The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1904-07-13


~ approved. Moreover, it Is profitable,
not recklessly so perhaps, but it Is
agreeable to look forward to nice lit
tie income for a reasonable number OF
years. All this begets timidity, and
timidity is a leech at the throat of
originality.
Let Us examine the canons which
govern the "aristocracy of American
letters" Originality, except in the
mildest form, is prescribed. What
never has been done never can be
done" may be said to be the motto OF
American literature.
The second canon is firm adherence
to the most curious convention that
has ever been insisted upon in any
country-that this world Is not as 1t Is,
but as 1t ought to be. The sole taboo
is not sex by any means. Many anoth-
err tendency of the human mind, many
another exposition Of life, must be for
ever ignored and denounced. Whether
or not this convention originated with
certain men, powerful in shaping Amer
lean literature, who had seen nothing
of the world, or whether there was
deliberate concerted attempt on the
part of the literary powers to make
American literature refined" artsto-
cratic. undemocratic, a rarefed thing
in the third stratum above mortals,
it would be hard to say. The result,
however, 1t may be observed here, Is
not aristocratic, but distinctly middle
class. 1t is the expression of that
bourgeoisie which Is afraid or doing
the wrong thing, not Of the indifferent
artstocrat; of that element which dares
not use slang, shrinks from audac1ty,
rarely utters a bold sentiment ana as
rarely feels one 1t is as correct as
Sunday clothes and as innocuous as
sterilized milk, but 1t Is not aristo-
cratic. The natural result OF It's sue
cess is that American writers feel no
necessity to see the world. Too much
knowledge, indeed, would upset the
prescribed poise, and they spend their
years comfortably describing the little
life about them, adding nothing what
ever to the knowledge OF mankind.
Their utmost range is after dialect
1. e.. illiterate phrases and local color.
They mildly interest people who are
used to them and can get nothing else.
A third canon, which is indeed but
mart of the second, is that fiction
to be literature-American literature
must be anaemic Vigor, vitality, rich
ness. vividness, audacity of thought or
phrase-any quality, In short, which Is
distinctively American-must be weed
ed out, bleached out, of the ambitious
author, would he receive recognition
as an American of letters. Here, again,
if they are trying to be ar1stOcratlc
they are making curious Dlunoer'
The qualities | have enumerated as
anathema distinguish the aristOcrac1es
Of all nations, and, as your true demo
crat is an aristocrat, therein lies the
close relationship between the nigh CIV
ilization of the old world and the SUI
perb Americanism which laughs at an
cient forms and superstitions, goes It's
own gait with apologies to no one. Our
literature fairly represents the bour-
geois spirit of Europe, but it does not
represent IDe I llIlCu otdlOo ia 10y
thing but matter of sort.
A fourth canon. still to subdivide the
second, is what might be called the te-
itch of the body. Magazine editors, their
confederate publishers, their writer's
and readers, defy the body, grovel in
the dust before it. 1t never has done
and can do no wrong. At all events 1t
must be protected at every hazard and
cost. Let the brain rot. The brain Is
invisible and insignificant. Let the
mind close it's doors to the best of
hteratures, to the immensely of life,
but let it keep its physical framework
even as a little child. That the body
was materialiZed for no other purpose
in the world than for reproduction and
as q more tangible expression for the
mind, and that the mind is given us
that we may put into it all the knowl-
edge that can be found in this world,
has never occurred to any Of these
teachers.
A fifth canon is that sleep must not
be disturbed nor even the nerves it'll
lated. Some years ago there was an
institution in New York known as I'm
cut Leaves" Before its assemblages
authors read stories, articles and poems
designed for the magazines. The tick