As we have already remarked, authors are very much like other people,
rarely coming up to the idea formed of them by enthusiastic readers.
They are pretty sure to have some idiosyncrasies more or less peculiar;
and who, indeed, has not? To know the true character of these
individuals, we should see them in their homes rather than in their
books.
Having so lately spoken of Landor, we are reminded of another literary
character who in many respects resembled him. William Beckford, the
English author, utterly despised literary fame, and when he wrote he
could afford to do so, for he was a millionnaire. His romance of
"Vathek," as an Eastern tale, was pronounced by the critics superior to
"Rasselas;" and indeed "Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia," is hardly in any
sense an Eastern tale. "Johnson," says Macaulay, "not content with
turning filthy savages, ignorant of their letters and gorged with raw
steaks cut from living cows, into philosophers as eloquent and
enlightened as himself or his friend Burke, and into ladies as
accomplished as Mrs. Lennox or Mrs. Sheridan, transferred the whole
domestic system of England to Egypt." Beckford read to Rogers one of
his novels in which the hero was a Frenchman who was ridiculously fond
of dogs, and in which his own life was clearly depicted. Even this
millionnaire author was finally reduced to such necessity as obliged him
to sell his private pictures for subsistence. The last which he disposed
of was Bellini's portrait of the "Doge of Venice," which was bought for
and hung in the National Gallery on the very day that Beckford died, in
1844.
Certainly those authors who give us their own personal experience as a
basis for their sketches are no plagiarists. The late Wendell
Phillips[63] delighted, in his lecture on the "Lost Arts," to prove that
there was nothing new under the sun; a not uncongenial task for this
"silver-tongued orator," who was an iconoclast by nature. So early as
the age of twenty-five he relinquished the practice of the law because
he was unwilling to act under an oath to the Constitution of the United
States. In one sense there is nothing new under the sun. Genius has not
hesitated to borrow bravely from history and legend. The "Amphitrion" of
Molière was adopted from Plautus, who had borrowed it from the Greeks,
and they from the Indians. Any one reading a collection of the Arabian
stories for the first time will be surprised at meeting so many which
are familiar, and which he had thought to be of modern birth. La
Fontaine borrowed from Petronius the "Ephesian Matron," which had been
taken from Greek annals, having been previously transferred from the
Arabic, where it appeared taken from the Chinese. There is no ignoring
the fact that a large portion of our plots belonged originally to
Eastern nations. The graceful, attractive, and patriotic story of
William Tell was proven by the elder son of Haller, a century ago, to
have been, in the main features, but the revival of a Danish story to be
found in Saxo Grammaticus. The interesting legend of the apple was but a
fable revived. The English story of Whittington and his Cat was common
two thousand years ago in Persia.
When the writer of these pages visited the grand temples of Nikko, in
the interior of Japan, he was told that the wonderfully preserved
carvings beneath the eaves and on the inner walls, thousands of years
old, were executed by one who was known as the "Left-Handed Artist," who
was a dwarf, and had but partial use of the right hand. It seems,
according to the local legend preserved for so many centuries, that
while this artist was working at the ornamentation of the temples at
Nikko he saw and fell in love with a beautiful Japanese girl resident in
the city; for Nikko was then a city of half a million, though now but a
straggling village. The girl would have nothing to do with the artist,
on account of his deformity of person. All his attempts to win her
affection were vain; she was inflexible. Finally the heart-broken
artist returned to Tokio, his native place. Here be carved in wood a
life-size figure of his beloved, so perfect and beautiful that the gods
endowed it with life, and the sculptor lived with it as his wife, in the
enjoyment of mutual love, all the rest of his days. Here, then, in
Japan, we have the legend upon which the Greek story of Pygmalion and
Galatea is undoubtedly founded.
As regards the subject of plagiarism in general, which is so often
spoken of as connected with literary productions, it should be
remembered, as Ruskin says, that all men who have sense and feeling are
being constantly helped. They are taught by every person whom they meet,
and enriched by everything that falls in their way. The greatest is he
who has been oftenest aided.[64] "Literature is full of coincidences,"
says Holmes, "which some love to believe plagiarisms. There are thoughts
always abroad in the air, which it takes more wit to avoid than to hit
upon."
It has been truthfully said that no man is quite sane; each one has a
vein of folly in his composition, a view which would certainly seem to
be illustrated by circumstances which are easily recalled. Take, for
instance, the fact that Schiller[65] could not write unless surrounded
by the scent of decayed apples, with which he kept one drawer of his
writing-desk well filled. Could we have a clearer instance of monomania?
He also required his cup of strong coffee when he was composing, and the
coffee was well "laced" with brandy. Bulwer-Lytton, in his life of
Schiller, declares that when he wrote at night he drank hock wine. As an
opposite and much more agreeable habit, we have that of Méhul, the
French composer, and author of over forty successful operas, who could
not produce a note of original music except amid the perfume of roses.
His table, writing-desk, and piano were constantly covered with them; in
this delicious atmosphere he produced his "Joseph in Egypt," which alone
would have entitled him to undying fame.
Father Sarpi, who was Macaulay's favorite historian, best known as the
author of the "History of the Council of Trent," having the idea that
the atmosphere immediately about him became in a degree impregnated with
the mental electricity of his brain, was accustomed to build a paper
enclosure about his head and person while he was writing. "All air is
predatory," he said. Salieri, the Venetian composer, prepared himself
for writing by filling a capacious dish at his side with candy and
bonbons, which he consumed in large quantities during the process.
Sarti, the well-known composer of sacred music, was obliged to work in
the dark, or thought that he was, as daylight or artificial light of any
sort at such moments utterly disconcerted him. Rossini, on the contrary,
seemed to have no special ideas about his surroundings when he was in a
mood for composing. He sat down among his friends, laughing and talking
all the while that he was creating, and framing with marvellous rapidity
strains that will live for all time. The whole of "Tancredi," which
first made his fame, was produced in the very midst of social life and
merry companionship. He said he found inspiration in the cheerful human
voices about him. As to the peculiarities we have noted in others, they
must at first have been mere affectations; but such is the force of
habit, that no doubt these individuals became confirmed in them and
really believed their indulgence a necessity.
Carneades, the Greek philosopher, so famed for his subtle and powerful
eloquence, before sitting down to write dosed himself with hellebore,--a
strange resort, as it is supposed to act directly upon the liver, and
only very slightly to stimulate the brain, besides being a fatal poison
in large doses. It is well known that Dryden resorted to singular aids
as preparatory to literary composition; being in the habit of first
having himself bled and then making a meal of raw meat. The former
process, he contended, rendered his brain clear, and the latter
stimulated his imagination. In 1668 he held the position now filled by
Tennyson, as poet-laureate of England. He was a notable instance of
power in poetry, satire, and indecency, whom Cowper characterized as a
lewd writer but a chaste companion. Dryden's own couplet will forcibly
apply to himself:--
"O gracious God! how far have we
Profaned thy heavenly gift of poesy!"
His "Essay on Dramatic Poesy," according to Dr. Johnson, entitled him to
be considered the father of English criticism. His dramas, such as
"Mariage à-la-Mode," "All for Love," "Don Sebastian," etc., were, by
reason of their indecency, examples of perverted genius. He was
sixty-six years old when he wrote his "Alexander's Feast," by far his
best literary effort. While Macaulay calls him "an illustrious
renegade,"[66] Dr. Johnson says, "he found the English language brick
and left it marble,"--a most superlative and ridiculous comment to be
made by so erudite a critic.
When James Francis Stephens, the English entomologist, was about to
write, he mounted a horse and arranged his thoughts and sentences while
at full gallop. This was a plan that Sir Walter Scott also adopted when
he wrote "Marmion," galloping up and down the shore of the Firth of
Forth. But he concluded that he could do better pen-work in a more
rational manner, so this practice did not become habitual with him.
Scott made an interesting confession when writing the third volume of
"Woodstock." He declared that he had not the slightest idea how the
story was to be wound up to a catastrophe. He said he could never lay
out a plan for a novel and stick to it. "I only tried to make that which
I wrote diverting and interesting, leaving the rest to fate." Sir David
Dalrymple (afterwards Lord Hailes) was a voluminous author on historical
and antiquarian subjects. His "Annals of Scotland," published in 1792,
was his most important work; Dr. Johnson called it "a book which will
always sell, it has such a stability of dates, such a certainty of
facts, and such punctuality of citation." Lord Hailes's mode of writing
was very domestic, so to speak, being performed by the parlor fire, and
amid his family circle of wife and children. He was always ready to
answer any appeal, however trifling, and to enter cheerfully into all
current family affairs. This seems hardly reconcilable with the extreme
nicety and absolute correctness of his work.
Cormontaigne, the French military engineer, wrote an elaborate treatise
on fortification in the trenches and while under fire. The Duke of
Wellington, when his army was at San Christoval awaiting battle with the
French, wrote a complete essay on the purpose of establishing a bank at
Lisbon after the English methods. Thomas Hood wrote at night, when the
house was still and the children asleep. Ouida[67] writes with her dogs
only as companions, while they lie contentedly at her feet in the bright
sunny library whose windows overlook the valley of the Arno and her
well-beloved Florence. In the flower-garden before the villa her
favorite Newfoundland dog, not long since dead, lies buried beneath a
marble monument. Her productive literary capacity is wonderfully rapid,
but the demand far exceeds it, and the prices she receives are
unprecedented. She has few if any intimate friends, and no confidants,
leading a life of almost perfect isolation.
Notwithstanding common-sense and experience have ever taught that the
brain is capable of producing its best work when in its normal
condition, still a host of writers have resorted systematically to some
sort of artificial stimulant to aid them in authorship. History tells
us that Æschylus, Eupolis, Cratinus, and Ennius, in the olden time,
would not attempt to compose until they had become nearly intoxicated
with wine. In more modern times, we know that Shadwell, De Quincey,
Psalmanazar the famous literary impostor, Coleridge, Robert Hall, and
Bishop Horsley stimulated themselves with fabulous doses of opium.
Alfred de Musset, Burns, Edgar A. Poe, Dickens, Christopher North, and a
host of others whose names will only too readily occur to the reader,
were reckless as to the use of alcohol. They were both fed and consumed
by stimulants. We are inclined, however, to forgive much of indiscretion
in a brilliant and ardent imagination. Schiller, so lately referred to,
was addicted to Rhenish wine in large quantities. Blackstone, author of
"Commentaries on the Laws of England," remarkable for his clearness and
purity of style, never wrote without a bottle of port by his side, which
he emptied at a sitting.
It is related of Bacon that he did not drink wine when engaged in
pen-craft, but he was accustomed to have sherry poured into a broad open
vessel, and to inhale its fragrance with great relish. He believed that
his brain thus received the stimulating influence without the narcotic
effect. Sheridan could neither write nor talk until warmed by wine. If
about to make a speech in the House, he would, just before rising,
swallow half a tumbler of raw brandy. Burke presents a remarkable
contrast; his great stimulant being _hot water_. The most impassioned
passages of his speeches had no other physical inspiration; all the rest
came from his glowing soul, which was powerful enough to vitalize his
body for an oration of four hours' length. The food which sustained him
on such occasions was _cold_ mutton, the drink being _hot_ water. Brandy
and port, even claret and champagne, would have driven him wild, though
they were the ordinary stimulants of his contemporaries. Burke was, like
Burns, a man of an excitable temperament; but, unlike Burns, he was wise
enough to avoid all dangerous alcoholic excitements, which increased the
impulsive elements of his nature and diminished the action of his
reason. It will be observed that even in the occasional violence of his
invective, his passion is still reasoned passion, or reason penetrated
by passion, so as to reach the will as well as to convince the
understanding.
Addison, with his bottle of wine at each end of the long gallery at
Holland House, where he walked back and forth perfecting his thoughts,
will be sure to be recalled by the reader in this connection.
Consciously or unconsciously he took a glass of the stimulant at each
turn, until wrought up to the required point. Dr. Radcliffe, the eminent
London physician and author, was often found in an over-stimulated
condition. Summoned one evening to a lady patient, he found that he was
too much inebriated to count her pulse, and so muttered, "Drunk! dead
drunk!" and hastened homeward. The next morning, while experiencing
intense mortification over the recollection, he received a note from the
same patient, in which she said, she knew only too well her own
condition when he called, and begged him to keep the matter secret,
enclosing a hundred-pound note.
Burns was wont oftentimes to compose, as he tells us, "by the lee side
of a bowl of punch, which had overset every mortal in the company except
the haut-boy and the Muse."[68] Of course "the pernicious expedient of
stimulants," as Carlyle would say, only served to use up more rapidly
his already wasted physical strength. Sometimes, however, Burns would
compose walking in the open fields. His first effort was to master some
pleasing air, and then he easily produced appropriate words for it. One
noble trait of Burns's character should not be forgotten. Though he died
in abject poverty, he did not leave a farthing of debt owed to any one.
Nothing could be finer than Carlyle's exordium in his review of
Lockhart's "Life of Burns:" "With our readers in general, with men of
right feeling anywhere, we are not required to plead for Burns. In
pitying admiration he lies enshrined in all our hearts, in a far nobler
mausoleum than that one of marble; neither will his works ever as they
are, pass away from the memory of men. While the Shakspeares and Miltons
roll on like mighty rivers through the country of Thought, bearing
fleets of traffickers and assiduous pearl-fishers on their waves, this
little Valclusa Fountain will also arrest our eye; for this also is of
Nature's own and most cunning workmanship, bursts from the depths of the
earth, with a full gushing current, into the light of day; and often
will the traveller turn aside to drink of its clear waters, and muse
among its rocks and pines."
As we have seen, musical composers, like those devoted to literature,
are apt to have singular fancies. Glück, who was at one time the
music-teacher of Marie Antoinette, and whose operas have entitled him to
a niche in the temple of fame, could compose only while under the
influence of champagne, two bottles of which he would consume at a
sitting. He was an eccentric individual, singing and acting the part for
which he at the same time wrote the music. Handel, when he felt the
inspiration of music upon him, sought the graveyard of some village
church, and on the moss-grown stones laid his portfolio and wrote his
notes, never trying their harmony until he had completed the entire
piece. It seems strange to us, in the light of his great genius, to
think what an immense glutton Handel was. We have already spoken of
this, but recur to it again in this connection; for one is puzzled how
to reconcile the grossness of his appetite with his æsthetic nature. He
could devour more food at one dinner than any other composer in
three.[69] Never before was height and breadth of musical genius
combined with such enormous appetite for the good things of the table;
and yet his digestion was as sound as his love and need of food was
portentous. Everything about this great composer was gigantesque, as
became a giant. His forgetive brain was recruited by the nourishment
drawn from a ravenous yet healthy stomach.
Unlike Handel's mode of composition, Mozart played his music upon the
harpsichord before he wrote a note of it upon paper; but he had a most
exalted idea of his mission, and prepared himself for composition, not
by partaking of a hearty dinner, but by reading favorite classic authors
for hours before beginning what was to him a sacred task. His favorite
authors on such occasions were Dante and Petrarch. He chose the morning
for his compositions; but he would often delay writing his scores for
the musicians until it was too late to copy them, and sometimes failed
altogether to write out the part intended to be performed by himself;
yet when the moment arrived, so perfectly had all been arranged in his
mind, he played it without hesitation, instrument in hand. The Emperor
Joseph, before whom he was performing on one occasion, observed that the
music-sheet before him contained no characters whatever, and asked,
"Where is your part?" "Here," replied Mozart, pointing with his finger
to his forehead.[70] He became blind before he was forty years of age,
but continued to compose. The duet and chorus in "Judas Maccabæus," and
some others of his finest efforts were produced after his total
deprivation of sight; nor did he cease to conduct his oratorios in
public on account of his blindness.
Spontini, the Italian composer, like Sarti, could only produce his music
in the dark, dictating to some one sitting in an adjoining room.
Rossini, author of the "Barber of Seville," composed his music as the
elder Dumas was accustomed to write; namely, in bed. Offenbach, of
opera-bouffe notoriety, almost lived on coffee while creating his dainty
aerial music. The writer of these pages met this composer in Paris in
1873, when he was at the height of his popularity, and was told by him
that he took no wine or spirit until _after_ his work of composition was
completed. Cimarosa, the Italian composer, who won national fame before
he was twenty-five, derived his inspiration from the noisy crowd. Auber,
the French composer, could write only among the green fields and the
silence of the country. Sacchini, another Italian composer, lost the
thread of his inspiration unless attended by his favorrite cats, they
sitting all about him while he worked, some upon the table, some on the
floor, and one always perched contentedly between his shoulders on his
neck; he declared that their purring was to him a soothing anodyne, and
fitted him for composition by making him content. Eugène Sue would not
take up his pen except in full dress and with white kids on his hands.
Thus he produced the "Mysteries of Paris," which Dumas designated as
"one-gross-of-gloves long." Buffon would only sit down to write after
taking a bath and donning pure linen with a full frilled bosom.
Haydn[71] declared that he could not compose unless he wore the large
seal-ring which Frederick the Great had given him. He would sit wrapped
in silence for an hour or more, after which he would seize his pen and
write rapidly without touching a musical instrument; and he rarely
altered a line. In early life, poor, freezing in a miserable garret, he
studied the rudiments of his favorite art by the side of an old broken
harpsichord. For a period of six years he endured a bitter conflict with
poverty, being often compelled for the sake of warmth to lie in bed most
of the day as well as the night. Finally he was relieved from this
thraldom by the generosity of his patron, Prince Esterhazy, a passionate
lover of music, who appointed him his chapel-master, with a salary
sufficient to keep him supplied with the ordinary comforts of life.
Crébillon the elder, a celebrated lyric poet and member of the French
Academy, was enamoured of solitude, and could only write effectively
under such circumstances. His imagination teemed with romances, and he
produced eight or ten dramas which enjoyed popularity in their
day,--about 1776. One day, when he was alone and in a deep reverie, a
friend entered his study hastily. "Don't disturb me," cried the author,
"I am enjoying a moment of happiness: I am going to hang a villain of a
minister, and banish another who is an idiot."
We have lately mentioned Dumas. Hans Christian Andersen, speaking of the
various habits of authors, thus refers to the elder Dumas, with whom he
was intimate: "I generally found him in bed, even long after mid-day,
where he lay, with pen, ink, and paper by his side, and wrote his newest
drama. On entering his apartment I found him thus one day; he nodded
kindly to me, and said: 'Sit down a minute. I have just now a visit from
my Muse; she will be going directly.' He wrote on, and after a brief
silence shouted '_Vivat_' sprang out of bed, and said, 'The third act is
finished!'"[72]
Lamartine was peculiar in his mode of composition, and never saw his
productions, after the first draft, until they were printed, bound, and
issued to the public. He was accustomed to walk forth in his park during
the after part of the day, or of a moonlit evening, with pencil and
pieces of paper, and whatever ideas struck him he recorded. That was the
end of the matter so far as he was concerned. These pieces of paper he
threw into a special box, without a number or title upon them. His
literary secretary with much patient ability assorted these papers,
arranged them as he thought best, and sold them to the publishers at a
royal price. We know of no similar instance where authorship and
recklessness combined have produced creditable results. Certainly such
indifference argued only the presence of weakness and irresponsibility,
which were indeed prominent characteristics of Lamartine.
The remarkable facility with which Goethe's poems were produced is said
to have resembled improvisation, an inspiration almost independent of
his own purposes. "I had come," he says, "to regard the poetic talent
dwelling in me entirely as nature; the rather that I was directed to
look upon external nature as its proper subject. The exercise of this
poetic gift might be stimulated and determined by occasion, but it
flowed forth more joyfully and richly, when it came involuntarily, or
even against my will." Addison, whose style is perhaps the nearest to
perfection in ancient or modern literature, did not reach that standard
without much patient labor. Pope tells us that "he would show his verses
to several friends, and would alter nearly everything that any of them
hinted was wrong. He seemed to be distrustful of himself, and too much
concerned about his character as a poet, or, as he expressed it, 'too
solicitous for that kind of praise which God knows is a very little
matter after all.'" Pope himself published nothing until it had been a
twelvemonth on hand, and even then the printer's proofs were full of
alterations. On one occasion this was carried so far that Dodsley, his
publisher, thought it better to have the whole recomposed than to
attempt to make the necessary alterations. Yet Pope admits that "the
things that I have written fastest have always pleased the most. I wrote
the 'Essay on Criticism' fast, for I had digested all the matter in
prose before I began it in verse."
"I never work better," says Luther, "than when I am inspired by anger:
when I am angry, I can write, pray, and preach well; for then my whole
temperament is quickened, my understanding sharpened, and all mundane
vexations and temptations depart." We are reminded of Burke's remark in
this connection: "A vigorous mind is as necessarily accompanied with
violent passions as a great fire with great heat." Luther, however
ribald he may have been at times, had the zeal of honesty. There was
not a particle of vanity or self-sufficiency in the great reformer. "Do
not call yourselves Lutherans," he said to his followers; "call
yourselves Christians. Who and what is Luther? Has Luther been crucified
for the world?"
Churchill,[73] the English poet and satirist, was so averse to
correcting and blotting his manuscript that many errors were unexpunged,
and many lines which might easily have been improved were neglected.
When expostulated with upon this subject by his publisher, he replied
that erasures were to him like cutting away so much of his flesh; thus
expressing his utter repugnance to an author's most urgent duty. Though
Macaulay tells us that his vices were not so great as his virtues, still
he was dissipated and licentious. Cowper was a great admirer of his
poetry, and called him "the great Churchill." George Wither,[74] the
English poet, satirist, and political writer, was compelled to watch and
fast when he was called upon to write. He "went out of himself," as he
said, at such times, and if he tasted meat or drank one glass of wine he
could not produce a verse or sentence.
Rogers, who wrote purely _con amore_, took all the time to perfect his
work which his fancy dictated, and certainly over-refined many of his
compositions. The "Pleasures of Memory" occupied him seven years. In
writing, composing, re-writing, and altering his "Columbus" and "Human
Life," each required just double that period of time before the
fastidious author felt satisfied to call it finished. Besides this, the
second edition of each went through another series of emendations. The
observant reader will find that Rogers has often weakened his first and
best thoughts by this elaboration. The expression of true genius
oftenest comes, like the lightning, in its full power and effect at the
first flash. "Every event that a man would master," says Holmes, "must
be mounted on the run, and no man ever caught the reins of a thought
except as it galloped by him." One who has had years of active editorial
experience on the daily press can hardly conceive of such fastidious
slowness of composition as characterizes some authors. Sir Joshua
Reynolds, in speaking of Rogers, Rochefoucauld, Cowper, and others, and
their dilatory habits of composition, says, that although men of
ordinary talents may be highly satisfied with their productions, men of
genius never are,--an assumption which is not borne out by facts, as we
shall have occasion to show in these chapters. Modesty is not always the
characteristic of genius; and very few popular writers are without a due
share of vanity in their natures.
Voltaire somewhere says that an author should write with the rapidity
which genius inspires, but should correct with care and deliberation;
which doubtless expresses the process adopted by this unscrupulous but
versatile writer, of whom Carlyle said: "With the single exception of
Luther, there is perhaps, in these modern ages, no other man of a merely
intellectual character, whose influence and reputation have become so
entirely European as that of Voltaire." Sydney Smith was so rapid a
producer that he had not patience even to read over his compositions
when finished. He would throw down his manuscript and say: "There, it is
done; now, Kate, do look it over, and put dots to the _i's_ and strokes
to the _t's_." He was once advised by a fashionable publisher to attempt
a three-volume novel. "Well," said he, after some seeming consideration,
"if I do so, I must have an archdeacon for my hero, to fall in love with
the pew-opener, with the clerk for a confidant; tyrannical interference
of the church-wardens; clandestine correspondence concealed under the
hassock; appeal to the parishioners," etc. He was overflowing with humor
to the very close of life. He wrote to Lady Carlisle during his last
illness, saying, "If you hear of sixteen or eighteen pounds of human
flesh, they belong to _me_. I look as if a curate had been taken out of
me."
Buffon caused his "Époques de la Nature" to be copied eighteen times, so
many corrections and changes were made. As he was then (1778) over
seventy years of age, one would think this an evidence that his mind was
failing him. Pope covered with memoranda every scrap of clear paper
which came in his way. Some of his most elaborate literary work was
begun and finished on the backs of old letters and bits of yellow
wrappers. We do not wonder that such fragmentary manuscript always
suggested the idea of revision and correction. It is difficult to
understand why Pope should have assumed this small virtue of economy and
yet often have been lavish in other directions; indeed, it may be
questioned whether it was intended to be an act of economy. Such petty
parsimony is inexplicable, but certainly it grew into a fixed habit with
him. We believe it was Swift who first called him "paper-saving Pope;"
but Swift was nearly as eccentric a paper-saver as Pope. He wrote to Dr.
Sheridan: "Keep very regular accounts, in large books and a fair hand;
not like me, who, to save paper, confuse everything!" Miss Mitford had
the same habit of writing upon waste scraps of paper, fly-leaves of
books, envelopes, and odd rejected bits, all in so small a hand as to be
nearly illegible. William Hazlitt was also remarkable for the same
practice, and we are told that he even made the first outline of some of
his essays on the walls of his chamber, much to the annoyance of his
landlady.
Some idea of the rapidity with which Byron wrote may be inferred from
the fact that the "Prisoner of Chillon" was written in two days and sent
away complete to the printer. The traveller in Switzerland does not fail
to visit the house--once a wayside inn, at Merges, on the Lake of
Geneva--where Byron wrote this poem while detained by a rainstorm, in
1816. On the heights close at hand is the Castle of Wuffens, dating back
to the tenth century. Morges is a couple of leagues from Lausanne, and
the spot where Gibbon finished his "Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire,"
in 1787. Colton, the philosophical but erratic author of "Lacon," wrote
that entire volume upon covers of letters and such small scraps of paper
as happened to be at hand when a happy thought inspired him. Having
completed a sentence, and rounded it to suit his fancy, he threw it into
a pile with hundreds of others, which were finally turned over to the
printer in a cloth bag. No classification or system of arrangement was
observed. Colton exhibited all the singularities that only too often
characterize genius, especially as regards improvidence and recklessness
of habit. He lived unattended, in a single room in Princes Street, Soho,
London, in a neglected apartment containing scarcely any furniture. He
wrote very illegibly upon a rough deal table with a stumpy pen. He was
finally so pressed with debts that he absconded to avoid his London
creditors, though he held the very comfortable vicarage of Kew, in
Surrey.
Montaigne, the French philosopher and essayist, whose writings have been
translated into every modern tongue, like the musician Sacchini was
marvellously fond of cats, and would not sit down to write without his
favorite by his side. Thomas Moore required complete isolation when he
did literary work, and shut himself up, as did Charles Dickens. He was
a very slow and painstaking producer. Some friend having congratulated
him upon the seeming facility and appropriateness with which a certain
line was introduced into a poem he had just published, Moore replied,
"Facility! that line cost me hours of patient labor to achieve." His
verses, which read so smoothly, and which appear to have glided so
easily from his pen, were the result of infinite labor and patience. His
manuscript, like Tennyson's, was written, amended, rewritten, and
written again, until it was finally satisfactory to his critical ear and
fancy. "Easy writing," said Sheridan, "is commonly damned hard reading."
Bishop Warburton tells us that he could "only write in a hand-to-mouth
style" unless he had all his books about him; and that the blowing of an
east wind, or a fit of the spleen, incapacitated him for literary work;
and still another English bishop could write only when in full
canonicals, a fact which he frankly admitted. Milton would not attempt
to compose except between the vernal and autumnal equinoxes, at which
season his poetry came as if by inspiration, and with scarcely a mental
effort.[75] Thomson, Collins, and Gray entertained very similar ideas,
which when expressed so incensed Dr. Johnson that he publicly ridiculed
them. Crabbe fancied that there was something in the effect of a sudden
fall of snow that in an extraordinary manner stimulated him to poetic
composition; while Lord Orrery found no stimulant equal to a fit of the
gout!--all of which fancies are but mild forms of monomania. James Hogg
(the Ettrick Shepherd) was only too glad to write without any of these
accessories, when he could get any material to write upon. He used to
employ a bit of slate, for want of the necessary paper and ink. The son
of an humble Scottish farmer, he experienced all sorts of misfortunes in
his endeavors to pursue literature as a calling. He was both a prose and
poetic writer of considerable native genius, and formed one of the
well-drawn characters of Christopher North's "Noctes Ambrosianæ." N. P.
Willis in the latter years of his life was accustomed to ride on
horseback before he sat down to write. He believed there was a certain
nervo-vital influence imparted from the robust health and strength of
the animal to the rider, as he once told the writer of these pages; and,
so far as one could judge, the influence upon himself certainly favored
such a conclusion.
Some authors frankly acknowledge that they have not the necessary degree
of patience to apply themselves to the correction of their manuscripts.
Ovid, the popular Roman poet, admitted this. Such people may compose
with pleasure, but there is the end; neither a sense of responsibility
nor a desire for correctness can overcome their constitutional laziness.
Pope, Dryden, Moore, Coleridge, Swift,--in short, nine-tenths of the
popular authors of the past and the present, all change, correct,
amplify, or contract, and interline more or less every page of
manuscript which they produce, and often to such a degree as greatly to
confuse the compositors. Richard Savage, the unfortunate English poet,
could not, or would not, bring himself to correct his faulty sentences,
being greatly indebted to the intelligence of the proof-reader for the
presentable form in which his writings finally appeared. Julius
Scaliger, a celebrated scholar and critic, was, on the other hand, an
example of remarkable correctness, so that his manuscript and the
printer's pages corresponded exactly, page for page and line for line.
Hume,[76] the historian, was never done with his manifold corrections;
his sense of responsibility was unlimited, and his appreciation of his
calling was grand. Fénelon and Gibbon were absolutely correct in their
first efforts; and so was Adam Smith, though he dictated to an
amanuensis.
We are by no means without sympathy for those writers who dread and
avoid the reperusal and correction of their manuscripts. Only those who
are familiar with the detail of book-making can possibly realize its
trying minutiæ. When one has finished the composition and writing of a
chapter, his work is only begun; it must be read and re-read with care,
to be sure of absolute correctness. When once in type, it must be again
carefully read for the correction of printer's errors, and again revised
by second proof; and finally a third proof is necessary, to make sure
that all errors previously marked have been corrected. By this time,
however satisfactory in composition, the text becomes "more tedious than
a twice-told tale." Any author must be singularly conceited who can,
after such experience, take up a chapter or book of his own production
and read it with any great degree of satisfaction. Godeau, Bishop of
Venice, used to say that "to compose is an author's heaven; to correct,
an author's purgatory; but to revise the press, an author's hell!"
Guido Reni, whose superb paintings are among the gems of the Vatican, in
the height of his fame would not touch pencil or brush except in full
dress. He ruined himself by gambling and dissolute habits, and became
lost as to all ambition for that art which had been so grand a mistress
to him in the beginning. He finally arrived at that stage where he lost
at the gaming-table and in riotous living what he earned by contract
under one who managed his affairs, giving him a stipulated sum for just
so much daily work in his studio. Such was the famous author of that
splendid example of art, the "Martyrdom of Saint Peter," in the Vatican.
Parmigiano, the eminent painter, was full of the wildness of genius. He
became mad after the philosopher's stone, jilting art as a mistress,
though his eager creditors forced him to set once more to work, though
to little effect.
Great painters, like great writers, have had their peculiar modes of
producing their effects. Thus Domenichino was accustomed to assume and
enact before the canvas the passion and character he intended to depict
with the brush. While engaged upon the "Martyrdom of Saint Andrew,"
Caracci, a brother painter, came into his studio and found him in a
violent passion. When this fit of abstraction had passed, Caracci
embraced him, admitting that Domenichino had proved himself his master,
and that he had learned from him the true manner of expressing sentiment
or passion upon the canvas.
Richard Wilson, the eminent English landscape-painter, strove in vain,
he said, to paint the motes dancing in the sunshine. A friend coming
into his studio found the artist sitting dejected on the floor, looking
at his last work. The new-comer examined the canvas and remarked
critically that it looked like a broad landscape just after a shower.
Wilson started to his feet in delight, saying, "That is the effect I
intended to represent, but thought I had failed." Poor Wilson possessed
undoubted genius, but neglected his art for brandy, and was himself
neglected in turn. He was one of the original members of the Royal
Academy.
Undoubtedly, genius is at times nonplussed and at fault, like plain
humanity, and is helped out of a temporary dilemma by accident,--as when
Poussin the painter, having lost all patience in his fruitless attempts
to produce a certain result with the brush, impatiently dashed his
sponge against the canvas and brought out thereby the precise effect
desired; namely, the foam on a horse's mouth.
Washington Allston[77] is recalled to us in this connection, one of the
most eminent of our American painters, and a poet of no ordinary
pretensions. "The Sylphs of the Seasons and other Poems" was published
in 1813. He was remarkable for his graphic and animated conversational
powers, and was the warm personal friend of Coleridge and Washington
Irving. Irving says, "His memory I hold in reverence and affection as
one of the purest, noblest, and most intellectual beings that ever
honored me with his friendship." While living in London he was elected
associate of the Royal Academy. Bostonians are familiar with Allston's
half-finished picture of "Belshazzar's Feast," upon which he was engaged
when death snatched him from his work.