WOMAN’S INFLUENCE IN THE JOHNSONIAN PERIOD.
It seems to me that so long as a literary man can hold a pen in his
hand there is no danger of his going to the poorhouse; for when he
becomes too old to give satisfaction as a reporter, or too prosy
and stupid to write essays on “The Probable Outcome of the Briggs
Controversy” for the religious journals, he can always find a purchaser
for a series of _Letters to a Young Man on the Threshold of Life_, and
the sillier the letters the greater will be their success.
I have read dozens of books of this sort, and have often wondered at
the uniform ignorance and stupidity which characterized them. There
was a time when I wondered who bought these books, for no young man
on the threshold of life would be seen reading one of them. I know
now that they are not written to suit the tastes of the young men
themselves, but of the old grannies who will buy one at Christmas-time
as a present for Bob or Tom or Bill.
They are compiled either by literary hacks, enfeebled clergymen, or
women of limited intelligence, and they are artfully designed to
ensnare the fancy of the simple-minded, the credulous, and the good. I
have noticed that those which are plentifully supplied with texts from
Holy Writ command the largest sale, provided, of course, the texts are
printed in italics.
I believe that books of this description belong to what is known
technically as the “awakening” class--that is to say, they are supposed
to awaken a young man to a sense of his own spiritual degradation. I
cannot answer for their effect on very young men, but I do know that
they awaken nothing in my heart but feelings of uproarious hilarity;
for I well remember how the merry Bohemians who enriched the literature
of the _Ledger_ age with their contributions turned many an honest
dollar by means of these admonitory letters, and not one of these
priceless essays but contained its solemn preachment on the advantages
to be derived from the companionship of good, pure women. But never a
word was uttered in regard to the bad influence of good women.
Indeed, I can fancy nothing that would have been less in harmony with a
literary spirit which denied recognition to stepmothers, fast horses,
and amatory cousins than a vivid bit of realism of that sort; and
as for the succeeding age, was not the good Dr. Holland himself the
author of the famous _Timothy Titcomb Papers_? It is even too bald a
bit of truth for the more enlightened Johnsonian period in which we
live. Nevertheless the recording angel has a heavy score rolled up
against the sex which it was once the chivalrous fashion to liken to
the clinging vine, but which, as some of us know, can clutch as well as
cling--a sex which continues to distil the most deadly and enervating
of intoxicants, the flattery of tongue and eye, by the same process
that was known to Delilah and to Helen of Troy.
But although the latter-day process of distillation is undoubtedly
the same that was employed in centuries long gone by the effects of
the poison are by no means the same now that they were then. In the
Homeric age it sent a man forth to do valiant if unnecessary deeds; but
in the present era it slowly but surely robs the young writer of his
originality, undermines his reputation, nips all healthy ambition in
the bud, and leaves him a stranded wreck of whom men say contemptuously
as they pass by: “Bad case of the Swelled Head.” It may happen that
some more thoughtful of the passers-by will have the grace to put
the blame where it belongs by adding: “That young fellow was doing
very well two years ago, and we all thought he was going to amount to
something; but he fell in with a lot of silly women who flattered him
and told him he was the greatest writer in the world. They swelled
his head so that he could not write at all, and now he’s of no use to
himself or any one else.”
But although these poor stranded human wrecks may be encountered in
every large community I have yet to find a writer of advice to young
men with sufficient courage, veracity, and conscience to utter a word
of warning against the poison to which so many owe their fall.
In order that I may make clear my meaning in regard to the evil
influences of good women let us imagine the unheard-of case of a young
man who actually reads one of these books of advice to young men on
life’s threshold, and is sufficiently influenced by its teachings to
seek the sort of female companionship which he is told will prove of
such enduring benefit to him. This young man, we will say, is beginning
his literary career in the very best possible way, as a reporter on a
great morning newspaper. He is not a “journalist,” nor a compiler of
“special stories” (which the city editor always takes special pains to
crowd out), nor is he “writing brevier” or “doing syndicate work.” He
is just a plain reporter of the common or garden kind; and very glad he
is to be one, too, for he and his fellows know that the reporter wields
the most influential pen in America in the present year of grace.
And every day this young man adds some new experience to the store of
worldly knowledge which will be his sole capital in the profession
which he has chosen. To-day the task of reporting the strike at
the thread-mills gives him an insight into the condition of the
working-classes such as was never possessed by the wiseacres who write
so learnedly in the great quarterlies about the relation of labor to
capital. To-morrow he will go down the Bay to interview some incoming
foreign celebrity, and next week will find him in a distant city
reporting a great criminal trial which engrosses the attention of the
whole country. He is working hard and making a fair living, and, best
of all, he is making steady progress every day in the profession of
writing.
It is in the midst of this healthy, engrossing, and instructive life
that he pauses to listen to the admonitory words of the Rev. Dr.
Stuffe:
“Young man on life’s threshold, seek the companionship of good women.
Go into the society of cultivated and thoughtful people. You will be
all the better for it!”
Whereupon the young man arrays himself in the finest attire at his
command and goes up-town to call on certain family friends whom he has
not seen for some years past. Within a short time he finds himself a
regular frequenter of receptions, kettledrums, and evening parties,
with dinners looming up on the horizon. He meets a number of charming
young women, and cannot help noticing that they prefer his society to
that of the other young men whom they know. These other young men are
richer, better dressed, and, in many instances, better looking than
our young friend from Park Row, but what does all that count for in
the face of the fact that he has often been behind the scenes at the
Metropolitan Opera-house, and is personally acquainted with Ada Rehan
or Ellen Terry?
He thinks that Dr. Stuffe was right when he advised him to go into
society, and already he feels sure that he is deriving great benefit
from it. But what he mistakes for a healthful stimulant is, in reality,
the insidious poison against which the Reverend Stuffe has never a
word of warning said; and, unless our young friend be strong enough to
flee from it in time, he will find his feet straying from the rugged
path which leads to true literary success, and which he has up to this
moment been treading bravely and with ever-increasing self-confidence
and knowledge.
“And so you’re really a literary man! How nice that must be! Do tell
me what _nom de plume_ you write under!” some lovely girl will say to
him, and then he will answer meekly that he does not sign either his
name or his _nom de plume_, because he is working on a daily paper--if
he has a mind as strong as Daniel Webster’s he will say that he is
a reporter--and then some of the light will fade out of the young
girl’s deep-blue eyes, and she will say “Oh!” and perhaps ask him if
he doesn’t think Mr. Janvier’s story about the dead Philadelphia cat
the funniest thing that he’s seen in a long while. Then she will ask
him compassionately why he does not write for the magazines like that
delightful Mr. Inkhorn, who sometimes goes down on the Bowery with
two detectives, and sits up as late as half-past eleven. Has he read
Mr. Inkhorn’s story, “Little Willie: A Tale of Mush and Milk”? It’s
perfectly delightful, and shows such a wonderful knowledge of New York!
At this point I would advise my young friend from Park Row to put
cotton in his ears or turn the conversation into some other channel,
because if the sweet young girl prattles on much longer he will find
that her literary standards of good and bad are very different from
those of his editor-in-chief, whom he has been trying so hard to
please, and of the clever, hard-working and hard-thinking young men
with whom he is associated in both work and play. If she can inspire
him with a desire to please her, he will have cause to bitterly regret
the day that he first sought her society in obedience to the suggestion
of Dr. Stuffe; for to accomplish this he must put away the teachings of
his editor-in-chief, who has learned four languages in order that he
may understand his own, and whose later years have been devoted to the
task of instilling in the minds of his subordinates a fitting reverence
for the purity and splendor of the Anglo-Saxon tongue.
It is precious little that the pure, refined young girl cares about
good English, and she would be a rare one of her kind if she did not
prefer it splattered with hybrid French because it “sounds better.”
She has a far higher regard for the author who signs his name to “The
Paper-hanger’s Bride” in the _Century_, or “The Dish-washer’s Farewell”
in the _Ladies’ Home Journal_, than she has for the reporter who, by
sheer force of humor, pathos, and imagination, has raised some trivial
city happening to the dignity of a column “story” which becomes a three
days’ talk along Park Row.
That there are women who habitually judge literary matter strictly on
its merits, and without regard to the quality of the paper on which it
is printed, I will not deny--I am even willing to admit that there are
women who will lead trumps at whist--but I most solemnly affirm that
the average well-educated, clever reading woman of to-day believes in
her secret heart that a magazine story possesses a higher degree of
merit than a newspaper sketch _because_ it appears in a magazine,
and that the “literary man” who has succeeded in selling enough short
stories to the monthlies to enable him to republish them in book form
has won for himself a more imposing niche in the temple of fame than
should be accorded to the late Mr. J. A. MacGahan, who was nothing but
a newspaper reporter to the time of his death.
A few cases of Swelled Head resulting from the flattery of women may
be mentioned here for the benefit of my imaginary young friend from
Park Row, to whom they should serve as so many awful examples of what
may happen to one who deserts the narrow and rugged path of honest
literary endeavor for the easy-going drawing-rooms in which “faking”
and even literary and artistic theft are looked upon with complacency
and tolerance.
About fifteen years ago sundry poems, essays, and short stories,
bearing a signature which is almost forgotten now, began to attract
the attention of the critical, and before long their author came to be
looked upon as one of the most promising and talented young writers in
the city. Unfortunately for himself, however, his very cleverness and
its remarkable precocity proved his ultimate ruin. He was a very young
man when he emerged from his native commonplace obscurity and crept,
almost unaided, to the very edge of the great white fierce light in
whose rays the most ordinary of folks become famous.
And, having reached the outer edge of this brilliant disk of light,
he leisurely sate himself down to rest, firmly believing that he was
in the very center of it, and that the silly flattery of underbred
and half-educated women, and some ridiculous puffery at the hands of
time-serving reviewers and paragraphers, were the greenest bays of
Parnassus. He became thoroughly satisfied with himself and with his
work; and the Swelled Head assumes no more virulent or insidious form
than that. He did not become an unpleasant, egotistical nuisance, as
many people similarly afflicted do. I cannot remember that he talked
very much about himself or his work; he simply agreed with himself that
he was the greatest writer of the age, and that he had already achieved
fame and glory of the highest sort.
That was not more than a dozen years ago, and at that time his name was
on everybody’s lips as the “coming man” of the period. Ah me! how many
of these “coming” men and women have come and gone along the outer edge
of the great white light within my short memory!
In the past six years I have not seen anything from his pen nor heard
him spoken of a dozen times. I saw him the other night on Third Avenue,
and if the light from a huge sibilant electric lamp had not shone upon
him much more vividly than the great white light of fame ever did, I
would never have known him. Seedy, abject, repulsive, he seemed fitted
for no rôle in life other than that of an “awful example” to accompany
one whose profession it is to go about delivering lectures on the evil
results of indulgence in Swelled Head.
In another case of Swelled Head which has come under my observation,
the victim is a woman--rather an unusual thing, for a woman’s vanity
is not, as a rule, as deep-seated as a man’s. This woman, whom I will
call Margaret Mealy, and whose real name is well known to thousands
of magazine readers, dwells in a pleasant inland town and has for a
neighbor an old-time friend and fellow-writer named Henry Kornkrop.
Both are graduates of the old _Ledger_ school--many a Friday morning
have they sat side by side on the poets’ bench in the outer office,
watching the awful shadow of Robert Bonner moving to and fro behind
the glass partition--and both have been successful, though in widely
different ways.
Mrs. Mealy has made the tastes of mediocre people her life-study, and,
as she has never for a single moment lost sight of the great literary
principles which she acquired during the period of her apprenticeship,
she has continued to keep herself in touch with editorial likes and
dislikes, with the result that she is now a regular contributor to the
leading magazines, and the author of various short stories and serials
of such incredible stupidity that I often wonder what hypnotic or
persuasive powers made it possible for her to dispose of them.
Her neighbor, Henry Kornkrop, is a literary worker of another stamp. He
goes to work every morning at nine o’clock, and from that hour until
noon the click of his type-writer does not cease for a single instant.
Two hours more in the afternoon complete his day’s stint; and as his
contract with his publishers calls for neither punctuation, paragraphs,
nor capitals, he is able to turn out a stupendous quantity of fiction
from one Christmas day to another. He writes over the name of “Lady
Gwendoline Dunrivers,” and deals exclusively with aristocratic life and
character. Many a young shop-girl going down-town in an early elevated
train with the latest “Lady Gwendoline” in her hand has been carried
past Grand Street and awakened with a start from her dream of Lord
Cecil, with his tawny mustache and clear-blue eyes, to find herself
at the Battery terminus of the road. There is strong meat in Henry
Kornkrop’s work, and his publishers gladly buy every ream that he turns
out. In one sense he leads an ideal literary life, with no editors to
refuse his work or alter it to suit the tastes of their readers, no
vulgar publicity, no adverse criticisms to wound his feelings, and,
best of all, no pecuniary care; for the “Lady Gwendoline” romances
bring him in not less than $10,000 a year, which is probably twice as
much as Mrs. Mealy makes.
Of course neither of these writers turns out any decent work the
year through, if we are to judge them by a respectable literary
standard; but it is not easy to determine which of the two is the more
culpable--Margaret Mealy, who puts gas-fitters to sleep, or Henry
Kornkrop, who keeps dish-washers awake. I fancy, however, that there
are few of my readers who will disagree with me in my opinion that,
of the two, honest Henry Kornkrop is by far the more successful and
prosperous. And yet Mrs. Mealy made up her mind a few years ago that
she really could not afford to be on such familiar terms with the
Kornkrops--not that Mrs. K. was not the very best of women, and Henry
the most industrious of men--but simply because her position before the
world as a literary woman made it necessary for her to be a little
particular about her associates.
In other words, the silly flattery of young women in search of
autographs, and of mendacious reviewers who have manuscript to dispose
of, has been sufficient to upset the mental equilibrium of this most
excellent woman and leave her a victim of the Swelled Head, pitied by
all who know her, and by none more than by her old associate of the
poets’ bench, Henry Kornkrop, the modest and gifted author of the “Lady
Gwendoline” romances.
One more instance of Swelled Head and I am done. The case to which I
refer is that of Mr. E. F. Benson, the author of _Dodo_, who has, I
am credibly informed, been so overwhelmed with attentions from women
of rank and fashion that his evenings are now fully occupied with
social functions and he is unable to attend night-school. This is to
be regretted, for Mr. Benson is by no means devoid of cleverness, and
I am sure that in an institution of learning of the kind that I have
named he would soon master such mysteries of syntax as the subjunctive
mood, and at the same time vastly improve his style by constant study
of such masterpieces of simple, direct English as, “Ho! the ox does
go,” and “Lo! I do go up.”