Newspaper Page Text
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CHAT.
SO KATHARINE of Briar Cottage
wishes to join the fraternity of
“Scribblers,” and asks for sug
gestions as to training herself to be a
writer for magazines and newspapers.
There is no school for journalism or
authorship in the South, though all
high schools and colleges teach the
ground work of author craft —rhetoric
and composition—and there are liter
ary syndicates and individuals in New
York, Philadelphia, Chicago and other
cities who profess to teach the art
of writing by correspondence for very
moderate pay. Several of our Sunny
South writers —among them “Ike,” of
Texas, whose humorous letters were
so much liked —have taken this cor
respondence course and are now, to
some extent, professional writers.
But, Katharine, if you have natural
aptitude and inclination in this direc
tion, you can accomplish a goodly de
gree of training right at home. Read
some of the best modern magazines
and papers to get the newest form of
composition—for literature changes
its fashions nearly as often as dress —
and keep your eyes open to all the
life and nature about you. Write about
it, too —write about the things you
observe and the every day happen
ings in your home. Write and revise
what you have written as carefully as
though you were going to send it for
publication. Describe the character
istics of your neighbors and their
children and of your home people. Try
to form a bright, simple, winsome
style, dashed with humor on occasion.
Choose graphic, picturesque words,
but not long or unfamiliar words.
Avoid a didactic, preachy style as you
would poison, and avoid writing on
threadbare and dry subjects—in the
old essay style. This is obsolete.
Look about you and observe the hab
its of plants, animals and insects.
Perhaps you will discover some pecu
liarities about them that will prove
new or useful, as did Helen Harcourt,
who wrote a series of interesting arti
cles about the plants, animals, trees,
fruits and industries of Florida for a
city press syndicate, which paid her
handsomely. They were things every
body could see and learn about, but
people thought they were too common
and every day to be interesting to the
public. However, they proved emi
nently interesting and were published
by all the best newspapers, being sent
to these through the syndicate.
An Atlanta girl, now receiving large
pay as a newspaper writer in New
York, after having hundreds of
“flowery” pieces declined, got into
print 'with a simple little article about
blackberries. Another—a North Caro
lina young woman, who has now
learned to write artistic short stories
—had more than fifty manuscripts re
turned before she finally had one ac
cepted—on raising ducks.
Cultivate conciseness. Many things
find acceptance simply because they
are short and to the point. Write
something and then proceed to cut it
down.
“Boil it down until it simmers;
Boil it down until it glimmers.”
Eliminate all that savors of repeti
tion. Say a thing in as few words as
possible and then let it alone. Don’t
tack any superfluous shed-rooms to it.
A crisp, bright, clear-cut way of ex
pressing thought or telling of a hap
pening is much to be desired. Cut
down all descriptions of nature to just
a few telling strokes, that serve to
putline a picture, unconfused by a
THE HOUSEHOLD
A Department of Expression Tor Those Who Teel and Think.
multitude of commonplace adjectives
and expressions, such as green foliage
and singing birds and golden sunshine.
You ask about verse. Don’t waste
time over it, Katharine. Don’t write
verse unless you can’t help it. With
born versifiers thought sings itself as
spontaneously as a bird chirps, as in
the case of Watts, who wrote thou
sands of musical rhymes, besides
“How doth the busy bee?” He was
born a rhymster—not a poet, how
ever —and when, as a barefoot boy, he
was switched by his father for neg
lecting the cow while weaving his
rhymes, he cried out as he danced
under the sting of the birch twig:
“Oh, do, dear father, mercy take,
And I will no more verses make.”
Whatever you can say as well in
prose should be put in that form.
There are thoughts and fancies and
imaginings which must perforce put
on singing robes, but these belong to
the poets, who are very few and far
between. However, some sweet senti
ment or graceful thought is often
charmingly woven into verse by our
“minne singers,” and it would not do
to exclude these from magazines and
newspapers. We want our robins and
larks as well as our nightingales and
mocking birds. But let the verse be
short flights of song, cheery and in
spiring, or tender, and avoid all stale
comparisons, such as the venerable
one of comparing life to an o'cean or
a river, or telling us the sunshine is
golden, or the stars are bright, or the
rose is red. Sad and sentimental
plaint about one’s broken heart or
blighted hopes and cruel fate went out
of fashion fifty years ago, with the
feeble imitators of Byron’s romantic
melancholy.
But here am I practicing just what I
was preaching against—long-winded
ness. And I have lots of things I
wanted to gossip about. I wished to
thank those of you who have remem
bered the Household with interesting
letters, some of which appear today.
Magnolia’s account of her up-to-date
irrigated truck farm will interest
everybody. Truck farming is the
great fad these latter days. Even the
society women are dropping their
bridge cards and taking up the hoe to
try intrinsic gardening in the back
yard. Mr. and Mrs. Pleas, of Chipley,
artists, florists and fruit growers, have
sent me another fine story of what
they are doing on those smiling acres
that carry such a variety of beautiful
and good growing things. With the
article came a box of fragrant, sunny
dwarf gardenias and blue hyderangeas,
absolutely as fresh as when gathered.
Mud a Hetnur, always loyal and always
interesting, has sent, among other
things, an interesting study of the
“Tracks of Animals.” Think of this
as a subject, Katharine! It is the kind
that is far more entertaining than the
“discussion” of some old worn-out sub-,
ject.
A number of inquiries have come to
me as to why Julia Coman Tait, of
Memphis, had ceased to write her.
always clever and interesting book re
views for the Household. I had been
wondering over it, never thinking of
sickness in connection with this beau
tiful, buoyant young woman, and
finally I sent her a card, which
brought me a letter from her husband,
saying that Julia had been quite ill
and was still unable to write, and, of
course, depressed in spirits, as every
one who is active and bright-spirited
must be when confined to bed or
cooped within four walls. “Nothing
The Golden Age for June 23, 1910.
would cheer her so much as hearing
from her friends,” writes her good
husband. If she has moved from 1005
Mississippi avenue, a letter will reach
her at the address of her husband’s
business office, 78 Washington avenue,
Memphis, Tenn. Let’s all of us write
her a cheering message, wishing her
a speedy restoration to health and a
return to the Household.
MATER.
Clarkston, Ga.
Witb ©nr Correspondents
NOT YOUNG, BUT STILL ENJOY
ING AND LEARNING.
Yes, dear Sister Householders, lam
an old woman, but my mind and body
are active. I take a keen interest in
the world’s progress and in the people
that live, work, enjoy and suffer. I
read with real hunger and digest what
I read. I am not able to buy many
books, and when I find myself in a
well-stocked library I am like a cow
in a corn-patch—l make haste to get
the brief good of it. Yet I do not read
superficially; I try to take in the
thought and motive of the author.
I did not take my Florida trip be
cause my dear brother was so low in
health. He suffered intensely, but
bore his sufferings with patience.
Now he has had his release. The
Death Angel has borne him beyond
our mortal vision. He was not afraid
to meet the great change. He said, as
it drew near, “I am almost at the dark
river. Soon I will cross over it. Hal
lelujah!” So it was that his faith
triumphed over death.
His name was William Bullard.
Some of The Golden Age readers may
have known him. He was one of the
fast diminishing army of Confederate
veterans. He was a member of the
Ninth Georgia regiment, which went
from Walton county, and he served
through the entire war. May God give
rest and peace to his soul.
My daughter has also been ill, and
she is still confined to her bed. I
trust the bright, balmy weather may
bring her a restoration to health.
Everything looks fresh and lovely
here in the blessed country. The
woods are full of wild flowers, some
of them as beautiful as those in gar
dens. If we would open our eyes to
the infinite loveliness of Nature, study
her ways and live near her heart, we
would be happier than living an arti
ficial, pushing, grinding life in the
crowded centers of civilization. I
wish all of us could feel the sweet
bond of brotherhood and sympathy.
But we are all intended to fill our
station here and accomplish our spe
cial mission, whether it take a few
years or many. When our mission is
ended we are called beyond. We
should never forget that life here
is merely a preparation for the future
life. As we develop spiritually and
mentally here, so shall we be there.
It is just life on a larger, freer scale,
with better opportunities to develop
and to work. Be sure we shall not be
idle. All are workers there. So much
to learn, so much to do, helping others
in their spirit and mind unfoldment.
We shall work with joy and not tire,
for we leave the flesh behind, and all
fleshly temptations.
Well, the world didn’t come to an
end from that whisk of the comet’s
tail. It did us no harm unless it was
through its influence that we had
some queer weather.
Sunday ufternpoij we had a sudden
and brisk storm. My daughter sat up
that day for the first time in months.
We had taken her out on the veranda,
and the storm came so quickly we had
no time to get her in the house before
everything movable was being whirled
away. She was badly frightened and
suffered a relapse, and has not been
able to be up since. Hoping this may
find the Mater and her family well, I
sign myself
Their sincere friend,
OLD WOMAN.
Red Rock, Ga.
HOW CAN ONE BECOME A
WRITER?
I want dear Mrs. Bryan to tell me,
through The Household, something
about the profession of journalist and
author, in which she has had such a
long, useful and beautiful experience.
Can I get myself trained as a writer
in any of the Southern schools? If
not, what should I study at home?
What should I do to form my style?
What form of literature is now most
in vogue? Is short-story writing very
profitable? How about poetry is
there any market for it? Can any
one learn to be a poet? I know the
old saying, “Poets are born, not
made,” but are there not rules for
verse? I detest the miserable drivel
I see in the papers sometimes the
old stuff about “blue skies” and
“warbling birds” and “I think of
thee,” and the trite, threadbare
simile of life, compared to a stream
or a sea and one’s self in a boat
crossing it or careening down it. But
I love real poetry, with thought and
soul and melody in it, like Arthur
Goodenough’s and Margaret Rich
ard’s.
I am nineteen years old. I love to
read, to think and to write. I have
many fancies and thoughts that seem
fairly good to me, and I have written
and published, in our local paper, sev
eral sketches that were praised. But
of course your friends say “That is
fine!” every time. It would be im
polite to say otherwise. I wish I
could get somebody to criticise me
truthfully, unsparingly. I would pay
such a sincere critic generously, for
I am in earnest about wishing to make
literature my profession. I do not
think I shall ever marry. I have no
inclination that way, and I am not
the kind of girl that men fall in love
with. I wish to give my heart and
mind, and my bit of money (I am an
heiress in a very small way), toward
attaining my desire—to be a success
ful writer.
Please, dear Mother Meb, give me
a few candid suggestions out of your
abundant store of knowledge and ex
perience. I know you are a genius,
and I am not, but still talent may
succeed, with application.
KATHARINE,
Os Briar Cottage.
“GET MONEY, MY SON.”
Friends of the household, are you
not made heartsick by the accounts
of fraud and bribery in high places
that fill the newspapers today? In
dividual officials—and groups of of
ficials filling high municipal and state
positions—indicted for receiving
bribes, embezzling, etc. (plain thiev
ing and robbing), and some of them
acknowledging their guilt with scarce
a blush of shame, and saying, “Oth
ers do it, only they are not always
caught!” What has become of the
high appreciation of character, the
fine sense of honor that obtained in
