THE CANT OF UNCONVENTIONALLY.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 86, 4 January 1908, Page 13

THE CANT OF UNCONVENTIONALLY.

For tho purpose of modern fiction there 'aro very fow inoral or social laws worth tilting nt," writes Lady Robert Cccil in tho National Review." "You cannot write a worl: of art about failing to observe a day of rost; jrou _cannot; sinco you aro riot 'Shakespeare, writo a tragody about 'filial ingratitude; you cannot va'ito a novel about picking and stealing (Mr. do Morgan could, and wo should all'road it); murder is too exceptional, and slander too much a matter of courso; .practically for tho unconventional minor novelist thoro is ohly one moral law worth breaking; hence, sinco, truo art requires somo moral breach s wo got tho dreary treadmill procession round about tho Seventh Commandment.

"It is not altogether edifying, this spectaclo of tho novelist with .-, artistic ideals painfully conforming to tlio Continental CouveniiOn, or rather—for it must bo admitted tho critic is in tracing tho' finger-prints of tho British Convention oven in the attempt to escape—painfully, falling between /two stools. • Tho unconventional novelist is afraid to bo English—it is terribly bourgeois to bo English, and with all his oft'qrts ho cannot quite contrivo-to bo Fi'ench, or Italian, or, Scandinavian, or Russian. ■ < "As to the rival morits of tho British and Continental Conventions, 'I hazard no opinion, but ono may perhaps bo allowed to suggest. that not tho nio3t artistic of; us has tho right wholly oii_ bis side. If. the. British Convontjon lias imposed arbitrary restraints on. English fiction—as doubtless it hiis from tho writing of 'St. Ronan's Well' dovmwards —has modorii French fiction suffered nothing from an undue deference to tho tast-o of tho i'aris public ?< . "However • that may be, tho English follower of tho French Convention secures-..at least oho Solid advantage.. Ho Secures for his production a respectful, , & more than hearing in tho literary press. If you writo a novel dealing with English politics , and grossly daricaturo tho- sentiments of your Radicsls and Tories, tho. reviewer may treat you to a little goodhumoured banter; .if you tuni hiiitory upsido down, he will reason .with you learnedly: if you write on orthodox religion, he will arguo with, you at length;'if you represent your peer wearing - his coronet on weekdays, ho will remind yoil that, real life is not so picturesque; if you fnisquoto a foreign language) or mix your scientific > terms, .no will odvis'o j you to' avoid theso siiates liest tiitio; but if you aro vriso.-nnd cunning, and havo interwoven your presentment of lifo with somo ' serious ■ moral problem treated from an 'unconvcntibnal'' point of view, you achisvo at onco a position of greater freedom and loss responsibility. . > : ': "Ono thing yon will do well to avoid. Yon will lind it actvisablo not to mention Spadea. Tho wells you may poison a little, indeed yoil may poison them to any exteiht, so long as it be done quietly, decorously, id a decent twilight of -well-chosen words;, but spades are nasty, awkward filings, bettor avoided. With this one exception borno in mind, you may onioy a liberty accorded to tho novoust m no other lino. Tho subjeot of your book may be commonplace; its construction weak, its action improbable; your characters freaks of psychology; your ideas threadbare: your paradox transparent; your philosophy oxploded a thousand or so years beforo you woro horii—no mattor: tho wholo' concoction, if it bo well mixed with 'emancipated' morality, will .bo gratefully swallowed by tho humble reviewer with his mouth open and his' eyes shut." ' . :