HOW A NOVEL IS WRITTEN

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LVI, 11 October 1922, Page 7

HOW A NOVEL IS WRITTEN

(By a Novelist.) ‘‘Of making many hooks there is no end,” said tbo Preacher in the I look of Ecciesialies, musing sorrowfully on ‘The ills that flesh is heir Co.” With tho selfishness that is the badge of my tribe I have just embarked on Uie task of adding to the burdens of humanity in this respect, and for the next four months I shall sh for six ‘hours a day at my desk writing some 6000 words a week till the manuscript of my new novel shall be completed. The idea for the plot came, as all such ideas that are worthy of consideration do, entirely unbidden. A chance remark planted the seed in my mind, subsequent re licet ion. in idle moments with a pipe between my teeth set it sprouting, and then, before I fully realised what had happened, there it was, like the beanstalk m the fairy tale, idling my imagination with its luxuriant growth—• the best seller, let me hope, of a future publishing season.

; No two authors follow the same method of composition. Where one, in possession of a plot, can outline the whole story down to the very chapter headings, another must trust to eonslant revision, carried out during the progress of composition, to secure, an' orderly result. The first thing I do is to draw up a list ol: the various character l - so far as 1 can forecast them, required, giving them appropriate names and attaching to each a brief synopsis if tho part ho or she will be reqiiired to play. My next step is to decide yn the background, giving preference to scenes with winch I am personally familiar, since I do not oolong to the school that, gathering local colour from guide books and volumes ol travel, proceeds to pass the information off as being obtained at first baud. A few situations that present themselves as indispensable to the development of the novel arc jotted down, and with these materials to go on I make a- start with Chapter One, Whether tho experience is a common one to my fellow-novelists i cannot say, but 1 find myself from the outset at the mercy of ray dialogue. An unexpected twist to the conversation and a scone will, as often as not, bo transformed j a character perhaps assumes a role quite foreign to its creator’s intention. > 1 remember once that a heroine whom mentally 1 had paired off with a certain individual resolutely refused to do my bidding, although 1 re-wrote tho episode three times. Similarly, an effective retort by one of my puppets caused mo to abandon the whole of my preconceived plan and piocecd on completely different lines. Some novelists may be able to turn out their plots as from a mould, and confine their characters in straitwaistcoats. I cannot. Consistency or spontaneity—that is the choice presented to me.

, Since “easy writing makes hard reading,” careful revision seems to me to bo one of tho secrets of success in fiction. Personally Igo over my work time and again, removing exeie.seeuces from my prose in the shape of inappropriate epithets and catch phrases, and searching for errors that have a knack of creeping into the best-regulated manuscripts, errors such as calling a character by the viong name, serving asparagus at a dinner ruble m niid-winter, and similar f di.-erepauabs. But that is a stage that marks the .completion of the novol.st’s task, and I, alas! am only at the beginning of mine.