The Washington times., 1921-07-31
AT lazge 81
Among The NPlA
Hterati,N y
Making q Novelist.

fight a great international trust.
amass a fortune, throw 1t away to
volunteer in a war for ideals, write
the outstanding realistic novel In a
year when all novelists Of pretensions
are photographing the sordid details
of colorless lives, romance more
colorful and exotic than Haggard,
produce a successful play and make
his mark as a journalist. has one
OF the worlds most valued assets-a
constructive imagination. Such a
man is Gilbert Frankau. the young
fun Of contrasts as the hero Of lis
Seeds of Enchantment."
Mr.. Frankau was reared in an at
mosphere of literature and high
finance, for his mother was Frank
Dandy" one of the most popular
povelists of the last generation, and
his father a wealthy wholesale cigar
importer. AS a child Gilbert could
never decide which was the moro
fascinating pursuit-to write stories
about charming people and places
that never were, or to be a cigar
merchant and know all the queer
foreign cities that his father talked
about so Familiarity. He compromised
by becoming both.
After his schooling at Eton,
Frankau was apprenticed in a Ger.
man cigar factory, where he worked
as an ordinary laborer for a year.
Then he joined his fathers firm in
London and at the age Of twenty-one
succeeded to the presidency of thu
company. He also succeeded to a
fight with the Havana end of the
tobacco trust and waged It to a
successful conclusion. Then came
the war and Frankau was one Of
the first to volunteer although 1t
involved the selling out of his bust
ness at great loss. Enlisting as a
private. a field gunner on the west.
ern front, he was promoted to staff
captain, was sent to Italy on. a spe-
cial mission. was shell shocked and
invaded out of the service with the
permanent rank Of captain. But
Frankau had not fought the war for
military honors and he never used
the title of his rank.
Living In the country for two years,
nursing back his strength, Frankau
began to write Peter Jameson"
realistic story Of a cigar merchant,
woven upon the woof OF his own ex-
perience and one of the outstanding
novels of 1920. Next came Seeds of
Enchantment," a romance of Indo-
China. so exotic. so fascinatingly re-
mote from actually that 1t is diff.
cult to imagine 1t as the work Of the
author of Peter Jameson" This also
made an instant success both in Eng
land and America. where it was pub
lished last spring by Doubleday. Page
and Company.
Since then Mr.. Frankau has made
his mark in journalism, has drama
tized one Of his mothers novels, which
ran all winter in London with his wife
In the cast, and is now making a col
lection of his poetry for book publ
cation.
Although at the age when most
eager young writer's are dabbling with
radical and Socialistic schemes for
bringing about the millennium, Gilbert
Frankau is an apostle of the doctrine
of hard work and plenty Of 1t as the
solution for the after-the-war unrest.
He loathes and is loathed by high
brows and believes that literature can
not be big unless it has a popular
appeal. Popular books aren't always
good" he says, but good books are
always popular" Mr.. Frankau is an
enthusiastic hunter and fisher and his
favorite sport is playing poker.