Formation of a new corporation, Hearst Magazines, Inc., which will acquire control of International Magazine Company, Inc., is announced by William Randolph Hearst. The magazine company is the publisher of five of the principal Hearst organization magazines: Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, Harper's Bazar, Motor and Motor Boating. This move marks a definite step in the segregation of the magazine and newspaper properties of one of the units of the Hearst organizations. The magazine company, together with the Los Angeles Examiner, the Los Angeles Evening Herald, the San Francisco Examiner, the San Francisco Call and Post, and the Oakland Post Enquirer, formerly comprised the Hearst Publications, Inc. Under the new arrangement, the latter organization will control only the newspaper properties.

According to the Publishers' Circular there were 9,989 new books published in England in 1926, and 2,801 new editions of old books. There were 1,501 new novels and 1,455 new editions. There were 448 new works of poetry and drama, while according to the Publishers' Weekly, there were 6,883 books published in the United States during the same time, by 173 publishing houses. The largest number of books published by any one firm was 614 by the Macmillan Company.

The petition of Charles Chaplin for an injunction to restrain the Pictorial Review from printing a series of articles about him, and asking damages of $500,000, has been denied.

The American Museum of Natural History has awarded the John Burroughs memorial medal to Ernest Thompson Seton, for his recent work on animal life.

Rider Haggard's first big success, "King Solomon's Mines," was written on a bet of a shilling, which bet was never paid. Haggard had previously written three dismal failures and was on the point of abandoning literature for the law when a friend offered to bet him a shilling he had n't another story in him. It was meant as a joke, but Haggard took it seriously. "King Solomon's Mines" was the result.

I am told by publishers that the books of our leading novelists today last about six months. Alfred Noyes.

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Examination of the estate of James Whitcomb Riley indicated that he received five hundred dollars a word royalties on his poem "An Old Sweetheart of Mine."

Sir Edmund Gosse said that Pope is the most quoted of all the English poets. Another authority places Shakspere first, Milton second, and Pope a good third, with Burns not far behind, perhaps highest of all in Scotland.

The late Bert Leston Taylor, a most skilful writer of light verse, used to say that if you could write a 99 percent line in three minutes and a 100 percent line in nine hours, or nine days, there should be no problem of conduct; that though maybe nobody would know the difference, you were writing for yourself, and nothing short of your uttermost was thinkable.

There's a lesson for writers in the story that a long-winded advertisement writer, working on copy for a soap campaign, produced this:

The alkaline elements and vegetable fats in this product are blended in such a way as to secure the highest quality of saponification along with a specific gravity which keeps it on top of the water, relieving the bather of the trouble and annoyance of fishing around for it in the bottom during his ablutions.

When the advertising manager revised this copy, he made it read:

It floats.

"I'll never again write a book which is just a story of a triangle or a tale for lazy people to read," says Willa Cather. "If I can't do something different from that I'll never write another line and I'll go and be a cashier in my brother's bank."

May Sutherland, an English clerk, wrote a novel in the evenings after her daily work was over. She knew that she knew nothing about novel writing but she kept doggedly at the book until she had finished it, writing and rewriting. After it was done, she read it and did not like it. She thought it was not good enough to be published so she put it aside. Some time later she happened to see an advertisement of a literary agent and she sent the manuscript off. The publishers to whom it was offered not only accepted it but asked for an option on her next three stories.

Autographing books for charity, the author of "Quality Street" wrote on the fly-leaf:

At six 'twas thus I wrote my name:
J. Barrie.

At twelve it was not quite the same:
James M. Barrie.

At twenty, thus, with a caress:
James Matthew Barrie.
At thirty I admired it less:
J. M. Barrie.
At forty-five it became so:
J. M. B.
And soon I think the M. will go:
J. B.

One tear for twenty's youthful swank,
And then the name becomes a blank.

LITTLE THEATRE ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT. For Community, University and School Including a History of the Amateur in Drama. By Alexander Dean. 333 pages. Cloth. New York: D. Appleton and Company.

Few students of American Drama can fail to realize the importance of a thorough knowledge of Little Theatre administration. A book, therefore, that treats this problem from every angle is of first importance. Professor Dean's new volume contains a preface by no less an authority than Walter Pritchard Eaton, who traces the decline of the professional theatre in this country, outside of New York City, and hails the Little Theatre as the salvation of the spoken drama.

"In no other form of art," says Mr. Eaton, "have we as a people found and seized such opportunity for self-expression and for creative self-expression, as we are now finding in the amateur theatre. The Little Theatres are already important, and in coming years they will be increasingly so. . . . That is why a book about them by an expert in their problems seems to me of very real interest and value. Alexander Dean is a man who has devoted his life to the theatre, and to the amateur theatre. He has had a wide experience in teaching undergraduates, to bring out their creative abilities; he has had wide experience in conducting Little Theatres in communities where there was no academic discipline to help, but the work was entirely volunteer; he

has been himself a student and practitioner of the manifold arts of the theatre, in their direct relation to American life. . . . He has the knowledge, and it is knowledge that just now should be widely disseminated for the good of our American theatre and the future of spoken drama."

A promising Preface, indeed. And the reader will not be disappointed. It would be difficult to find a more comprehensive study. The book was written with the avowed ideal that each Little Theatre should be financially self-supporting and every subject is therefore covered. A chapter is devoted to a historical sketch of the Amateur in Drama, another chapter to The Little Theatre and the Individual, and then Professor Dean takes up all administrative problems of school, community, university, travelling, experimental, and juvenile theatres. These include founding, organizing, committees on play-choosing, membership, casting, publicity, production, financing, stage managing, music, and building.

Professor Dean shows that Little Theatre management is as technical and commercial as professional theatre management. He admits the commercial aspect of the practical chapters, but defends the business-like side of his work with such eloquent arguments as the following:

"Shakspere had as great an ambition to become socially and financially successful as he did to become artistically great . . . Furthermore, no one in the world of writers ever watched the pulse of

his audience more than did Shakspere. His genius lay in detecting their reactions and paying marked heed to them in his next play. We have always heard that the audience was a part of the play, that a drama was not drama until it had been put on a stage before an audience and had proven successful before that paying public. At the beginning of his career he constantly imitated every known type of popular play which his predecessors had been using. Of course, that was done partly to learn the fundamentals of his craft, but just as much to cash in on their success. I believe it is very much more a mark of great genius that he never lost sight of his desire to hold his public by giving them what they wanted, but at the same time to give them what he wanted them to have. It took greater power and ability. His greatest of plays are filled with the melodramatic claptrap which was what they, as a paying group, wanted, but also they contained a great understanding of the human soul and its relation to the conflicting world which was what he, as an artist, wanted. He worked for many years before he combined the two so that both his pocketbook and his artistic ideals were satisfied. Herein lies a magnificent parable."

THE ROMANCE of GreetinG CARDS. By Ernest Dudley Chase. An Historical Account of the Origin, Evolution, and Development of the Christmas Card, Valentine, and Other Forms of Engraved or Printed Greetings from the Earliest Days to the Present Time. 255 Pages. Cloth. Cambridge: The University Press.

The countless writers who turn their idle moments to pleasure and profit by composing greeting card verses will also find pleasure and profit in reading this book. The author who is both artist and publisher knows all the problems of the industry and he shows its historic background of invention, originality, and inspiration. From the origination of the

first Christmas card in England to the present era of remarkable growth in America, Mr. Chase tells of the work of the leaders in this field and describes the business of preparing and distributing the cards. Verses for every possible occasion are quoted, from the beautiful sentiments of such artists as Edwin Markham and Joyce Kilmer to some unpublished monstrosities, without rhyme or reason, actually received by publishers "at regular rates"; i.e. the following:

HAPPY DAYS

Many happy hours together

We have wandered on the beach,
Listening to the singing bullfrogs,
While the crocodiles would preach.

The profuse and varied illustrations include the first Christmas card designed for Sir Henry Cole, London, in 1846, the 1926 Christmas designs for King George and the Prince of Wales, and special cards sent to President Coolidge.

SYNOPSES OF ENGLISH FICTION. By Nora I. Sholto-Douglas. 392 pages. Cloth. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company.

This book will be helpful to the student writer who desires in briefest possible form, the plots of the first books that could be called by the name of novel. What Lamb did for Shakspere in his famous "Tales from Shakspere" is here attempted for English classic fiction. Part I deals with the first forty works of English fiction, from More's "Utopia" (1551), to Porter's "The Scottish Chiefs" (1810). Thus we see the gradual transition of the novel from the pure romance its interest depending solely on more or less improbable incident to the more modern conception, whose chief interest is in character development and analysis of motive.

From 1810 a selection is made from the ever-increasing novels, dealing with lesserknown and very long stories of special merit. The classical index is a helpful feature.

SOME DICKENS WOMEN. By Edwin Charles. 350 pages. Cloth. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company.

When we realize that the published works of Charles Dickens contain more than five hundred women characters, we appreciate the task which Edwin Charles assumed in this first attempt to give a brief but complete story of the most representative characters. Professor Charles is such a true Dickensian, however, that his work is clearly a labor of love and it deserves a prominent place on the shelves of every Dickens collector. The very atmosphere of Dickens is in it, as the various characters are portrayed by numerous extracts, connected by short lucid explanations. The book makes no attempt at severe criticism and the comments are as highly entertaining as the subjects. G. K. Chesterton contributes a Foreword.

New Books in Brief

"What is News?" by Gerald White Johnson, is a handbook of journalism, published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.

"Columbia Journalism Graduates," by C. W. Steffler (Columbia University Press), is a summary of the results of instruction in journalism at Columbia University, with statements of what the graduates have accomplished since receiving their degrees.

"Best American Stories," edited by Blanche Colton Williams (Doubleday, Page, & Co.), contains the ninety-four best stories written by American authors, selected by the Society of Arts and Sciences.

"The World's Best Stories of 1926" (George H. Doran Company) is a collection of stories which first appeared in magazines, and were then syndicated. The authors represented are Achmed Abdullah, Mary R. S. Andrews, Maxwell Struthers Burt, Richard Connell, F. Scott Fitzgerald, F. Tennyson

Jesse, Peter B. Kyne, Lynn Montross, Honoré Willsie Morrow, Charles Saxby, Benjamin Richard Sher, Raymond S. Speare, Wilbur Daniel Steele, Booth Tarkington, W. C. Tuttle, and Edgar Wallace.

"Spenser," by Emile Legouis (E. P. Dutton & Co.), is a critical study, which was first delivered in a series of lectures at Johns Hopkins University.

"The Patriot Novelist of Poland: Henryk Sienkiewicz," by Monica M. Gardner (E. P. Dutton & Co.), is a critical analysis of Sienkiewicz's fiction, with many translated extracts.

"Rabindranath Tagore, Poet and Dramatist," by Edward Thompson (Oxford University Press), is a study of the poet's work as well as a chronicle of his life.

The "Early Life and Letters of John Morley," by Francis Hirst (The Macmillan Company), tells of Morley's boyhood, his years at Oxford, his struggles for a footing as a writer, his work on the Saturday Review and the Fortnightly, and the friendships he formed with prominent authors and thinkers of the day.

American as well as English literature is represented in the revised and enlarged edition of "Stories of Authors," by Edwin Watts Chubb, published by the Macmillan Company.

"Main Currents in the History of American Journalism," by Willard Grosvenor Bleyer, Professor of Journalism in the University of Wisconsin, is published by the Houghton Mifflin Company.

"Caxton: A Study of the Literature of the First English Press," by Nellie Slayton Aurner (Houghton Mifflin Company), is an attempt, as the author says, to "study Caxton as author and printer, to examine the works he selected to print, and through them to gain more knowledge of one of the least understood periods of English Literature." The book contains also a list of reprints of his books, an enumeration of his publications in chronological order, and a reprint of all his prologues, epilogues, and scientific interpolations.

D. Appleton & Co. publish a "Dictionary of English Pronunciation, with American Variants," by H. E. Palmer, J. Victor Martin, and F. G. Blandford.