The sun., 1918-09-29
ME appearance Of Jossely"'s Wife,
| Kathleen Norris's new novel, fairly

creult, ana writing DOCKS That sell IN Tie
any old thousands, without little serious
investigation. Certainly not! Creden-
tials, please, Mrs. Norris; and are your
detectives all in orderl
Kathleen Norris's credentials are her
books, beginning with Mother, and begin
ming more Importantly with The Story Of
Julia Page, published three years ago;
and pausing, for our present purpose,
with JosSelyn's Wife.
Mr.. HoweIls's Explanation.
"Mrs. Norris explains William Dean
Howells, puts the problem or the fact
or the trait before You by quick, vivid
touches of portrature or action. If she
lacks the final touch of Frank Norris':s
power, she has the compensating gift of
a more controlled and concentrated OBJ
servation. She has the secret of closely
adding detail TO detail in a triumph of
what another California author has
called Littleism, but what seems to be na-
lures way of achieving Largeism"
OF course this is the method of Kath-
leen Norris, the method in her madness,
to use the word madness in its old sense
of being possessed by something. What
is Mrs. Norris possessed by? Why, the
irresistible impulse TO put things before
you and make you consider whether they
should be so. HIN, preacher might do
that. Well, had most preachers the
preventative skill of Kathleen Norris there
would be ticket spectators on the side
walks in front of their tabernacles!
If you want 10 make people think write
a novel-but be sure You know how! Mrs.
Norris does. Why, is easily answered
She was not newspaper reporter for
nothing. Newspaper training does incul-
cate "a taste exact for faultlcss fact" that
amounts to disease" quite as the lifting
lines in The Mikado have it.
How Does She Do It?
As in a good piece of reporting, a sim
gle important idea or fact or problem is
at the bottom of each of her novels.
Mrs. Norris never appears to have
taken her fact or idea or problem and
said, 81 will build n tale about this"
She seems always to be describing actual
people and actual occurrences. This
seeming may be deceptive. 1t may be
that she goes about it the other way,
proceeding from her idea to her people
and incidents. Ii she does, the trail is
covered perfectly. For the reader gets
the sensation first of persons and "do-
ings' and then, later, of problems arts
ing from their relations to each other;
which is the precise and invariable eff
feet life itself always gives us. We do
not think of the problem of divorce first
and Of our neighbors John Doe and Cora
Doe afterward; we see Cora Doe going
past the house and recall when John Doe
was last in town and then, and not until
then, do we think of the tragedy of their
lives and the dreadful question mark
coiled in the centre of it.
In other words, life assimilates all its
great facts and problems and the novels:
who would set them forth effectively must
first have assimilated them, too, so that
they will not have to be drought in" the
story he is telling, but will be in it from
the beginning, disclosing themselves as
the action develops. The reader must feel
that he has discorcred the fact or the
problem for himself, that he, all by him
self. has distracted it ont of the scenes
put before him. He must see Cora Doe
go by and hear of John Does last APP