On a former call, she told me that her New York stories are built on
her observations, and that the characters are so changed as not to
antagonize her friends, for she enters the best society through her
family ties and her well-earned prestige.
“It is very peculiar,” she continued, “how, in writing a story, the
characters govern me, not I the characters. I may have the outline and
ending of a book in my mind, but the characters take everything into
their hands, and walk independently through the pages. I have always
found it best to obey. The ending of ‘Anglomaniacs,’ which caused so
much adverse criticism, was not as I had planned. I was helpless under
the caprices of the characters. At first, I was displeased at the
ending; but now, looking back upon it, I am well satisfied.”
“Then the characters to you become real, and you are entirely under
their spell, merely chronicling what to you appears real?”