TŌKYŌ, September, 1899.
DEAR MITCHELL,--I am sending you two documents just received--one from
Lowder's new company, I suppose; the other, which makes me rather vexed,
from that ---- woman, who has evidently never seen or known me, and who
spells my name "Lefcardio." (Wish you would point out to her somebody
who looks small and queer,--and tell her, "That is Mr. Hearn--he is
waiting to see you.") At all events, these folks have simply been
putting up a job to amuse themselves or to annoy me; ---- has apparently
been putting up a job to annoy _you_. We are in the same boat; but you
can take much better care of yourself than I can. I do wish that you
could find out something about those ---- people: I am very much ashamed
at having left my card at the hotel where they were stopping.
One thing sure is that I shall not go down to the Grand Hotel again
for ages to come--I wish I could venture to say "never"--nevermore. It
is one more nail in my literary coffin every time I go down. If I am
to be tormented by folks in this way, I had better run away from the
university and from Tōkyō at once.
That ---- woman is a most damnable liar. I wonder who she can be.
Well, so much for an outburst of vexation--which means nothing very
real; for I only want to pour my woes into your ear. I can't say how
good I think you are, nor how I feel about the pleasure of our last too
brief meeting. But I do feel more and more that you do not understand
some things,--the immense injury that introductions do to a struggling
writer,--the jealousies aroused by attentions paid to him,--the loss to
him of creative power that follows upon invitations of any kind. You
represent, in a way, the big world of society. It kills every man that
it takes notice of--or rather, every man that submits to be noticed by
it. Their name is legion; and they are strangled as soon as they begin
to make the shadow of a reputation. Solitude and peace of mind only
can produce any good work. Attentions numb, paralyze, destroy every
vestige of inspiration. I feel that I cannot go to America without
hiding--and never can let you know where I go to. I shall have to get
away from Tōkyō,--get somewhere where nobody wants to go. You see
only one side--what you think, with good reason, are the advantages of
being personally known. But the other side,--the disadvantages,--the
annoyances, the horrors--you do not know anything about; and you are
stirring them up--like a swarm of gnats. A few more visits to Yokohama
would utterly smash me--and at this moment, I do wish that I never had
written a book.
No: an author's instincts are his best guide. His natural dislike to
meet people is not shyness,--not want of self-appreciation: it is
empirical knowledge of the conditions necessary to peace of mind and
self-cultivation. Introduce him, and you murder his power,--just as you
ruin certain solutions by taking out the cork. The germs enter; and the
souls of him rot! Snubs are his best medicine. They keep him humble,
obscure, and earnest. Solitude is what he needs--what every man of
letters knows that an author needs. No decent work was ever done under
any other conditions. He wants to be protected from admiration, from
kindnesses, from notice, from attentions of any sort: therefore really
his ill-wishers are his friends without knowing it.
Yet here I am--smoking a divine cigar--out of my friend's gift-box,--and
brutally telling him that he is killing my literary soul or souls. Am
I right or wrong? I feel like kicking myself; and yet, I feel that I
ought never again in this world to visit the Grand Hotel! I wonder if
my friend will stand this declaration with equanimity. He says that
he will never "misunderstand." That I _know_. I am only fearing that
_understanding_ in this case might be even worse than misunderstanding.
And I can't make a masterpiece yet. If I could, I should not seem to be
putting on airs. That is the worst of it.