THE SECRET OF STYLE
Communicable Elements
One can readily sympathise with the melancholy of a man who, after
reading De Quincey, Macaulay, Addison, Lamb, Pater, and Stevenson, found
that literary style was still a mystery to him. He was obliged to
confess that the secret of style is with them that have it. His main
difficulty, however, was to reconcile this conviction with the advice of
a learned friend who urged him to study the best models if he would
attain a good style. Was style communicable? or was it not? Now of all
questions relating to this subject, this is the most pertinent, and, if
I may say so, the only real question. It is the easiest thing in the
world to tell a student about Flaubert and Guy de Maupassant, about
Tolstoi and Turgenieff, but no quantity of advice as to reading is of
much avail unless the preliminary question just referred to is
intelligently answered. The so-called stylists of all ages may be
carefully read from beginning to end, and yet style will not disclose
its secret. Such a course of reading could not but be beneficial; to
live among the lovely things of literature would develop the taste and
educate appreciation; the reader would be quick to discern beauty when
he saw it, but the art of producing it other than by deliberate
imitation of known models would be still a mystery.
_Is_ style communicable? The answer is _Yes_ and _No_; in some senses it
is, in others it is not. Let us deal with the affirmative side first.
This concerns all points of grammar and composition without which the
story would not be clear and forcible. No writer can make a "corner" in
the facts of grammar and composition; it is impossible to appropriate
them individually to the exclusion of everybody else; and since style
depends to some extent on a knowledge of those rules which govern the
use of language, it follows that there are certain elements which are
open to all who are willing to learn them. For instance, there is the
study of words. How often do we hear it said of a certain novelist that
he uses the right word with unerring accuracy. And this is regarded as
an important feature in his style; therefore words and their uses should
have a prominent place in your programme. In "The Silverado Squatters,"
Stevenson represents himself as carrying a pail of water up a hill: "the
water _lipping_ over the side, and a _quivering_ sunbeam in the midst."
The words in italics are the exact words wanted; no others could
possibly set forth the facts with greater accuracy. Stevenson was a
diligent word-student, and had a certain knowledge of their dynamic and
suggestive qualities.
The right word! How shall we find it? Sometimes it will come with the
thought; more often we must seek it. Landor says: "I hate false words,
and seek with care, difficulty, and moroseness those that fit the
thing." What could be stronger than the language of Guy de Maupassant?
"Whatever the thing we wish to say there is but one word to express it,
but one verb to give it movement, but one adjective to qualify it. We
must seek till we find this noun, this verb, this adjective, and never
allow ourselves to play tricks, even happy ones, or have recourse to
sleights of language to avoid a difficulty. The subtlest things may be
rendered and suggested by applying the hint conveyed in Boileau's line,
'He taught the power of a word in the right place.'" In similar vein,
Professor Raleigh remarks, "Let the truth be said outright: there are no
synonyms, and the same statement can never be repeated in a changed form
of words."
The number of words used is another consideration. When Phil May has
drawn a picture he proceeds to make erasures here and there with a view
to retaining wholeness of effect by the least possible number of lines.
There is a similar excellence in literature, the literature where "there
is not a superfluous word." Oh, the "gasiness" of many a modern
novel--pages and pages of so-called "style," "word-painting," and
"description."
The conclusion of the matter is this: the right number of words, and
each word in its place. Frederic Schlegel used to say that in good
prose every word should be underlined; as if he had said that the
interpretation of a sentence should not depend on the manner in which it
is read.
It is also highly necessary that the would-be stylist should be a
student of sentences and paragraphs. Surprising as it may seem, it is
nevertheless true that many aspirants after literary success never give
these matters a thought; they expect that proficiency will "come."
Proficiency is not an angel who visits us unsolicited; it is a power
that must be paid for with a price, and the price is laborious study of
such practical technique as the following:--"In a series of sentences
the stress should be varied continually so as to come in the beginning
of some sentences, and at the end of others, regard being had for the
two considerations, variation of rhythm, and grouping of similar ideas
together." And this, "Every paragraph is subject to the general laws of
unity, selection, proportion, sequence, and variety which govern all
good composition." The observance of these rules (and they are specimens
of hundreds more) and the discovery of apt illustrations in literature
are matters of time and labour. But the time and labour are well
spent--nay, they are absolutely necessary if the literary man would know
his craft thoroughly. For the ordinary man, something equivalent to a
text-book course in rhetoric is indispensable. True, many writers have
learned insensibly from other writers, but too severe a devotion to the
masterpieces of literature may beget the master's weaknesses without
imparting his strength.
Incommunicable Elements
The incommunicable element in style is that personal impress which a
writer sets upon his work. What is a personal impress? I am asked. Can
it be defined? Scarcely. Personality itself is a mysterious thing. We
know what it means when it is used to distinguish a remarkable man from
those who are not remarkable. "He has a unique personality," we say. Now
that personality--if the man be a writer--will show itself in his
literary offspring. It will be in evidence over and above rule,
regulation, canons of art, and the like. If there be such a thing as a
mystic presence, then style is that mystic presence of the writer's
personality which permeates the ideas and language in such a way as to
give them a distinction and individuality all their own. I will employ
comparison as a means of illustration by supposing that the three
following passages appeared in the same book in separate paragraphs and
without the authors' names:--
"Each material thing has its celestial side, has its
translation into the spiritual and necessary sphere, where it
plays a part as indestructible as any other, and to these ends
all things continually ascend. The gases gather to the solid
firmament; the chemic lump arrives at the plant and grows;
arrives at the quadruped and walks; arrives at the man and
thinks."
* * * * *
"He [Daniel Webster] is a magnificent specimen; you might say
to all the world, 'This is your Yankee Englishman; such limbs
we make in Yankeeland! The tanned complexion; the amorphous
crag-like face; the dull black eyes under their precipice of
brows, like dull anthracite furnaces, needing only to be
blown; the mastiff mouth, accurately closed:--I have not
traced so much silent Bersekir rage that I remember of in any
man.'"
* * * * *
"In the edifices of Man there should be found reverent worship
and following, not only of the Spirit which rounds the form of
the forest, and arches the vault of the avenue,--which gives
veining to the leaf and polish to the shell, and grace to
every pulse that agitates animal organisation--but of that
also which reproves the pillars of the earth and builds up her
barren precipices into the coldness of the clouds, and lifts
her shadowy cones of mountain purple into the pale arch of the
sky."
Now, an experienced writer, or reader, would identify these quotations
at once; in some measure from a knowledge of the books from which they
are taken, but mostly from a recognition of style pure and simple. The
merest tyro can see that the passages are not the work of one author;
there is, apart from subject-matter, a subtle something that lies
hidden beneath the language, informing each paragraph with a style
peculiar to itself. What is it? Ah! _The style is the man._ It is
composition charged with personality. Emerson, Carlyle, and Ruskin used
the English language with due regard for the rules of grammar, and such
principles of literary art as they felt to be necessary. And yet when
Emerson philosophises he does it in a way quite different to everybody
else; when Carlyle analyses a character, you know without the Sage's
signature that the work is his; and when Ruskin describes natural
beauties by speaking of "shadowy cones of mountain purple" being lifted
"into the pale arch of the sky"--well, that is Ruskin--it could be no
other. In each case language is made the bearer of the writer's
personality. Style in literature is the breathing forth of soul and
spirit; as is the soul, and as is the spirit in depth, sympathy, and
power, so will the style be rich, distinctive, and memorable. Professor
Raleigh says that "All style is gesture--the gesture of the mind and of
the soul. Mind we have in common, inasmuch as the laws of right reason
are not different for different minds. Therefore clearness and
arrangement can be taught, sheer incompetence in the art of expression
can be partly remedied. But who shall impose laws on the soul? . . .
Write, and after you have attained to some control over the instrument,
you write yourself down whether you will or no. There is no vice,
however unconscious, no virtue, however shy, no touch of meanness or of
generosity in your character that will not pass on to paper." Hence the
oft-repeated call for sincerity on the part of writers. If you try to
imitate Hardy it is a literary hypocrisy, and your sin will find you
out. If you are Meredith-minded, and play the sedulous ape to him, you
must expect a similar catastrophe.
_If the style is the man, how can you hope to equal that
style if you can never come near the man?_
Be true to all you know, and see, and feel; live with the masters, and
catch their spirit. You will then get your own style--it may not be as
good as those you have so long admired, but it will be _yours_; and,
truth to tell, that is all you can hope for.