Towards the close of the last century Booth Tarkington wrote “The
Gentleman from Indiana.” It is _as_ the Gentleman from Indiana that Mr.
Tarkington has been widely known ever since. There was a time, some
fifteen or twenty years ago, when every native Hoosier was supposed to
have the manuscript of a “Best-Selling” novel concealed somewhere about
his person. Some of the authors died, and some of them went into other
occupations, and the state has managed to live the belief down. But Mr.
Tarkington remains the most conspicuous living figure linking Indiana
with letters.
Born in Indianapolis on July 29, 1869, he studied at Phillips-Exeter,
and later at Princeton. In both places he was recognized as one likely
to go far. Princeton he entered as a junior, but “made” the editorial
boards of both college publications, the _Tiger_ and the _Lit_--his
sketches for the former being rather better than his literary
contributions to the latter. He wrote the play for the Triangle
Club, and, at graduation, was voted the most popular and promising
man in the Class of 1893. There followed, however, lean years, when
the prophecies seemed unlikely of fulfillment. That was a period,
when, like the John Harkless of his own story (“The Gentleman from
Indiana”), he was figuratively “sitting on a rail fence in Indiana.”
Always a hard worker, he toiled unremittingly at invention and
rewriting, only to have the manuscripts that he submitted with bright
hopes come back to him with disheartening regularity. That was the
story of the five or six years after 1893. His first tale to be sold
was “Cherry,” a whimsical romance of the country about Princeton and
undergraduate life at the College of New Jersey in pre-Revolutionary
days. Accepted by _Harper’s_, it was not published until long after.
Then, suddenly, success came. Almost simultaneously “The Gentleman from
Indiana” and “Monsieur Beaucaire” appeared, the first a full-length
novel of mid-western life, the second a charming little romance of
eighteenth-century manners at Bath when Beau Nash reigned and a Prince
of the Blood came over from France in the guise of a barber in the
French Minister’s train. The recognition won with those two books
has widened with the years. After the “Gentleman” and “Beaucaire”
came “The Two Van Revels,” the germ of which had been a short tale
of two thousand words written in the author’s undergraduate days. As
a result of a brief fling at political life Mr. Tarkington wrote the
stories collected under the title “In the Arena.” That was followed by
“The Conquest of Canaan,” the story of a discredited boy who leaves
his native town under a shadow, and returns to win its reluctant
admiration. The years spent about that time in Europe suggested “The
Guest of Quesnay,” and two shorter stories with scenes laid in Italy,
“The Beautiful Lady,” and “Mine Own People.” The chief distinction of
“The Flirt,” in which the author returned to the Indiana setting of the
earlier books, was the picture of the heroine’s impish brother, Hedrick
Madison. “The Turmoil,” dealing with the evolution of one of the great
mid-western cities, showed Mr. Tarkington in the full maturity of his
power. After that book he struck a new and rich vein in his sketches
delineating boy life, the stories dealing with Penrod Schofield and
William Sylvanus Baxter having found a response in every corner of the
land. Mr. Tarkington has also to his credit considerable achievement
as a playwright. “The Man From Home,” written in collaboration with
Harry Leon Wilson, was one of the most successful plays of the American
stage of recent years. Other plays from his pen are “Cameo Kirby,”
“Springtime,” “Mister Antonio,” “The Country Cousin,” and “Seventeen.”
Calling Indianapolis his home town, Mr. Tarkington spends much of his
time at Kennebunkport, Maine, and usually passes a month or two every
year in Princeton, New Jersey.
[Illustration: PHOTOGRAPH BY PETER A. JULEY