Following the success of “Cap’n Eri” and when the royalties from the
book began to pile up, Lincoln wrote “Partners of the Tide,” continuing
along the same amusing and humorous lines of writing which had been so
successful in his first book. Then came “Mr. Pratt” and “The Old Home
House” and a string of notable successes beginning with “Cy Whittaker’s
Place,” “Galusha the Magnificent,” and so on, with a new book appearing
each year until his death at the Virginia Inn, Winter Park, Florida,
in March, 1944, when he died of an unexpected heart attack at the age
of seventy-four. At the time of his death Lincoln had written and
published more than fifty Cape Cod books, his last book being “The
Bradshaws of Harniss,” published in October, 1943. According to a
newspaper item shortly after his death he left an estate estimated at
$200,000.
One of the most remarkable things about Joe Lincoln’s success as a
writer was the fact (according to his publishers) that each succeeding
novel enjoyed a larger sale than the one which preceded it. During
his life time Lincoln devoted three or four hours every morning to
his work. From nine in the morning until noon or one o’clock Lincoln
disappeared into his workshop often the address of which no one but
himself knew. Here at work he scorned a typewriter and wrote with a
soft stubby pencil on large sheets of yellow paper. When his morning’s
work was done and when he was at his summer home on the Cape, Lincoln
spent his afternoons fishing and golfing and re-exploring the ponds and
lakes of his boyhood where the scrappiest bass and the largest pickerel
were to be found. Occasionally he took a jaunt to Maine or Canada to
try his luck with the northern fish or when he was at home on the Cape
spent his afternoons golfing on one of the beautiful golf courses near
his Cape Cod home or motoring over Cape Cod roads.
Joe Lincoln had little sympathy with the creators of fault finding and
sordid novels of small town life, who insisted that that sort of thing,
and it alone, was realism. He had no desire to attempt that style of
literature himself. Quite the opposite of George Bernard Shaw, who
once said to the effect that much of his success was due to making as
many people as possible hate either him or his work, Lincoln sought a
reputation in letters the hard way by making people love his work. Said
Lincoln, “perhaps I could write a story with wholly gloomy situations
and unhappy misadventures, but I wouldn’t like to try it. I would much
rather try to make people cheerful and keep myself cheerful at the same
time. Life contains both laughter and sorrow; and it seems to me that
one is as real as the other.”
The popular impression that Lincoln used actual people as his
characters in his books and actual localities for his scenes was held
by the author to be without foundation, despite the fact that many
people who spent time on the Cape swore that they knew just the place
or the person to which Lincoln referred in one of his stories. In reply
to this Lincoln said:
“In writing of a Cape Cod town or village, although I purposely
refrained from describing it as any one town in particular, I have
tried conscientiously to give it the characteristics of the Cape Cod
towns I am acquainted with. The promontories and inlets and hills and
marshes in ‘my’ Cape Cod may not be found where I have located them,
but I have tried very hard to make them like those which are, or were,
to be found on the real Cape.
“And so with Cape Codders in my stories. I have never knowingly drawn
the exact, recognizable portrait of an individual. I have, of course,
received hundreds of letters from readers who inform me, in strict
confidence, that they know the original of ‘Cap’t ----’ and recognized
him at once. Nevertheless, they were wrong for no character of mine had
lived. I have endeavored always to be true to type, and in writing of
the old deep-sea Captain, the Coasting Skipper, the Longshoremen or the
people of the Cape villages, I have done my best to portray each as I
have seen and known specimens of his or her kind. But I have endeavored
just as sincerely never to draw an individual portrait which might
offend or hurt. And in attempting to transcribe the habit of language
I have made it a rule never to use an expression or idiom I have not
heard used by a native of the Old Colony.”
As a matter of fact, Lincoln did not have to study Cape Codders. He
was, of course, one of them. His very speech marked him as such--the
slightly clipped, curt words: the “hev” and “hed” that once in a while
take the place of have or had, and even a touch of good old Yankee
talking through his nose. His proudest boast was, “I am a Cape Codder.”
Lincoln’s great success as his books became widely read brought him
to the happy stage which every author dreams of, where his work was
actually sought by editors for magazine publication months in advance
of publication. His books were eagerly sought after by theatrical
producers for plays and motion pictures. A play based upon his novel
“Shavings” was one of the real dramatic successes of the early nineteen
hundreds. It was rumored that he received $80,000 for the rights to the
book as a play.
When interviewed by a reporter at the peak of his career Lincoln
replied when asked to name his favorite author:
“I have a good many, for I read all sorts of books, and at all times.
I don’t know that I can name any particular author who may be called
my favorite. I am very fond of Stevenson, for instance--but then, so
I am of Kipling--Mark Twain, of Tarkington, and many others. I think
I like a story for the story’s sake. I like to like my characters or
dislike them in the old fashioned way. I realize--no one can help
realizing--the fine literary craftsmanship in a book like ‘Lord Jim.’
It is a wonderful piece of character mosaic, and yet in reading it I
am always conscious of the literary work. I say to myself, ‘this is
marvelous; see how the writer is picking his hero to pieces, thought
by thought, motive by motive.’ And being so conscious of the writer,
I do not lose myself in the story. This is not offered as criticism:
certainly I should not presume to criticize Mr. Conrad. It is more of a
confession of something lacking on my part. I enjoy reading ‘Lord Jim,’
or ‘The Old Wives’ Tale’ but I do not return to them again and again
as I do to--well, to ‘Huckleberry Finn’ or the ‘Beloved Vagabond.’
Perhaps this is, as some of my realistically inclined friends tell me,
a childish love for romance on my part. If it is, I can’t help it; as I
said, this statement is not offered as an excuse but as a confession.
“This sort of thing shows in my own stories. It would be very hard for
me to write a long story that would end dismally. It is only too true
that stories in real life frequently end that way, but I don’t like my
yarns to do so. So it is fair to presume that in the majority of books
I may hereafter write, the hero and the heroine will be united, virtue
rewarded and vice punished, as has happened in most of those for which
I am already responsible. Perhaps this same weakness for a story, a
cheerful story, makes me care little for the so-called problem novel.
It doesn’t mean that I am not fond of novels dealing with certain
kinds of problems. Winston Churchill’s political stories, or his ‘The
Inside of the Cup,’ I like immensely; but the sex problem--the divorce
question does not appeal to me. A morbid lot of disagreeable people,
married or otherwise, moping and quarrelling through a long story, seem
to me scarcely worth while. To a specialist in nervous diseases such a
study might be interesting, but I really doubt if the average healthy
man or woman finds it so. Certainly we should not care to associate
with such people were they living near us. We should get away from them
if we could.”
In his inimitable novels Joe Lincoln endeavored to uphold the finest
traditions of America. A compatriot said of him, “He is saving for us
a precious part of America writing down, before it is too late, a past
recent enough, but changing fast, a past closely woven into the very
fibre of our character and meaning as a nation. He shows us, too, the
coming era, the Cape Cod of today against the background of yesterday.
And when I say Cape Cod I mean pretty much any part of our country that
is not within the boundaries of a great city, but that has drawn from
the foundations of American heritage for its foundations.”