登陆注册
26300900000024

第24章 THE PLUTONIAN FIRE(1)

There are a few editor men with whom I am privi- leged to come in contact. It has not been long since it was their habit to come in contact with me. There is a difference.

They tell me that with a large number of the manuscripts that are submitted to them come advices (in the way of a boost) from the author asseverating that the incidents in the story are true. The des- tination of such contributions depends wholly upon the question of the enclosure of stamps. Some are returned, the rest are thrown on the floor in a corner on top of a pair of gum shoes, an overturned statu- ette of the Winged Victory, and a pile of old maga- zines containing a picture of the editor in the act of reading the latest copy of Le Petit Journal, right side up - you can tell by the illustrations. It is only a legend that there are waste baskets in editors' offices.

Thus is truth held in disrepute. But in time truth and science and nature will adapt themselves to art.

Things will happen logically, and the villain be dis- comfited instead of being elected to the board of directors. But in the meantime fiction must not only be divorced from fact, but must pay alimony and be awarded custody of the press despatches.

This preamble is to warn you off the grade cross- ing of a true story. Being that, it shall be told sim- ply, with conjunctions substituted for adjectives wherever possible, and whatever evidences of style may appear in it shall be due to the linotype man.

It is a story of the literary life in a great city, and it should be of interest to every author within a 20- mile radius of Gosport, Ind., whose desk holds a MS. story beginning thus: "While the cheers following his nomination were still ringing through the old courthouse, Harwood broke away from the congrat- ulating handclasps of his henchmen and hurried to Judge Creswell's house to find Ida."

Pettit came up out of Alabama to write fiction.

The Southern papers had printed eight of his stories under an editorial caption identifying the author as the son of "the gallant Major Pettingill Pettit, our former County Attorney and hero of the battle of Lookout Mountain."

Pettit was a rugged fellow, with a kind of shame- faced culture, and my good friend. His father kept a general store in a little town called Hosea. Pettit had been raised in the pine-woods and broom-sedge fields adjacent thereto. He had in his gripsack two manuscript novels of the adventures in Picardy of one Gaston Laboulaye, Vicompte de Montrepos, in the year 1329. That's nothing. We all do that.

And some day when we make a hit with the little sketch about a newsy and his lame dog, the editor prints the other one for us -- or "on us," as the say- ing is -- and then -- and then we have to get a big valise and peddle those patent air-draft gas burners.

At $1.25 everybody should have 'em.

I took Pettit to the red-brick house which was to appear in an article entitled "Literary Landmarks of Old New York," some day when we got through with it. He engaged a room there, drawing on the general store for his expenses. I showed New York to him, and he did not mention how much narrower Broadway is than Lee Avenue in Hosea. This seemed a good sign, so I put the final test.

"Suppose you try your band at a descriptive arti- cle," I suggested, "giving your impressions of New York as seen from the Brooklyn Bridge. The fresh point of view, the -- "

"Don't be a fool," said Pettit. "Let's go have some beer. On the whole I rather like the city."

We discovered and enjoyed the only true Bohemia.

Every day and night we repaired to one of those palaces of marble and glass and tilework, where goes on a tremendous and sounding epic of life. Valhalla itself could not be more glorious and sonorous. The classic marble on which we ate, the great, light- flooded, vitreous front, adorned with snow-white scrolls; the grand Wagnerian din of clanking cups and bowls the flashing staccato of brandishing cut- lery, the piercing recitative of the white-aproned grub-maidens at the morgue-like banquet tables; the recurrent lied-motif of the cash-register -- it was a gigantic, triumphant welding of art and sound, a deafening, soul-uplifting pageant of heroic and em- blematic life. And the beans were only ten cents.

We wondered why our fellow-artists cared to dine at sad little tables in their so-called Bohemian restau- rants; and we shuddered lest they should seek out our resorts and make them conspicuous with their pres- ence.

Pettit wrote many stories, which the editors re- turned to him. He wrote love stories, a thing I have always kept free from, holding the belief that the well-known and popular sentiment is not properly a matter for publication, but something to be privately handled by the alienists and florists. But the editors had told him that they wanted love stories, because they said the women read them.

Now, the editors are wrong about that, of course.

Women do not read the love stories in the magazines.

They read the poker-game stories and the recipes for cucumber lotion. The love stories are read by fat cigar drummers and little ten-year-old girls. I am not criticising the judgment of editors. They are mostly very fine men, but a man can be but one man, with individual opinions and tastes. I knew two associate editors of a magazine who were won- derfully alike in almost everything. And yet one of them was very fond of Flaubert, while the other preferred gin.

Pettit brought me his returned manuscripts, and we looked them over together to find out why they were not accepted. They seemed to me pretty fair stories, written in a good style, and ended, as they should, at the bottom of the last page.

They were well constructed and the events were marshalled in orderly and logical sequence. But I thought I detected a lack of living substance -- it was much as if I gazed at a symmetrical array of presentable clamshells from which the succulent and vital inhabitants had been removed. I intimated that the author might do well to get better acquainted with his theme.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 黑少女与冷王子

    黑少女与冷王子

    第一次见面,他将躺在草丛里补眠的她当做了“死尸”还不巧的踩到了她的手,结果......“大白痴!睁大你的白痴眼看清楚!竟然说老娘是死尸,你眼眶内的黑白球是摆设吗?”“我刚来。”“……?”“你们学校的没素质.”“哦,原来今天要转到我们学校的就是你啊,我在厕所里听说过你!你现在也是我们学校的学生了,那你的素质也高不到那里去吧。”“……你想干嘛?”“交赔偿金!”“…………”然后是“该死的黑脸怪!竟敢打晕我,我一定会报仇的!”当干柴遇上烈火,两人将一发不可收拾,而那所普通的中学也将因为他们的爱恨情仇而显得生机盎然.
  • 九世帝尊

    九世帝尊

    苍茫宇内间。有远古巨龙的身影,遨游浩瀚星空;有火焰异兽的怒炎,炼化十万天方;有独眼巨人的吐息,摧毁一座座神坛……这是一个强者至上的天地!而在苍茫边缘一个不起眼的天方世界,弱小的人族少年,因为一场意外机缘,有幸接触到了这婆娑繁华的大千宇内,展开了一条不同寻常的强者之路!
  • 海明威

    海明威

    海明威(ErnestHemingwayl899~1961)美国小说家。1954年度的诺贝尔文学奖获得者。生于乡村医生家庭,从小喜欢钓鱼、打猎、音乐和绘画,曾作为红十字会车队司机参加第一次世界大战,以后长期担任驻欧记者,并曾以记者身份参加第二次世界大战和西班牙内战。晚年患多种疾病,精神十分抑郁,经多次医疗无效,终用猎枪自杀。他的早期长篇小说《太阳照样升起》(1927)、《永别了,武器》(1927)成为表现美国“迷惘的一代”的主要代表作。
  • 好人卡战争

    好人卡战争

    【起点第五编辑组签约作品,请放心收藏。】“陆小婉,我喜欢你!”“对不起,许朗,你是个好人……”【滴……滴滴……检测到好人卡存在……好人卡收藏系统激活中……】因为一次意外,许朗得到了神奇的好人卡收藏系统,每得到一张女孩儿发给他的好人卡,系统就会生成一张拥有特殊能力的卡片。想要变强吗?很简单,向可爱的萌妹子告白吧,然后被她华丽丽的拒绝掉!唔……于是,好好先生许朗,从此开始了他貌似悲催的别样人生。
  • 溺宠甜心:蜜恋定制娇妻

    溺宠甜心:蜜恋定制娇妻

    十年前,她们就认识,十年后,她们再次重逢,感情的天空,永远为有缘份的两人而准备......
  • 叶罗丽精灵梦之新泪

    叶罗丽精灵梦之新泪

    场景一“洛水妍!你真是给我丢脸!”“爸爸。。我”“水妍,闭嘴!”“妈,水妍还是小孩子…”场景二“没想到这么久了,你还是没变,呵呵。”“但是你变了。。”
  • 生化危机之末日拯救

    生化危机之末日拯救

    H大学秘密实验基地“龙神”遭到毁坏。路教授为避免生化病毒泄露,关闭实验基地,开启“龙神”自毁。马朔作为实验员之一,带着路教授的遗命逃离实验基地,与此同时,另一名实验参与者卡尔为自救,在自己体内注射了生化病毒,逃出基地。生化病毒由此扩散。马朔在路教授留下来的秘密实验室继续进行实验,一夜之间却发现整个世界被病毒侵蚀,而母亲和弟弟也受到感染。为了拯救亲人,马朔开始与变异人、幸存者、终极大boss卡尔之间,冲突迭起……最终……
  • 妃常毒宠

    妃常毒宠

    前世,那虐遍天下美人的歹毒王爷,就遗憾一件事:没能虐了皇帝的老婆萧袭月,终含恨而死、不得瞑目!前世暗恋十多年,今世重生总算得手了!他挑眉:“虽然我家世好,颜值高,但我还是希望你爱上我的内在。”她皱眉:“三皇子殿下,请自重!”
  • 穿越之哎妈穿成太监了

    穿越之哎妈穿成太监了

    她本是现代姑娘,工作之余喜欢玩宫庭计游戏,老是幻想可以穿越成为女主,有一天终于穿越了,美梦成真兴奋之余发现有点不对,拿起镜子一看,哎妈,咋穿成太监了,一边照镜子一边哭着说:人家穿越不是穿成帅哥就是美女,然后和男女主谈一场轰轰烈烈的恋爱,结果我两样全穿了,穿成不男不女的了。
  • 请叫我网红之爱上男闺蜜

    请叫我网红之爱上男闺蜜

    这是一篇有痴情绝恋和耽美于一体的小说,你可以看到当代社会的黑暗,爱情的谎言与真诚。并不是付出就会有回报,并不是坏人就会有应该有的报应,金钱、爱情、亲情。最现实的利益关系,最脆弱的感情链条,都在这里