Dr. Conan Doyle's "Facts about Fiction"
Dr. Conan Doyle's "Facts about Fiction" is an article published in The Surrey Comet on 11 october 1893.
Report of a lecture "Facts about Fiction" given by Arthur Conan Doyle on 21 october 1893 at the St. James Hall (Kingston, UK).
Report
KINGSTON LITERARY SOCIETY.
DR. CONAN DOYLE'S "FACTS ABOUT FICTION."
For the second lecture of the session of the Literary Society on Tuesday evening, the services of Dr. Conan Doyle had been secured, and his popularity as a writer drew a full audience to St. James-hall to hear him discourse on the congenial topic of "Facts about Fiction."
Dr. TROUNCER, one of the vice-presidents, occupied the chair, and in introducing the lecturer expressed his delight with the syllabus which had been arranged for the session, remarking that it was spoken of in London and elsewhere as one of the best that had ever been presented to any society. It was a source of pleasure to him, as it must be to the lecturer, to see such a splendid audience on such a very wet night.
Dr. Conan Doyle, who was greeted with applause, said his subject was much too vast to be treated in anything more than a very superficial manner, even though he confined himself to the very youngest contemporary writers of fiction. In the literature of our country lies the most certain and powerful of its glories ; all else that we possess may pass away. Other nations have been rich and poor ; they have founded great empires and lost them ; but our literature is an asset upon which we may always reckon. The material glories of Greece and Rome have long since passed away, but the work of their dramatists and historians still survives. We have in England the precious racial inheritance of a great literature, and he thought it was interesting to take stock of it in these later days, so as to see if there was any work being produced now which is likely to live. It was difficult to form an estimate of living writers, and especially of young ones, because in their case promise had to be taken almost as much as performance, and literature was essentially a history of unredeemed promises. From a survey of the field of poetry, he concluded that the stream of English poetry would soon run as richly and strongly as ever. Referring to the many wails as to the decay of English literature, he said that critics in every age had always taken a gloomy view of the era in which they had happened to live, for that which was near to us always seemed smaller and more insignificant than that which was at a distance. This point Dr. Doyle enforced by a capital story of a now popular writer who was brought up close to Niagara, and had to pass the mighty fall every day when going to school. The boy had read Southey's famous poem on "How the water comes down at Lodore," and he had imbibed the notion that Niagara was but a poor spectacle compared with Lodore. The disenchantment came, however, a few years later, when he visited England, and went to Westmoreland to look for Lodore. It was a very hot summer day when he started on his quest for the waterfall, and after walking a long way he sat down to rest on a ledge of rock, and seeing a countryman come along he asked him to direct him to the famous fall of Lodore, and was startled with the reply, "Why, man, you're sitting on it." It is possible, said the lecturer, for a critic to conjure up a Lodore when he has a Niagara close by his side. Coming to the subject of contemporary fiction, he said there was no living writer who occupied anything like the place which Dickens and Thackeray filled in the minds of our fathers. Thomas Hardy and George Meredith are writers of greats power, but they have not such a hold on the masses. At the same time, if very great writers are wanting, he believed that the average was as high as it had ever been. The growth of the British empire has had an excellent effect on the younger writers, by rendering them less insular, and broadening the scope of their interests, and he thought it was possible that our literature in the future might be even more brilliant than it has been in the past. If the last generation of writers were under the influence of Dickens, it was not too much to say that the present generation had been impressed with the genius of Robert Louis Stevenson. It is the rarest thing in the world to find a man who excels in writing both short and long stories. Neither Scott nor Reade nor George Eliot, nor Thackeray had written any short story of the rank, and those who had done the very best in short stories had never succeeded in the longer venture. Edgar Allen Poe wrote some of the very finest short stories that had ever been penned, but he never attempted a novel ; and the same thing was true of Bret Harte. But Stevenson had mastered the whole gamut of fiction, and his short stories were most characteristic and most certain to retain their place in English literature. All his novels had great virtues, but there was often present some drawback which might possibly lessen their permanent value ; but he could not imagine that any change in public taste would ever take the charm from such a story as "The pavilion on the links," or the magnificent parable of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde." (Applause.) The influence of Meredith traceable in Stevenson's earlier work was referred to, and the novelist's style was analysed, the subordinate position occupied by woman in his novels being specially pointed out as an evidence of the reaction from the abuse of love in fiction. The lecturer quoted numerous sentences from Stevenson's works as illustrations of his marvellous power of packing into the briefest space that which most powerfully impressed the mind. The next writer referred to was Olive Schreiner, who Dr. Doyle said struck a much deeper note than Stevenson, and he illustrated his point by reading an extract from "The story of a South African Farm." If ever a writer her heart for an inkpot it was Olive Schreiner. The cry of pain that rang in every chapter told plainly of a great and strong and sensitive nature which had been isolated and forced in upon itself. She had been unable to pass the great problems of the universe, and had grappled them alone, single-handed, and without flinching. Thus the emotions which, under happier circumstances, might have been confided to her own circle, had been poured straight from her lonely soul on to her manuscript. What the future may have in store for Olive Schreiner nobody could say, but at least one work she had written must be placed quite in the forefront of the fiction of the age. Turning now to a different class of writers, the lecturer said we have never had such accurate drawings of our own homely peasant folk as within the last generation. In this work Thomas Hardy has of course taken the lead. But in the last few years Scotland has produced a writer in the person of J. M. Barrie, who as so keen an insight into the character of her people, and so kindly and sympathetic a touch in future be handed down in Scotland with the pride of a national possession. Dr. Doyle read a very entertaining extract from "A Window in Thrums," which he said had the eternal value that lies in truth, and was an admirable example of the quiet, sympathetic humour of Barrie which makes you love his characters while you smile at them. The style of Barrie was quite a model of what a style should be. There was a magnificent simplicity about it which was the outcome the highest art. He had heard Mr. Barrie say that many of chapters had been written ten times before be was satisfied with them, and nothing could be more clear out, nervous, and delicate than some of his paragraph. To a man who commands the whole range of humour and pathos, as Barrie does, and who not likely to be hurried into the production of premature work, there is a great future, especially as he is still under 33 years of age. Another writer of the highest promise is Mr. Quiller Couch, or "Q," as he prefers to call himself on the title page of a book. He is a curious product, partly of the Cornish coast and partly of Oxford University. Something of those two influences may be seen in his writings, from the extremely delicate finish of some of his shorter stories to the brilliant, dashing effects of his books of adventure. In the former phase the lecturer liked him best, and thought it was along that line that his literary development was likely to proceed. In a short story he has few equals, and his "Noughts and Crosses" is amongst the most brilliant work of our age. He has been greatly influenced by Stevenson, and has none of that diffuseness which is the be-setting sin of the short story writer. There is not a superfluous sentence in his paragraphs, or word in his sentences. An extract was given from "Noughts and Crosses," as a type of Mr. Couch's style. The lecturer next dealt with a writer whose precise value was more difficult to assess, because if his virtues were brilliant, his faults also were more pronounced, He referred to Mr. Rudyard Kipling. (Applause.) There are times when he takes a false note, and when he tries to take a note that he cannot reach. He often tries to force his story through with mere bluff, when he started with little enough to tell, and he has that "cocksureness" which led Sydney Smith to say that he wished he could be as sure of anything as Macaulay was of everything. (Laughter.) He gives one the impression of being curiously wanting in the power of self-criticism. These were amongst his obvious defects, But who could stop to criticise when reading Kipling's short stories? We are carried off our feet by the rush and go of them. His charming enthusiasm, his full-blooded virility, his sympathy with all that is most dear to the English heart — horses, ships, out-door life, and daring deeds — these are the things which win our hearts and make us forget the rest. There has never been in our literature anything quite like him before. He seems like some vivid Indian orchid amongst our homely English roses. He first appeared before the public four years ago with his "Plain tales from the Hills," which was followed by two other collections of short stories, "Many Inventions" and "Life's Handicap," which were all characterised by the same brilliant qualities. His only novel "The light that failed," was much less successful as a work of art than his shorter stories. The orientalism that pervades his work led, Dr. Doyle to say that Kipling is a political force, and has brought India nearer to us than the Suez Canal. He seems to have focussed the people of India until we look down upon them as Sir John Lubbock looks down upon a colony of ants ; we learn to know them all, from the courtly Viceroy to the young subaltern with the bloom of the old country still upon his cheeks. We realise what it means to be a civil servant in a fever-stricken district, and we gain some dim perception of the thousands who lay down their lives in the routine of the empire. In times of danger the widespread knowledge and sympathy which his books have produced may have an enduring influence upon the course of history. When it is remembered that Kipling is only 27 years old, it must be allowed that since Dickens we have had no man who has shown so brilliant a promise at so early an age. After mentioning a list of less-known writers, the lecturer referred to Jerome K. Jerome, who he said had never yet had that hearty recognition from the critics which he had long had from the public. As a specimen of Jerome's rare fund of humour, he read a highly entertaining piece from "Three men in a boat." In conclusion, he said they must not look upon fiction as an evil thing, nor as a pastime or plaything. It is in truth one of the most vital influences in the world, for it is what the people read, and what they read they think, and what they think they are very liable to do. (Aplause.)
