Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1902-05-15
CRITICS WHO ARE SHY.
The Men Who. Have Rejected Most of
the Best Books Are Not Easily
Accessible,

The head of a big Philadelphia pub
fishing house leaned far back in his
revolving chair, his feet upon his
desk.
What do you wish?" he asked, as
he applied a black cigar to his mouth
and gazed at the swirling smoke
clouds, with one eye closed. critically.
He had just lunched. He was con-
tent. 1t would have been a happy
moment to try to sell a novel to him,
relates the Philadelphia Record.
But the interviewer only muir
INJURED: II wish to know something
about publishers readers, about
those men who examine manuscripts
and decide whether they are to be
taken or rejected. They are a mys-
FERROUS class"
They have to be- said the pub
Usher. For two reasons they have
to be. First, because they are con
s~tantly turning down novels that
eventually make a tremendous sue
cess. Now that is a ludicrous thing
for them to do, and if their names
were known people would give them
the laugh for it on the street, and
they would feel ashamed. Second. in
this wholesale reputation of novels
they offend bitterly innumerable hot
blooded and revengeful writer's.
These writer's would not hesitate to
annoy them if they knew them. would
not hesitate even to give them Il
punch on the nos or Il kick. That
has happened to publishers readers
before this. | know one man who
had a front tooth Knocked out by a
brick that a young poet, annoyed at
the rejection of a sonnet, hurled pet
ulantly. So you see in order not to
be laughed at and in order not to be
assaulted, publishers readers go,
tguratively speaking, masked.
The fiction reader for a Boston
house p%retends that he is a wool
salesman. He carries manuscripts to
and from his residence in those cyl
inders of yellow paper that wool
statesmen put their samples in. Yet
the writer's suspect him withal. A
short story writer, at a tea, poured
a cup of hot chocolate down the
back of his neck. She pretended it
was accidental, but he had rejected
a fairy tale of hers the week before"
How many readers does the aver
age publishing house employ?'
"Ahn1t 81 1,-op
And through what process does a
manuscript-say the manuscript of a
novel-go from the time of it's re-
ceipt to the time of its rejection or
acc]eptance?"
well, on its arrival it is entered in
a book and given a number. Then it
is roughly examined and if it he il
literate it is returned at once to it's
author, with u polite printed slip
of rejection. But modern manu-
scripts are rarely %illiterate; in this
age everybody can write; and prac-
tically everything submitted to us
has some degree of good IN it and
shows some signs of skill.
when a manuscript looks promis-
ing it gets eight or nine readings.
We wish to know what different
minds think of it. They always think
different things, and the chapter that
n reader praises another denounces
in strong terms. But out of all that
tumble of contradictory opinions the
publisher manages. somehow. to hit
on what he believes to be the right
course, and this he takes, either ac-
cepting or rejecting the work. to find
not i~nfrequently that his right course
has been the wrong one, after all.
THAT is nothing, though. Every
publisher and every reader habitual-
ly makes grave mistakes. Their rep
utations are smirched and blotted
over the rejection of ] don't know
how many manuscripts that later ON
have made great hits, like David
Harum' or The Crisis or 'rrilbv.'
said the other day to a young wom-
an whose book we were bringing out:
"'Your work has just one element
of weakness; it hasn't been rejected
by enough publishers
"'Helen's Babies had 81 reflections.
'Eben Holden had 81. David Harum'
had AZ. Uncle Toms Cabin had IA.
The latest success of u local writer,
In Search of Ma'm'selle,' by George
Gibbs, was rejected six or seven
times. To have condemned these
notable works is not a piece of pro-
fessional acumen of which any pub
Usher or reader would be proud.
Therefore, these fellows keep their
condemnations Of we!l-known books
buried deep in their breasts and smile
awkwardly when the subject is
brought up"