SHORT STORIES OF THE NINETIES.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1265, 21 October 1911, Page 9

SHORT STORIES OF THE NINETIES.

I'rsm an interesting review, in • the "Morning Post," of Mr.. 11. G. Wells's volume of short stories, "Tho Country of the Blind":— in our own particular Country of tho Blind short stories are a curiously intermittent and sporadic growth. Ono could, of course, if there wore space and time, g» back to the lai and conto of the Middle Ages, to tho novella of Elizabethan days, and to the "characters" and "tales" of the Eighteenth Century essayists. But a glance at this history would almost prove it unnatural in tho Englishman wile has a story to tell to bo short and concise in tho telling. He prefers to be genially prolix' and discursive. Ton must take his views on lii'o as a whole or ondnre his silence. All our short narratives have been exotics. For thei idea of the lai came to' ns with our French dominion, the novella our scholars and travellers brought back from Italy, and in'moro rccent times we have been told that "the short story is Maiipnssant; the anocdote is damnable." Mr. Wells attributes this paralysing verdict to "Mr. Edward Gnrnett or Mr. George Moore in n violently, anti-lvipling mood." Let ns hope it -was duo to Mr. Mooie, who, as an Irishman, has a s"rt of prescriptive riirht to knock off our English haloes. This cruel epi.CT.mi of Mr. Monro's was, If wo are to bcli°ve Mr. Wells, the deaHi-hlow of tho English short story. In the 'Nineties the short story writer lived ns in PnT.vlise:— ".Mr. Kinling had made his astonishing advent with a series of little blue-Tre.v book*, whose covers opened like windowfihntters to reveal tho d"stv snn-srlnre and blazing colours of the East: Mr. Barrie had demonstrated what could be done 'n a little snaco through tho nnnes of his 'Window in Thnnns.' The 'National Observer' was at tho clirrax of its career of heroic insistence upon lyrical brevity and a vivid finish, and Mr. Frank Harris was not only printing pood short stories by other people, but writing still better ones himself in the dignified pages of the 'Fortnightly Review.' 'Longman's Magazine,' too, represented a clientele of appreciative short-story readers that is now scattered. Then came the generous opportunities of the 'Yellow Book.' and the 'National Observer' died onlv to give birth ts tho 'New R-evicw.' No short ttory of tho slightest distinction went for long unrecognised. Tho sixpenny popular magazines had still to deaden down tho conception of what a short story might be to the imaginative limitation .of tho common reader—and a maximum length of six thousand words. Short stories broke out everywhere. • Kipling was writing short stories; liarrie, Stevenson, Frank Harris; Max Beerbohm wrote at least one perfect one, 'The Hatipy Hypocrite'; llenrv .lames pursued his wonderful and inimitable bent; and among other names that occur to me, like a mixed handful of jowcls_:lrawn from a bag, are: George Street. Siorlcy Roberts. George Kissing, Ella d'Arcy. Murray Gilchrist, E. Ncsbit, Stcjjhcn Crane, Joseph Conrad, Edwin I'ugh, Jeromo K. Jerome, Kenneth Graham, Arthur Morrison, Marriott Watson, George licorp. Grant Allen, Jacobs (who alone seoras inexhaustible}. I daro say I could rccall as many more names with a little effort. I may be succumbing to tho infirmities cf middle age, but I do not think the. present decade can produce any parallel, to this list, or, what is more remarkable, that tho later achievements in this.field ol' an;.;.of the survivors from that time, with ino sole exception of Joseph. Cor-rad. can compare., with the work t-'jey did befc/ 1 lt)00. Jt seems to me this outburst of .short stories came net only as a phase in literary development, but also as a Dha.se in tho development., of tho individual writers concerned." Ojldl-v enough. Mr. Wolls iroDUtes this decline not only to Mr. Moore's op;>Mm but to the decay in intelligent criticism, an unljxiked-for tribute to the power of the critic.. A mad millionaire, he says, who commissioned maslerpieces to burn would find it -impossible In buy them, and searce'y an.v artist will hesitate in tho choice befween Mioney ami attention. It was nrimmiir far attention, if .you will belie vs. him, that flic., sort of series of the 'Ninettes were written. In those, remote days "Peoplo Ini.bfJ . about . tliom tremendously, e/impnred Ilieni. and ranked litem. That wns ljio 'Mng that mattered." ft ir\ .possible that M-r. nlacos the critic too high in this matter j

and the author too low. But I suspect that what he really means is that in certain literary circles of tho 'Nineties there was iinnienM interest in tho use of tho short story form. But cau one doubt that, the interest arose from the fact that with tho advent of Flaubert and Gautier and Jlaupassaut, and, let us add, Jtr. Thomas Hardy, thuru was disclosed a whole world of new possibilities in literary art, so that every author of consequence was ngog to try his hand at tho new gamo. Some of them succeedcd. Some of them did not.

Mr. Wells was young at that time, and intellectually, as well as artistically, in an experimental stage. Some of his uhori stones wore failures, somo of them wero triumphs, and many of them were neithsr. All of them were interesting. But, naturally enough, Mr. Wells's mental development continued until at length ho settled down to bo comfortably didactic and discursive in novels of six hundred pages. Something of tho same sort happened to other short story writers of his day—a few of them may oven have realised tho indisputable fact that is not so difficult and much more lucrative to write indifferent novels than to bother themselves with tho detailed and microscopic work of short stories. However this limy be, Hr. Wells does them wrong in imagining that tliey were deterred by any epigram about Maupassant. lie is most unjust—though this is a pure matter'of opinion—to the short story writers of the present day. Never, it seems to mo, was there so much of the. vanetv and iaxness for which lie pleads, combined with positive achievement, for even i»lr. Wolls must confess that_ very many of tho short stories of tho 'Nineties were tho veriest nonsensical failures. It is nifficult at a moment's netioo to write oown a list of the short story writers of to-day. But somo of Mr. Belloc's stories-read tor instance, "Tho Dream"—.ire as good as his best tssavs; and there aTe Mr. Algernon Blackwood, Mr. Oliver Onions. Mr. E. -M. F"rst.»r, Jlr. Maurice Baring, Mr. Leonard Merrick, Mr.' Hector Munro, Mr. Dion ralthrop, Jlr.' Storgo Moore, Mr. Ford Madox ITuefTcr. and Mr. Marnott \WtsMi. In America also are admirable artists Edith Wharton and Kichard jlarding Davis.