exceeding two hundred lines, and must send three typewritten copies of his poem, each entry being accompanied by a statement certifying that the contestant is a bona fide resident undergraduate at some time during the session of 1924-1925. The author's name should not appear on the manuscript. All poems must reach Dallas not later than March 15, and should be addressed to Jay B. Hubbell, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas. No manuscripts will be returned. The American Academy in Rome announces its fifth annual competition for the Walter Damrosch Fellowship in musical composition, carrying a stipend of $1,000 a year for three years, with an additional allowance of $1,000 a year for traveling expenses in visiting the leading musical centres of Europe. Candidates must file with the secretary not later than April 1 two compositions, one either for orchestra alone or in combination with a solo instrument, and one for string quartet. Circular of information and application blank may be obtained by addressing Roscoe Guernsey, Executive Secretary American Academy in Rome, IOI Park avenue, New York. chorus, with Florida as the theme; the coined word "Suniland" must be used in the title, and at least twice in the chorus. Compositions should be of the syncopated, or waltz, type, and must feature the charms of Florida. Contestants automatically agree to allow their lyrics to be published in Suniland Magazine and in newspapers during and after the contest. No sets of lyrics will be returned, but musical compositions will be returned when the required postage is received. The author of the successful lyric or song assigns all rights to Suniland Magazine, with the understanding that his or her name as author shall be carried on every copy of the song. The contest will close March 15. All compositions should be addressed to the Contest Editor. Maynard Shipley, president of the Science League of America, announces prizes of $50, $35, $15, and three prizes of a year's paid-up membership in the Science League of America, for essays giving the best reasons for teaching in the schools evolution rather than Genesis as an explanation of the origin of the earth and of man. These prizes have been donated by the Arbitrator, of New York. Essays must be limited to 500 words, and must be mailed on or before March 1. Envelopes should be marked "Prize Contest W," and addressed to Maynard Shipley, President, Science League of America, 618 Liberty Bank Building, San San Francisco, Calif. No manuscripts will be returned. D. D., executive secretary of the Massachusetts Federation of Churches. The first prize of $30, offered by George Foster Howell, through Our Dumb Animals, for the best essay on "The Humane Treatment of the Horse," was awarded to Mrs. O. F. Frederick. The second prize of $20 was given to Mrs. Mildred Claunch. The Hawthornden prize of £100, given annually for the best imaginative work of the year by a writer under forty years of age, has been awarded to R. H. Mottram, for his book, "The Spanish Farm." The Chicago Madrigal Club has awarded the W. W. Kimball prize of $100 for the chorus setting of the poem, "May Comes Laughing," to May A. Strong. The Bok advertising prizes for 1924, given through the Harvard Graduate School of Business, have been awarded to the National Vigilance Committee of the Associated Advertising Clubs of the World; the J. Walter Thompson Company; Barton, Durstine & Osborn; the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, and the Hawley Advertising Company; the Eastman Kodak Company; and Mrs. Erma Perham Proetz. Prize offers still open : Prizes in Letters offered by the Columbia Univer sity School of Journalism: For the American novel published during the year which shall best present the wholesome atmosphere of American life and the highest standard of American manners and manhood, $1,000 for the original American play, per. formed in New York, which shall best represent the educational value and power of the stage in raising the standard of good morals, good taste, and good manners, $1,000; for the best book of the year on the history of the United States, $2,000; for the best American biography teaching patriotic and unselfish services to the people, illustrated by an eminent example, $1,000; for the best volume of verse pub. lished during the year by an American author, $1,000. Also, Prizes in Journalism, amounting to $3,000 and a $500 medal, and three traveling scholarships having a value of $1,500 each. All offered annually under the terms of the will of Joseph Pulitzer. Nominations of candidates must be made in writing on or before February 1 of each year, addressed to the Secretary of Columbia University, New York, on forms that may be obtained on application to the Secretary of the University. Hart, Schaffner and Marx prizes of $1,000, $500, $300, and $200 for the four best studies in the eco nomic field submitted by June 1, 1925. Particulars in June WRITER. Prize of $2,000, in addition to royalty, offered by Harper & Brothers for the best novel submitted before April 1, 1925. Particulars in July WRITER. Prize of $50 offered by the Harvard School of Education at Harvard University for an official song. Particulars in February WRITER. Prizes amounting to $1,600 offered by the National Federation of Music Clubs. Particulars from Mrs. Edwin B. Garrigues, 1527 Spruce street, Philadelphia, Penn. Prize of $2,500, to be awarded in 1925 and every three years thereafter, and an annual prize of $300, offered by the Chicago Trust Company for the best contribution on any subject relating to business development and the modern trust company. Particulars in the August WRITER. Maurice Tourneur prize of 170,000 francs for the best scenarios depicting the Frenchwoman as she is - a clever and happy companion, a devoted wife, an excellent, economical housekeeper, and an admirable mother. Particulars in March WRITER. Prize offered by the Poet's Guild for the best May Day poem on childhood, contest extended to April 10, 1925. Particulars in July WRITER. Annual poetry prize of $100 offered by the Nation, poems to be submitted between Thanksgiving Day and New Year's Day of each year. Particulars in February, 1923, WRITER. Prizes of the Poetry Society of South Carolina ; Blindman Prize of $250; Southern Prize of $100; Society's Prize of $25; Henry E. Harman Prize of $25 Sky Lark Prize of $10 all offered annually. Particulars in January, 1923, WRITER. Monthly prizes offered by the Photo-Era Maga. zine (Wolfeboro, N. H.) for photographs, in an advanced competition and a beginner's competition. Walker prizes for the best memoirs on Natural History, offered annually by the Boston Society of Natural History, closing March 1 of each calendar year. Particulars in June WRITER. Monthly prizes of $25 offered by Station WLW for the best radio dealing with Americanism, contests closing the first of each month, and manuscripts to be sent to Radio Department, Crosley Manufacturing Co., Cincinnati, Ohio. Particulars in December WRITER. Prize of $100 offered by the Drama League of America for the best play suited to children, contest closing August 1. Particulars in January WRITER. American Humane Association prizes of $25, $15, and $10, for posters, contest closing June 1. lars in January WRITER. Particu Weekly prizes offered by the Boston Post for original short stories by women, published each day. Particulars in May WRITER. CURRENT LITERARY TOPICS. Poets and Novelists Both. - Few great writers have succeeded in the dual roles of poet and novelist. In the case of Scott, he began as poet and gave place, so to speak, to Byron. When he turned to the novel he found his true vocation. Hardy and Meredith changed the order. The novel was their first love, and we read their poetry mainly because of their greatness in prose. A fourth, Rudyard Kipling, is equally famous as poet and novelist, if not in the highest class - the class of the three I have mentioned in either sphere. I am reminded of this because Alfred Noyes has turned to the short story, and in "The Hidden Player," shows that he has the art of the novelist. - London Saturday Review. Prices Paid Authors. Longmans, the oldest English publishers, this year celebrate their second centenary. Some time in the year 1724 Thomas Longman, the first, hung out his Signs of the Ship and the Black Swan, emblems which are still the crests of the house. That big prices were paid authors in those days, is shown by the fact that Thomas Longman, the second, offered Thomas Moore £3,000 for "Lalla Rookh" before a line of it was written. The third Thomas Longman visited Walter Scott in 1802 and bought the copyright of the Border Minstrelsy," and was also interested in "The Lay of the Last Minstrel," for which, after the first edition had been exhausted, he offered £500. Scott accepted the offer, and afterward the publishers added £100 more in "their own unsolicited kindness," to supply the loss of a fine horse which broke down suddenly while the author was riding with one of the worthy publishers." Macaulay, who published "Lays of Ancient Rome," with Longmans, thought so little about the verse that he made them a present of it. The work was given back to him and became very valuable both to Macaulay and his family. In 1843 Macaulay was doubting whether his "History of England" would be of any permanent value. He was wrong, because the history became famous and was such a success that on March 13, 1856, the author got a check from Longmans for £20,000 as his share "on account" of the profits of the third and fourth volumes. New York Evening Post. Think of John Milton, receiving fifty dollars for Paradise Lost," the general scheme of which he had worked out twenty years before he wrote it. Think of Samuel Butler, who received nothing at all for "The Way of All Flesh." Think of Poe. His publishers paid him ten dollars for "The Raven." And again he got but one hundred dollars for "The Gold Bug," and became a country gentleman on the strength of it. And once again : he accepted fifty cents a sheet for a short story, and said that it was adequate compensation. Think of Bobbie Burns, imploring the government to increase his pension from $175 to $200 a year, that he might not die of either starvation or disease; and of the dying Ben Jonson, who scorned a small gift from the king, with the remark: "He sends me so miserable a pittance because I am poor and live in the alley. Go and tell him that his soul lives in an alley." Boston Herald. What It Costs to Make a Book.-Regarding the cost of producing books, these statements are made by an anonymous "New York Publisher-Bookseller," in an article in the January Atlantic Monthly: The average two-dollar novel uses about a pound of paper, ranging in price from 61⁄2 to 10 cents. Plates, by far the most expensive item, vary in price according to the number of pages, but average $500 to $600. The publisher usually makes a first printing of from 2,500 to 3,000 copies and endeavors to amortize the cost of the plates against this first printing. The amortized charge varies from 17 to 24 cents a copy. Presswork - that is, the actual printing from the plates costs 4 to 5 cents a copy of an edition of this size. Binding costs 14 to 22 cents a copy, according to the style and quality used. Then there are always extras, such as jacket dies, end papers, illustrations for the jacket, printing the jacket and the like, which come to 3 to 5 cents more apiece. In other words, our finished novel costs from 44% to 66 cents a copy for the first edition without royalty, which varies from 10 to 20 per cent. on the retail price. The two-dollar novel, then, costs the publisher from 641⁄2 to 96 cents. The publisher sells these novels wholesale to the bookseller at discounts varying from 33 1-3 to 40 per cent. of the retail price, according to the quantity of each title ordered. The wholesale price to the trade is from $1.20 to $1.34, leaving the publisher a margin for gross profit of 24 to 551⁄2 cents. 29 1924. BOOK REVIEWS. - Be A STORY TELLER'S STORY. By Sherwood Anderson, 442 PF. Cloth. New York: B. W. Huebsch, Inc. Sherwood Anderson's autobiography is nothing like a photographic record of the events of his career. It is rather a series of impressionist sketches, commonly of feelings rather than of facts, with the author often straying off into the realm of imagination, philosophizing by the way. In his early "notes," relating to his boyhood, he draws a contemptuous picture of his father, a romantic, impecunious, improvident, irresponsible, imaginative painter of houses and signs from whom the son may have inherited his story-telling talent, giving a more favorable impression of his mother, of Italian parentage, who died at the age of thirty, leaving a family of five boys and two girls, on whose young lives she had exerted a strong influence. fore taking up, in Book Two, his life as a laborer in the factories of the Middle West. Mr. Anderson tells how his own imaginative life began to take form, and how from listening to the tales told by his father who was also a country showman and in a way an actor I he wanted to begin inventing tales of his own, illustrating how his mind played with fanciful scenes, giving about as much attention to his dreams as to his doings, and often writing more about his associates than about himself. The last hundred pages of the book are devoted to Mr. Anderson's work as a writer. In the same discursive way he tells how day by day, as an advertising man in Chicago, after his failure in an attempt to be a manufacturer, he for years wrote advertisements during the day but had all the time been secretly scribbling in his room at night. "Never," he says, "was such an almighty scribbler as I later became, and am even The result of the scribbling, the tale of perfect balance, all the elements of the tale understood, an infinite number of minute adjustments perfectly made, the power of selfcriticism fully at work, the shifting surface of word values and color in full play, form and the rhythmic flow of thought and mood marching forward with the sentences these are things of a dream, of a far dim day toward which one goes knowing one can never arrive but infinitely glad to be on the road." Mr. Anderson's idea of what a story should be is indicated by his reference to "a notion that ran now. W. H. H. THE BOOKMAN'S GLOSSARY. By John A. Holden. 127 pp. Cloth. New York: R. R. Bowker Company. 1925. Mr. Holden, who is the business manager of the Publishers' Weekly, has rendered a useful service in the compilation of this book, which is described on the title page as a compendium of information relating to the publication and distribution of books. It is an alphabetical list of the terms used in book-publishing and its allied industries paper-making, printing, binding, illustrating, and publicity. Every term is adequately defined, so that the glossary gives any one interested in books an explanation of any term used in book production or the handling of books for instance, Bowdlerized, super-calendered paper, grangerizing, hanging indention, cliché, colophon, fat matter, leads, double-leaded, incunabula, progressive proofs, solander, point system, swash letters, unopened (as distinct from uncut edges), remainders, rebinds, quad, catchword, colophon, font, blurb, foxed, end papers, wrong font, and vanity publishers (a name given to publishing concerns that specialize in publishing books for authors at the author's risk, on a commission basis). Under "nom de plume," Mr. Holden might have quoted from the Dictionnaire de Slang, by Legras: "Nom de plume pseudonyms, each with the name of the person STICKFULS. Compositions of a Newspaper Minion. and The first half of "Stickfuls" is autobiographical, telling how Irvin Cobb, then living in a little Kentucky town, got into newspaper work at the age of sixteen and of his progress. till he became a first-class reporter magazine contributor. "At twenty-six," he says, "I was beginning to get cured of the adolescent belief that the only good writing was the so-called fine writing, full of adjectives and screaming metaphors and reverberating periods. In other words, I had quit writing at the top of my voice all the time; and when a young reporter or an old one learns that great and difficult lesson there is Mr. hope for him ultimately, I reckon." Cobb in his early days had some thrilling experiences as a reporter, of which he tells some interesting stories. When he went to New York to apply for a job, as he puts it: "I spent two solid weeks canvassing the daily newspapers; I never got past the ante-room of Then a single solitary one." W. H. H. he wrote a pseudonyme. Les Anglais en traduisant mot à mot 'pen-name' ont cru parler français; à reléguer avec blancmange et autres spécimens du français d'Angleterre." In an appendix Mr. Holden gives the classical names of towns and cities used on the title-pages of old books, a list of curious editions of the Bible, specimens of favored type-faces for book work, and a table of proofreader's marks with a page showing a corrected proof. THE COLLOQUIAL WHO'S WHO. An attempt to to humorous egotistical letter, describing himself as "probably the livest reporter and the best writer and the ablest editor that had ever come to New York to uplift its journalism to the highest possible level," and yet nobody had jumped at the unparallelled chance of hiring him! This letter he sent in duplicate thirteen different papers. One of them gave him a job next day, and from three others he had offers of trial jobs. Of late years Mr. Cobb's work has been largely for magazines, but he prides himself on being a good reporter. After telling why and so showing what a good reporter should be - he says: "In fine and in short, I am a good reporter, and if you don't believe I am why, I am that's all." |