M. Paul Otlet, the Secretary of the Brussels International Bibliographic Institute, places the total annual book production of the entire globe at approximately 150,000 volumes per annum.
Senor Eduardo Ravarro Salvador, a distinguished Spanish author, has compiled with greatest care statistics of a similar nature which are printed in theMadrid Heraldo, and his estimate quite closely confirms the other, aggregating approximately a little over 160,000 for the year 1911.
A dozen years ago, when book production was smaller than today, Mr. Percy L. Parker, in theNew York Independent, gave the total number of books issued by thirteen countries in an average year as 77,250, which would be not as large as the estimates of either Senor Salvador or M. Otlet, but is nevertheless of use in confirming them, and increasing the probability that a mean of the three estimates may be quite substantially near to the truth.
Mr. Joseph B. Gilder, in an article in theNew York Times, for January 25, 1914, states that our Ambassador to the Court of St. James, Mr. Page of the publishing firm of Doubleday, Page and Co., said not long before departing for his post, that American men spend less for books than for neckties, and American women less than for the buttons on their frocks. The same article quotes the Boston bookseller, Mr. W. B. Clarke, who is Chairman of the Executive Committee of the American Booksellers Association, as saying that the per capita consumption of books is less than of any other commodity.
Following Mr. Gilder's article, and using the statisticsof theStatesman's Year Book, as to population, and of theWorld Almanac, as to book production in 1910, we find that in Switzerland there was one book printed for every 872 population; in Japan one to 1,224; in Germany one to 2,075; in France one to 3,809; in Great Britain one to 3,808; and in the United States one to 7,295. In 1911 our showing was not quite so good.
According to statistics prepared for theWorld Almanac, and to sources indicated above, and others, the number of books issued annually in the United States varies in late years but little either way from 10,000. It would appear that the United States issued roughly only about six per cent of the total, and if we deduct new editions and translations, only about four per cent of the total.
Further, by an examination of these various and varying statistics from the best experts, it is evident that little Switzerland, which is scarcely one-eighteenth the size of our State of Texas, and whose population is less than one-twenty-fifth that of the United States, publishes more than three-quarters as many books per annum as we do; in other words, ten times as many books per million inhabitants per annum are published by Switzerland as by the United States. In fact she leads the world in this particular.
By similar analysis, we find that the Scandinavian countries, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, which in book production are next in rank to Switzerland, have an output of about six times ours. Germany, France, the British Empire, Holland, Italy, Austria greatly surpass us, all running, per million of population, from three and one-half to five times our output. Roumania, with one-thirteenth our population, publishes one-fourth as many books; Japan with slightly more than half our population, publishes four times as many; in other words, eight times as many per million of population; but a large number of these are pamphlets: so instead of publishing in percentages eight times as many, she really issues an average ofbetween three and four times as many, which makes our showing even then bad enough.
In the density of our ignorance, we sometimes think and speak of Russia as a benighted country, forgetting that in her middle and upper circles, she is vibrant with intellectual and artistic energy. In book production, even though the showing on her side is distorted by the countless millions of her ignorant peasant class, who number about 79 per cent of her population, we find that she produces two and three-quarters times as many books as we do, and has a population only one and two-thirds times larger. In other words, she materially exceeds us in book production.
This leaves us to seek in Spain the only one of the civilized nations of the entire globe that publishes so few books per million of population per annum as we do; and it is questionable whether we are able to hold the lead over even her: for an analysis of the statistics of both Otlet and Salvador places us slightly behind united Spain and Portugal, the figures for the two being given in conjunction. Beneath these there is no lower depth.
Germany produces more books than any other nation in the seven highly creditable classes of educational, arts and sciences,belles lettres, theology, medicine, voyages, and law.
Italy holds first rank in political economy; France in history, poetry and drama; and the United States ties France for first place in one item only, books on sport. That is our best bid for a premier place.
ThePublishers' Weekly, the semi-official organ of the book trade, in its issue of Jan. 30, 1904, contains the following statement:
The great decrease in all the more serious departments of literature, as well as in some of the lighter ones, is a curious and unexplainable condition of our book production. Scientific and philosophical writings are as conspicuous through their absence as are the simply amusing books.
The great decrease in all the more serious departments of literature, as well as in some of the lighter ones, is a curious and unexplainable condition of our book production. Scientific and philosophical writings are as conspicuous through their absence as are the simply amusing books.
Moreover, this backward condition of America's book production is a new situation that has existed for a generation only. That this is so, is shown in various ways, but particularly in the parlous condition of the retail bookselling trade. A generation ago, when our population was a little less than one-half what it is today, there were in the United States, it is estimated, between three and four thousand booksellers carrying fairly good stocks of books representative of history, light science, economics, art, biography, travel, poetry, essays, fiction andbelles lettresgenerally.
There are less than fifteen hundred booksellers left, and this number is steadily being diminished through withdrawals from business. Yet on January 9, 1914, the Secretary of the American News Company told the House Committee on Post Office that the country contains nearly a hundred thousand news stands.
Since there were three or four thousand bookstores, not only has the population of the country more than doubled, but the general average of wealth has increased markedly, being quite four times what it was then: so that by good rights the three or more thousand booksellers of that day should have increased three-fold or over, to at least ten thousand, instead of diminishing by more than one-half.
If it be true, as has been repeatedly asserted, that a good bookstore, well stocked and intelligently managed, performs an educational work in any community only slightly, if indeed at all, less important than that done by its schools, colleges, libraries or churches, this deplorable condition of affairs merits serious attention.
The reason for the situation is not far to seek: though not even its existence, let alone its cause, is as generally known as it should be. Yet the cause seems plainly and definitely determinable. To arrive at it, we must turn from book production to another printing-trade industrythat has waxed in the United States as book production has waned. Forty years ago less than ten million copies of periodicals, exclusive of newspapers, were published annually. Today it is estimated that there are published over seven-and-a-half billion, and of this quantity more than one-half gets distribution through the mails. These extra hundreds of millions of periodicals would seem to mean as many tens of millions fewer good books; and that seems to be virtually the sole cause of the disappearance of the books.
On June 23, 1874, there was approved an act of Congress establishing a pound rate of postage on mail matter of the second-class—newspapers and periodicals. At first this rate was three cents a pound for magazines, and two for newspapers. Soon it was lowered to two cents for each, and still later, becoming operative on July 1, 1885, the rate was reduced to only one cent per pound for each. The cost of service rendered then and every year since, is many times that amount: at present it is estimated by various experts and commissions as running from 6-1/2 cents to 12 cents per pound.
The effect of that law is emphatically shown in the following table giving amounts of second-class mail (periodical literature) carried by the Post Office Department at various dates.
For1875(first year law was operative) 40,000,000pounds"188061,000,000""1890204,000,000""1900450,000,000""19131,096,000,000"
At this rate, within less than ten years, if the law is not changed, this output will have increased to more thantwo billion poundsper annum.
Evidently giving to periodical literature this serviceat one cent per pound, $20. per ton, the cost being eight or ten times as much, has been simply a subvention, and a very effective one. Although we publish few books as compared with other civilized nations, we issue more periodicals than all other nations put together, and half as much again: for we publish sixty per cent of the periodical literature of the entire globe.
The United States, according to the report of the Third Assistant Postmaster General for January, 1914, handled in the second-class mail, during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1913, over five thousand million copies of periodicals—more than fifty for each man, woman and child in the United States—enough to make more than 2,600 train loads of ten fully loaded cars per train. And this does not take into consideration the enormous number of copies of daily newspapers and other periodicals which are circulated outside of the mails, by carriers, newsdealers and others.
Underlying this megalosaurus-like development, is the factor that carriage by the government at the nearly free rate of one cent per pound, covers not only the literary product but the advertising material which has been the determining factor in this marvellous increase. At the time the pound-rate law first became operative, magazines were few in number, and contained little advertising and much good literature; but the pound-rate law gave birth to a new kind of magazine issued at less than cost for the revenue to be derived, because of the immense circulation possible under the subvention, from its advertising pages;and their advertising pages generally weigh more and cost the government more to transport, than do their literary pages.
To increase this revenue, circulations were forced by methods that directly violated the law, and these methods are still being used. Premiums were given to an extent that led to an investigation by the Post Office Department,and it was found (Third Assistant Postmaster General's report, Dec. 1, 1911, p. 39) that in one case four-fifths of the subscribers went for the premium, the publication being worth nothing except as an advertising medium because of its large circulation—a circulation with which, despite the government subvention, literature had nothing to do. Another periodical, weekly and agricultural, forced by premium 122,000 subscriptions out of 143,000; another 41,000 out of 53,000.
There are hundreds of needless growths of this sort. As an instance, there are published in the United States some eighty-six banking periodicals. The Secretary of the American Bankers' Association, when asked how many of these were needed, replied: "From three to six, and the other eighty are 'leg pullers.' They live in great part by sandbagging advertising out of financial interests."
Dr. Talcott Williams, at the session of the American Historical Association at Washington a few years ago, said that one hundred years earlier, the aggregate weight of one copy of each issue of an ordinary city daily for a year was about ten pounds; fifty years later it was twenty-five pounds; twenty-five years later it had become fifty pounds; and when he spoke it was a hundred and twenty-five pounds; while in some instances the Sunday editions alone weigh more than that. How much of it is published to the real advantage of the community?
Upon careful consideration, it seems evident that at first the law diverted the patronage of the reading public from books to the higher-priced and more respectable magazines, those so priced that their sale at the published rate would be possible even if the advertising were a minor consideration; that next, the twenty-five cent issues cut the ground from under these older and higher-priced ones; that then rapidly appeared the fifteen-cent ones, and next the ten-cent ones—all so expensive to make that onlythe great volume of advertising rendered the low price possible; and that now the five-cent issues are, in their turn, no less rapidly displacing the ten-cent ones. Swift's doggerel tells the tale:
So, naturalists observe, a fleaHas smaller fleas that on him prey;And these have smaller still to bite 'em;And so proceedad infinitum.
So, naturalists observe, a fleaHas smaller fleas that on him prey;And these have smaller still to bite 'em;And so proceedad infinitum.
While this article has primarily to do with the decadence of our literature, the economic side should not be lost sight of.
For the fiscal year ending June 30, 1913, the expense account of the Post Office Department amounted to over $260,000,000. The second-class mail supplied nearly two-thirds of the tonnage, and cost more than one-third of the total aggregate of expense, but the revenue paid by its publishers amounted to just under $10,000,000, as against the cost of over $86,000,000.
To make up for the loss thus incurred, the first-class mail—the letter mail, which weighed only about one-fifth as many pounds, had to supply $175,000,000 of revenue from a service costing the government less than $100,000,000. That is to say, the letter mail paid eighteen times as much revenue as the second-class mail, and weighed but one-fifth as much.
There were carried the past year very nearly two billions of postal cards which produced a revenue of nearly $20,000,000. The weight of these was only about 12,000,000 pounds.Twelvemillion pounds of postal cards therefore produced almost exactly twice as much revenue asone thousandmillion pounds of publishers' second-class mail.
Averaging all in all, first-class mail costs at most not quite four times as much per pound as second-class mail, and pays eighty-four times as much.
In other words, each time that one of the forty or fiftymillion users of the first-class mail puts a two-cent stamp on a letter, one cent pays for the service rendered, and nearly all of the other cent is taken by the Department to give the "special privilege" of service at one-eighth of cost, to less than thirty thousand periodical publishers.
Is it any wonder that new periodicals have begun their career in the United States at the rate of more than ten a day for every day, Sundays and holidays included, of the past fifteen years? Fortunately, however, the death rate is nearly as great as the birth rate; but since those that persist are the selected growths, there is, as we have seen, a tremendous annual increase.
One expert estimates that the total number of books published in the world since the invention of printing is some fifteen millions, and another, more modest, places the figures at between ten and twelve millions. Assuming for each book a first edition of one thousand copies, a somewhat common issue, we should have from ten billion to fifteen billion copies ofall. In other words, there are issued in the United Stateseach yearfrom one-half to three-quarters as many copies of periodicals as haveeverbeen published in the first editions ofallbooks ever printed by all the nations of the world.
There can be no deduction made from the general features of the situation other than that the distribution of this one class of merchandise at a practically free rate is nearly the sole reason for this wasteful over-production.
When the pound-rate law was enacted, the distinct purpose was announced that its effect should be educational. The contrary is unmistakably the case. The reading of the ten to twenty minute magazine article or the skimming over of the Sunday paper, seems to have become too often the limit of the intellectual activity of our people of average education.
To carry thePolice Gazetteat a cent a pound while charging eight times as much for a spelling book or Bible,and then to claim that the law permitting this discrepancy was enacted in the interests of education, is at least edifying. Archbishop Hare in his bright little volumeGuesses at Truthonce remarked that a very bad reason was in effect next to a very good one.
Mr. J. N. Larned the very eminent librarian says:
The so-callednewspaperwhich interests itself and which labors to interest its readers in the trivialities and ignoble occurrences of the day—in the prize fights and mean preliminaries of prize fights, the boxing matches, the ball games, the races, the teas, the luncheons, the receptions, the dresses, the goings and comings and private doings of private persons—making the most in all possible ways of all petty things and low things, while treating grave matters with levity and impertinence—with what effect can such anewspaper be read? I do not care to say. If I spoke my mind, I might strike harshly at too many whose reading is confined to such sheets, but I will venture so much remark as this: That I would prefer absolute illiteracy for a son or a daughter of mine, total inability to spell a single printed word, rather than that he or she should be habitually a reader of the common newspaper of America of today, and a reader of nothing better.
The so-callednewspaperwhich interests itself and which labors to interest its readers in the trivialities and ignoble occurrences of the day—in the prize fights and mean preliminaries of prize fights, the boxing matches, the ball games, the races, the teas, the luncheons, the receptions, the dresses, the goings and comings and private doings of private persons—making the most in all possible ways of all petty things and low things, while treating grave matters with levity and impertinence—with what effect can such anewspaper be read? I do not care to say. If I spoke my mind, I might strike harshly at too many whose reading is confined to such sheets, but I will venture so much remark as this: That I would prefer absolute illiteracy for a son or a daughter of mine, total inability to spell a single printed word, rather than that he or she should be habitually a reader of the common newspaper of America of today, and a reader of nothing better.
According to Census Bulletin No. 57 for 1905, there was spent in the preceding year in the entire country for newspapers the enormous sum of $280,000,000, and for all textbooks for use in both public and private schools, sectarian and non-sectarian, and in all colleges, only some $12,000,000! More than $23 spent for ephemeral literature, much of which debases the literary taste of the community, for each dollar spent for literature whose function was technically educational.
To get a further idea of the literary pabulum that the government subvention is creating for us, let us consider an average magazine of the so-called popular sort. Someone defines it as follows:
"A magazine is a small body of literature, entirely surrounded by advertising. In this respect, it resembles a railroad ham sandwich with the advertising bread cutvery thick and the literary meat in especially thin slices. The situation is well summarized when Dooley says: 'Hinnessy, mon, last night on my way home from wurruk I bought one of them popular magazines expectin' after I had eaten me supper and put on me slippers, and lighted me pipe, to sit down for a quiet avenin's enjoyment looking over the advertisements, and do you know, mon, twinty-five per cent of the dommed thing was just nothing but "litherachoor."'"
The magazine frequently gives great prominence to pictures of actresses—doubtless by favorable arrangements with their managers. With these may appear an article with an alliterative title, showing How Cleveland was Cunningly Conned; How Placid Philadelphia's Putridity was Purged; Why Denver went to the Devil; etc. Then may follow an article explaining how our reporter Wily Willie went under "Jawn Dee's" window and, by making a noise like an extra dividend, secured an interview with him. Then a trifling poem or two, and a long continued dry-as-dust serial story, which serves in some measure as the talcum powder to disinfect, so to speak, the rest. Then may follow a Retraction article, showing that whereas we stated in our latest issue that an emissary of the Standard Oil Co. was responsible for the Chicago Conflagration by sneaking up behind Mrs. O'Leary's cow and sticking a pin into her while she was being milked, we wish to inform our readers that we are now convinced that this was incorrect. Further investigation shows that the Standard Oil Co. was entirely innocent. It was an employee of the Packing House Trust who was guilty of the dastardly deed. Then perhaps will follow a Passionate Personal Appeal from the publisher for subscriptions to about $10,000,000 worth of stock of the Magazine Company. (Send in any sum from $1 up, use the corner coupon.) All of this will be encased in a gaudy, if not neat, cover bearing a design showing a girl's face and some of her form. If you want to see the rest of that, look at thecorset advertisements inside. An old lady lately said that when she read her modern magazine, she felt that she had been to an undress party where the men all came in their "unions" and the women in their "nemos." Then will follow advertisements of soaps, soups, shoes, massage creams and a thousand other articles.
As illustrating another abuse that results from the pound-rate privilege: Let me refer to some periodicals that are light in weight; certain small magazines, for example, weigh but a fraction of an ounce, and the government must distribute many of them in order to secure one cent. We have in our possession a little Farm Journal so light that it takes forty copies to make a pound. As it is published monthly, not until the Post Office has served a subscriber with this journal for three years and four months, will it get as much as a single cent for the entire service.
And the government carries this kind of literature, advertising and all, at one cent a pound—$20 per ton, and charges for books eight cents per pound—$160 per ton, and for the social-letter and business mail, 84 cents per pound, $1680 per ton!!
Bryan's philosophy was sounder than it sometimes has been, when he said:
The Supreme Court has describedunjust taxation as larceny in the form of law. If one citizen is compelled by law to pay ten dollars for the support of the government where he ought to only pay five, and under the same law a neighbor is required to pay but five where he should pay ten, the law which causes this inequality simply transfers five dollars from one man's pocket to another's.
The Supreme Court has describedunjust taxation as larceny in the form of law. If one citizen is compelled by law to pay ten dollars for the support of the government where he ought to only pay five, and under the same law a neighbor is required to pay but five where he should pay ten, the law which causes this inequality simply transfers five dollars from one man's pocket to another's.
Then a law which is each year taking over seventy-five million dollars of net profit, above cost of service, from the ninety-three million people who benefit from letters, in order to give the thirty thousand periodical publishers service for ten million dollars which costsmanytimes thatsum, is certainly not merely petty larceny or grand larceny, but larceny that is absolutely grandiose.
To illustrate: One publishing company, it is reported, made last year a net profit of over two million dollars. Their postage was about $650,000, and it cost the government over $4,500,000 to handle the output. Moreover, more than $11,000,000 of advertising was borne on the pages of those publications, and for it the company also received virtually free distribution.
Had a special privilege as great as this of the second-class mail rate been enjoyed at national expense by any class of citizens other than its publishers, the publishers would not have permitted it to exist a year. Yet the loss has long been well known to post-office officials and members of Congress, though for a time it was kept from the knowledge of the public, because practically the sole means the public has had of obtaining the knowledge, has been through the columns of journals that enjoy the privilege. TheNorth American Reviewfor February, 1908, had a most scathing article by Professor Munroe Smith, entitledThe Dogma of Journalistic Inerrancythat illustrated this situation forcibly.
No lobby sent to Washington in furtherance of corrupt legislation has ever been more persistent or dealt less fairly with both legislators and public than the lobby that has worked for retention of the second-class mail rate. Some able editors have been accused of hunting very jealously for other people's pulls while maintaining a pretty heavy one of their own.
And the ceaselessly increasing monthlies of mammoth circulation that so nobly, though with somewhat of iteration, harp upon the graft of our plutocrats, our patent medicine manufacturers, our frenzied financiers, our food trusts, our fraudulent insurance officials—is it possible that none of their diatribes, worthy though they may be, are never to be directed against themselves? Let us hopethat some of these public-spirited citizens so patriotically intent upon ridding a much-suffering land of its various forms of organized rapacity, may be led to see a great light in connection with the one industry of this country that is by law largely relieved from subjection to those competitive forces to which producers and distributors of all other articles are keenly alive.
We may in time realize the truth of Emerson's remark that "though no checks to a new evil appear, the checks exist and will appear." For it is fast becoming notorious that that advertising which is as the breath of life to all those low-priced periodicals, has passed beyond the line of marginal utility, and will not compensate the farther sale of the magazines at less than cost of production.
A generation ago an English-born resident of Australia was homesick. He thought how charming it would be to see gamboling about his place an English rabbit. He imported a pair. The soil and climate proved congenial. They multiplied with enormous rapidity, and recently the Australian government had a standing offer of £25,000 for anybody who would devise some practical method of exterminating the rabbit pest. Another settler, this time a New Zealander of Caledonian birth, recalling to mind the rugged beauty of the Scotch thistle, imported that, and planted it at his doorway. The resultant development was similar. There are hundreds and hundreds of square miles of Scotch thistles in New Zealand. A few years ago, a scientist imported for experimental purposes, the gypsy moth, and caged it in his back yard in one of the suburbs of Boston. A storm of wind and rain wrecked the cage, and some of the moths escaped, with the result that the state of Massachusetts has spent over three million dollars in an effort to exterminate this pest that is devastating its forests and bids fair to extend over the entire United States with a resultant loss of countless millions of dollars.
In legislation as in biology, it sometimes seems easier, even with good motives, to spread noxious things than useful ones. Our postal legislation has bred a swarm of periodicals of which the vast majority are but a swarm of pests.
In attacking them "at the source"—the cheap postage by which we ourselves superficially seem to benefit, we are entitled to no credit. On the contrary, while we think our action is in favor of the good literature which we try to serve, we still must own up to selfish motives. The rank growth of worthless periodical literature tends to smother the kind which we and a few of our colleagues are trying to make. We think some of those colleagues are standing in their own light when they advocate the policy which breeds their worthless competitors. Periodicals are like currency: the bad always drives out the good.
The publishers of thisReviewhope that, without having their motives misconstrued, they can add, from their own experience, a very suggestive illustration of the main contention of the foregoing article. Most of the readers of theRevieware familiar with the Home University Library, and some of them have praised it highly. In England it has had a phenomenal success, in America but a very moderate one. The American publishers are constantly being told that in England it is on every railway news stand, and asked why it is not here. The answer is that here the flood of cheap periodicals leaves no room for anything more substantial. The Home University Library appeals to a popular constituency, and there is a tremendous popular demand for it in England, while in America there is none: its circulation here is virtually restricted to the highly educated. The rank and file of American readers have their tastes formed and supplied by the Sunday newspapers and the cheap periodicals. The idea of gathering a library of cheap books on substantial subjects is virtually unknown among them.
The worst feature of the whole case is that the enormous demand for inferior stuff limits the field for writers who can produce valuable matter, and consequently checks the development of such writers. It would be as difficult to produce a Home University Library in America as it is to sell it. We have men of the requisite knowledge, but our conditions do not attract them to cultivate the literary art. Few of our scientific men and scholars are writers, many more of those in England are. And as for imaginative literature!
The cheap carriage of our periodicals was avowedly enacted as a government subvention to literature. Why was it not extended to books? In a year's shipments they do not bulk nearly as large as periodicals. Are we forced to the conclusion that at the present stage of evolution, a helpful subvention to literature is beyond the power of a pure democracy? If so, that is one reason for working all the harder to raise the character of that democracy. Would the withdrawal of the subvention be a good beginning?
Many of our readers whom we have met have asked: "Why don't you give us the names of your contributors?" and we suppose that many whom we have not had the pleasure of meeting have the same curiosity.
Well, in the first place, we wish our articles to be taken on their merits, and each, so far as practicable, to carry whatever authority theReviewas a whole may be able to attain.
Next, among the popular fashions that we do not wish to follow is that of exploiting names.
And finally, to be very candid, we need to profit by whatever discussion may be aroused by speculation regarding the authorship of the contributions.
Three months of anonymity, however, will be enough to secure the first consideration, to lessen the objections inherent in the second, and to give us most of whatever benefit may be realized from the third; and therefore in such lists of contents of previous numbers as are included in our advertising pages, we shall indicate the authors.
Moreover our advertising pages will often include lists of our most frequent contributors, and this may add zest to such guessing at the authorship of contributions as our readers may care to do.
Virtually all our contributors approve the anonymity, perhaps partly because the names of most of them are so well known as to make farther publicity a matter of indifference.
Another question often put to us by friends is: "How are you getting along?"
Well (again), as our title indicates, we entered uponthe enterprise with our eyes wide open to the fact that it could never be popular. Our only hope was that there might be enough people with standards above the popular, to support the undertaking. We still feel justified in entertaining that hope. Of course some ludicrous failures to understand what we are about have been forced upon our attention, but not as many as we expected; and we looked for more letters like the first one following, which, we are surprised and glad to say, is the only one of the kind we have received. All other dissent has been expressed with intelligence and courtesy; and this is the only occasion when our motives have been impugned. We think we can trust our readers to understand why we give the letter, and also the answer which the writer of the letter did not expect us to send. The former seems to us one of the most interesting and instructive contributions it has been our privilege to present, though not exactly for the reasons which make our other contributions worth while. We are glad to repeat, however, that the indications, so far, are that there is less of this sort of thing about than we had supposed.
Here is the letter, in its essentials:
... This number contains some of the most insidious and dangerous fallacies that it has been my fortune to peruse in many years, and that are only intended to craftily instil into the minds of the "rather large class" of people the erroneous doctrines thus covertly inculcated by insinuations and to promote the consequent satisfaction with their comparatively hard lot and the necessity of contentment with their own condition as well as with that of those who are subjects of a more forlorn state.Now I am going to make a proposition to you that will prove conclusively that your object in publishing thatReviewis solely for the purpose last above enumerated, as I do not hope that you will accept my proposition; and that theReviewis supported by the capital of the men who are a part of the financial oligarchy that is bent on ruining the poorer classes of this country: I will write you an article in opposition to theIrrepressible Conflictand theJuggernaut of the Majority, whichwill be written in as good a diction as either of those articles and not more controversial in tone and style thanIrrepressible Conflict, and shall expect as much pay for it as either of those two articles secured to their respective authors, or as much as it is worth if those articles were produced by respective members of the said oligarchy; and shall insist, if you refuse to publish it, that it is the substance and doctrine of it that make it unavailable andnotthe diction and style. I have a right to ask this as the public press which claims to be the leaders of public opinion, are teeming with just such articles as these that I have criticised and are published for theexpress purposeof leading me and the remainder of the public astray on vital questions affecting the material interests of us all,—in other words, there is a comprehensive and well formed conspiracy among publishers of almostallnewspapers and magazines to do as I have said and to refuse to permit the other side to be heard. I do not expect to ever get an answer to this letter but I shall make just such use of the reticence and your silence as my poor judgment teach me is legitimate and proper.
... This number contains some of the most insidious and dangerous fallacies that it has been my fortune to peruse in many years, and that are only intended to craftily instil into the minds of the "rather large class" of people the erroneous doctrines thus covertly inculcated by insinuations and to promote the consequent satisfaction with their comparatively hard lot and the necessity of contentment with their own condition as well as with that of those who are subjects of a more forlorn state.
Now I am going to make a proposition to you that will prove conclusively that your object in publishing thatReviewis solely for the purpose last above enumerated, as I do not hope that you will accept my proposition; and that theReviewis supported by the capital of the men who are a part of the financial oligarchy that is bent on ruining the poorer classes of this country: I will write you an article in opposition to theIrrepressible Conflictand theJuggernaut of the Majority, whichwill be written in as good a diction as either of those articles and not more controversial in tone and style thanIrrepressible Conflict, and shall expect as much pay for it as either of those two articles secured to their respective authors, or as much as it is worth if those articles were produced by respective members of the said oligarchy; and shall insist, if you refuse to publish it, that it is the substance and doctrine of it that make it unavailable andnotthe diction and style. I have a right to ask this as the public press which claims to be the leaders of public opinion, are teeming with just such articles as these that I have criticised and are published for theexpress purposeof leading me and the remainder of the public astray on vital questions affecting the material interests of us all,—in other words, there is a comprehensive and well formed conspiracy among publishers of almostallnewspapers and magazines to do as I have said and to refuse to permit the other side to be heard. I do not expect to ever get an answer to this letter but I shall make just such use of the reticence and your silence as my poor judgment teach me is legitimate and proper.
Our answer was:
...The Unpopular Reviewis entirely the property of its publishers.It is not a forum for discussion, but a pulpit for the preaching of what we believe to be sound doctrine. As you don't believe our doctrine is sound, probably we would not believe yours is sound: so your challenge to us to put it in our pulpit is of course outside the case. You should send it to somebody of your own way of thinking, or set up a pulpit of your own—into which we certainly should not wish to challenge you to insert anything of ours.
...The Unpopular Reviewis entirely the property of its publishers.
It is not a forum for discussion, but a pulpit for the preaching of what we believe to be sound doctrine. As you don't believe our doctrine is sound, probably we would not believe yours is sound: so your challenge to us to put it in our pulpit is of course outside the case. You should send it to somebody of your own way of thinking, or set up a pulpit of your own—into which we certainly should not wish to challenge you to insert anything of ours.
A change of subject may be welcome.
If any of our readers have been expecting an article on Psychical Research in this number, their disappointment at not finding one may be somewhat assuaged by the realization that the article in the first number was of four times the average length. The apparent neglect here however, is not real, but it has been impracticable to get what we wanted. We hope to be more fortunate in the future.
Since the bull against the comet, there has probably been no assertion of authority as absurd as one recently furnished by our National Government. Yet there was no attention called to it in the debate preceding the passage of the act containing it, and we do not remember seeing any notice of it in the press, although it was immense enough and pitiful enough to justify Iliads.
For years, government—and no government more energetically than President Wilson's—had been hammering away at the trusts, especially those producing petroleum, steel and tobacco. Yet petroleum, steel and tobacco are not necessaries of life, nor have their prices been rising as much as the prices of necessaries of life. These have been rising more than anything else. What has been done about them by the government that has been destroying the trusts in other things? It has simply gone out of its way to specially legalize a trust in these things. In a bill providing money to fight trusts in comparatively non-essential things, Congress specially exempted from prosecution any trust that may be formed by the farmers to raise the price of food. Other trusts claim to lower the prices of their products, and sometimes have done it; but our government has not merely authorized the farmers to form trusts, to raise the price of foods, but has specially authorized them, in the letter of the law, to use methods denied to everybody else but wage-earners; and this at a time when the one problem above all others was how to lower the price of foods, and when the high price was the one burden above all others on the poor.
This piece of imbecility was virtually a "rider" on the trade-union-exemption rider, and was of course "playing politics" to catch support for the principal rider.
In our efforts to uphold the dignity of letters, of course we intend that each of our contributions shall be as nearly as possible a perfect example from its special field, and ordinarily it would ill become us to suggest the possibility of degrees of perfection. But our readers will, we trust, find justification for our calling special attention to the following model of divinatory criticism.
The fact that it has already passed the ordeal of the Authors' Club, though a trifling derogation from its novelty, is much weightier as a reason for presenting it for the careful consideration of our readers. [Ed.]
The subject is the proper interpretation of a familiar lyric poem, which runs, in thetextus receptus, as follows:
Dr. Foster went to GloucesterIn a shower of rain;He stepped in a puddle up to his middleAnd never went there again.
Dr. Foster went to GloucesterIn a shower of rain;He stepped in a puddle up to his middleAnd never went there again.
The question is, What does this poem mean? What does it mean, that is, in its intimate and ultimate essence? According to the conventional interpretation these lines are didactic. Their higher import—what we may call their spiritual center of gravity—is believed to reside in a pragmatic moral conveyed, or at least adumbrated, in the last line: "He never went there again." The idea is supposed to be—remember that I am now speaking of the conventional interpretation—that he never went there again because he had learned wisdom by experience—the annoying experience of the puddle. According to this view the dominant note of the poem is not lyrical feeling, but what literary critics are wont to call—usually with a shade of contempt—ethicism. It is supposed to be a sort of psalm of life—pitched to be sure in a minor key, but essentially didactic.
I wish to show you that this conventional interpretation is altogether wrong. I shall try to prove that we have to do here, not with a shallow didactic rime, not with a piece of brain-spun ethicism, such as a common poetaster might produce, but with a lyrical ballad of deeply felt tragic import.
I call your attention, in the first place, to the singular ambiguity in that famous last line. "He never went there again." "Never went where?" one instinctively asks. Are we to understand merely that Foster henceforth avoided the particular puddle into which he had stepped, or that he in after time discontinued his visits to Gloucester altogether? This is evidently a question of vital importance, and the poem at first does not seem to answer it at all. In the absence of biographical data extraneous to the text, we can only attack the problem by analytic methods. Let us consider the only two possible hypotheses.
1. That Foster never went to Gloucester again. This supposition is utterly untenable, because it is clearly inconsistent with Foster's character, which can be read from the poem itself with entire certainty. In the first place, he was clearly a doctor of medicine. Had he been a doctor of laws, or letters, or philosophy, there would have been no special urgency in his call to Gloucester, and he would surely have waited until the weather should clear up. Secondly he was a youngish doctor. Had he been an elderly practitioner he would not have gone himself, but would have sent his assistant. Or perhaps he would have telephoned that he would come immediately, and would then have quietly waited for the rain to cease. But our Dr. Foster "went"—went in a shower of rain. From this we see, in the third place, that he was a man of energy, capable of self-abnegation, dominated by a strong sense of professional duty. Now can we suppose that such a man would have renounced forever his practice in Gloucester merely because he had stepped casually into apuddle in a well meant effort to reach the place? The supposition is an insult to his intelligence and to ours. No doubt the incident of the puddle was humiliating, but we do not read that there were spectators. In the absence of specific evidence to the contrary we must assume that Foster was alone. That being so, a man of his character would surely have extricated himself from his unpleasant dilemma, given vent to his emotions in language suited to the occasion, and gone on his way. It is simply impossible to believe that he can have taken from the puddle such a deep and lasting chagrin that he would have been willing to renounce forevermore his growing practice in Gloucester.
2. We turn now to the other hypothesis, according to which Mater Anser means merely that Foster never again stepped in that particular puddle. This supposition makes the whole poem trivial to the point of banality. Why in the world should any man in his senses deliberately step into a deep puddle a second time? Remember too that it was raining at the time. The puddle did not exist ordinarily, but was a transitory affair due to the freshet. Had Foster chosen to come back the next day, there would have been no puddle there, hence nothing to be afraid of. To assume that a man of Foster's intelligence would have retained through life a morbid dread of a mere depression in the ground where he had once encountered a puddle is contrary to all reason. Evidently we must seek some other interpretation for that mysterious last line, "He never went there again."
And now observe, please, a singular technical defect in a poem which is otherwise technically perfect. I refer to the dubious rimepuddle-middle. There has never been a time in the history of the English language, so far as I know, when that was a tolerable rime. If puddle were of French origin and had retained its Frenchü-sound, "He stepped in a püddle up to his middle" might perhaps pass muster. Butpuddleis not of French origin. It was thisbad rime, coupled with the anatomical vagueness of the phrase "up to his middle," which led me to conjecture that thetextus receptusmust be corrupt. It is pretty evident that Mater Anser originally wrote not "middle," but some word which was taken for "middle" by a pestilent scribe. And what word can that possibly have been but "noddle"? Perhaps a captious critic may object that, as a matter of rime,puddle-noddleis not much better thanpuddle-middle. But remember that in early English o and u were often confused. It is altogether likely that the word which we pronouncepuddlewas familiar to Mater Anser's dialect aspoddle. What she wrote was: He stepped in a poddle up to his noddle.
In the light flashed on the poem by this recension of the text, we penetrate at once the mystery of that last line, "He never went there again," because he never went anywhere again. He perished. His promising career came then and there to an untimely end. We now understand why it is that the career of Dr. Foster subsequent to his memorable expedition to Gloucester has failed to interest the Muse. There was no subsequent career.
I trust I have made it clear that Dr. Foster is the hero of a tragical ballad. He is evidently a being of the same order as Achilles and Siegfried—those dazzling heroes of the Dawn who are destined to run a brilliant career in the pride of their youthful strength, and then to meet with an untimely end. It is true that Achilles and Siegfried are invulnerable, except in one place, and that we hear nothing of Foster's invulnerability. But if you look closely you will find something in his case that is quite analogous. The underlying idea of the invulnerability is always simply this: That the hero is fated to die in one particular way, and in no other. Now it is clear that Foster was fated to die by water. Water was his enemy, his fate. A pious mother had no doubt brought him up to dread and avoid it. When he set out on that last journey he of course took an umbrella, but his precautions didnot end there. In view of the inclement weather he of course felt the need of something to fortify the inner man, but he durst not and did not drink water. He drank something else. Just what it was we are not told, but it was evidently something that made him a little unsteady on his feet. And so, just as in the case of Oedipus, the very precautions that he took to avoid his predestined fate only served to precipitate it.
I conclude by summing up briefly what my interpretation does for the advancement of science.
1. It converts what has been supposed to be a rather trivial didactic rime into a tragical ballad of heart-rending pathos.
2. It removes the one serious technical defect of the poem.
3. It accounts in a natural way for the oblivion which has settled like a pall over the career of Dr. Foster after his visit to Gloucester.
4. It enables us to connect Foster with the great heroes of epic song.
Language, like society, has to recruit its upper strata from the lower. Here are some recent candidates.
I. The very eminent author ofThe Baby and the Beein this number puts into the mouth of one of the characters the word "humans" as an equivalent for human beings. The same use of it has been met elsewhere in quarters of less dignity. Many of our readers must have regretted the absence from the language of a single word equivalent tohomo. Is not "human" as a noun worthy of being raised to that dignity?
II. Another new labor-saving locution has already found its way into the Standard Dictionary, and seems worthy of general recognition. The dictionary treats it thus:
thon, 1 thon; 2 thon, pron. sing. pl. [thon's, poss.; thon, obj.] that one; he, she, or it; a pronoun of the 3rd person, common gender; a contracted and solidified form ofthat one, proposed in 1858 by Charles Crozat Converse, of Erie, Pennsylvania, as a substitute in cases where the use of a restrictive pronoun involves either inaccuracy or obscurity, or its non-employment necessitates awkward repetition. The following examples, first as ordinarily written, and afterward with the substitution of the genderless pronoun, illustrate the grammatical deficiencies of the English language in this particular and the proposed method of removal: "If Harry or his wife comes, I will be on hand to meethimorher(or whichever appears)." "Each pupil must learnhisorherown lesson." With the substitution ofthon; "If Harry or his wife comes, I will be on hand to meetthon(i.e., that one who comes)." "Each pupil must learn thon's lesson (i.e.,hisorherown)." Compare he'er, him'er, his'er.
thon, 1 thon; 2 thon, pron. sing. pl. [thon's, poss.; thon, obj.] that one; he, she, or it; a pronoun of the 3rd person, common gender; a contracted and solidified form ofthat one, proposed in 1858 by Charles Crozat Converse, of Erie, Pennsylvania, as a substitute in cases where the use of a restrictive pronoun involves either inaccuracy or obscurity, or its non-employment necessitates awkward repetition. The following examples, first as ordinarily written, and afterward with the substitution of the genderless pronoun, illustrate the grammatical deficiencies of the English language in this particular and the proposed method of removal: "If Harry or his wife comes, I will be on hand to meethimorher(or whichever appears)." "Each pupil must learnhisorherown lesson." With the substitution ofthon; "If Harry or his wife comes, I will be on hand to meetthon(i.e., that one who comes)." "Each pupil must learn thon's lesson (i.e.,hisorherown)." Compare he'er, him'er, his'er.
III. A third applicant for thecachetis "near," not as a preposition, but as an adjective signifying imitation or ineffective approximation, as, near pearls, near lover, near artist, etc., etc. It would at least often save several syllables, and sometimes save a circumlocution. It seems to have begun rather low down. We don't half like it, and we were surprised to find it as far up as in an article by an eminent professor in our present number. But there it was, and it seems well on the way to full habilitation.
The invitation in the January number for views on Simplified Spelling has brought some interesting letters from both sides. The best objections that we have seen anywhere are the following:
(1) From an eminent professor:
... This point, briefly, is whether the spoken language is the onlyentity, so to say, to be considered in the case, and the written language merely an effort to represent it, or whether the written language is equally a reality for the purposes of civilization....I have just received a holiday greeting ... readingHarty Crismas Greetings.The chain of frendship reaching farLinks days that wer with days that ar.For him [the sender] all written characters are absolutely nothing but the effort to express spoken sounds, and he puts anything on paper which he thinks will represent the sound he wants most immediately for the reader's intelligence. If he is right, if our written language is nothing but this, there should be no delay in altering it radically.But is my philological friend right? I think certainly not. Since printing came to take a really large place in civilization, the written word has been alogos—a direct means of representing thought—quite as truly as the spoken. As an agency for communicating thought between absent persons, for preserving thought from one time to another, and even for communicating the knowledge of a foreign tongue to a contemporary learner, the written word actually exceeds the spoken in general importance. And to a very large extent it does thisnotby representing the sounds of the spoken word, but by representing the idea through an independent convention. When I read the word "choir" I do not think first that it represents the syllablekwiir, and then that the syllablekwiirmeans a company of singers. Some foreigners who have learned English orally doubtless do go through this process; but those who have learned it primarily by reading, or for reading, do not....The participlefinishedhas a certain real existence as a language fact, undisturbed by the accident that it is now pronouncedfinisht.And this great entity, the written English language, the chief medium of scholarship, literature, history, law, and even business ... is what it is proposed to change. Perhaps it should be done; perhaps the times demand an heroic sacrifice of the organ of scholarly and literary communication and tradition, in the interest of increased efficiency on the part of the average man for whom the language of scholarship and literature is negligible. But we should not mistake the meaning of the effort. It is not the mere effort to do better what we are doing already—writing words so-and-so because they sound so-and-so; for we are already doing nothing of the kind. It is the effort to transfer English from the group where, with modern French and other tongues, it now belongs,—the group of languageswhose history has differentiated a written and a spoken form,—to the group represented by classic Latin and modern Italian, whose (doubtless happier) history has kept the written form a fairly accurate replica of the spoken....The impression often prevails that those who hesitate to commit themselves to the enticements of the Spelling Board do so merely because the new spellings "look so queer." Of course this very statement is a clumsy and unpenetrating way of expressing the fact that the whole language psychology of areadinggeneration is disturbed by the efforts in question.
... This point, briefly, is whether the spoken language is the onlyentity, so to say, to be considered in the case, and the written language merely an effort to represent it, or whether the written language is equally a reality for the purposes of civilization....
I have just received a holiday greeting ... reading
Harty Crismas Greetings.The chain of frendship reaching farLinks days that wer with days that ar.
Harty Crismas Greetings.The chain of frendship reaching farLinks days that wer with days that ar.
For him [the sender] all written characters are absolutely nothing but the effort to express spoken sounds, and he puts anything on paper which he thinks will represent the sound he wants most immediately for the reader's intelligence. If he is right, if our written language is nothing but this, there should be no delay in altering it radically.
But is my philological friend right? I think certainly not. Since printing came to take a really large place in civilization, the written word has been alogos—a direct means of representing thought—quite as truly as the spoken. As an agency for communicating thought between absent persons, for preserving thought from one time to another, and even for communicating the knowledge of a foreign tongue to a contemporary learner, the written word actually exceeds the spoken in general importance. And to a very large extent it does thisnotby representing the sounds of the spoken word, but by representing the idea through an independent convention. When I read the word "choir" I do not think first that it represents the syllablekwiir, and then that the syllablekwiirmeans a company of singers. Some foreigners who have learned English orally doubtless do go through this process; but those who have learned it primarily by reading, or for reading, do not....
The participlefinishedhas a certain real existence as a language fact, undisturbed by the accident that it is now pronouncedfinisht.
And this great entity, the written English language, the chief medium of scholarship, literature, history, law, and even business ... is what it is proposed to change. Perhaps it should be done; perhaps the times demand an heroic sacrifice of the organ of scholarly and literary communication and tradition, in the interest of increased efficiency on the part of the average man for whom the language of scholarship and literature is negligible. But we should not mistake the meaning of the effort. It is not the mere effort to do better what we are doing already—writing words so-and-so because they sound so-and-so; for we are already doing nothing of the kind. It is the effort to transfer English from the group where, with modern French and other tongues, it now belongs,—the group of languageswhose history has differentiated a written and a spoken form,—to the group represented by classic Latin and modern Italian, whose (doubtless happier) history has kept the written form a fairly accurate replica of the spoken....
The impression often prevails that those who hesitate to commit themselves to the enticements of the Spelling Board do so merely because the new spellings "look so queer." Of course this very statement is a clumsy and unpenetrating way of expressing the fact that the whole language psychology of areadinggeneration is disturbed by the efforts in question.
(II) From a lady:
This unspeakable spelling is history-destroying, tradition-annihilating, and puts the veriest hind on a semblance of equality with a person of elegance.As Nietsche says: "Let us be free from moralic acid"!!
This unspeakable spelling is history-destroying, tradition-annihilating, and puts the veriest hind on a semblance of equality with a person of elegance.
As Nietsche says: "Let us be free from moralic acid"!!
Possibly to some tastes, a neck without a goitre would be more "elegant" than a neck with one—orthothanthough.
(III) From a well-known author:
The tendency of our English speech is constantly to "reform" its Orthography! Witness the betterment between the spelling of Chaucer and that of Shakespeare, and between that of Shakespeare and that of the days of Queen Anne! Well then, granting it to be the irresistible tendency of our Orthography to better itself, why not permit it to go on in peace bettering itself? Why assist Fate? Are our awful Spelling Reformers, like the impatient young gentleman in Mr. Stockton's story, appointed to the task of Assisting Fate?
The tendency of our English speech is constantly to "reform" its Orthography! Witness the betterment between the spelling of Chaucer and that of Shakespeare, and between that of Shakespeare and that of the days of Queen Anne! Well then, granting it to be the irresistible tendency of our Orthography to better itself, why not permit it to go on in peace bettering itself? Why assist Fate? Are our awful Spelling Reformers, like the impatient young gentleman in Mr. Stockton's story, appointed to the task of Assisting Fate?
(IV) From a talented author and critic—a lady:
You must allow me, as an old friend of yours and a new friend of theReview's, to protest against the introduction of "reformed spelling" into a literary journal of a high class, which is what we all consider the new venture. To many of us who respect the English language as an inheritance, and are content to leave its simplification to the slow erosion of time, pages like those at the end of theReviewgive positive pain.
You must allow me, as an old friend of yours and a new friend of theReview's, to protest against the introduction of "reformed spelling" into a literary journal of a high class, which is what we all consider the new venture. To many of us who respect the English language as an inheritance, and are content to leave its simplification to the slow erosion of time, pages like those at the end of theReviewgive positive pain.
It would indeed be a hardened reformer who would not feel the force of the foregoing objections.
To "Why assist Fate?" and "the slow erosion of time" the answer is that the doctrine oflaissez fairehas had its day, and can hardly be regarded as open for discussion.
On the other side, we have received many letters favoring the reform from the highest philological authorities:
(I) From a Johns Hopkins Professor:
Serious study of the problem becomes the duty of every thoughtful person.
Serious study of the problem becomes the duty of every thoughtful person.
(II) From a Harvard Professor:
A discussion of orthographic possibilities can hardly fail to be enlightening. I do not much like the scheme you tentatively advocate, but anything that reveals existing absurdities and opens up new vistas is useful at this stage.
A discussion of orthographic possibilities can hardly fail to be enlightening. I do not much like the scheme you tentatively advocate, but anything that reveals existing absurdities and opens up new vistas is useful at this stage.
(III) On the other hand, the Superintendent of Education in one of the Canadian provinces, whose sympathies are naturally British, writes:
"Your simplified spelling appeals to me in preference to that of the S. S. S. of London."
"Your simplified spelling appeals to me in preference to that of the S. S. S. of London."
The main differences are illustrated in (the S. S. B. coming first)tiemandtiimfortime,doeranddoorfordoor,tipingandtippingfortipping.
(IV) A Nova Scotian, president of an important educational institution, writes:
Your article on simplified spelling is a very courageous one—for an American! Probably it has alredy brought upon you the whips and scorns of the conventional journalist. In the Old Country, scholars are accustomd to stand up against professional journalists. Do you think you can do so with your new scheme? I hope so, for it seems to me simple in principle, and, on the whole, a good working basis. One is tempted, of course, to ask why such inconsistencies as:Allwaiz—Becauz.Oonly—Molar.
Your article on simplified spelling is a very courageous one—for an American! Probably it has alredy brought upon you the whips and scorns of the conventional journalist. In the Old Country, scholars are accustomd to stand up against professional journalists. Do you think you can do so with your new scheme? I hope so, for it seems to me simple in principle, and, on the whole, a good working basis. One is tempted, of course, to ask why such inconsistencies as:
Allwaiz—Becauz.
Oonly—Molar.
We accept theawsound forabeforell, but probablyawlis better thanall; and inbecauzit should undoubtedly beaw.
As tomolar, we propose that a single vowel should always, as generally now, be long at the end of a syllable.
The same correspondent continues:
Again, if long vowels are to be indicated by the doubling of the letter, is there any need of doubling the consonant after a short vowel?
Again, if long vowels are to be indicated by the doubling of the letter, is there any need of doubling the consonant after a short vowel?
(V) Another correspondent joins in the same charge:
It hardly seems logical to double a vowel to indicate its lengthening and at the same time to double a consonant to indicate the closing of a preceding vowel. It strikes me as rather a clumsy artifice at best, and leads to some very cumbrous forms, of which "annuthther," as you point out, is an extreme instance.
It hardly seems logical to double a vowel to indicate its lengthening and at the same time to double a consonant to indicate the closing of a preceding vowel. It strikes me as rather a clumsy artifice at best, and leads to some very cumbrous forms, of which "annuthther," as you point out, is an extreme instance.
But, as just said, it is not proposed that always "long vowels are to be indicated by doubling of the letter," but only when the syllable is closed by a consonant. See also the second paragraph of the following letter answering a correspondent, which shows some aspects of the question that may be worth presenting to other readers as well:
Thanks for your letter.... I wish all that I get on the subject were equally sensible. At the same time, there are two or three things that call for rejoinder.When a consonant beginning a second syllable, is repeated at the end of the preceding syllable, to prevent the vowel being counted as long, the consonant is by no means "doubled" in the sense that a vowel is doubled to make it count as long, or as the terminal consonant is doubled in fall, call, etc.In English spelling probably there cannot be carried out any principle that won't land us somewhere into awkwardnesses almost as great as "annuthther." That particular one, I have no doubt, if ever adopted, would work into smaller dimensions, which of course would have some elements of inconsistency. There is no reason, however, why we should not use the methods which lead to absurdities in that word, in hosts of other words where they don't.I shall never take any part in an attempt to add charactersto the English language. The only thing in that line it has done since it began taking shape, is to get rid of two very useful ones; and I don't believe it will ever move in the opposite direction. My humble efforts will be concentrated on doing the best practicable with those we have, though I wish Godspeed to everybody who works for consistency and reasonableness, even if he thinks he can introduce a new alphabet.It is never going to simplify our language to introduce diacritical marks. My little experience with French satisfies me on that subject.I am glad you agree with me as to dropping theuafterq.I am not sure about usingxwithout a vowel preceding it (e. g.xpense). Theoretically no consonant carries a vowel, butxis pronounced as if there were a shortebefore it, though, like any other consonant, it will take the color of any vowel.I don't believe that I am going to be any farther reformed in regard to vowels thanooindoor,eeinfeel,aaas suggested by the British Society in "faather,"uuin "suun" as also suggested by them; andiiin "tiim," as suggested by me and probably by others whom I don't know of. I only wish you would leave your diacritics and new letters, and fight with me for these vowels. There seems to be some hope in such a fight, as the English Society is for all but theii, and consistent people will naturally work for their acceptingii; and as nobody that I am aware of, in the direction of either body, is with you for new letters and diacritics.
Thanks for your letter.... I wish all that I get on the subject were equally sensible. At the same time, there are two or three things that call for rejoinder.
When a consonant beginning a second syllable, is repeated at the end of the preceding syllable, to prevent the vowel being counted as long, the consonant is by no means "doubled" in the sense that a vowel is doubled to make it count as long, or as the terminal consonant is doubled in fall, call, etc.
In English spelling probably there cannot be carried out any principle that won't land us somewhere into awkwardnesses almost as great as "annuthther." That particular one, I have no doubt, if ever adopted, would work into smaller dimensions, which of course would have some elements of inconsistency. There is no reason, however, why we should not use the methods which lead to absurdities in that word, in hosts of other words where they don't.
I shall never take any part in an attempt to add charactersto the English language. The only thing in that line it has done since it began taking shape, is to get rid of two very useful ones; and I don't believe it will ever move in the opposite direction. My humble efforts will be concentrated on doing the best practicable with those we have, though I wish Godspeed to everybody who works for consistency and reasonableness, even if he thinks he can introduce a new alphabet.
It is never going to simplify our language to introduce diacritical marks. My little experience with French satisfies me on that subject.
I am glad you agree with me as to dropping theuafterq.
I am not sure about usingxwithout a vowel preceding it (e. g.xpense). Theoretically no consonant carries a vowel, butxis pronounced as if there were a shortebefore it, though, like any other consonant, it will take the color of any vowel.
I don't believe that I am going to be any farther reformed in regard to vowels thanooindoor,eeinfeel,aaas suggested by the British Society in "faather,"uuin "suun" as also suggested by them; andiiin "tiim," as suggested by me and probably by others whom I don't know of. I only wish you would leave your diacritics and new letters, and fight with me for these vowels. There seems to be some hope in such a fight, as the English Society is for all but theii, and consistent people will naturally work for their acceptingii; and as nobody that I am aware of, in the direction of either body, is with you for new letters and diacritics.
To the same correspondent:
Your letter of the 5th is very suggestive.I think one trouble between us is that you think it worth while to strive for ideal perfection in spelling. If we attained it, it would not stay put.You say: "It seems to me simple arithmetic admonishes us that we have to have new characters for the vowel sounds." There are two reasons why we don't. One is that (me judice) there is no use in seeking absolute perfection. Another is that we can do with existing letters as much of the work as we need to.It may be "important" to "develop an alphabet in which each character stands for a precise sound" but I haven't the slightest idea that the English-speaking people will ever do it.Of course all existing languages have come because "peoples ... drift so far apart in pronunciation as sooner or laterto become almost unintelligible to each other," but printing and facilities of communication are probably obstructing farther movements in that direction, and I should not be surprised if the present tendency were toward unity.I am sorry you are one of the reformers who "believe that we should go the whole way, or let things stay as they are." It is not often that any reform goes the whole way, and I suspect that we would be a good deal farther along if people of reforming disposition would be content to go only so far as practicable.
Your letter of the 5th is very suggestive.
I think one trouble between us is that you think it worth while to strive for ideal perfection in spelling. If we attained it, it would not stay put.
You say: "It seems to me simple arithmetic admonishes us that we have to have new characters for the vowel sounds." There are two reasons why we don't. One is that (me judice) there is no use in seeking absolute perfection. Another is that we can do with existing letters as much of the work as we need to.
It may be "important" to "develop an alphabet in which each character stands for a precise sound" but I haven't the slightest idea that the English-speaking people will ever do it.
Of course all existing languages have come because "peoples ... drift so far apart in pronunciation as sooner or laterto become almost unintelligible to each other," but printing and facilities of communication are probably obstructing farther movements in that direction, and I should not be surprised if the present tendency were toward unity.
I am sorry you are one of the reformers who "believe that we should go the whole way, or let things stay as they are." It is not often that any reform goes the whole way, and I suspect that we would be a good deal farther along if people of reforming disposition would be content to go only so far as practicable.
On one side, then, we have habit and sensitive associations, and on the other side the facts which cannot be denied by anyone who is thoughtful and educated (not always synonymous terms) that the anomalies of English spelling not only breed lawlessness in the juvenile mind, increase the difficulties of education, and waste much labor and expense in writing and printing, but also seriously obstruct commerce, diplomacy, and the peace of the world.
No wonder these opposing conditions produce the frame of mind expressed to us by a leading city Superintendent of Schools: "I abominate simplified spelling, but I am in favor of it."
Now between this Scylla and this Charybdis, what is the reasonable course?
We must regard two considerations too often ignored by reformers, though they were insisted on by as great an authority as Spencer. The first is that feeling, more than reason, determines conduct; the other is that everything is so inextricably connected with other things, that raising one is like raising a strand of a net, which involves raising many other strands with it. With this reform are tangled up not only the feelings and habits illustrated in the foregoing quotations, but all existing English literature, including many thousand tons of it in electrotype plates. All these obstruct a sudden reform. Must then the reform be as gradual as that from Chaucer's spelling to ours? Prophecy is dangerous, but we are inclined to think not.
We favor simplified spellings, but we don't want our attention diverted by them from anything that we value more, and we don't want to interfere with anybody's Shakspere or Tennyson, any more than we want anybody to interfere with ours. We are glad, however, when we see the sign of a "Fotografer," or an announcement of a "thru" train. We have no doubt that a large and increasing number of people share both these sets of feelings, and they seem to indicate the way out of the dilemma.
Now there's no question of intrinsic beauty between the new forms and the old. Preference for the latter is simply a matter of habit, but habit is stronger than intelligence; and here, with the student, intelligence balks at habit in a paradoxical way. In reading an impassioned passage, he encounters a "thru"; his thoughts are not only diverted to the spelling, but to the years of association he may have with the problems concerning it. For ourselves, the more we study it, if we meet it in literature the more we "abominate" it, with the superintendent already quoted; but the more we see it in advertisements and other indifferent places, the more we are "in favor of it"; and this we think is apt to be the experience of those who really bring their intellects to the problem. Nay, we even think that, in time, the younger portion of the thinking people whose habits favor the old forms, may perhaps come around to the new: for, after writing the most radical of the new forms, as in the last number of theReview, we have been surprised at the way they linger in the memory and seem for a while more habitual than the old forms. This experience makes it seem probable that if, for our children's sake, and for the sake of the great causes already indicated, we were to condemn ourselves for a few weeks, or possibly even a few days, to the better forms, they would become more natural than the worse.
Press ofT. Morey & Son, Greenfield, Mass.