Let us return to my imaginary young friend from Park Row, to whom I have referred in a previous chapter, and let us picture him at a small social gathering in the drawing-room of some clever and charming woman of fashion, of the kind that assiduously cultivate the society of men of art and letters because they like to hear the gossip of literature, the stage, and the studio “at first hand,” if I may use the term.
Our young friend is modest and well-bred, and, moreover, carries with him a[Pg 119] certain breezy and intimate knowledge of the men and events of the day which fairly entitles him to a place of his own in what ought to be the most enjoyable of all circles of society. He is delighted with the young women whom he meets here in what his hostess fondly hopes will become a salon—how many New York women have had a similar ambition!—and yet he cannot understand why they pay so much attention to certain gentlemen who are present also, and whom he knows to be of very small account so far as the arts and letters are concerned.
Young Daubleigh is there, the centre of a breathless group, to whom he is bewailing the utter lack of all true art sense on the part of Americans, and the hideousness of New York, which, he declares, offers absolutely nothing to a true artist. Daubleigh never goes into society without a pocketful of art phrases, such as “au premier coup,” “he has found his true[Pg 120] métier,” “the divine art of Velasquez,” and others of the same sort. Of course he is a great social favorite, and of course he has very high ideals of his art, and is apt to refer slightingly to artists who know how to draw as “mere illustrators”—a form of speech which does not somehow endear him to those who know that he ought to be at Cooper union learning the rudiments of his calling.
Another guest, and a favorite one too, is the strangely gifted romancer who poses as a literary man because he has sold two sonnets and a short story to one of the magazines, and of whom it is related in an awestruck whisper that he once went through Mulberry Bend, disguised with green side-whiskers and under the protection of a Central Office detective—all this in search of what he calls “local color.”
Our young friend from Park Row spent two hours in Mulberry Bend the night[Pg 121] before in search of a “story” for his paper, and has the hardihood to say so to the charming young girl beside him, adding that he felt as safe as if he had been at an organ recital. The next moment he realizes that he has made a mistake in trying to destroy any of the glamour that shines from the green whiskers and the detective. The conversation now turns upon the availability of New York as a field for the writer of fiction, and is ably sustained by a young gentleman who is known to be “literary,” although no one can say definitely what he has written. However, he is literary enough to have a place in this salon, and to take a leading part in the discussions which go on there. He is very decided in his views regarding literature, as distinguished from what he calls “mere newspaper scribbling,” and does not scruple to express his contempt for anything that is not printed either in a magazine or “between covers,” as he[Pg 122] puts it in his careless, professional fashion. Like many a one of the gentler sex, he has been dazzled in early life by the glare from the supercalendered paper. It is now nearly two years since he first began to be a literary man, and he regards the progress that he has made during that period as extremely gratifying, for he has put himself on an excellent footing in three or four of the most delightful literary and artistic salons in the city, and confidently expects to have a story published in one of the leading monthlies by midsummer. And that story will be published, as I happen to know, as soon as he has made certain alterations suggested by the editor—taken out the strong scene between the banker’s daughter and the poor but impulsive suitor, and modified various sentences which in their present form might wound the susceptibilities of a large contingent of subscribers.
This promising young writer has been[Pg 123] such a constant visitor to magazine offices since he first embarked on a literary career, and has associated so much with the junior members of the editorial staffs (or staves?), that his opinions are a reflex of theirs, and he is now thoroughly in accord with those with whom he is anxious to do business.
Therefore when he remarks, in that superior manner which insures for him the instant credulity of the women in the company, that it is not worth an author’s while to study the social structure of New York, he is right from his own point of view, and it ill becomes our young friend from Park Row to despise him for it. And when he goes on to say that our beloved city has no individuality of its own, and is permeated through and through with the awful flavor of commerce, while its society is nothing but a plutocracy, I would advise my young friend of the city department to draw him out and make[Pg 124] careful notes of what he says about life and literature.
This young man of letters is merely echoing the opinions of those at whose feet he has sat, humbly and reverently acknowledging their literary supremacy, and fondly hoping that they will purchase his manuscript. He knows that Johnson does not like low life, just as Jack Moran knew that Bonner would not tolerate second marriages or fast horses; and so far as his own literary ambitions are concerned, a thorough knowledge of New York would prove about as useful to him as a familiarity with the customs and beliefs of the Mormons or the names of the Derby winners would have been to the old-time Ledger poets.
But the young reporter, who hears him with feelings of either amusement or contempt or indignation, as the case may be, has already seen enough of New York—it may be that he is able to compare it[Pg 125] with foreign capitals—to know that there is an abundance of material within its limits which native writers of fiction have not only left untouched, but of whose very existence most of them are absolutely unaware. But it would be useless for him to say so in this company, for he who has just spoken so decisively is a “literary man,” whose work will one day be printed on the finest quality of paper and perhaps adorned with beautiful pictures. And besides, do not all the nice people live north of Washington Square?
Ah! those nice people and that supercalendered paper—what an influence they exert in our literary Vanity Fair!
Perhaps one of the young literary men will go on to say, in proof of his theory about the literary poverty of New York, that the magazines have already published a great many articles and stories about the Bowery and the east side, and have in fact quite covered the field without[Pg 126] enriching the literature of the day to any very noticeable degree. All of which is perfectly true, but the results might have been different had the work been intrusted in each case to a writer who was familiar with the subject instead of to one whose only qualification was that he had mastered the art of writing matter suitable for magazines—or, in other words, “literature.” An exception to this rule, and a notable one too, was made in the case of Jacob A. Riis, who wrote some articles for Scribner’s Magazine a few years ago on the poor of New York, and who is known as the author of How the Other Half Lives and The Children of the Poor. Mr. Riis knows his subject thoroughly—he has been a police reporter for years—and his contributions are valuable because of the accuracy of the information which they contain, which is more than can be said of the work of some of the wiseacres and gifted story-writers who[Pg 127] seem to stand so well in the estimation of the magazine managers.
But, fortunately enough, the truth is mighty, and must, in the long run, prevail, in literature as in other forms of art: and the enduring novel of New York will be written, not by the man who, knowing his audience of editors rather than his subject, is content with a thin coating of that literary varnish known as “local color,” but by this very young man from Park Row or Herald Square, to whom I take the liberty of addressing a few words of encouragement and advice. When this young man sits down to write that novel, it will be because he is so full of his subject, so thoroughly in sympathy with his characters—no matter whether he takes them from an opium-joint in Mott Street or a ball at Delmonico’s—and so familiar with the various influences which have shaped their destinies, that he will set about his task with the firm conviction[Pg 128] that he has a story to tell to the world.
In that novel the “local color” will be found in the blood and bones: it will not be smeared over the outside surface with a flannel rag. And men and women will read the story and talk about it and think about it, just as they are reading and talking and thinking about “Trilby” now.
Did you ever hear any one talk about Mr. Du Maurier’s “local color”? I never did.
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