________________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
“David
Harum” has passed the hundredth edition.
_____
Do you belong to
the “League of Poet-Humorists”?
_____
Mr. Henry Edward
Warner, the well known Baltimore journalist, can tell you all about it.
_____
Mr. S. E. Kiser,
Roy McCardell, Frank Stanton, M. Quad and “Bob” Burdette are among the
prospective members.
_____
And why not? The
poet-humorist is a pretty important spoke in the journalistic wheel just now.
The cartoonist, the book reviewer, the stage critic and even the editorial
writer himself is no more closely read than is the care-destroying
poet-humorist.
_____
“The Transit of
the Red Dragon” is the title of Eden Phillpotts’
new novel, to be published next month. A regular Phillpotts title this.
_____
The silence of
Maxwell Gray is broken, and she has written another novel, which D. Appleton
& Company will publish. The book will be called “Richard Rosney.”
_____
Mr. Guy Wetmore
Carryl, the brilliant young humorist, who has lately become a resident of the
good old Bay State, will follow his “Lieutenant Governor” with “Zut and Other
Parisians,” to be published by Houghton, Mifflin & Company.
_____
And still another
new novelist. This week it is Mary Kincald, author of “Walda.” Every household
will yet boast its novelist.
_____
A SMILE.
It pays to wear a
smiling face,
Whatever else you do;
Whatever be your
stormy place
A smile will pull you through.
Where’er you go
you’re sure to find
Some lone heart to beguile;
So kindly keep
this in your mind:
To smile, smile, smile.
A smile may change
a Nation’s fate,
May save a human life;
A smile may alter
love from hate,
May calm a bloody strife.
A smile, a simple
thing to give,
Just try it for a while;
And mark my word,
as long as you live
You’ll smile, smile, smile.
J.
C. in “The Suburban.”
_____
PERSONAL POINTS: Alice Hegan, who wrote “Mrs.
Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,” and who has since the book was published become
Mrs. Rice, has written another novel, “Lovely Mary.” Whether this is wise, at
this stage of her fast-growing reputation, remains to be seen. “Lovely Mary” is
neither a strong nor a unique title. It will be published over her full name,
Alice Hegan Rice. – Some of our progressive American papers are trying to prod
laureate Austin to the point of writing a poem on the Anglo-German affair, and
then poke fun at him; but Alfred is wiser than they guess. – Miss Mildred
Champagne, the well know society “journaliste,” has been engaged to conduct a
department in “The Suburban,” the new Cambridge magazine. – Dr. Hale, who
rapped the author of “The Crisis,” now has this to say about women’s clubs: “Some
women’s clubs deserve to die,” and among others he names those formed only for
literary study, - “self-centered.” he calls them.
B. Courier JOE CONE.
Cambridge, Mass. Feb. 21, 1903.
_______________
________________
Literary
Sidelights
_____
If
I’d but $40,000 a year, “Mr. Dooley.”
_____
It’s “Guy Wetmore
Carryl, novelist.”
_____
The Press Club
made a wise choice in electing its president this year. Mr. Paul Brown is a
well known artist and a spanking good fellow.
_____
Mary MacLane hates
poetry. Let’s see, there’s lots of others who can’t write it, too.
_____
The Bureau of
Equipment of the Navy Department has immediately added “Diplomacy in the
Orient,” the new book by Hon. John W. Foster, to the list of selected books for
ships’ libraries, United States Navy.
_____
Naturalist John
Burroughs and Naturalist William J. Long are on the ever of war. Naturally.
_____
Mark Twain is
evidently playing tag with the Christian Scientists, and in turn the Christian
Scientists play tag with curiosity seekers – and all of us are more or less
curious, – so the thing is pretty well balanced up after all.
_____
New York Times:
Bliss Carmen, poet and critic, one time resident of New York, has translated to
be Boston as editor of the Literary World of that psychic center, and naturally
enough he has received many letters of congratulation. One of these, from a New
York friend, who yet remains upon the lower levels groveling for the
unattainable, begins as follows:
Dear Carman:
Into the Higher
Life;
Not crystalized.
But something
purer, sweeter, finer –
Bostonized.
_____
The six best
selling books in New York for the week ending March 14:
1.
Lovey
Mary.
2.
Lady
Rose’s Daughter.
3.
The
Pit.
4.
Letters
of a Self-Made Merchant to His Son.
5.
The
Star Dreamer.
6.
The
Four Feathers.
_____
Mr. George Ade,
who first found fame through his “Fables in Slang,” has another book out
entitled “People You Ought to Know.” There
are twenty-six studies of American character in the book. Ade, if anything,
ought to know.
_____
There was an old Maid in
Calcutta,
All she did thro’ the day
was to sputta;
She sputtered so bad
That the skim milk she had
Immediately turned into
butta.
_____
Agitators of the
child labor question will read with interest in “A Daughter of the Pit,” the
pathetic descriptions of the little “trapper” boys who have to work in utter
darkness in the English coal mines. In view of the miner’s strike and its
present consequences in this country, Margaret D. Jackson’s novel is of special
timeliness.
_____
PERSONAL POINTS: Guy Wetmore Carryt’s novel, “The
Lieutenant’s Daughter,” published by Houghton, Mifflin and Company, is already
out and in great demand. – Alice Brown’s
latest story, “The Mannerings,” will be published by the same firm on March 28.
– Margaret D. Jackson’s novel, “The Daughter of the Pit,” is already in its
second edition. – Doubleday, Page and Company announce that they will publish a
complete uniform edition of the books by the late Frank Norris. – “The Story of
My Life,” by Helen Keller, is on the market, and well advertised. For obvious
reasons it will have a large sale. – The success of “Soltaire” has driven
George Franklin Willey, its author, into further fiction writing and he already
has two stories under way. They will be woven about the White Mountains, a
country Mr. Willey knows like a book. – President Roosevelt and John Burroughs
are to visit the great Yellowstone Park together. What a pity W. J. Long cannot
go along to give them points on the habits
of animals, etc. – Mr. Hezekiah Butterworth is a full-fledged lecturer now, and
has twelve lectures ready to be given at a moment’s notice. Not many men in the
business are so richly endowed. He has been so largely engaged in book writing
for several years that he turns to the lecture field as a means of relaxation.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
_______________
March 16,
1903
________________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
What
does Mr. Bryan want of the presidency now? Isn’t he an editor?
_____
Rudyard Kipling,
who has been on another literary hunt in South Africa, sails for England about
April first.
_____
The Harpers are
looking up. Reports have it that they have absorbed the publishing business of
R. H. Russell, New York.
_____
We have all sorts
of book titles, from “The Heavenly Twins” to “The Middleman” and down to “The
Traitors.”
_____
I have all the
respect and admiration possible for Dr. Kennedy, the lately released suspect of
the murder of Dolly Reynolds. He has been a long time in prison, and has had
all the requisite fame, but refuses to write a book or go on the stage.
_____
“People are very
fond of the poem “Hiawatha,” but it’s plain enough
that they don’t care a rap about the “injuns” whom the poem represents. Quite naturally.
_____
“The Regeneration
of Mary Mather,” by Clara Ward, a well-known Wellesley girl, is out, and is
receiving favorable comment. This is gratifying as Miss Ward has heretofore
been regarded only as a clever verse writer.
_____
The Pennell affair
has made it more evident than ever that the automobile may appropriately be termed
“the suicide machine.”
_____
Edward Stanwood,
author of “A History of the Presidency,” is just completing an new book on “American
Tariff Controversies,” which will be published by Houghton, Mifflin & Company
early in the autumn.
_____
John F. Weir, who
has for many years been the Leffingwell
professor of painting and design at the Yale School of Fine Arts, has just
published through Houghton, Mifflin & Company, a new book entitled “Human Destiny
in the Light of Revelation.”
_____
The importance on
the part which is being played by the American representatives in the
Venezuelan affair makes all the more timely the new book on “American Diplomacy
in the Orient,” by John W. Foster, former Secretary of State. What our
diplomacy has accomplished in the east is largely responsible for the respect
in which it is now held by Europe.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
_______________
Mar.
28, 1903.
________________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
Most
of the spring poetry seems to have that tired feeling.
_____
The summer girls
are getting ready for the summer, and the publishers are getting ready for the
summer girls.
_____
Mr. Wanamaker has
said “ta, ta” to the magazine business, but he’s simply multiplied his troubles
in buying out a daily paper.
_____
The world is sorry
for Ira D. Sankey, who has recently lost his eyesight. His marvelous voice has
thrilled thousands of hearers in “Hold the Fort,” “The Ninety and Nine,” and
like familiar hymns.
_____
In connection with
Mr. Sankey’s blindness I am reminded that Fannie Crosby, who is also blind, has
up to the present time written 5000 hymns. It seems off that these two
world-renown hymnists should meet with the same affliction.
_____
Thomas Fielders,
the English critic, seems to know a whole lot about American literature. He
bestowed a little praise on Alfred Lewis, and admitted that “the United States
have a few men and women who know how to write.” Will someone please send Mr.
Fielders a few dozen of our many hundreds of first-class books.
_____
Winston Churchill,
the novelist, is one of the new candidates for honors at the horse show. He has
made a number of entries in several classes. It is evident that “The Crisis” in
Mr. Churchill’s bank account is past.
_____
Mr. John Kendrick
Bangs, the Jerome K. Jerome of America, is editor of Colonel George Harvey’s
magazine, the New Metropolitan. The first number under the new management is
very “Bangsy,” consequently very good.
_____
One of the most
important announcements of the season is
that sent out by Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Company, bearing upon the
publication, on the one hundredth anniversary of Ralph Waldo Emerson, the
Centenary Edition of Emerson’s Complete Works. The introduction has been
written by the editor, Edward Waldo Emerson, son of the great Concord seer.
_____
“Truth Dexter,” by
Sidney McCall, one of the popular novels which has remained in constant demand,
is being brought out in a new popular edition by Little, Brown & Company.
The edition contains a frontispiece made from Jesse Wilcox Smith’s head of
Truth Dexter used on posters. Fifty thousand copies of the regular edition of
this novel have already been sold.
_____
PERSONAL POINTS: Kate Douglas Wiggin, author of so
many charming books for the young, has sailed to England where she is to spend
the spring and early summer. A new book will probably result. – Mr. George
Franklyn Willey, who wrote “Soltaire,” is at work upon two more books, the
scenes of which are laid in the vicinity of the White Mountains. “Soltaire” is
now going into its fourth edition. – Mis Kate Sanborn, the author-lecturer, who
has been wintering in New York City, will open her Metcalf “farm” early this
season.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
April
4, 1903.
________________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
The
Balkans are getting balky.
_____
“The Reader” was
not read enough to find a foothold.
_____
Poor John
Burroughs! He’s catching it from all round.
_____
Yone Noguchi, the
Japanese poet, has been visiting literary Boston. You will notice I said
literary Boston. There are many kinds of Boston.
_____
And now Madison Cawein,
Mr. William Dean Howell’s poetic “find,” is called America’s finest nature poet.
Are the poets going to be divided into nature, love, patriotism, sport, war,
music, religion, etc, etc.
_____
Greenland now has
its newspaper. It is a weekly called Katorikmik. A hot name for such a cold
type.
_____
If the new novel
by George Cram Cook, “Roderick Taliaferro,” ever becomes startlingly popular,
it won’ be because of its mellifluous name.
_____
No, the diary of
John Quincy Adams is not at all like the Real Diary of a Real Boy, tho’ it’s
hard to determine which is the more interesting.
_____
“The Spinners of
Life,” by Vance Thompson, will for a brief time have to play second fiddle to
the spinners of Lowell.
_____
There is war,
rumors of war, or trouble of some kind brewing, for Richard Harding Davis set
sail for Liverpool on April 4, bound for the Balkans. Hos address will be “R.
H. Davis, firing line.”
_____
Mrs. Julia Ward
Howe has more fame heaped upon her, which is not of her own earning. She has
just become a great-grandmother for the first time.
_____
Mr. Thomas Nelson
Page, who has written nothing since his famous “Red Rock,” has just finished a
new novel, “Gordon Keith.” We are informed that the hero is a Southerner and
the heroine a New York girl.
_____
John Wanamaker has
sole out “Everybody’s Magazine to the Ridgeway, Thayer Company, which consists
of Ermin Ridgeway, J. A. Thayer and G. W. Wilder. But Mr. Wanamaker isn’t out
of trouble wholly. He has purchased a New York daily.
_____
Uncle Tom’s Cabin,
David Harum, and Heart and Home Ballads will have to take a back seat as far as
“sales” go. Webster’s Spelling Book was issued by D. Appleton & Company. In
the thirty-five years (1855-1890) during which it was published by them,
31,155,000 copies were sold. High-water of this book was reached in 1866, just
after the close of the war, when 1,596,000 copies were sold.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
Courier, Apr. 10,
1903.
[This
might have been April 11, as the 10th was a Friday and all the other
columns were published on Saturdays]
Courier, Apr. 18, 1903.
_________________________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
Is
that Yellowstone a literary or political game?
_____
Truth Dexter
appears to be enjoying another healthy boom.
_____
Lady Rose’s Daughter
is to be dramatized and produced in New York in September.
_____
Colonel George
Harvey seems to be It in New York publishing circles nowadays. Twain, Howells,
Dunne, Ade, Bangs, Gibson and Martin write “exclusively” for him.
_____
Another literary
match – Ellen Thorneycroft Fowler, who is soon to publish a new novel though
the Appletons, is about to be married to Alfred Lawrence Felkin.
_____
Mary
Wilkins-Freeman has gone back to her first love, as regards her literary
signature. On the title page of her latest book, The Wind in the Rose Bush,
appears simply “Mary E. Wilkins.”
_____
Chauncey C.
Hotchkiss, author of For a Maiden Brave, just published by D. Appleton and Company,
says he has written his last Revolutionary romance, and his next work will be one
dealing with modern times and matters, the scene being laid in the Southwest.
The title has not yet been announced.
_____
The most popular
little book now on the counters is “Love Sonnets by an Office Boy,” by S. E.
Kiser. Two large editions have been printed during the last month. Mr. Kiser
has written another series of office sonnets, which are now appearing in the
Saturday Evening Post under the title of “Soul Sonnets of a Stenographer.”
_____
Mr. George S. Wasson
has written a book which is bound to attract attention. It is called “Cap’n
Simeon’s Store,” and sketches the life on New England deep sea fishermen. Houghton,
Mifflin and Co., will publish it this month.
_____
Guy Wetmore Carryl’s book, “The Lieutenant Governor,” is in its third
edition. It has attracted the favorable
attention of President Roosevelt, Ex-President Cleveland and Admiral Dewey. Mr.
Carryl has improved since he became a resident of the Bay State.
_____
The number ‘eight”
cuts no small figure in the international yacht races. Reliance contains that
familiar number, as does also Vigilant, Defender and Columbia. Skippers are beginning
to look upon 8 as the lucky “figger.”
_____
Many authors find
it more difficult to name their books than to write them. “In Merry Mood, A
Book of Cheerful Rhymes,” Nixon Waterman’s recent popular work, was entirely
printed (with the exception of the title page) before the versatile poet of his
publisher could determine upon a title
for it. Then the author’s wife came to the rescue with the very appropriate
title and further contributed to the attractiveness of the volume by designing
the beautiful cover.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
____________________
_______________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
Allan
Eric writes me from New York.
_____
It is privately
whispered that the above mentioned has personally delivered a spring poem to
the editor of The Century.
_____
Nathan Haskell
Dole is to deliver the poem on the occasion of the Ancient’s visit. There won’t
be a dole-ful line in it.
_____
Cutcliffe Hyne should
profit by Conan Doyle’s experience and not kill Captain Kettle dead.
_____
Has Richard G.
Baxter a corner on the poets? He issues three volumes this week.
_____
Mr. Hezekiah
Butterworth has just returned from an extended lecture tour through the west.
_____
Brewster’s Millions,
by Richard P. Cleaves, published by Herbert Stone of Chicago, starts off
exceedingly racy.
_____
Letters of
everybody are being pushed upon the market nowadays. Letters of a Diplomat’s
Wife is announced for May.
_____
Coal is likely to
keep up in price and many Boston poets are hard at work piling up manuscripts
for next winter’s use. They are said to beat peat.
_____
Mr. Richard
Burton, who has become a well behaved Bostonian, has a new volume of poems,
Message and Melody, just off the press of Lothrop & Company. Like wine, Mr.
Burton improves with age.
_____
Bookbinders and
their Craft, just published by the Scribners, at $12.00 per copy, will never
rise to a David Harum run.
_____
Mr. C. W. Willis,
the Somerville author, is in New York, a guest of Buster Brown.
_____
Marcel Prevost,
the French author, like Dumas, believes in living the life he writes about. He
has wounded, in a duel, a brother of the woman he jilted.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
______________May 9, 1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
The
Pope has blessed Ben Hur. The reading public did it years ago.
_____
Carnegie has snubbed
Marie Corelli. Just wait till Mary writes her next book.
_____
What do you think
of “Pigs in Clover” for the title of a society novel?
_____
Poor Richard Henry
Stoddard. The “dean of American Poets” has passed away. Time will know him
better.
_____
Mrs. Carter
Harrison of Chicago is to publish a volume of fairy tales. Did her husband tell
them?
_____
It’s not Colonel
Winston Churchill now, if you please; it’s the author of The Crisis.
_____
Richard Harding
Davis is between two fires, now, Manchuria and the Balkans, but that is better
than being between two firing lines, as Richard doubtless knows.
_____
In Chicago’s a
poet named Kiser,
In the poetic
world a quick riser;
He went up like a rocket,
And now has a full pocket,
And pours out his
verse like a giser.
_____
A recital of the
songs of Miss Agnes Helen Lockhart of Cambridge, was given by Mr. J. Hallett
Gilberte, at his residence, 755 Boylston street, last Sunday evening. Many of
Miss Lockhart’s poems are specially adapted to music, and Mr. Gilberte has
composed some very charming settings for them.
_____
While Mary
Elizabeth Carter’s Millionaire Households, just published by D. Appleton &
Company, is supposed to have a greater interest for those who have the genius
to model their own modest establishments on the plan of the more pretentious
ones, it has also appealed directly to the class which it has essayed to
portray. A number of New York millionaires have purchased the book, although
from what motives it would be difficult to determine. In any rate the book has
established itself as the standard authority on high-grade housekeeping, a
perusal of its pages revealing the good, hard, common sense of the writer.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
May 16,
1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights.
_____
_____
All literary roads
lead to Concord.
_____
Old England may
laud her Browning; New England her Emerson.
_____
Olympian bards who
sung
Divine ideas below;
Which always find
us young
And always keep us so.
EMERSON.
_____
It is all about “Poor Anthony Stirling,” and his much heralded Journal, tho’ I doubt if
any of the wise and deep thinking shed any tears over the matter. It was one of
Upton Sinclair’s jokes, and while he made a cool thousand out of it, he might
have made another one by keeping dark awhile longer.
_____
In keeping with
the Emerson Centenary many evidences of the wide influence of the Concord
philosopher are coming to light. Charles Dana, when visiting the Procurator General
of the Russian Holy Synod – who has been the practical head of the Orthodox
Church in Russia for many years and was justly regarded as the very embodiment
of reaction and conservatism – found that this dignitary was not only a great
admirer of Emerson, but had even translated and published some of Emerson’s
works in Russian. Emerson’s Correspondence with Herman Grimm, just published,
shows the regard in which he was held in certain circles in Germany, and his
friendship with Thomas Carlyle is well known.
_____
NATURE.
The rounded world
is fair to see,
Nine times folded
in mystery:
Tho’ baffled seers
cannot impart
The secret of its
laboring heart,
Throb thine with
Nature’s throbbing breast,
And all is clear
from east to west.
Spirit that lurks
each from within,
Beckons to spirit
of its kin;
Self-kindled every
atom glows,
And hints the future
which it owes.
EMERSON.
_____
THE POET.
A moody child and
wildly wise
Pursued the game
with joyful eyes,
Which chose, like
meteors, their way,
And rived the dark
with private ray:
They overleapt the
horizon’s edge,
Searched with
Apollo’s privilege;
Through man, and
woman, and sea and star,
Saw the dance of nature
forward far;
Through worlds,
and races, and terms and times,
Saw musical order
and pairing rhymes.
EMERSON.
_____
In making a fresh
examination of the Emerson manuscripts, in preparation for the Centenary
Edition, considerable material of marked interest, hitherto unpublished, has
been brought to light. In the present opinion of Emerson’s literary executors,
there is sufficient unpublished manuscript to for two or possibly three
volumes. While the date of publication of this material cannot be definitely
announced at present, the purchasers of the Centenary Edition will have the
opportunity to secure it, on publication, in a style uniform with the preceding
volumes.
The Centenary
edition, which will be issued through the regular trade channels, will be
printed from new Caslon type, and in style of issue will rank with the best
library editions of standard authors issued by the Riverside Press. Besides the
notes and editorial equipment above mentioned, it will contain a very full
index to the entire works.
The Notes, by
Edward Waldo Emerson, are printed at the end of each volume. They explain the
circumstances attending the delivery of the more famous discourses, indicate
the impression made by the essays at their first publication, comment upon
persons and events mentioned in the text, and often trace in Emerson’s poetry
the thought or the phrase which appears also in his prose. As no annotated
edition of Emerson’s writings has hitherto been issued, this feature of the
Centenary Edition gives it peculiar importance.
_____
Work of his hand
He nor commends
nor grieves:
Pleads for itself
the fact;
As unrepenting
Nature leaves
Her every act.
EMERSON.
_____
My friend Mason W.
Walton, the famous Hermit of Gloucester Heights, author, naturalist and lecturer,
is to publish a book on his twenty years’ solitude with wood and animal life.
Mr. Mason is a nature lover and has been a contributor to Forest and Stream for
years.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
______________
May 23,
1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
Thousands
of literary customers will soon be shopping at “Cap’n Simeon’s store.”
_____
The worthy “Town
Crier” seems to be hunting after that golf-ball yet.
_____
The death of Max O’Rell
follows quickly the passing away of Paul du Chaillu. O’Rell, who was a
world-wide favorite, died in Paris May 23d.
_____
Another society
woman turned novelist. This time it is Mrs.
Dore Lyon, “Queen of the Clubs,” who has written a story of New York Society
life, entitled “Prudence Pratt.” Society continues to swell the ranks of
authors and actors at a dizzy rate.
_____
According to
London Bookman, “the circulation of Wee Macgreegor since its appearance on
English soil has increased by leaps and bounds.” Among the books m ost in
demand in England during the past four weeks are Mrs. Ward’s Lady Rose’s
Daughter, The Reflections of Ambrosine, by Elmore Glyn, and Mr. Dooley’s
observations. Mr. Dooley, though so American and so Irish, has become a prime
favorite in England.
_____
The manuscript of
Poe’s “Bell’s” has been sold for something like $2000, but this doesn’t benefit
Poe very much; he’s a long time dead. Poets need those fancy prices when they
are very much alive.
_____
Two extremes met on
the stage of Chickering Hall last Thursday night when Holman Day, from the far
east, and Nixon Waterman, from the far west, read their delightful verse before
an enthusiastic audience. With Miss Georgia C. Nelson they appeared in the
interests of the Golden Rest.
_____
The man who
discovered the gorilla, and who was one of the most interesting of travelers
and authors, Paul Belloni Du Chaillu, died at St. Petersburg on April 30, after
a long and varied career. Mr. Du Chaillu had the good fortune to outlive the
doubts which at first surrounded his tales of strange lands and peoples, and to
grow surely into the respect and affection of his readers, old and young. His
Land of the Midnight Sun, his Wild Life Under the Equator (Harpers), are among
the best works of their class, and with others from the same pen will fill an
inevitable shelf in all standard libraries. Mr. Du Chaillu was a native of New
Orleans of French extraction, and a man of the most friendly and vivacious
nature.
_____
Will N. Harben’s
novel, “The Substiture,” is full of bits of homely wisdom. Here are some
further examples:
“Bein’ afeard you
hain’t as good as other folks is the biggest drawback on earth.”
“All the ancestry
an’ family trees an’ blue blood royal on earth cayn’t keep a woman’s heart from
floppin’ jest the way it wants to flop.”
“She’s jest a
woman, George – jest a woman, after all, and they are all pine blank alike
except in the sight of the different men who dote on ’em.”
“A woman knows a
woman, now matter how different they’ve been raised.”
“Nothin’ ain’t
smooth in this world, an’ why should married life be an exception?”
“A good un – with soul
and heart. … Lovin’ a woman like that’s
jest ambition, an’ ambition’s right an’ upliftin’.”
“It’s plumb
foolishness to try to lay down rules for other folks to live by.”
“Thar never was a
quicker way to kill courage in a feller than to fight his fights for ’im.”
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
May 30,
1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
_____
The author of Dodo
is going to wed an American Venus.
_____
Wee MacGreegor has
swelled into a literary personage of very considerable size.
_____
Cambridge has a
new poet in the person of Miss Josephine Andrews. Congratulations.
_____
The girls’ paper
across the way, the Cambridge Press, is causing the men of the University City
a little uneasiness politically. Those horrid women!
_____
Gay Roswell Field
has given his Boston friends a thrill by announcing for early publication The
Romance of an Old Fool.
_____
A band of
excellent women, headed by Jean Kincaid, are to start a magazine devoted to
mother and child interest. It is to be called “The New Mothers’ Magazine.” The
title contains food for thought.
_____
My friend Mr.
Dennis A. McCarthy, the poet, is branching out as a very successful story
writer. An exceedingly strong narrative from his pen appears in the Memorial
Day number of the Catholic Columbian.
_____
Self-Made Letters
from Home-Made Idiots seem to be all the rage just now. George Horace Lorimer’s
very successful book, Letters of a Self-Made Merchant to His Son, is the cause
of it all. Mr. Lorimer, I understand, is out with a gun after some of the
infringers. They deserve it.
_____
There was once a
young poet in France
Who wanted to go
to his ance;
He hadn’t the fare
To pay his way thare
And so he went off
in a trance.
There was also a
poet in Sweeden,
Who dashed off
some very rank reeden;
The town rose en-masse
And told him quite sasse
To at once change
the life he was leeden.
_____
A young American
woman who had the exceedingly rare privilege of interviewing the author of Lady
Rose’s Daughter, Mrs. Humphry Ward, reports that the distinguished author’s portraits
do not do justice to a very English, fresh-colored and agreeable face. She also
brought away the impression of a manner which combined graciousness with the dignity
of a grande dame. Mrs. Ward’s daughter, who was present, was also described as
an all together charming English girl who is not devoted to literary work.
_____
Mr. Howells has written for Harper’s Weekly a most interest account of his personal “Impressions of Emerson,” whom he knew as early as 1860, when they met at Concord. He associates Emerson and Lincoln a the supreme American types, and when in the presence of either of them was wont to think of the other. Mr. Howells recalls Emerson’s loyalty to his friends, and remembers that he once spoke of Poe as the “jingle man,” feigning to remember him with difficulty, because of Poe’s cutting attack on the poet Channing, who was Emerson’s neighbor.
_____
The far West with
its cowboys, gold diggers, Indians and thieves has always been a favorite
background for stories of fiction, and the recent success of The Virginian has
proved that the public has not grown tired of the theme.
“The Log of a
Cowboy,” is such a story, but it has the added value of coming from a dweller
of the plains, from the cowboy himself. It tells of many thrilling adventures
while rounding up and driving an immense drove
of cattle, and describes the exciting incidents, adventures and escapes with
genuine interest. The stories and reminiscences which color the narrative are
full of humor and character.
Andy Adams has
lived for twenty years on the plains, most of the time in the saddle, but his
style is excellent and his story is absorbing.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
Courier, June 6,
1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
Old
Home-Week poems are starting to appear.
_____
Letters of
Margaret Fuller are promised for early publication.
_____
“Wee MacGreegor” is
certainly a growing youngster.
_____
If only poets
could climb Parnassus as easily as Miss Peck climbs the dizzy heights of
nature.
_____
Joseph Conrad,
whose “Youth” is at its height, will publish a novel in the fall. “Youth” is a
collection of short stories.
_____
Kate Douglas
Wiggin has returned from England and will spend the summer in Hollis, Maine.
_____
Hezekiah
Butterworth has been engaged for some months on an important work called
Brother Jonathan. It is soon to be published by D. Appleton & Company.
_____
Richard Harding is
to return to Marion, his summer home, and silence the “bow-wows.”
_____
At the Emerson
Centennial celebration in Boston, Professor George E. Woodbury of Columbia
University, author of the well known biographies of Poe and Hawthorne, read an
original ode, which is published in the June Atlantic. Professor Woodbury sails
very shortly for Europe to spend his sabbatical year.
_____
Pope, edited by H.
W. Boynton, has been admitted to the Cambridge edition of poets, published by
Houghton, Mifflin & Company. The list now includes, with Pope, Tennyson,
Longfellow, Browning, Shelly, Milton and Burns.
_____
The secret of
Simeon Ford’s success is out. He’s such a funmaker that he fills his hotel
guests with laughter instead of costly provisions, thereby saving thousands of
dollars a year at the grocers.
_____
Mr. George Ade,
the Chicago humorist, paid his first visit to Boston last week. He came to
inspect the production of “Peggy from Paris,” his latest and most successful
light opera.
_____
Some of the
writers think it strange that the President, who paid his respects to the many
authors as he passed thro’ their different states, didn’t send for Mary MacLane
as he passed through Montana. They seem to forget the main point – the President
sent for authors.
_____
John Muir, author
of “Our National Parks,” was just the man to show off the Yosemite Park to
President Roosevelt. Directly after leaving the President, Mr. Muir started for
the East, and he has just left Boston for Siberia to accompany Professor
Charles S. Sargent, author of “The Silva of North America,” on an extended
expedition to study the flora and fauna of northeastern Asia.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
June 13, 1903.
_______________
Literary Sidelights
Is Simeon Ford Bill Nye 2?
_____
The publishers say
“Nothing Doing.”
_____
It was the bell-e
of the parade.
_____
As usual class-day
outclassed all other class days.
_____
A pity Arthur
Sidman couldn’t have witnessed the popularity “York State Folks” has honestly
won.
_____
Molineaux and his
book dropped suddenly out of sight, but Mrs. M— still plays to the gallery.
_____
Mr. Will M.
Clemens, a near relative to the great humorist, is fast coming into prominence
as a novelist. His latest book is “The Gilded Lady.”
_____
Buchanan Read’s
home has been sold at auction for $12,000. The price he received for Sheridan’s
Ride, however, wouldn’t have shingled his barn.
_____
Another Cambridge
poet! The city of literature is looking up a bit. This time it is Daniel Irving
Gross, who has just published “What,
Saxon! and Other Poems.”
_____
Beware of Marcel
Prevost, the warlike French novelist, who is soon to visit America. He can
fight as well as write.
_____
The Master of
Millions, a novel by Dr. George C. Lorimer, formerly pastor of Fremont Temple,
is out and is meeting with favor amongst the reviewers.
_____
Henry James, whose
novel The Ambassadors is now appearing serially in the North American Review,
intends to visit America next season for the first time in a great many years.
_____
Mr. Justin Huntly McCarthy,
who has recently published through Harpers his new novel, Marjorie, has been
honored by having his play If I Were King presented in Turin, Italy, in an
adapted form.
_____
There was once a
young poet in Dedham,
Wrote poems and
then went and redham;
But the neighbors rebelled,
And had him expelled,
And now he is
sorry he redham.
_____
The discussion
which is afoot over Carlyle’s domestic relations, directs attention to the
letters to his youngest sister, Jenny. These letters, published by Houghton,
Mifflin & Company, reveal, as no other of his writings do, the tenderness
of his affection and the depth of his heart.
_____
A grim but powerful
drama has been made of Henry Seton Merriman’s novel “The Sowers,” which was
published here by the Harpers, and proved one of the most successful of latter-day
novels. The play, which received its first presentation on April 27, at the New
Palace Pier Theatre, Brighton, England, is entitled “The Moscow Doctor,” and
was written by H. P. Gardiner. It is in four acts.
_____
Mr. Carleton Noyes,
author of The Enjoyment of Art, sailed on June 6 for Italy and will spend the
summer in Europe. Professor Hugo Munsterberg, author of American Traits, has
also just gone abroad as the official representative of the St. Louis exposition.
He will make an effort to secure the co-operation of the German government and
the educational institutions of Germany in the international congress of
science to be held at St. Louis next year.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
1903, June 20.
______________
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
_____
Did you Hooker day
off?
_____
“Love Letters of
Margaret Fuller” have been published by D. Appleton & Company. Why?
_____
The July magazines
are fairly booming with their display of fire-cracker stories.
_____
Mav O’Rell bequeathed
his library to St. Paul’s school, London, where he was for a long time French
master.
_____
With the removal
of the Old Corner Book Store, Boston’s most famous literary landmark will be a
thing of the past.
_____
Now all of those
editors who made graduation day addresses will be flooded with MMS. from the
sweet girl grads.
_____
The cartoon
business is looking up. John T. McCutcheon has been hired by the Chicago-Tribune
at a salary of $20,000 a year.
_____
Dr. Charles
Eastman’s autobiographical story, Indian Boyhood, has gone into its third
edition.
_____
Andy Adams, who
wrote The Log of a Cowboy, and who has been spending some time at Colorado
Springs, is soon to make a journey to his old home in Indiana.
_____
Harper’s Weekly
for June 20 contains a page of very effective photographs showing some of the
sculpture groups which Mr. Isidore Konti is doing for the St. Louis Exhibition.
Mr. Konti is executing the largest commission awarded to any single sculptor
for decorative work at the World’s Fair.
_____
THE GRAD
Now with his
sheepskin ’neath his arm,
And courage tried and true,
The graduate doth
sally forth
To conquer worlds anew.
But by and by he
wanders back,
With less of quip and quirk,
And says “they’ve all been conquered,
I’ll now settle down to work.”
_____
Houghton, Mifflin
& Company’s Riverside Bulletin for July is devoted almost entirely to a
description of the Riverside Press, at Cambridge. It is an exceedingly
interesting and useful number, and fortunate indeed is the book-lover into
whose hand it falls. Besides the reading matter it contains twenty excellent
half-tones, picturing book-making from start to finish.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
June 27,
1903.
_____________________________
Literary Sidelights
A humorist has been discovered in England.
_____
Will the
Philistine give a full account of the case – and the verdict?
_____
It begins to look
as tho’ the literary circle is to have another visitation of Margaret Fulerism.
_____
Current Literature
for July exhibits a stunning portrait of F. Hopkinson Smith.
_____
The literary
humbug is the worst bug of all. York State papers please copy.
_____
Messrs. Houghton,
Mifflin & Co.’s autumn list of publication includes
a volume of essays by Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
_____
Mrs. Estelle M. H.
Merrill, formerly Jean Kincaid, is editor-in-chief of the New Mothers’
Magazine. Let me see, let me see, I believe Mr. Merrill makes no pretense of
being a father.
_____
A Cambridge
individual, who is something of a joker, too, is worrying over the troublous
times in and around Turkey for fear they will affect the price of Thanksgiving
supplies.
_____
Mr. Marshall Pun
Wilder, the humorist, has taken unto himself a wife. Just think of the number
of jokes the poor Mrs. Wilder will have to put up with.
_____
I do not care a picayune
Whether ’twere
Shakespeare or Bacon
Who wrote
those plays in the olden days,
Which the
world by storm has taken.
I only wish it understood
That I could write some half as good.
_____
Ventures into Verse,
by Henry L. Mencken, are likely to prove a disastrous one to Mr. Mencken, or
his publishers, or both.
_____
The six best
selling books in New York for the week ending June 27, were:
1.
Gordon
Keith.
2.
Lady
Rose’s Daughter.
3.
The
Gray Cloak.
4.
How
Paris Amuses Itself.
5.
Lovely
Mary.
6.
Pigs
in Clover.
_____
A new book by the
author of Wee MacGreegor, entitled Ethel, has been published by Harpers &
Brothers. Mr. Bell has told this story without any dialect, and entirely in
dialogs between Ethel and her fiancé. Ethel, who is a captivating Scottish
girl, has odd little points of view, and dimples in her cheeks. She is
portrayed with the same fresh and natural skill which has made Wee MacGreegor
famous over several continents, and so well known in Great Britain that Mr.
Bell figured the other day on a list of guests of the New Vagabond Club as “Wee
Macgreegor.”
_____
Professor Shaler,
of Harvard University, affirms that we are not justified in saying that plants
have no capacity of thought. He ably points out, in Harper’s Magazine for July,
certain reasons for crediting plants with their own degree of intelligence. He
dissents from the tendency of modern naturalists to view the loser animals and
plants as automata – their apparent sense being merely mechanical action, like
that of sensitive instruments – and gives his reason for so doing. Professor
Shaler is dean of Lawrence Scientific School and Professor of Geology at
Harvard. He is a Kentuckian by birth.
_____
It seems hard that
such men as Frank T. Bullen, Herbert E. Hamblin, and Andy Adams should not be
allowed the credit of having written their books, just because they can express
themselves in good English without having gone to college. Andy Adams is the
latest victim of literary critics in this respect. It is charged that parts of
his “Log of a Cowboy have been polished off by someone who never smelt
sagebrush, or knew the thunder of the stampede, or felt the smart of the alkali
dust. As a matter of fact, the language of the book is precisely that of the
author. The only editing done applied simply to punctuation, for which each
printing office has its own rules. Mr. Adams is a modest man and makes no pretensions
except to intimate that he knows what he is writing about. He is accurate
without effort and his book contains no such absurd flaws as have been detected
in recent popular stories which Easterners have written about the West.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
July 4, 1903.
______________________________
Literary Sidelights
School’s out!
_____
The proverbial
sternness of the wielder of the rod is only a myth.
_____
What will the “young
ideas” be up to while the school-marms are away?
_____
Professor N. S.
Shaler is soon to blossom out as a poet. He has written a long poem, Elizabeth
of England, which will be published in the fall.
_____
The summer season
of fairly on, but where is the usual crop of summer novels? Surely drought nor flood can he held responsible.
_____
It is said that Colonel
D. Streamer, author of that very unhumorous book of humor, Perverted Proverbs,
is non other than Captain Graham, of the staff of the governor general of Canada.
He ought to be seen to.
_____
Mr. Anthony Hope
Hawkins, author of the Dolly Dialogues, Prisoner of Zelda, etc., was wed July 1st to Miss Elizabeth Sheldon of New York.
Another reason why England and America should dwell in eternal peace.
_____
Mr. James Cox,
founder and for many years editor of the Cambridge Press, passed away on Monday
last at the Holy Ghost Hospital in Cambridge. Mr. Cox was an honor to the city
of his adoption, and a kind helper to the struggling young newspaper man, as
the undersigned can testify.
_____
Andy Adams’s Log
of a Cowboy is another illustration of the saying that authors are born and not
made. His field in literature is practically as yet unscratched, so to speak,
and the remarkable feature of his writing is its unstudied realism. Like Bullen
and Hamblen, he is an instinctive writer. The few friends to whom he read his
early sketches remonstrated: “But, Andy, that’s too abrupt an ending.” “I can’t
help it,” was the answer, “it occurred that way.”
_____
Houghton, Mifflin
& Company announce the following new printings: Thirteenth edition of The
Right Princess, by Clara Louise Burnham; sixth edition of The Mannerings, by
Alice Brown; fourth edition of Literary Values, by John Burroughs, and a third
edition of Three Little Marys, by Nora A. Smith.
_____
It is safe to say
that all persons who have read the recent autobiography of “Charles Eliot,
Landscape Architect” will be keenly interested in the projected bridge and
path, dedicated to his memory, to encircle the summit of Great Blue Hill near
Boston.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
________________________
Courier, July 11, 1903.
______________________________
Literary Sidelights
Literary Boston is either a shore or a woods.
_____
Thomas Bailey
Aldrich is at Ponkapod, his summer home.
_____
The good Dr. Hale
is summering at Matunuck, Rhode Island.
_____
A goodly number of
the summer school teachers linger in the lap of Boston.
_____
Lee and Shepard
are sending out a tasty catalog announcing their newest publications.
_____
Mrs. Ward’s novel,
Lady Rose’s Daughter, has now swung into the full stream of popular interest,
and is selling at a rate of one thousand copies a day.
_____
The title of Kate
Douglass Wiggins’ new story, “Violette,” smacks of the French.
_____
The last book
written by Mr. Henty was completed in just eighteen days. It isn’t impossible
that Mr. Henty wrote himself out.
_____
Count Zara, to be
published by L. C. Page & Co., is destined to create a literary sensation
when it appears. The scene of the story is laid in Austria.
_____
Mr. Robert W. Chambers
is out with a new novel, “Maids of Paradise.” A most charming title.
_____
Mark Twain will
pass the summer with his family in Elmira, N. Y. In October next he will sail
to Europe on a trip to be undertaken for rest and recreation, but more
especially to benefit Mrs. Clemens, who has been ill for a year.
_____
It is evident that
some of the writers of new books are catering to the fair sex. For instance:
His Daughter First, by A. S. Hardy; Maids of Paradise, by R. W. Chambers;
Lovely Woman, by T. W. H. Crosland; Ethel, by J. J. Bell.
_____
The Ladies’ Home
Journal is tickling itself over the fact that it is a Magazine With a Million.
It doesn’t say, however, a million what – dollars or subscribers. Either would
be pleasant, I suppose.
_____
David Gray’s book
of clever hunting stories, “Gallops,” is now in its sixth printing. His newest
book, “Gallops No. 2,” will be ready in the autumn.
_____
The author of the
amusing book of Perverted Proverbs (Harpers), who writes under the nom de plume
of “Colonel D. Streamer,” is Captain Harry Graham, the well known aide de camp
to the governor general of Canada. He is the author of Ballads of the Boer War,
and of several books of humorous verse, The Baby’s Baedeker among them.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
July
18, 1903.
____________________________
_______________
Literary Sidelights
_____
_____
Mr. Thomas Bailey
Aldrich has left Ponkapoag for the Adirondacks.
_____
John Kendrick
Bangs has resigned from the New Metropolitan, and will devote his time to
writing comic operas.
_____
Sam Walter Foss,
poet librarian, will be present at the Old Home Week celebration in Candia, N.
H., his native town.
_____
There are nearly
as many Charles Garvices as there are Bertha M. Clays.
_____
If every person
who whistles Hiawatha had attended the show it would have been S. R. O.
indefinitely.
_____
Mr. Frank C.
Bostock, the animal king, has turned author. The reading public, however, is much
harder to train than lions.
_____
E. Nesbit, author
of The Red House, is contributing a series of chapters on “The Literary Sense”
to the Pall Mall magazine.
_____
The six
best-selling books in New York, as reported to the New York Tribune Weekly
Review by leading booksellers, were given
in the following order:
Gordon Keith, by
Thomas Nelson Page.
Rose of Normandy,
by W. R. A. Wilson.
His Daughter
First, by Arthur Sherburne Hardy.
The Under Dog, by
F. Hopkinson Smith.
The Simple Life,
by Charles Wagner.
Lovely Mary, by
Mrs. Hegan Rice.
_____
The present craze
for walking matches in England recalls a similar one in this country some years
ago, when even lawyers, editors, and other men in dignified callings entered
walking contests with great enthusiasm. Mr. Will B. Harben, author of The
Substitute, remembers going in with five other men for a go-as-you-please
six-hour sprint, in which he made 29¾ miles in that time without stopping or
leaving the track. Mr. Harben says he passed the first hour or two in contriving
how he could get out gracefully without casting a blemish on his reputation for
hardihood. But somewhat to his surprise he wound up at the goal ahead of his
competitors. He thinks he was so
absorbed in his schemes for avoiding failure that he didn’t notice any bodily
fatigue.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
July 25,
1903.
___________________________
Literary Sidelights
With Riley I say, “Ho for green fields and running
brooks!”
_____
At my very elbow
now is a running brook. I just let it run, and lay off and watch it.
_____
As for green
fields they can’t be any too green for me. There’s a vast difference between
green fields and green folks.
_____
As for the latter,
they frequently drive past my bungalow and ask questions. A party held up here
yesterday and the spokesman spake thusly:
“I suppose you
find pretty good fishing in this brook?”
“Yes,” I replied
confidently, “but it’s not so good fishing as it is bathing and yachting.”
(The brook is
about two feet wide and we take it in nights.)
_____
But I’m straying
from the paths of literature. My good friend Allen Eric informs me that he and
the Junior Partner have just returned from an extended cruise along the shores
of Lake Champlain, frequently penetrating the wilds of the Adirondacks. I
suspect Mr. Willis has been upon a literary foraging expedition, and that his
prolific pen will be heard from in the near future.
_____
Mr. John H. Whitson,
author of “Barbara, a Woman of the West,” is summering with his family in Southampton,
N. H. Mr. Whitson has written a new book for the W. A. Wilde Co., for fall
publication. It is written around Freemont, the Pathfinder, and other Western
heroes.
_____
More than local
interest will be attached to the forthcoming book of Justin H. Smith, entitled “Arnold’s
March from Cambridge to Quebec.” Mr. Smith, who is the author of “The Troubadours at
Home,” is professor of modern history at Dartmouth College. G. P. Putnam’s Sons
will publish.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
Aug.
1, 1903.
___________________________
Literary Sidelights
Clinton Scollard is railroading.
_____
Edmond Rostand has
entered the French Academy.
_____
James Lane Allen,
deservingly, is the star author in the August Current Literature.
_____
Tolstoi is writing
a novel dealing with the labor question.
_____
Phil May, the
noted London artist, died at his
residence on Camden Hill, August 5. He attracted considerable attention while
visiting this country a few years ago.
_____
It is whispered
that a brother of Richard Harding Davis is to be resident manager of the new
Globe Theatre, owned by Weber and Fields.
_____
Mr. Will Payne’s
new novel of Chicago business life, Mr. Salt, will be published this fall by
Houghton, Mifflin & Company in book form without first appearing serially.
_____
ItAn addition of
special interest to the American Men of Letters series is the Life of Sidney
Lanier which Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Company announce is to be written
by Professor Edward Mims of Trinity College, Durham, N. C.
_____
Thomas Bailey
Aldrich is at Saranac in the Adirondacks. His forthcoming book, Ponkapog
Papers, is to contain, among other essays, a biographical and critical study of
Robert Herrick, the Man and the Poet.
_____
Mr. Hall Caine has
written a strong, dramatic story which the World will serial. Is is called The
Shadow of a Crime, which smacks too strongly of the “dime novel” for one of Mr.
Caine’s standing.
_____
Dr. George H.
Lorimer is in London doing the slums for literary material. Will not the good Dr.
abandon the pulpit for the pen at no distant day? It is usually from pulpit to
pen rather than from pen to pulpit.
_____
In a review of
Professor George B. Garrison’s Texas (American Commonwealths) the Nation says: “The
description of the rivalry between France and Spain for possession, and the
discussion of the types of Spanish settlement, the weaknesses and failure of Spanish
colonial method, constitute the best treatment of the subject in English in
brief space.”
_____
Among other good
things in Sports Afield in August is an illustrated article, Jamaica for Sportsmen,
by Allan Eric, a Boston author well known to readers of the COURIER. Mr. Eric has
made many trips to Jamaica and adjacent islands and knows them thoroughly.
JOE
CONE.
Cambridge, Mass.
Aug.
15, 1903.
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