of time all war
must cease?'
mo, 1 do not think so. Nature will al
ways sway the world, and it is mans ma
ture to fight for supremacy no matter how
deadly the conflict may become"
Salesman-'Here's the same book in a
fine binding. 1t Is half calf