THE AMERICAN IN LITERATURE
I have been a guest at the annual dinner of the ----, one of the leading
literary associations in America, and later at a "reception" at the
house of ----, where I met some of the most charming men and delightful
women, possessed of manners that marked the person of culture and the
_savoir faire_ that I have seen so little of among other "sets" of
well-known public people. But what think you of an author of note who
knew absolutely nothing of the literature of our country? There were
Italians, French, and Swedes at the dinner, who were called upon to
respond to toasts on the literature of their country; but was I called
upon? No, indeed. I doubt if in all that _entourage_ there was more than
one or two who were familiar with the splendid literature of China and
its antiquity.
But to come to the "shock." My immediate companion was a lady with just
a _soupcon_ of the masculine, who, I was told, was a distinguished
novelist, which means that her book had sold to the limit of 30,000
copies. After a toast and speech in which the literature of Norway and
Sweden had been extolled, this charming lady turned to me and said, "It
is too bad, ----, that you have no literature in China; you miss so much
that is enjoyed by other nations." This was too much, and I broke one of
the American rules of chivalry--I became disputatious with a lady and
slightly cynical; and when I wish to be cynical I always quote Mr.
Harte, which usually "brings down the house." To hear a Chinese heathen
quote the "Heathen Chinee" is supposed to be very funny.
I said, "My dear madam, I am surprised that you do not know that China
has the finest and oldest literature known in the history of the world.
I assure you, my ancestors were writing books when the Anglo-Saxon was
living in caves."[3] She was astonished and somewhat dismayed, but was
not cast down--the clever American woman never is. I told her of our
classics, of our wonderful Book of Changes, written by my ancestor Wan
Wang in 1150 B. C. I told her of his philosophy. I compared his idea of
the creation to that in the Bible. I explained the loss of many rare
Chinese books by the piratical order of destruction by Emperor Che
Hwang-ti, calling attention to the fact that the burning of the famous
library of Alexandria was a parallel. I asked her if it were possible
that she had never heard of the _Odes of Confucius_, or his _Book of
History_, which was supposed to have been destroyed, but which was found
in the walls of his home one hundred and forty years before Christ, and
so saved to become a part of the literature of China.
Finally she said, "I have studied literature, but that of China was not
included." "Your history," I continued, "begins in 1492; our written
history begins in the twenty-third century before Christ, and the years
down to 720 B. C. are particularly well covered, while our legends run
back for thousands of years." But my companion had never heard of the
_Shoo-King_. It was so with the _Chun Tsew_[4] of Confucius and the
_Four Books_--_Ta-h[ue]-[uo]_,[5] _Chung-yung_,[6] _Lun-yu_,[7]
_M[ua]ng-tsze_.[8] She had never heard of them. I told her of the
invention of paper by the Marquis Tsae several centuries before Christ,
and she laughingly replied that she supposed that I would claim next
that the Chinese had libraries like those Mr. Carnegie is founding. I
was delighted to assure her that her assumption was correct, and drew a
little picture of a well-known Chinese library, founded two thousand
years ago, the Han Library, with its 3,123 classics, its 2,706 works on
philosophy, its 2,528 books on mathematics, its 790 works on war, its
868 books on medicine, 1,318 on poetry, not to speak of thousands of
essays.
I could not but wonder as I talked, where were the Americans and their
literature when our fathers were reading these books two thousand years
ago! Even the English people were wild savages, living in caves and
huts, when our people were printing books and encyclopedias of
knowledge. I dwelt upon our poetry, the National Airs, Greater Eulogies,
dating back several thousand years. I told her of the splendors of our
great versifier, _Le-Tai-Pih_; and I might have said that many American
poets, like Walt Whitman, had doubtless read the translations to their
advantage. I had the pleasure at least of commanding this lady's
attention, and I believe she was the first American who deigned to take
a Chinaman seriously. The facts of our literature are available, but
only scholars make a study of it, and so far as I could learn not a word
of Chinese literature is ever taught in American schools, though in the
great universities there are facilities, and the best educated people
are familiar with our history.
The American authors, especially novelists, who constitute the majority
of authors, are by no means all well educated. Many appear to have a
faculty of "story-telling," which enables them to produce something that
will sell; but that all American authors, and this will surprise you,
are included among the great scholars, is far from true. Some, yes many,
are deplorably ignorant in the sense of broad learning, and I believe
this is a universal, national fault. If one thing Chinese more than
another is ridiculed in America it is our drama. I met a famous
"play-writer" at the ---- dinner, who thought it a huge joke. I heard
that his income was $30,000 per annum from plays alone; yet he had never
heard of our "Hundred Plays of the Yuen Dynasty," which rests in one of
his own city libraries not a mile distant, and he laughed
good-naturedly when I remarked that the modern stage obtained its
initiative in China.
A listener did me the honor to question my statement that Voltaire's
"_L'Orphelin de la Chine_" was taken from the _Orphan of Chaou_ of this
collection, which I thought every one knew. All the authors whom I met
seemed surprised to learn that I was familiar with their literature and
could not compare it synthetically with that of other nations, and even
more so when I said that all well-educated Chinamen endeavored to
familiarize themselves with the literature of other countries.
I continually gain the impression that the Americans "size us up," as
they say, and "lump" us with the "coolie." We are "heathen Chinee," and
it is incomprehensible that we should know anything. I am talking now
of the half-educated people as I have met them. Here and there I meet
men and women of the highest culture and knowledge, and this class has
no peer in the world. If I were to live in America I should wish to
consort with her real scholars, culled from the best society of New
York, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, Baltimore, and other cities. In
a word, the aristocracy of America is her educated class, the education
that comes from association year after year with other cultivated
people. I understand there is more of it in Boston and Philadelphia than
anywhere; but you find it in all towns and cities. This I grant is the
real American, who, in time--several thousand years perhaps--as in our
own case, will demonstrate the wonderful possibilities of the human race
in the West.
I would like to tell you something about the books of the literary men
and women I have met, but you will be more interested in the things I
have seen and the mannerisms of the people. I was told by a
distinguished writer that America had failed to produce any really great
authors--I mean to compare with other nations--and I agreed with him,
although appreciating what she has done. There is no one to compare with
the great minds of England--Scott, Dickens, Thackeray. There is no
American poet to compare with Tennyson, Milton, and a dozen others in
England, France, Italy, and Germany; indeed, America is far behind in
this respect, yet in the making of books there is nothing to compare
with it. Every American, apparently, aspires to become an author, and I
really think it would be difficult to find a citizen of the republic who
had not been a contributor to some publication at some time, or had not
written a book. The output of books is extraordinary, and covers every
field; but the class is not in all cases such as one might expect. The
people are omnivorous readers, and "stories," "novels," are ground out
by the ton; but I doubt if a book has been produced since the time of
Hawthorne that will really live as a great classic.
The American authors are mainly collected in New York, where the great
publishing houses are located, and are a fine representative class of
men and women, of whom I have met a number, such as Howells, the author
and editor, and Mark Twain, the latter the most brilliant litterateur in
the United States. This will be discovered when he dies and is safe
beyond receiving all possible benefits from such recognition. Many men
in America make reputations as humorists, and find it impossible to
divest their more serious writings from this "taint," if so it may be
called. They are not taken seriously when they seriously desire it; a
fact I fully appreciate, as I am taken as a joke, my "pigtail," my
"shoes," my "clothes," my way of speaking, all being objects of joking.
The literary men have several clubs in New York, where they can be
found, and many have marked peculiarities, which are interesting to a
foreigner. Several artists affect a peculiar style of dress to advertise
their wares. One, it is said, lived in a tree at Washington. It is not
so much with the authors as with the methods of making books that I
think you will be interested. I met a rising young author at a dinner in
Washington who confided to me that the "book business" was really ruined
in America by reason of the mad craze of nearly all Americans to become
writers. He said that he as an editor had been offered money to publish
a novel by a society woman who desired to pose as an authoress. This
author said that there were in America a dozen or more of the finest and
most honorable publishing houses in the world, but there were many more
in the various cities which virtually preyed upon this "literary
disease" of the people. No country in the world, said my acquaintance,
produces so many books every year as America; so many, in fact, that the
shops groan with them and the forests of America threaten to give out,
and the supply virtually clogs and ruins the market. So crazy are the
people to be authors and see themselves in print that they will go to
any length to accomplish authorship.
He cited a case of a carpenter, a man of no education, who was seized
with the desire to write a book, which he did. It was sent to all the
leading publishers, and promptly returned; then he began the rounds of
the second-class houses, of which there are legion. One of the latter
wrote him that they published on the "cooperative" plan, and would pay
_half_ the expenses of publishing if he would pay the other half. Of
course _his_ share paid for the entire edition and gave the clever
"cooperative" publisher a profit, whether the edition sold or not. And
my informant said that at least twenty firms were publishing books for
such authors, and encouraging people to produce manuscripts that were so
much "dead wood" in the real literary field. He later sent me the
prospectus of several such houses which would take any manuscript, if
the author would pay for the publishing, revise it and send it forth. I
was assured that thousands of books are produced yearly by these houses,
who are really "printers," who advertise in various ways and encourage
would-be authors, the idea being to get their money, a species of
literary "graft," according to my literary informant, who assured me I
must not confuse such parasites with the large publishers of America,
who will not produce a book unless their skilled readers consider it a
credit to them and to the country, a high standard which I believe is
maintained.
Perhaps the most interesting phase of literature in America is found in
the weekly and monthly magazines, of which there is no end. Every sport
has its "organ," every great trade, every society, every religion; even
the missionaries sent to China have their organs, in which is reported
their success in saving _us_ and divorcing us from our ancient beliefs.
The great literary magazines number perhaps a dozen, with a few in the
front rank, such as the Century, Harper's, Scribner's, The Atlantic,
Cosmopolitan, McClure's, Dial, North American Review, Popular Science
Monthly, Bookman, Critic, and Nation. Such magazines I conceive to be
the universities of the people, the great educators in art, literature,
science, etc. Nothing escapes them. They are timely, beautiful, exact,
thorough, scientific, the reflex of the best and most artistic minds in
America; and many are so cheap as to be within the reach of the poor. It
is interesting to know that most of these magazines are sources of
wealth, the money coming from the advertisements, published as a feature
in the front and back. These notices are in bulk often more than the
literary portion, and the rate charged, I was told, from $100 to $1,000
per page for a single printing.
The skill with which appeals are made to the weaknesses of readers is
well shown in some of the minor publications not exactly within the same
class as the literary magazines. One that is devoted to women is a most
clever appeal to the idiosyncrasies of the sex: There are articles on
cooking, dinners, luncheons, how to set tables, table manners, etiquette
(one would think they had read Confucius), how to dress for these
functions; and, in fact, every occupation in life possible to a woman is
dealt with by an extraordinary editor who is a man. Whenever I was joked
with about our men acting on the stage as women, I retorted by quoting
Mr. ----, the male editor of the female ----, who is either a consummate
actor or a remarkably composite creature, to so thoroughly anticipate
his audience. The mother, the widow, the orphan, the young maiden, the
"old maid," are all taken into the confidence of this editor, who in
his editorials has what are termed "heart to heart" talks.
I send you a copy of this paper, which is very clever and very
successful, and a good illustration of the American magazine that, while
claiming to be literature, is a mechanical production, "machine made" in
every sense. One can imagine the introspective editor entering all the
foibles and weaknesses of women in a book and in cold blood forming a
department to appeal to each. I was informed that the editors of such
publications were "not in business for their health," but for money; and
their energies are all expended on projects to hold present readers and
obtain others. The more readers the more they can charge the
"advertiser" in the back or side pages, who here illustrate their deadly
corsets, their new dye for the hair, their beauty doctors, freckle
eradicators, powders for the toilet, bustles, and the thousand and one
things which shrewd dealers are anxious to have women take up.
The children also have their journals or "magazines." One in New York
deals with fairies and genii, on the ground that it is good for the
imagination. Another, published in Boston, denounces the fairy-story
idea, and gives the children stories by great generals, princes of the
blood, captains of industry, admirals, etc.; briefly, the name of the
writer, not the literary quality of the tale, is the important feature.
There are papers for babes, boys, girls, the sick and the well.
The most conspicuous literary names before the people are Howells,
Twain, and Harte, though one hears of scores of novelists, who, I
believe, will be forgotten in a decade or so. As I have said
previously, I am always joked with about the "Heathen Chinee." I have
really learned to play "poker," but I seldom if ever sit down to a game
that some one does not joke with me about "Ah Sin." Such is the American
idea of the proprieties and their sense of humor; yet I finally have
come to be so good an American that I can laugh also, for I am confident
the jokers mean it all in the best of feeling.
There are in America a class of litterateurs who are rarely heard of by
the masses, but to my mind they are among the greatest and most advanced
Americans. They are the astronomers, geologists, zoologists,
ornithologists, and others, authors of papers and articles in the
Government Reports of priceless value. These writers appear to me, an
outsider, to be the real safety-valves, the real backbone of the
literary productions of the day. With them science is but a synonym of
truth; they fling all superstition and ignorance to the winds, and
should be better known. Such names as Edison, Cope, Marsh, Hall, Young,
Field, Baird, Agassiz, and fifty more might be mentioned, all authors
whose books will give them undying fame, men who have devoted a lifetime
to research and the accumulation of knowledge; yet the author of the
last novel, "My Mule from New Jersey," will, for the day, have more
vogue among the people than any of these. But such is fame, at least in
America, where erudition is not appreciated as it is in "pagan" China.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] As a frontispiece to this volume, the cover design used on one of
these old Chinese books is shown.
[4] Spring and Autumn Annals.
[5] Great Learning.
[6] Confucian Analects.
[7] Doctrine of the Mean.
[8] Works of Mencius.