Facts About Fiction (report 9 december 1893)
Facts about Fiction is an article published in The Nottinghamshire Guardian on 9 december 1893.
Report of the lecture "Facts about Fiction" given by Arthur Conan Doyle on 4 december 1893 at the Mechanics' Hall (Nottingham, UK).
Facts about Fiction
On Monday a crowded audience in the Mechanics' Hall, Nottingham, had the opportunity of making the acquaintance of Dr. A. Conan Doyle in a new role — that of critic and expounder of his own art. In a lecture entitled "Facts about Fiction" Dr. Doyle for an hour and a quarter kept his audience in a state of enthusiastic attention. His lecture was confined mostly to the younger novelists, whose work he criticised in graphic style, while in the case of a few he gave characteristic selections from their works. It was difficult, he said, to appraise the work of one's own generation, for promises had to be taken into account as much as performances, and unhappily the record of literature had often been that of unredeemed promises. It was impossible to deny that we had now no writers who possessed such a hold on the public mind as Thackeray and Dickens did in their day. Thomas Hardy and George Meredith were two writers of great and original power, but it would be idle to claim a place for these approximate to those he had named. Still, though existing writers may compare unfavourably with those of the first half of the Victorian era, he thinks that fiction as an art has improved, and writers have a clearer conception of the laws which govern it, and consequently the average remains as high as ever. In Dr. Doyle's opinion, British fiction in becoming more cosmopolitan has gained considerably. He regards Stevenson as the one who today influences all rising novelists, who strive after the dramatic instincts and happy choice of words that characterises his work. Stevenson is one of the few British writers who have been equally successful in the long as in the short story. Poe was one of the finest short story writers in the English tongue. Neither Kipling nor Bret Harte, he thinks, has been very successful in long stories. He is inclined to the opinion that Stevenson at first was "Meredith and water." One thing about Stevenson that he admires is that he goes straight on with his story. Dr. Doyle holds that an author has no more right to stop the course of a narrative in order to give his views on any particular question, than a dramatist has to stop a play to come forward to the footlights and give his views on the nebular hypothesis or social inequality. In this respect he thinks British criticism has gone very wrong. He regards Olive Schreiner's "Story of an African Farm" as one of the greatest books a woman has ever written. In fact, that and Emily Bronte's "Wuthering Heights" are to him two marvellous productions, and how two girls, who had seen nothing of life, could have written such books must, he thinks, remain a psychological problem. With regard to J. M. Barrie, he has so high an opinion of that writer's descriptions of homely Scotch life that he thinks they will be handed down with pride as a national possession. In parts they are models of what style should be. Barrie has told him that he has re-written some of them ten times over. Of Quiller Couch's short stories he thinks very highly. The writer who appears to give Dr. Doyle most trouble in assessing his precise value is Rudyard Kipling. Still, with all his faults, he is bound to admit that no man since Dickens has given such promise at an early age as Kipling. Kipling is 27. Most men have done nothing great in fiction until 40, and some not until 50. Kipling, he believes, has done more to bring India nearer to us than the Suez Canal did, and some time, when our interests in the East are threatened, perhaps the widespread sympathy created by his work may have a very marked effect upon the course of history. He believes it will be a national misfortune if anything happens to hinder the development of Rudyard Kipling. Other writers Dr. Doyle dealt with were Maarten Maartens. Bolderwood, Hornung, Gilbert Parker, Zangwill, "Mark Rutherford," Gissing, and Jerome. In reply to the pessimists who bewail the decadence of British literature, he maintains that there are still some goodly saplings springing up in the old forest. The lecturer was preceded by an organ recital, given by Mr. W. Wright.
