The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-08-03
THE
LITERARY
OUTLOOK
BY HERBERT BREWSTER.

BY HERBERT BREWSTER
CERTAIN timeliness gives partic-
/ ~ ular interest to 1.-The Conquest of
the Air." by John Alexander. a
book on aerial navigation which has
| just been published in both England
| and America. The young Brazilian,
Santos Dumont has recently arrived in
| this country and is proposing TO steer
| his airship 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 compassed. Edi-
son 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 cooperation of all in
veStigatOrs of aerial navigation. The
| problem has been a most attractive
one, as well as most battling, for almost
| a century, and while the present VOL
ume will not give the layman precise
directions as TO how TO ny. il will give
him considerable information as to
what has been done to that end Sir
Hiram Maxim, who has been expert
menting with aeroplanes for several
years, contributes preface to the vol
ume, from which il may be understood
hdence is TO be places in the solution
of the aerial problem by such investi-
gators as Santos-Dumont, who are try
ing ito steer a feather through the
air." 1t seems TO be a general belief
of scientific 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
successful aerial navigation viii be ae-
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 1.-The heaYenf
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 The Jimmie
Stories.'' The present title is doubt
less 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 founded on
facts of his career. he was as merry a
monarch as ever sat on a throne. The
reading public may well be grateful to
Mr. Robert Barr for having given
them this book. for not since The Bor-
der Tales of John Wilson christopher
North have better stories been writ
ten about these characters and times.
In "A Prince of Good Fellows" Jamie
is shown as one of band of conspira-
tors against himself, as a beggar, as
a poet. as a traveller over his own
kingdom, as an adventurer at home,
lover abroad. etc.-in all OF which
adventures he carries himself well. Ja-
mic 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 sub
jects thought of their young ruler.
There is a good plot in each tale.
Last week there 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 a second-rate writer, just as they
have done for years. but in point of de-
mand 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 other
writer's. So many tales are told of the
Dumas novel factory that it is prob
ably safe to put most of them down
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 a month was issued
from the novel factory and had not the
proprietor been so prodigal with his
money, he might have been immensely
wealthy, so popular was his work and
such good prices did he obtain. Dumas
was once asked about some inaccuracy
in one of his books.
Il never read the book he is said
to have replied Let me see; who
wrote that story. All. / remember. It
was the little Auguste Macquet.
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 of 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 volumes in
profusion. Still the subject has TO ma
ture, 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
preparations, supposing an author to
take no more rest than is absolutely
necessary supposing him to eat hasti-
" and sleep little-all impossible con-
ditions-on this hypothesis, I say, the
most fecund writer might produce fif-
teen volumes a year Fifteen volumes,
NJ. Dumas. And even so he would have
no time TO polish his style or to correct
his proofs.
You published sixty volumes in 1916.
Very we'll Now we will make the fol-
lowing simple calculation.
THE most skillful copyist, writing
twelve hours day, hardly copies $500
letters an hour At the end of the day
he will have got through 46,S00 letters,
or sixty pages of the average novel. He
Will be able TO copy five octave vol
umes in a month. or sixty in a year
on condition that he never stops for an
hour. and never loses a second.
Monsieur Dumas you are q very
meritOrious copying clerk.
From the 1st of January TO the 31st
of December you work regularly twelve
hours a day, sleeping little, and eating
in haste; you never devote q moment
to pleasure, you hardly ever travel, you
are never met out of doors Conse-
quently. on the assumption that your
dramatic work, your correspondence