VOL. XXXVII.

During the past six years I have been associated with hundreds who were learning to write for the magazines and motion-picture producers. It has been my part to bring to their attention and to teach them certain rules for short-story writing. Some of them have taken those rules and by practicing them faithfully have attained success. Others have apparently ignored all rules they ever were taught, and they, too, have attained success.

I have talked with editors who have judged and bought stories that were quite evidently written according to formal rule, and those who have become enthusiastic over tales that seemed to follow no rules but those their authors evolved for the occasion. Some of these editors have insisted that no story worth reading ever was written without being

No. 2.

modelled on lines laid down by masters of the past. Others have waived all rules contemptuously, saying that if a writer has a story that is interesting, and if he can delineate character and action convincingly he can tell the story in any old way he desires and it will be acceptable. All this has a tendency to be a bit confusing. It might well set the beginning writer's mind in such a whirl that he would spend precious months or even years in getting the thing straight; in deciding what course he should pursue in order to perfect himself in his craft. Especially as the student comes across the arguments that are set forth, frequently in the most plausible and authoritative manner, by the exponents of either school of practice, will he be subject to a cross-current of influence. In the end he may rise above the flood of argument, strike out for himself with powerful and original strokes and come to the firm ground of an inner knowledge . . . or, mazed in a dispute among those who seem to know the arcana of literature, give up in despair and decide that writing is something too mysterious and contradictory for him.

My solution of the problem, and it is, I am convinced, the solution found by any writer who has met the conflict and had to beat his way through it, may be helpful to those of the second class; those who, confused by a multitude of good but contrasting counsel, are tempted to conclude that successful writing is a gift of the gods, and not something that can be thought out, practiced, and achieved. This is the understanding that both methods of treating a story are necessary, but are practiced at different stages in a writer's development. They represent respectively apprenticeship and mastery.

All art shows the stages championed first by the author and editor who are all for the rules,

and finally by the author and editor who are contemptuous of rule. The serious writer must first spend a period learning what the past has done, and the laws the past evolved and obeyed. Then he begins practice, constructing his stories upon a framework previously invented and proved trustworthy. Eventually, after a term of years whose length depends upon his innate talent or genius, he comes to his own maturity; he acquires an insight into life and an interpretation of his art that are original. He chooses finally some rules and rejects others, follows some without change and modifies others, constantly experimenting so that he may achieve a creation that is personal to himself.

Those who watch the uncharted progress of the latter class of writer call them anarchists. They do not understand how they manage to succeed. The critic consults Rule 16, Page 107 of the Primer of the Short-Story, and triumphantly points out its violation. The truth is that the writer who has seemingly violated that rule learned its essential meaning long ago and developed it into the form most useful to his individual practice. He first sat at the feet

of a teacher, and then, with the advance of time and his mastery of the craft developed his own insight and skill. He now seems free, but once was bound. He knows what is safe and justifiable to do, indeed what is necessary to do in modifying rules, and he does it; but first he learned that there were rules to modify and what they were; he first submitted to discipline, then claimed freedom. It is ignorance of this that causes confusion.

Here, then, is the reason I go on teaching. rules, though some editors and authors have reached the point at which rules no longer seem essential. Because I can execute a problem in differential calculus I will not put any hindrance in the way of a young pupil's learning simple addition. The two will at some future time merge. He who is now learning that three and three are six may write a lucid explanation of the theory of relativity, and prove that sometimes three and three are nothing. Likewise he who is now learning the elementary technique of the short story need not revert to it slavishly forever. There should come a time when he, too, will seem to make his own rules. Frederick Palmer. HOLLYWOOD, Calif.

"I dare not go near our Public Library," a writer confessed the other day, "I waste so much time browsing about."

Having been a library hound for a number of years, I at once launched into instructions as to how the library mine of information should be systematically worked.

There is more to it then simply knowing your way through a Dewey Index. The layman is better out of the General Index. The best thing to do if you are a writer in search of data is to consult the directory in the entrance hall, go straight to the department you want and there take the lady at the desk into your confidence. Tell her your subject and the kind of material you want and whether you mean to treat it dryly or humorously or pathetically. She will lead you directly to

the material you desire, or will tell you what books you need, and will recommend books of reference, and all this in a few efficient minutes. It would have taken you at least an hour to get so far by looking up your own books.

Of course, if you know in advance just which books you wish to consult, the best way is to find them in the General Index, make a list of them, noting the full reference number, and then corral a boy and let him bring. you all the books (or as many as you can deal with in one day) to a table in the refer

ence room.

By locating in the index of each book the pages which bear on your subject and by inserting bookmarks in these pages, you can turn quickly from one to another, correcting

one opinion with another, making abstracts, and marking paragraph and page references. Otherwise you will be flapping pages when the janitor calls closing time.

Besides the card-index racks in the library you will find many time-saving guides in the shape of Annuals, Year Books, Guides, Directories, and so on. By reading the introductions to these you will discover their full use, which is wider than you might suppose. Bibliographies of writers, the index of business books, Ayer's guide to publications, the Readers' Guide to Periodicals, are all short cuts to the information you are wanting.

The art department of the library very

likely contains prints and paintings illustrative of your subject. You will gain much by studying these, as well as by reading what has previously been written. If your heroine is going to wander in an old-fashioned garden,. write the description of the garden with a. picture of it before you, unless your memory for some special garden is unusually keen. Pictures help to keep your descriptions to the point.

In most city libraries, study rooms can be engaged for definite hours each week. These rooms are great time and nerve savers for "literary persons"! M. Chapman. CHATTANOOGA, TENN.

we have of an

III. What Makes a Story a Story. So far we have learned that words are the materials with which writers work and that these words when formed into sentences give us rhythm. We have learned to recognize the various sentence forms. In our actual writing we have written a description, and have added to it an incident which involved characters, conversation, and action. For purposes of illustration imagined that our description was Italian street fair and that the incident was a proposal by a young Italian and his acceptance by the lady of his choice. We agreed that while this scene might partake of the nature of a sketch it emphatically has no story interest. Let us see if we cannot give it a story interest and then deduce the underlying principle, so that we may know what makes a story a story.

If the girl refused the young Italian or if she accepted him and immediately afterward was kidnapped by a rival, we should immediately have a story interest. I do not claim that this suggested plot shows any originality, but it illustrates my point.

I think that we shall all recognize at once that as soon as an obstacle appears we get a story interest. This is a fundamental truth

about stories, so fundamental that often we ignore it. A story to be interesting must have an obstacle. Sometimes one obstacle suffices for a given story. Sometimes other obstacles grow out of the first one. Sometimes there is a series of unrelated obstacles, but it can be laid down as a truth that the story starts with the first obstacle and ends with the overcoming of the last one. When the lovers kiss each other in a "movie" it is the end of the "movie," however much it may be the beginning of something charming in real life. The obstacle can be called a struggle if you like. It is often much disguised. It need not be unpleasant.

If I started a story like this: "Jane Doe lived in Boston and she was perfectly satisfied to be there," it would not interest you unless. you had a sort of pre-vision that somebody was going to come around and make her dissatisfied with Boston. If I started a story with a desire on her part to get to New York which she apparently could n't gratify, it would be more interesting. If I started to write a story telling how happy a married couple were it wouldn't be interesting. Even "Little Women" was made interesting because it was a series of half humorous and extremely human misadventures which brought out the affection uniting the family. The adventure

story, which is about the simplest form, still has struggle or obstacles.

If we started an adventure novel something like this: "Savon de Castile shook from his feet the dust of Paris. The world was before him. All he had was the indomitable spirit of youth in his heart and in his pocketbook a recipe for eye-water," the obstacle would be suggested how he would make his way in the world without money, possibly fights on the road and other complications. One thing would be sure: If our hero was going to have an easy time the novel would not be interesting.

Another way to visualize the obstacle in a story is to regard it as a knot in a string. The author appears before his readers like a conjurer, holds up a string with a knot in it which is apparently unconquerable. This starts the story. He makes various attempts to untie the knot, involving the string in 'several new and more complicated knots. This is the middle or main part of the story. Then, unexpectedly, with a deft turn the knot becomes untied as if by magic. This is the end of the story. The author bows to the applause of his readers and withdraws.

I am dwelling at such great length on this matter of the obstacle or problem or knot that makes a story a story because it is so simple that many persons seem unable to get it. I have read so many amateur stories that had good characterization, description, and action which was interesting in itself, but no knot or struggle or obstacle, so that there was no relation of parts to a whole. All the elements in the story were good, but they didn't fuse. The reader's attention was dissipated. He felt like saying: "This is good stuff, but what is it all about, where does it lead us?" and when I have said to the authors: "Your string has n't any knot, your action has n't any obstacles, your story has n't any problem, there is n't a flow in any definite direction," they have looked at me blankly. It seemed almost impossible to get them to understand that putting in an obstacle would make all the elements of the story fall into place.

Pick any novel from your book-shelf cr any volume of plays or of short stories and

look for obstacles or knots. You will find that almost on the first page of every novel, play, or short story an obstacle is either expressed or suggested, and that everything that goes before it is simply a setting of the scene or a description of a character so that the reader will be interested in the problem when he comes to it, but the human mind is so constituted that it is apt to be more interested in problems than in mere description or personalities, so that in many of the best stories the problem is stated or suggested in the opening paragraph and the descriptions follow with an enriched interest.

In a comedy as in "As You Like It" the story starts with the trouble between Orlando and his brother. Complication follows complication and the story ends with the reconciliation between Orlando and his brother, Orlando's marriage to Rosalind and the restoration to the banished Duke of his original Dukedom.

It has been said that every story should have a beginning, a middle, and an end, but this sometimes hardly seems to have much meaning. We ask, what is a beginning, what is a middle, what is an end? We can understand it if we say that the beginning of a story is where the obstacle is stated, the middle of the story is where the obstacle is being removed, and the end of the story is where the obstaclę is removed finally.

I have dwelt on this matter of the obstacle or knot or struggle at this great length because I know without it you cannot write stories that will succeed. It is the fundamental essential of the story-teller's art. Fall down on characterization, and you may not fail. Be weak in your description, and you may not fail. Be tone deaf to words and slovenly in sentence construction, and you may not fail. If you

have the power to set an obstacle before the