In December 1917 Joe Lincoln was interviewed by a young reporter on the
Boston Herald. Although neither the interviewed nor the interviewer was
aware of it at the time, the young reporter was to become one of the
greatest American poets of the century. His name was Joyce Kilmer, the
soldier-poet who was later killed in France during the First World War.
One can imagine young Kilmer, pencil and note book in hand, sitting
with Lincoln before the open fireplace at the Lincoln home which
was then in Hackensack, New Jersey, and asking the now famous “Joe”
questions about his work and career. Fortunate would have been the
casual eavesdropper on the conversation to have memories of such a
meeting. For America had already taken the work of Joe Lincoln to its
heart but was before long to remember the lines of Kilmer’s immortal
poem, “Trees,” which is still popular today.
According to Kilmer’s article which appeared in the Boston Herald
on January 2, 1917, in spite of its proximity to the humorous body
of water called the Hackensack River, there was nothing especially
nautical about the home of Joseph Lincoln. According to Kilmer one did
not expect to find Cap’n Eri lounging on the porch of this pleasant
suburban residence, nor Cap’n Warren and Cap’n Dan caulking the seams
of a rowboat on the broad lawn.
Kilmer wrote, “There was nothing nautical about the house: that is,
except its owner. Mr. Lincoln could not, if he would, disclaim the
title of Cape Codder.” Kilmer described him as, “thick-set and broad
shouldered, a good build for pushing a whaleboat through the breakers
and his skin was bronzed and his flesh hardened by winds laden with
salt spray.”
Kilmer went on to say that Lincoln at that time was unique among
contemporary fiction makers in having written from the first the things
he liked to write about. He had no tale of woe to tell about relentless
editors who had forced him to continue the annals of Cape Cod fishermen
when he wanted to write about Parisian sculptures or London flower
girls, or something of the sort.
“I am a Cape Codder,” Lincoln said as he sat with Kilmer before the
fireplace, which strange to say, was not of driftwood. “My people have
been Cape Codders for many generations. They have lived at Cape Cod
when they were at home, but most of the time, of course, they were out
at sea. I was born at Cape Cod and spend my summers there. I cannot
imagine myself tiring of Cape Cod.
“I didn’t,” Lincoln continued, “set out writing about Cape Cod. I wrote
about it because it was the place I knew best. My first book was a
book of poems entitled ‘Cape Cod Ballads.’ I continued to write about
Cape Cod and Cape Codders, not because I was forced to by editors but
because I wanted to.
“It has been said that magazines commercialize literature and force
writers who do one thing well to do that thing all the time,” Kilmer
said. “What do you think about this?” the young reporter asked.
“Well,” said Lincoln, “I don’t think there is much in it. I think
a lot of nonsense is written and spoken about the commercialization
of genius. I don’t think that a writer can prostitute his talent
successfully.
“There is very little real commercialism in genius, and the reason is
that commercialization of genius doesn’t pay. A man who is successful
believes in what he is doing when he is doing it. You hear people say:
‘What dreadful stuff so-and-so is turning out, and what amazing success
it is having! I could write stuff like that with one hand behind my
back.’
“But so-and-so’s critics couldn’t write successfully what he is
writing. They couldn’t do it because they couldn’t believe in it--and
if a writer doesn’t believe in his work the public won’t believe it,
won’t read it, and won’t buy it.”
“Then you don’t think that the magazines are harmful literature?”
Kilmer asked Lincoln. Evidently at that time stories in magazines
were considered doubtful literature in the beginning of the twentieth
century.
“Not at all,” replied Lincoln. “They pay the writers more money now
than has ever been paid them, but I can’t see it does any harm. I don’t
see how some people figure out that writing for money harms an author’s
work. It seems to me that the spur of the necessity of making a living
is a fine thing for a writer’s creative powers. Writers who are
subsidized, who are paid a regular salary irrespective of the amount of
work they turn out, would certainly not write as much as people who are
writing for a living, and I am inclined to doubt that the quality of
their work would be as high.
“Robert Louis Stevenson said that every good thing that was done
was done either directly or indirectly for money. And certainly the
greatest example of a man writing for money was Shakespeare. He wrote
to make a living and he had no hesitation in writing to order. When
Queen Elizabeth liked ‘Henry the Fourth’ she said to its author: ‘Let
me see the fat knight in love.’ And Shakespeare didn’t draw himself up
and say: ‘I will not commercialize my genius!’ Instead he hurried home
and wrote ‘The Merry Wives of Windsor.’
“And coming a little closer to our own time than Shakespeare, what
about O. Henry? Surely if any man ever wrote for money, he did,”
Lincoln continued.
“I think,” said Mr. Lincoln, “that a man can write a novel more easily
if it has been ordered before hand than if it has not. Once a famous
publisher in New York asked me what work I was doing. I told him I was
busy with a novel. ‘Have you thought about a publisher yet?’ he asked.
I told him that this was all attended to and the contract signed. ‘I
don’t see how you can write to order that way,’ he said. I explained to
him that the contract specified nothing about the plot or style of the
novel, and that I could write it much more comfortably if I didn’t have
to worry about finding a publisher for it. But I don’t think I put his
mind at rest.
“There may be a little truth in the theory that magazines harm
literature, but there is a great deal of nonsense to it. And of this I
am sure, that no literary career had ever been ruined by the magazines.
You may be sure that a man who is writing successfully for the
magazines believes in what he is writing, and is doing the best work he
can.
“Some publishers tell us, however, that the magazines harm literature
in this respect--A novel that has been serialized in a widely
circulated magazine does not sell well when published as a book. But
other publishers say that serialization helps the sale of the book
by advertising it. One publisher told me that the ideal plan was for
a writer to serialize his first two novels, thus advertising himself
and his work, and getting paid for the advertising, and then stop
serializing, bringing out his subsequent novels in book form without
giving them to the magazine for publication.”
“What about the fiction of our day?” Kilmer asked Lincoln. “Is it
better than it was twenty-five years ago?”
“It’s just as good, anyway,” Lincoln replied. “There are more short
stories and they are better paid for than they used to be. The writers
are getting a squarer deal than they ever got before. If a writer has a
good story to tell he will find no difficulty in getting it before the
public. The editors are more eager than ever to discover and encourage
young writers.
“Much of this talk about the lofty mission of the writer is nonsense. A
writer’s mission is simply to do as good work as he can, and that’s all
there is to it.
“As to those editors who are blamed for insisting that authors
continue to write a certain kind of story--well, we must remember that
the editor is merely the interpreter of the public. He knows what the
public wants and the public wants what they know to be the author’s
best work. Editors ask me for Cape Cod stories, but I get many more
requests for Cape Cod stories from the public. People write to me
almost every day telling me to stick to Cape Cod. So I can’t blame the
editors.
“While I was working in a bank I wrote ‘Cap’n Eri,’ giving my evenings
and Sundays to it,” Lincoln went on. “After it was published I
gradually gave up my editorial work, going to the office at first three
days a week, then two days a week, then not at all. Since that time
I have devoted all my time to writing. Now I write novels instead of
short stories most of the time--I have written only two short stories
in a year and a half.”
Lincoln mentioned with amazement the industry of one of the most
popular and highly-paid of modern writers of the time who sometimes
wrote for fifteen hours a day. “When I have worked four or five hours,”
he said, “I think that I have done a good day’s work.”
“What do you think of the custom of dictating fiction?” Kilmer asked
Lincoln in the interview.
“I tried it,” replied Lincoln, “But I had to give it up. I like to
write with a pencil. I correct as I go along. I change a sentence
perhaps a dozen times, and then I let it stand--I don’t revise the
complete story. And that is a hard thing to do in dictating. But I know
there are writers who get the best results by dictating their work.
James did this--he dictated, whether or not he got his best results
that way--and Thackeray dictated most of ‘Esmond’.”
Lincoln’s interview with Kilmer took place in December, 1917. Not
long afterward young Kilmer went off to war as a member of the Rainbow
Division and gave his life for his country on the battlefields of
France, leaving his wife and four small children behind. Had he lived
the full span of life he would have undoubtedly himself written an even
greater chapter in the annals of American letters.