THE PAINS AND PERILS OF LITERATURE.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VI, Issue 36, 6 September 1890, Page 9

THE PAINS AND PERILS OF LITERATURE.

I r has been said that there are a hundred British novelists who make at least a thousand a year. For one novelist who makes that sum there are scores who have no taxable income. These are the poor but heroic young fellows who work, eat, and sleep in one room within earshot and noseshot of all the sounds ami smells that become insufferable to a successful member of the craft. Literary history is. however, full of consolation and hope for the strugglers. Homer, for instance, must have written or composed his big balleds under strange conditions, probably often in Greek stables in the company of horses, or in shepherd's huts, sleeping where he got his charitable meal, which would no doubt sometimes be the merest fragment of bread and milk or cheese, with an occasional thimbleful of wild honey. We may take it, however, that it was not uncommon for the ‘divine bard ’ to go supperless to bed, with perhaps a goat's skin for a blanket. If Homer dwelt in hutsand sulfo red hunger, our poor, but rising novelists ought to be able to moderate their discontent with small lodgings and humble fare. To do them justice, they do make brave efforts. We could toll strange tales to their credit in that line. But the east* of Homer is not t heir source of comfort. (’ervantes wrote his great book partly in prison, and generally under many trials and dis comforts. The idea of a man taking his meals in a room five rooms from his study would have made him howl with laughter. The same thing may be said of Oliver Goldsmith, whose incomparable ‘ Vicar' was produced under inflictions that would be simply insufferable to many inferior tale makers of these times. We are not arguing against the general necessit y of com fortable conditions to a working nuther, but it is impossible to forget in what extremely simple states of life many immortal works have been written ; ami we give finally the mimes of Shakespeare and Burns, some of whose works were written under circumstances which would have sent many of our daintier poets and novelists into fits, if not to a madhouse. Old Fuddles (clinging lovingly to lamp post): ‘ N no, m’dear friend, I will not leave you : I will no’ go home ’nless you come 'nd have bit shuppei hie !’ Baritone at the piano sings, ‘ Kiss me, darling, in the spring!' And the fair accompanist murmurs softly, ‘ What’s the matter with doing it now ?’