MEDIOCRITY IN LITERATURE.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1067, 4 March 1911, Page 9

MEDIOCRITY IN LITERATURE.

! -TKe successful- -manager. ■ of- a: :newspaper syndicate, a part of whoso business 1 :* it is to purvey serial stories, was asked not long agoVßat' were the qualities that found .Jfavpur in tho eyes of his public, jHovarious answers,but 'filially, wlieri pinned down to the question exactly what was tho inSispojisablo element, the.-,vcry quintes.siihcc thpt must never be missing," his; ; "rCpfy wis brief and "to - tho, point-...- . "Jl&lioicrity,": he said/'and' n6 word .-.Snore.'. And_ he - meant it, too. he cohsider it aHhard saving, as-0110 who should confess' that the tasto of the' middle classes^-as. middling bad. The first tiring to bear in mind is that he wds speaking of fiction; and sad expedience shows ftjjat in ihat. there are worse than mediocrity. In a time when-.so many daring ventures arc tried in novel-writing, so many extremes of- brutality and Jaibricity attempted, there'may be a sort of comfort in discovering that, the majority of readers feel that the£ goj safest-in medio. !Nor does it follow .that those who re'ad''commorfp!ad« books have common-place.minds,'..--Tell 1110 what you read and I will tell .you what you are, lias not yet been erected into an axiom. It is r,rue that university extension lecturers and literary hortators urgo us to read. oi'.!y tho world's greatest books, so that our minds may in the process become great;-.. But .there is always a serious dw:bt'whether even these counsellors of perfection' take their own advice, and it is certain that, they do not expect others to do so. They probably give it on Goethe's theory that the safety of olFerjifg advice lies in the certainty 'that, .it will not be followed. • It is ail very' well to tell us that 'wo ought to spend our nights .with"'Plato and our tlaj-s..with Dante,-but life is not wholly made up. of" heights and'abysses; wo ail of''TlS like'-a good :-macadani road to travel on occasionally, and the mediocre books furnish it. ri

"What arc t.ho. youii" people of England' reading?" lately asked the headmaster of Eton. Rn also have asked what their elders .vcre reading,

and ono answer would have pretty well fitted both questions. The same queries put to tho young men and women in American colleges would have yielded much the samo result. No tremendous amount of reading is done at all, and tho bulk of what is dono consist;; of current newspapers and periodicals, novels temporarily in vogue, with now and than a. venturesomo clash into poetry or drama or biography.- But docs this prove that the minds of the readers aro .hopelessly dull, and never will pass on .-to:.better -pasturage? Observation answers no. A great deal of this perfunctory and rather low-grade reading is done for the sake of information: finding out what is'going on in the world, getting some idea of the work of science and invention, following social and political developments, and discovering what peoplo are thinking about and writing about. A course of magazine reading may not bo very elevating, intellectually, but it is instructive. The habit of reading tho novels of tho day may not furnish a training in stylo or taste, but it at least gives ono an idea of what are the tendencies in romance. And if one is. able to ride swiftly oyer this macadam road without letting his mind beromc macadamised in tho process, ho may bear away a certain amount of useful knowledge, with a senso of having touched elbows with tho world about, him, while all tho time having a surplusage of energy wherewith to bend his faculties to worthier and more fruitful reading. There is a pefpetual interest, but there is always a danger of drawing fallacious inferences, in asking what college boys are reading. As a rule, and leaving out their "prescribed" reading "which they usually hate, it will be found that they read contemporary writers. Lucky boys who had Thackeray. and George Eliot and Lowell and Holmes for contemporaries 1-Lucky, too, thoso later ones who had Meredith and Stevenson and Hoivells. If to-day it is Chambers awl London and Oppcnhcim who catch the eye of undergraduates, blame them not overmuch. As-' old Thomas Fuller said that, lie would have praised God iiiorc melodiously if God had given him a better voice, so tho college youth of to-day might say that; they would read less mediocrity in literature if the literature of .their time !were not so mediocre. ■■ Wo hold no brief for mcdiocrity in letters or anywhere else, but. it'is well not to blind ourselves to its uses. If. it be cynically said that tho chief usefulness of mediocrity is in showing us what to avoid, tho reply may be made, that, hi thousands of cases, mediocrity has tho precise effect of driving its votaries to better things. Even mediocre reading may create tho habit of reading, and then tliero is 110 telling' ivlioro 'it'; will strike out. . A' certain kind and, amount of mcdiocrity will spell satiety,' and thereupon the wearied mind, seek-' ing variety, will uso tho now acquired instinct of reading to explore literature of.more value. From overmuch read-, ing of newspapers, it will pass on to. magazino articles; from those to books; and from cheap and dull books to those which feed the intellect and lift the spirit. This, at any rate, is the observable experience of many who begin in mediocrity _ but early, graduate from it. At first," tho commonplace writer appeals and is popular bccause, as John Hay said of J. G. Holland, no ideas are advanced except those that aro familiar to the average Tcadcr and he greets them in print as old friends whom lie is mighty glad to see. But the desire for _ new acquaintances and wider experiences is strong in the heart of man, and , tho little that ho lias learned of mediocrity may spur him on to excellence.—New York "Nation."