Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-07-20

press L wish l could lay il before YOU.
Genius has been said to be the capacity
or Infinite labor. II this is So Thomas
Nelson Page has IT. His writing is done
slowly and the manuscript is worked over
and over and over again. The first draft
is made with a pencil and in his own
hand. This is often one mass of correc-
lions and revisions before il goes to the
typewriter and comes back to him. The
typewriter manuscript is revised in the
same way, and a second and third COPY
often meets the same fate When the
work is satisfactory it is sent to the pub
fishers.
1t comes back to him again in the
galley proof, and this is revised not only
as 10 words and sentences, but often as
TO whole paragraphs and sections. the old
copy being cut out and new copy in
serted.
| was especially interested in the first
manuscript OF THE Stable of the Inn,"
one of his stories Of The Land of the
Spirit which has just been published.
This IS written with a pen. but il is so
crossed out and peppered with insertions
and revisions that il looks more like the
hierogiyphics in some Egyptian tomb
than the penmanship of the ordinary
author Nevertheless, Ii has well paid
for the labor, for the story is a gem. and
some OF the churches have thought so
much of its moral that they have asked
the permission of DIR. Page to publish
for tract distribution editions of 5000
and more.
Another manuscript over which I look
ed was that of the Life of Robert E.
Lee" which, as you may know, con-
tains 500 pages and promises to be one
of the most lasting and best works re-
lating to the civil war and the great
southern hero thereof.
During the conversation the names of
some of the worlds great novelists came
up, and l asked whether, If Thackeray
and Dickens Were now writing, their
books would be among the best sellers
Most assuredly they would" was the
emphatic reply. Those men would set
the pace III fiction now just as they did
when they wrote their greatest novels.
do not mean that their writings would be
the same. but their natural ability would
be as prominent in their pictures OF the
present as they are in those of the past.
The setting would be different, but the
stories would be as fully appreciated"
The conversation here turned to purity
of thought in literature and 1 asked DR..
Page his opinion of the novels of today.
which verge so closely upon forbidden
ground in dealing with the character
popularity known as 1.-THE white slave"
He replied:
with the sex problem and marriage. That
problem has always been a feature of fc-
ton and it is one of the live elements or
human life. j do not see how you can
with ii. We find it in the literature OF
the past. Dickens touched upon il in the
person of Steerforth in David Copper
field; Thackeray gives US the temptations
of Pendennis in his novel of that name.
and Oliver Goldsmith presents such sit
uations in the Vicar of Wakefield
have dealt somewhat with the social out
cast question in John Marvel. Assistant
and also in one of my stories. The Land
of the Spirit, just published SUCH
things depend entirely upon how they are
treated. They may be handled with per-
feet purity. / hardly know how TO de-
scribe it, 1t is the difference between
nakedness and suggestive sensuality.
Nakedness has nothing, vicious or revolt
ing about It. It Is a part of nature and
should be treated as such. On the other
hand L do not approve at all of catering
70 the vicious instincts along such lines"
FRANK G.. CARPENTER