LITERARY GOSSIP

New Zealand Mail, 5 February 1902, Page 26

LITERARY GOSSIP

We have to tliank Alessrs Spicer Bros., the well-known paper merchants, for a copy of Whitaker’s Almanack for 1902.

"Chambers’s Journal” for December is an admirable double number. Besides its usual complement of healthful literature, the “Journal” contains five complete stories suitable for Christmas reading. _ Prefixing an article on “Sir John Alillias” by Air W. W. Fenn, are two coloured sketches by the famous artist. Clara Singer Poynter, of Otago, contributes a couple of verses, entitled “A Question.”

“Good Words,” the old London monthly, appeals to the poets of the British Empire to show the quality of their genius and their loyalty in the composition of an od« in celebration of the approaching coronation of King Edward AMI. and his Queen Consort. The occasion, the editor says, is enough of itself to inspire the muse of every British poet, but as an additional incentive a prize of £SO is offered for the best. Coronation Ode submitted, £ls for the second best and £lO for tlie third. All others which are considered worthy of publication in “Good Words” will be accepted and paid for in the regular way. Poems submitted in competition must reach the office of tho magazine in London not later than April 20th, 1902. The publishers especially desire that the poets of the. various distant parts of the Empire will enter into the competition.

\ anity Fair” occupies an unassailable position as an English classic, and consequently editions of it may be expected to multiply with the years. We have received from Messrs S. and W. Mackay, Wellington, a copy of an illustrated edition that has just been published by Alacmillan and Co., of London. This volume, which is issued in good cloth hoards at tlie price of 3s 6d, is notable, as it contains all. the original drawings with which Thackeray embellished Ins novel without a hero.” It also reproduces in fac simile the illustrated cover in which the firstmart was issued in serial form from “Ptn*ch” office m 184 1. This would make a most

suitable book for presenting to young people of literary tastes.

NOVEL WRITING. Novel writing as a trade has not shown any material financial improvement in the last fifty years. The enormous increase in the number of readers has been counterbalanced by the extraordinary increase in the number of publications, and also in the number of writers. Thackeray, for example, received 50 guineas a part for the periodical issue of “Vanity Fair.” It appeared in nineteen numbers, one of them being a double part, so thataltogether this issue brought him 1000 guineas. Nowadays, though Air Kipling received £SOOO for the serial rights of “Kim,” few writers receive as much as Thackeray, although it must ho remembered that his publisher held the entire copyright for a certain short number of years.

For “Esmond” Thackeray had 1200 guineas, and “The Newcomes” yielded about £4OOO, while his editorial connection with the “Comliill” is said to have been worth £4OOO a year—an income that will certainly compare with that of the editors of any twentieth century monthly publication. “Pickwick” brought Charles Dickens £2500 and a share in the copyright after five years. “Nicholas Nickleby* was worth £4500, and “Barnaby Rudge” £3OOO for the copyright till six months after publication. It is interesting in view of the 300,000 copies sold of “The Alaster Christian,” the 100,000 of “The Eternal City,” the 500,000 of “Richard Carvel,” and tlie 80,000 of “The History of Sir Richard Calmady,” to note that the original sale of “Great Expectations” was 30,000 copies! In four years George Eliot received £I6OO from “Adam Bede,” hut “Romola” brought her £7OOO from the “Cornhill,” and “Aliddlemarch” was, on the whole, even more profitable, the American edition alone being worth £I2OO to the authoress. Charles Reade received £3O for “Peg Woffington,” but that was at the beginning of his career, and “Griffith Gaunt, or Jealousy,” attained to £ISOO. Anthony Trollope, a steady and persistent writer, made from his books a gross sum of £70,000, or some £2OOO a year. “The Claverings” brought £2BOO. “The Small House at Allington” £3OOO. and “Can You Forgive Her?” £3525. Charles Kingsley sold “Alton Locke” for £l5O to Alessrs Chapman and Hall, a sum certainly less than a twentieth of the financial return his daughter, Airs St. Leger Harrison (Lucas Alalet) will receive for her latest novel. In 1853 Alessrs Routledge gave Bulwer i Lytton£2o,ooo for ten years’ copyright j of the cheap edition of liis novels, and ; at the end of that period they paid £SOOO for another period of five years, and made a contract on the same terms at the end of tiie second period. Going back to tlie beginning of last century, it is interesting to remember that while Scott received large sums j for the Waverley Novels. Jane Austen j earned during her lifetime less than j £7OO in all for the work of her pen. | Alaeaulay was one of the first authors : to receive payment on the royalty svs- | tom, that being his arrangement with I Alessrs Longmans for his- History, and George Eliot also bad a. similar arrange- ! ment with Blackwoods for some of her i novels. Thanks, however, largely to j the efforts of Sir Walter Besant ‘ and the Authors’ Society, as well as of Air I Watt and the other literary | agents, the system, which was rather i the exception twenty-five years ago, i lias become almost universal.

An author now receives, as a rule, from 10 per cent, in the' ease of an unknown writer, to 25 per cent, in the case of an established favourite, on the gross retail price of his book. He also, of course, receives large sums for the serial rights. As a matter of fact, in the case of many .writers the receipts from the serial rights often exceed the royalties on the complete book. Approximately it may therefore be coneluded th<it in the case of & novelist* like Aliss Alarie Corelli, with an enormous and constant public, one book, although, as was mentioned a week or two ago. she never serialises, will bring at least £20.000 in all, a figure which is also probably reached by many of the books of Mr Kipling and Air Hall Caine. When one reads the statement that a successful book is selling at the rate of between 1000 and 2000 a week, it is safe to assume that the author is receiving between £IOO and £l5O a week for it and so on. Of course, these figures only to at most half a dozen novelists. Another twenty, however, will receive from £4OO to £SOO for the serial rights of their books, and make on an average half as much more by their royalties. It may also be safely reckoned that outside the ranks of the first thirty writers, novel writing nowadays hardlv pays.