Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1908-11-28

7 ONDON. Nov. 11--Sonic big pli-
l. waite collections Of books have been
put up at auction lately, and then
have been suddenly bought IN again
iiy the owners. Several other Golee-
lions which We're known to be rip"n-
&ng for the market have lille% s@
dropped out of sight again in the
same mysterious manner. For IN
stance. q fourth edition OF Hamlet"
for which the owner hnd announced
his Willingness to take $1,000, was
Withdrawn on the day Of sale. on
speaking to one of the auctioneers
about this curious situation, an eN-
PLANTATION was furnished by the iacl
that The agents OF wealthy American
book lovers have been active recent
~ in buying UP privately as many
literary treasures as they could put
their hands on. j. =. Morgan has
acquired a large percentage Of these
and lie is said To be averse to having
works which he intends TO purchase
put up at auction. He would rather
pay considerably more for a book
by private treaty than at q public
sale.
A London bookseller who makes Il
specially of "neW-thought' books tells
me there is queer run on books
by the moroSe, cranky Nietzsche, who
ended his days In madness, and on the
other hand on books by the robust
and amiahle Chesterton Strange TO
say, the people who most enjoy the
gloomy pictures Of life portrayed by
the German author, are the very ones
who delight in G. X. Chesterton /
asked for an explanation of this para
doX i'll taste.
NOVELS WITH A PURPOSE.
It can only account for it," said
the bookseller. 'by the fact that the
person who has had a good dose of
NieHsche, needs Chesterton or Mark
Twain to take the taste out of his
mouth. / must admit that in the last
five Years there has been almost n
revolution in thought in England. n
fond Of cheerful books than they
are now Al present everybody is
buying books which contain prob
lens OF some kind, ranging from
marriage to psychology. The novel
with purpose has come back with
a vengeance. L constantly asked the
question, What social problem does
er decides 60 buy. 1t was for this
reason that we recently set out some
{ tables in our shop on which We're
spread literary banquets,'
II do not regard the present at
titude,'' continued the bookseller
''as healthy one at all, or course,
novelists must study the trend Of
events, but it seems a pity that liter
AIRY production should depend so
largely as it does now upon the use
| of bizarre themes in order to mako
books go. A few successful novclists
still deal with the old-fashloned
'humanities' and love stories of the
domestic kind, but sales of such
works are dropping off !"
ASSAULTED HIS CHIEF.
A curious little story has just come
to light concerning Guy Thorne, au-
thor of a number of thrilling serials,
and of the much-advertised book,
when 1t Was Dark" and other tales.
Shortly before Thorne STRUCK ie'' in
real authorship he found it necessary
to apply for position on one of the
big London daiies, which we might
indicate by saying that it claims the
largest circulation of any halfpenny
paper published in England. The now
successful author was appointed an as
sistant editor on this paper. and it
seems that the editor persisted in put
ting UP on the young man work of n
more or less ignomininus character. One
day, the editor sent his assistant out