Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1910-01-01

failed to recognize the significance OF
these dramas. Thus Dr. Tatlock, of
the University of Michigan. writes:
They seem to me plays of rare Sig
nificance. especially considered togeth-
er, and give one more hope for the
anything which has appeared in this
country for long time"
Gertrude Smith the popular writer of
stories for very little people who has
been spending several months in
Wyoming has left the strenuous
west" as she herself puts it. until next
summer" Miss Smith has gone 10
Atlanta, where she is accustomed TO
make her winter quarters. One of the
first copies of her new book. when
Roggle and Reggie Were Five" to come
from the Harper press was a gift TO
Miss Ethel Roosevelt, to whose father
II was dedicated.
The question of how novels happen
to be dramatiZed comes often to the
public mind. A case in point Is Ann
Boyd the novel by VIII n Harben,
which the Messrs Harper published.
and which the Messrs. Shubert Will
shortly present as a play. 1t appears
that Miss Lucille La Verne. who final
ly made the dramatization. never in
to bring the story to the attention OF
the managers. Miss La Verne is her
self an actress and her desire was
aroused to play the role of Ann. She
carried the story to several managers,
who declared 1t was the one they would
be glad to take hold of If it were al
ready prepared for the stage, but the
playwrlghts proved to be all busy with
previous contracts. Finally the Idea
came of doing 1t herself. whereupon,
sitting down, she began to write and
kept on writing all day and all night.
For days | was not on speaking terms
with my family confessed the dra-
matlst, 'and 1 had to remember l was
hungry" This devoted labor had It's
accepted after the reading of the first
act.
If one rare swimmer and wallower In
the current stream of fiction may trust
his own observation. 1t is symptomatic
that the supernatural. barred from f1c-
ton for several generations, Is re-
entering, with power" Two of the
recent novelists whom a reader with
something else TO do has found himself
somehow forced to read are Du Maur-
Ter and De Morgan. Moderni2ing
Thackrey as they both do, though you
might maintain that the newer also
addicts himself 10 modernizing Dickens
| they both rush in where their masters
would have feared TO tread Dickens.
| indeed, was by no means above telling
ghost stories. But like Mr.. Kipling In
| "A Matter OF Fact" he told II as u
| lie" when he did not present is as an
| equally obvious allegory. and never for
| n moment endeavored to impose upon
! the credulity OF his readers Thack-
cray. on the other hand. strictly abb
stained from relating any adventure
which might not plausibly have hap
| pened to anybody AS for Anthony
| Trollope. he would have died first So
for that matter, different az were his
subjects and his treatment. would
| Charles Reade. The double conscious
ness In Hard Cash. and again in "A
| Simpleton." is not supernatural. but
| preudo- scientific. The mid-Vlctorians
| In fact, dIsdained or ignored as subject
| matter any material which was not
| documentcd. But the late Victorlans
and carly Edwardians have reverted to
the prime matter of romance.
The two recent noyelists named might
be dismissed as amateurs who have
felt bound to impart an adventurous in
tcrest TO their pictures of life and man
| ners There Is nothing of the superna-
tural in Joseph Vance" But the ghos
In Alice for Short" Is so to say, of tho
essence. and it is pretty nearly as docu-
| mentcd as the double consciousness
In Somehow Good" But Du Mauriel
sought and found a properly superna'
tural motive for each OF his stories
The dreaming true" in Peter Ibbct-
son." the hypnotism in "Trilby." are
distinctly of the essence. And so was
the Martian motive in 'The Martlan.
in the authors mind. inappreclable a'
1 that motive may be to the readers who
have yet found delight in the picture oi