The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-08-24
De Morgan Hard at Work

William de Morgan, the venerable au-
thor OF Joseph Vance," and "Alice-for
Short, who recently authorized me to an
nounce new novel from his pen. secuted
the idea of an interview at first but
eventually yielded on learning that 1
wanted him to discuss the proposition re-
Gently put forth by the Bishop of South
wark, namely, that the best test of a
mans ability is how far can he develop
after the age of 50?' Probably the bishop
could find no better illustration of his
theory-unless, indeed, it be that wonder
full countryman of ours, Edward Payson
Weston-than Mr.. de Morgan, who pub
lished his first novel at the age of So,
and promptly became famous, and who
still is writing at the age of a. having,
in the meantime, produced half a dozen
other novels most of them of prodigious
length.
Revising His Book
Tall, with a flowing white beard and
an eye almost as keen as Mark Twain's,
the veteran novelist looks all of his
age. and confessed when l called on him
at his home in Chelsea, that he is begin
ming to feel the strain of his literary
labors. / found him deep in the revision
of his latest romance, for which he has
not found a name yet, and which Is
so long that he is compressing parts of it.
but it is exacting business" he
said. "I'm afraid 1t may have to come out
in two volumes after all-and then We
shall have the old quarrel with the Ii
braries about the two-volume novel,"
He writes every word of his novels, he
says. ] asked him If he never had tried
debating them but he smiled, remarlxing
that he found the mere holding of the pen
real inspiration. So when you consider
that his stories run to three times the
length of an ordinary novel of today, the
mass of his output is astonishing. He
proved, however, modestly unwilling to
express an opinion as to whether 1t was
fair to test men generally by the extent
of their work after they had passed the
half century.
"ln my case" he said, II cannot say
that I set out deliberately to create
new career" previously to his debut as
| a novelist he had. of course, been known
chiefly for his work in stained glass and
artistic tile makingD Il had, | suppost
1.-THE capacity for writing lying dormant in
me- and 1t Is no eXaggeration to say that
| ] discovered 1t by the merest chance
| There is no doubt that it has developed
from that time.
How "JOseph Vance Was Written
| 'iI had a few hours leisure and | was
curious to see whether j could write IL
the form of fiction. l had written a little
| in other forms when / was quite young
man, and had forgotten all about 1t. I
wrote the first two chapters OF Joseph
Vance just to see what | could do, but
] was so little impressed with the result
| that | put the manuscript away and for
got it, Written on odd scraps of paper, it
| got among a number of business docu-
ments which l carried away with me to
| Florence.
zone day my wife found It. Really
| she said you ought to go on with this
Well. did and when the character of
| Lossie came into the story ! became in
| tensely interested. l was laid up: but |
had pens and paper in bed to help me
| while away the time. Thus | became in
volved in 1t, without the slightest idea of
] publication. You know the result"
| One of the immediate results, by the
! way. was that the head of the typewrit-
ing office which dealt with the manu-
script complained that her girls were al
ways weeping over the story, instead Of
| going on with their work.
"Yoq don't think it fair, then said I
| to the author. ito measure the abilities of
| other men by the standard of your own
activities after 5o?55
! II DON'T" he. replied. "but I see no
reason why any man should regard his
activities after 5o?''