Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-03-01
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES f. TR4CEWELL.

| When lola fell to specializing on that
most interesting of persons, himself he
naturally enough built up heroic lola
to parade before the public
He pictured himself as the champion
| of the doWnfallen and the miserable,
the stern judge Of vice, the prosecutor
of injustice.
! fore he was any one OF them he was
| first and foremost a writing man who
wanted to make good.
* k*
lola was too great an artist to have
had any other main purpose than to
write as greatly as he could.
| Those contributions Of his to the
thought of the world. as he rather
grandiloquently phrased 1t, were en-
tirely secondary to his real contribu-
tionS--a score or more of prose narra-
tives so nicely timed and conceived that
many of them stood the civilized world
of his day upon it's figurative ear, and
so we'll done that some of them today
remain as world masterpieces.
These remain masterpieces, not be-
cause they had "a higher aim than
merely to amuse." but foremost because
they do just that. There are more in
terpretations than one of the word
We prefer the verb ito interest" II
writer has enough common sense,
enough indignation in his system, to
stir himself up before he writes, he may
stir up his readers. II he is . rare
genius. he may rely on nothing more
than his genius. 1t is enough.
Most writer's. however. seem to de-
mand some prior prodding, some slim
ulation in order to wind themselves up
for the mental and physical task be-
tore them. lola received his literary
training under a French newspaper
owner who believed in astounding the
dear public at every turn. 1t was due
to this training that lola turned rap
idly from theme to theme in his novels.
shocking the literary world of his day
with successive treatments of topics
never treated SO frankly before.
AS one looks back over his history
there is no escaping the belief that he
first Of all had the legitimate purpose
or writing as best he could. This pri-
mary purpose. with so great a man as
lola. held all other purposes. If his
artistic sense had not seen the merit In
his theme. even If no one else had seen
it. he would have abandoned it and
have discovered at once some other
cause" to champion.
His first work was the discovery of
themes to write about, a labor which
every one who writes at all, even let
ter, knows all about. We will not be-
lleve for an instant that he selected the
coal fields of France for his "Germinal''
because he wept tears over the fate of
the miners. No, he saw good story
there and he went and got it. His main
purpose, we insist, was to write as good
a story as he could on the theme he
chose.
In doing that. We allow him all the
other purposes" he liked. Surely his
works, as Dickens did, helped amel-
iorate certain harsh conditions prevail
ing in his day and age. The souls of
some Of his novels still go marching on.
and inasmuch as their battle is not vet
won reader will humbly admit that he
had a higher purpose than Just to
amuse. Such. however, Is the purpose
OF every honest. decent man, every seri-
ous-minded man who sees or thinks
he sees the injustice in the world and
would like to see it set right. In this
grand purpose novelists and readers are
at one.