OUR LITERARY CONNER

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 13739, 21 May 1910, Page 7

OUR LITERARY CONNER

A GREAT SHORT-STORY WRITER. „0. HENBY'- A_>T> HIS "WORK. /Br'flA"» T Thcbston Peck in the ( Amebic an "Bookman.") m the caso of many writers it would te unnecessary and perhaps impertinent £ M v anything about their personality B-t"".r'th- Mr Sydney Porter ("(>. {/-„«») hia life goes so far toward., the ; - Ligation of his books as to make at reference to it md.spcnsable. Moreover, so many legends have been Circulated about him as to render it dosirablo to give the essential tactrt of his When tho signature of "O. '• Henry" bc^n to attrac - att<3ntioi "> s 'f ' or seven years ago, there was a widespread demand to know just who tbjs ffi-sttrious gentleman was. Tho demand . vis gratified by imaginative nowsparfcr ffle n, who in some of tho tales they t£ld ■JkamA that they were themselves only eligWly inferior to Mr Porter himseljf in • tit- "-c v of fiction. Even now the/ acoijunt of Mr Porter in this year's volume of "Who's Who" is in several ' respects inaccurate; and tho alleged fjicts are so very meagre as to clisap- ' point the enquiring mind. Let us first then sum up briefly the event- of Mr Porter's life, --4 afterwards consider what bearing they bave upon thej books which ho has written. J In the first place, tho author of, 'Cabbages and Kings" was born in (Jreens'torough, North Carolina, in 1&67, so that he is now in tho forty-thirtl year 0 f his age. His health as a boy Was not very good, and hence instead being gent to college he was placed lipon a ranch in Texas, whero he remained for more than two years. Ho was riot himoc'f a. rancher, nor, as some bavri said, a steep-breeder and cowboy; thoiigh he soon learned a great many thing* con- " ctrning ranchmen and herders and cowboys. He also camo into close contact *itb a vcrj* stimulating sort of lifo; and in the fresh air of the prairies he jjrew strong and possessed of superb , health. . ' , j Remaimng m Texas, he secured a position with the Houston "Post," having to prepare a column every day at the rate of fifteen dollars a week. .Within a few- weeks this salary was advanced to twenty dollars, and in another two weeks it had. been increased to twentyfive dollars—a rate of compensation which' for a Texan newspaper was rightly regarded by Mr Porter as very liberal. The editor, -however, said to -him:'"Within'fire years you will bo earning a "hundred dollars a week on a . New, York newspaper." . " At this time' Mr Porter did a■. good deal of serious reading, in which respect t lie'resemble-.Mr Howells, who, when a very young man, read the host of the English classics while employed upon a newspaper. : Mr Porter lately said to an interviewer. — .' "I did more reading between my thirteenth and nineteenth years than 1 have-done in all the years that have . passed since then. And my taste at that time was much better than it is today; for. I used to read nothing But s< tho classics.. Burton's'•'Anatomy of .;? Melancholy" and Lane's translation of - '"T-io--ATabia_u Nights" wore my-favour- ■' ites." ■;■'..

?iot unnaturally','-Mr Porter __~ success on the staff of- the Houston "Post" 'fired his ambition and led him to take .over a weekly story-gaper 1 in .which most of .tho stories came from' the owner's pep. These.stories are probably among those which wo all have read, though. _. dofybtlera they have been changed and vcjy ranch .improved; for Mr Porter . sajs that he never yet wrote a story . tliK was not finally published between the covers of a booK or in tho pages of some- widely read magazine. But his attempts at editorship proved to be' a. failure; and then Mr Porter and a •friend of his made a visit to Central America. The friend hoped to make a ' ■ fortune in raising -and exporting bananas. Mr Porter went along to see him ,do it." As a matter of fact, there must * hato been some mysteries in tho banana trade which his friend was unable to - - understand, for he sank what money ho had-taken with him. Then, Mr Porter spent much' time, as he describes it, in "knocking around among the oonsulanii the refugees." It must have seemed to him that a good deal, of his life wtfs being wasted; In truth, however, he was adsorbing the knowledge and the atmosphere which give a curiously exotic, and at the some tiipe realistic, touch to his first book, "Cabbages and Kings." It enabled,him to set before «s, with tlio masterly ease of one who knows, a marvellous background of swiw-white beach, and waving palms, and sunshine, and trees laden with fruit. and a wealth of tropical flora,, which,' nevertheless, only half conceal the heat and squalor and discomfort that TO-iko us .understand'with, a perfect sjmpathy the feeling of tho American or European exile who looks over, tho shimmering blue waters-and, lohgs wistfaHv for one moro sight of >hat he pathetically calls-*,'God's own country." When Mr Porter returned -to .'God's own country," ho had accumulated - enoush oxperienc© to write many booss;. yet a certain nomadic instinct kept him roving for a while longer. He drifted into the State of Texas again, and for Ho weeks acted as general assistant to * druggist. The duties and the place alike seemed monotonous; and, therefore, onco more he began his wandermgs until he reached the city of New Orleans, whore the zest for writing came upon him once again. Ho wrote and wrote, sending stories not only to ' luigazines but to newspapers—to everything, in fact, which published fiction; and v, hen these ventures came back to . him, as they often did, bo never lost yourage, but supplied them with fresh "stamps and sent them again upon their way. He has said (and we. may repeat it as an encouragement to those who di» not immediately succeed): "Take 'The Emancipation of Billy'—as good a •story as I ever wrote. It was rejected "no less than thirteen times. Yet, like all the rest, it finally landed." It was during his literary strivings in New Orleans that-ho decided, ior *" some reason or other, that he must have a pen-name. He took counsel with - a friend, and the two picked up a news- - paper and turned to an account in it ol a social function. They ran over the names hastily and Mr Porter picked out the name "Henry." "That will do for the last name." ho . said; "but I want a short first name in - •nil*; syllable." His friend remarked that he might ure a plain initial letter. "Good!" said the writer. "O is aboul the easiest letter written, and so lot's call it. O." Afterwards when the name of O. Henry was known all over the land, a certain newspaper wrote aud asked him for what tho O stood. With cheerful irresponsibility Mr Porter gravely an-bv-cred that the O was an abbreviation of the French Olivier. Sometimes, therefore, Mr Porter's stories have been ascribed to one 'Olivier Henry, a Franco-American. Such is the. genesis ot a famous nom-dc-guerre. Mr Porter grew weary of New Orleans, a__ he would probably grow weary

ORIGINAL AND SELECTE/b MATTER. ___-—-___— jNOTES ON BOOKS AND) AUTHORS.

of an.V place ia a few years. He came to Nt\w York about 190_». Already he had -acquired a small public. Mr Oilman Hall/, then the editor of "Ainslco's M-oe'azine,'' promised him a hundred dollprs apiepce for twelve stories. That seej-ned a attractive offer. At pre/sent, he rarely sells a story for lo.*>s than a thousand dollars, and magazine editors are glad to make contracts for stfiries from bus pen, paying the full artioui-t in advance. Therefore, Mr P.orter has decidely arrived. ' From reading this brief account ot l.i.s life and experiences, and granting Jliis Ame.ricani-.ni, it is quite obvious /that Mr Porter must have developed or acquired certain definite traits. The nomadic life make... ono tolerant as it also makes one exceedingly observant. The person who acquires his experience in n library gets it only at second-hand, nor can he .ever have that easy touch-and-go which comes from contact with the individual human being. Mr Porter is a real flaneur of the American Upe, only, he confines himself to no boulevard, to no city, to no State, nor even to a single country. The world, in fact, is his oyster, and he has learned almost unconsciously to open it and to .-..-.tract from it alike tho meat and tbe salty juices. As he himself has remarked to an interviewer: — ""When I first came to New York I spent a great deal of time knocking around the streets. 1 did things then that 1 wouldn't think of doing now. I used to walk at all hours of the day and night along the river fronts, through Hell's Kitchen, down the Bowery, dropping into all manner of places, and talking with any one who would hold converse with nie. I have nover met anyone but what I oould learn something from him. He's had some experiences that I havo not had; he sfes the world from his own viewpoint. If you go at it in the right way tho chajices aro that you can extract something of value from him. But whatever else yon do. don't flash a pencil and notebook. Either ho will shut up, or he will beoome a Hall Came.': What Mr Porter has described as being his method here in New York is undoubtedly his method everywhere. He gets down to the very heart of things. H. sees the humour and the pathos blended, yot, on the whole, he is an optimist, for he sees that in tho end most things come out as they ought to, or olse if they come out wrong, the majority of the peoplo do not know it. Henco arise his own easy temper, his careless slangy ways, his lack of reverence, his willingness even to spoil even a good story because of a strong temptation to inject something absurd into tlio midst of it. You laugh at the absurdity, but tho story is thereafter impossible to taJ.e seriously. If Mr Porter merely indulged in slang at times, his stories might have a chance of escaping oblivion; but unfortunately—*>r jis I think, fortunately— slang is an extremely short-lived form of speech. Just a few words of it are taken up into the legitimate vocabulary; but most of its words resemble that sort of bastard which is incapable of reproduction. A 6lang . word or phrase is done to death .in a few months or often even in a few weeks; because everyone uses it continually for a little while, and then overyone Becomes weary of it and finally is sickened by it. Now a touch of it in any book may be preserved like flies in amber; but when a book is aU shot through with it and daubed with it,, then tho book, like the slang itself, cannot last for very long. .Therefore, Mr"Porter's stories, while thoy are caught at'with avidity and'read with vast amusement for a while, must finally go down into tin ; pit, for this ono reason, that with all their wit and humour and cleverness, thoy have upon thorn the taint of tiie argot that is ephemeral and that .will make chem in a few years unreadable and unintelligible. Mr Porter is reaping a rich harvest, not merely in money, but in approbation. ;We could quote a dozen or more passages whore-he writes so well as to evoke thc admiration of the most critical. Ho has also a variety of different backgrounds. Now we see the picturesquely squalid shores of South America; again we are taken into tlio heart of tho West as it really is; and finally we are introduced to a thousand attractive haunts iv the great cities of our own country. The author seems to know almost overy type of man—the rich and portly financier, the "fly" newsboy or district messenger, the denizens of the great hotels, the "sales-ladies," the clionis girls, the women in the;shoos, the raffish hangerson of the saloons.'the gamblers and tho grafter?. Ho makes us know them too. In a senso he has constructed for us a panorama of the times in which we live. And, as I said before, he is never pessimistic, or, at the most, ho is only superficially so. At heart he is an optimist, who believes that in every human being there is to bo found something good, however mixed it may bo with other qualities; and. like a true.American, he can see and chuckle at the humour of it all;