Critical Studies

tution, or exercise the same authority. The English temper is not academic, the Royal Academy is proof enough of that. Moreover, Englishmen are indi

ndon what is called a Society of Authors, which is supposed to resemble the Société des Gens de Lettres in Paris, but the English Society appears to be chiefly an association for the multiplication and publication of inferior works, and its authority on literature is nil. In addition to these, th

ncement of volumes originally published at six, eight, ten, twelve shillings, to be sold second-hand, perfectly new and uncut, at the miserable prices of two shillings, eighteen-pence, one shilling, and even sixpence? Amongst these is sometimes a work of real and scholarly worth, which it is painful to see thus sacrificed, but rarely; for it is rarely that such a work

paper, so easily obtainable, with the title of the book clearly printed on its flank. Instead of this result, some unwritten law, as violently despotic as that which used to compel the three-volume issue, has decreed that the London romance shall always appear in a cloth-bound volume at six shillings; the most foolish price that could be selected, too dear to be suitable for private purchas

inexplicable as why the London drapers sell you a stuff at six shillings a yard in February, but, if you wait till June, sell it you at two-and-sixpence a yard at the clearance sales. Either

first price be correct, why alter it to the second in a year's time? If the

and servant girls, I must buy it at its high price in February; but if I want to read a novel whilst it is at its highest price, I can read it in tha

l similar to that French form which is good enough for Pierre Loti, f

not have it so; or because some other unwritten la

it pains me to see such a deluge of worthless verbosity pour from London lanes and London stree

ry away and swamp all true English literature under it, as a mo

ed are paid for by the authors; that they themselves must publish something, or cease to exist as a trade; and that the public does not know good from bad,

t-storms of verbosity and imbecility, but of death by its own suicide, through its own curtailed proportions. It was indignantly asked why it was not as long as it used to be in the 'Fifti

d Dickens wrote at such length because they were obliged to fill their monthly numbers! It seems to me far more likely that they were in love with their characters, as every writer of true talent is, and lingered tenderly over many needless details and dialogues out of sheer pleasure in their creations; and it must be admitted that both of them had naturally a discursive style, which would have been the better for some excision. But were it true that there is an unwritten law which limits or expands the length of romances according to the public caprice or taste, surely nothing could be more harmful t

lly, he certainly is so bound. That this obligation is continually defied and broken through by many Engl

of its subject; and the writer who is an artist will know, as the painter knows, that he cannot alter the unwritten law which prescribes to him those proportions. What has either length or b

volumes put together of Georges Ohnet; one of the Sonnets

francs twenty-five centièmes; less than one-and-sixpence in your money. It is bound in thick cream-coloured paper; it is called Il Moretto di Brescia, being a brief study of the life and works of the great artist of whose pure and noble work the city of Brescia is full. That the text is of rare scholarly excellence, and of the

ould find anything equal to

r cheap illustrated books are still more scandalously treated. I have before me a book priced four-and-sixpence, more than double the price of Il Moretto. It is a book for children; its illustrations have been reproduced from earlier works, and they are not even all of the same method or the same size; some are printed from old wood-blocks, some are photo

tice. When the illustrations are fresh, the designer frequently does not attempt to adapt them to the text; a gentlemen is drawn like a cad, and a Newfoundland

rved that it has become, properly, as binding as a written law. I mean the law that

d affixed another? Both picture and statue may have many faults; they probably have; but such as they went out from the studio they

nown to their readers. They would urge, I suppose, that they have a right to do what they like with their own. But your work once

r, as to the reader of a story, it should seem absolutely true; the actors in it should appear absolutely real. The illusion of reality is only strong in the reader according to the strength of that illusion in the writer; but some such illusion must always exist whilst the reader reads fiction, or fiction would have no attraction for anyone. The writer who alters his romance after it has once appeared destroys this illusion, and says effectively to h

ny wrongs met with which are real and great wrongs, yet which must be endured because they cannot be remedied by law suits, an

al betrayal of trust. In the first place, the proof of an article is of necessity entirely dependent on the good faith of the editor. It is an understood thing, a tacit, unwritten law, that no one except the editor is to see it until the public does so. It is never considered necessary to stipulate this. To show it to a third person to obtain a refutation, or a burlesque, of it before the article is pub

during his career? I doubt if we, any of us, know the extent to which we are robbed by

despite previous experiences, to receive apology and reparation. I misunderstood my generation. The editor wrote back, with airy indifference, that the lady who had produced this shameless piracy had never read Puck. To my citation, in reply, of the words of the Emperor Julian, 'If it be sufficient to deny, who will ever be found guilty?' and to my objection that an appropriation of an entire section of a novel could not by any possibility be otherwise than an intention

s must be deposited at the English tribunal into which the suit is brought; a kind of foregone c

o be done in suc

njury, leave unpunished the plagiaris

on, however hostile or rudely expressed, as Mr Whistler sued Mr Ruskin, for th

ersonage in the law, who is always kind enough to give me his advice, and asked him if he considered it worth while for me to prosecute them. He wrote me in answer: 'All three articles are foully slanderous, yet one only, perhaps, would come within the grip of the law;

al libels, there is, neither in law nor in society, any means of obtaining redress which a great lawyer can honestly recommend to a friend. For such matters, w

ence, are all punishments which fall upon the plaintiff. What consolation is it for them that he may perhaps be awarded a thousand pounds damages, though it is more probable that he will receive only a farthing, and be left to the enjoyment of paying his own costs? In either result, is the game worth its very costly candle? Is the injury made less an injury? Is the combat

r to meet the inevitable blackmail which will certainly be levied upon her. This blackmail is levied on every kind of success as well as on royalty. What

her kind of public feeling; but where is there an

s hopeless to ask for an unwritten or a written law on this subject. The arrogant 'we' would soon fall to zero in its influence on the public if it were signed by a Tom, Dick, or Harry, who, as Matthew Arnold used to say, forms his opinions from what he overhears on the knif

ld have paused before making themselves responsible for such language? I am often accused of using too strong language; but at all events I sign whatever I say, and I should be ashamed to do otherwise. An anonymous Press possesses dangerous privileges; such privileges as the mask gives a masquerade; it also, as I have said, acquires a dignity and an importance which are not its

ss at least are all recognised by their style, or well known by the initiated; but this knowledge is limited to a few hundred person

world in general which makes the violation of these not only condoned by others but frequently profitable to the sinners. Take two instances of this: The sale of private letters both of the living and of the dead; and the seizure of the plots and characters of romances by people who are themselves dramatic adapters. The latter is the more trivial offence of the two; but it is as impudent as it is dishonest. It is injurious in a great degree, and

ters ought to be the property of the recipient, but it should be an inalienable property which he should be no more able to sell than he is able to sell entailed property. To write a letter, even a brief one, is, in a sense, an act of confidence. In writing it we assume that its contents will not be used against us, either for injury or ridicule. If a conversation be considered confidential, how much more should a correspondence be so! A letter, in any

e autograph-albums of men and women of the world, letters of the most intimate character by distinguished writers; letters which have been evidently written in the careless, open-he

ch a collection, since the writer of it is great and is alive. Not for twenty louis, not for twenty thousand, should it ever have been purchasable. What traitor sold it? What servant stole it? How

scarcely fair that, because a personality has interest and eminence attached to it, every d

inence, who was the subject that week of one of the 'Portraits'

g being handed about to amuse people in my own country house; but when one knows that it will be s

ho are thus pilloried, even if they think

day, keeps aloof from the public arena men who would do honour to it, but whose strength of intellect is accompanied by shyness, pride, and sensitive reserve. Some unwritten law should also render impossible those verbal libels which are continually published by persons cunning enough to keep to t

ther we should yield to the temptation, even if we ourselves suffer in reputation by not doing so. But the bookmakers of the world have no such excuse as this temptation offers; they are merely footmen who have listened with pricked ears whilst they waited at table on their masters, and when their master is powerless to chastise, s

vers of tortured geese, so it loves to devour with its frothy brain all that belittles, ridicules, dishonours, or betrays the few amongst it-the very few!-who are above it in mind, in will, in force, in fame. 'Come, come!' they cry to the great man's servants when the great man lies dead; 'tell us, you who saw him in his hours of abandonment, tell us of all that can drag him down nearer to our level! Tell us of his varicocele, tell us of his dyspepsia, tell us of his caprices, tell us of his humours, tell us of his tears when his poisoned dog lay dying-you saw them through the keyhole-tell us of his hasty words, his pettish foibles, his human mortal waywardness-you know so