_Ambitious for Literary Honours_
Your achievements in college, where you distinguished yourself in
rhetoric and literature, would justify you in thinking seriously of a
career as an author.
And the fact that your father wishes you to take charge of his brokerage
business, and to relinquish your literary aspirations, should not deter
you from carrying out your ambitions.
Prom your mother you inherit a mind and temperament which wholly unfit
you for the pursuits your father follows and enjoys. You are no more
suited to make a successful broker than he is fitted to write an Iliad.
Try and make him understand this, and try and convince him that to
yield to his wishes in this matter, means the sacrifice of your tastes,
the waste of your talents, and the destruction of your happiness.
If he cannot be convinced by your consistent and respectful arguments,
then you must quietly, but firmly, refuse to accept a career distasteful
to you.
No parent has a right to drive a child into so undesirable a path for
life as this would prove to one of your nature.
Your father would think the horticulturist insane, who took a delicate
fern and planted it in arid soil, on a hilltop, far from shade, and
expected it to thrive and bear blossoms like the cactus.
Yet this would be no more unreasonable, than to expect a son of your
temperament and inclinations to be happy and successful in Wall Street.
It is a curious study to watch parents, and to observe their utter lack
of knowledge regarding a child's nature and capabilities; and to find
them not only ignorant in those important matters, but unwilling to be
enlightened.
You say it makes your father angry to have any one refer to your
literary talents.
I remember when your father bred race-horses, and how proud he was that
a two-year-old colt showed traits and points noticeably like its
high-priced dam.
He chose for your mother, a woman of rare mind, and of poetic taste, and
why should he not be proud and glad that his son resembles her? When
will fathers learn that sons are more frequently like their mothers, and
daughters like their fathers, than otherwise?
The temporary dissatisfaction of your father is not so sad to
contemplate as your own lifelong disappointment if you accede to his
wishes in this matter.
Each individual has a right to choose his own career in life, so long as
that career is respectable and bodes no evil to humanity.
If, as your father threatens, he refuses to give you support while you
are exploring the field of literature, you should feel grateful to him
for this unintentional incentive to success.
I do not agree with those who consider the necessity to earn money a
misfortune to genius.
I believe the greatest works of art given to the world have been brought
to light through necessity.
The artistic temperament is almost invariably combined with a propensity
to dream, and to float upon the clouds of imagination.
The ranks of wealth and comfort are full of talented and accomplished
people who "never are, but always to be" great.
One great man in a score may have been reared in affluence, but I doubt
if the statistics would show so large a percentage.
There are many hills which contain valuable ore, but if the owner sits
in ease upon these elevations, and gazes at the sunsets, he does not
find the ore. If he is a poor man, and takes his pick and _digs_, he
finds his fortune.
At first he may cast out only loose earth and stones, but by this very
necessity to find valuables, he continues to search until the ore is
reached.
Were you to remain at home and enjoy all the benefits of your father's
wealth, I doubt if you would have the persistence to dig down into the
mine you possess within you.
You would sit on the hilltop and dream.
If you are forced to write to live, you may cast up some rubbish from
the surface; yet by the continual digging you will reveal all that lies
below.
Regarding the style you speak of adopting, let your feeling come
_first_, your style of expressing that feeling _second_. Say nothing
merely to exhibit your style--and hold back some strong feelings until
you can give them the best expression.
As to the methods of getting your work before the public and the
"influence" you need, I can only assure you that unless you write with
purpose, and power, and passionate enjoyment of your art, forgetful of
all things save your desire to express yourself, no influence on earth
can do more than give you a page in a magazine, or a column in a
newspaper for an occasion or two. And if you do write under those
conditions, you will need no influence: for it is just such writing the
world wants; and the editors and publishers will be forced to read you,
whether they are inclined to or not.
Christopher Columbus found his continent because he was so determined,
so persistent, so certain that unknown lands awaited him.
It made no difference who told him that all the earth had been
discovered, and that he would never be able to succeed in his wild
venture. His purpose was too strong to be influenced by the doubts of
others.
It has always seemed to me that God would have made a continent to
reward such a search, had it not already existed.
Unless you set forth on the sea of literature, with the spirit of a
Columbus in your soul, you may as well give up the idea of finding the
Port of Glory. If you do set forth with that spirit, you need ask no
mortal influence.
God is the only influence genius needs.
Perseverance the only method.
To find the way to success alone, is the test of talent.
Some influential author might give you the entreé once to a magazine.
But editors and publishers are men of purely business instincts, and
they will not accept work on the recommendation of any third party,
which they think their public will not like. Their constant effort is to
find what that public _does like_, and the unknown author has an equal
advantage with the genius, if he sends such material.
An author once told me that he "trapped" twenty manuscripts and sent
them out to editors, and all came back unread, as his "trap" proved.
Since he sent them forth with such doubts in his mind, it is no wonder
his trap succeeded and his manuscripts failed.
No great literary fire of purpose could be in the mind of a man who
spent thought and time on such a plot to trick an editor. And because
there was no great flame, the inanimate manuscripts were returned
unread. For even a package of paper sends out its "aura," and invites or
repels attention.
If you are discouraged by the people who tell you that "everything has
been written," and that you can only be a faint echo of greater souls,
then you do not deserve success. I have no doubt the croakers of that
day told Shakespeare the same.
It seems that Shakespeare did take many old themes and other people's
plots and ideas to re-create in his own way. And what a way! Surely he
who best uses an idea is most entitled to the credit.
There is nothing new under the sun, but there is always the new
audience. For the majestic old poem of Spring, bound over in new covers
of green, God creates fresh, eager young eyes and hearts each year. And
not yet has he said to the year, "Do not attempt another spring--there
have been so many before, you can but repeat their beauties." Then why
should any mortal say to the poet or the author, "Do not try to
write--it has all been said before."
Proceed, my young friend, and write what is in your heart. Nothing quite
the same was ever in any heart before, and yet the greater part of it
has been in all hearts, and will be in all hearts, so long as the world
lasts.
Remember that when you write from the heart, it will go to the hearts of
your readers: and when you write from your head it will go no lower than
the head.
And if the critics score or ridicule you, consider yourself on the path
to success.
If you have a message for the world, nothing and nobody can prevent you
from delivering it.
He only fails who has nothing to say.