VINTAGE BOOKS: Free Opinions. 1905‪.‬

A VITAL POINT OF EDUCATION

In days like these, when the necessity of Education, technical or otherwise, is strenuously insisted upon by all the learned, worshipful, governmental and dictatorial personages who “sit” on County Councils, or talk the precious time recklessly away in Parliament without apparently arriving at any decision of definite workable good for the nation, it will not perhaps be considered obtrusive or intrusive if a suggestion be put forward as to the importance of one point,—

The Necessity of Teaching People to Read.

This essential of education is sadly lacking among the general majority of “educated” persons in Great Britain, and I think I may say America. Especially among those of the “upper” classes, in both countries. When we speak of these “upper” classes, we mean of course those, who by chance or fortune have been born either to such rank or to such sufficient wealth as to be lifted above the toiling million, and who may be presumed to have had all the physical, mental and social advantages that tuition, training and general surroundings can give them. Yet it is precisely among these that we find the ones who cannot read, who frequently cannot spell, and whose handwriting is so bad as to be well-nigh illegible. When it is said

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 that they cannot read, that statement is not intended to convey the idea that if a book or newspaper be given to them they do not understand the letters or the print in which the reading matter is presented to their eyes. They do. But such letters and such print impress no meaning upon their minds. Anyone can prove this by merely asking them what they have been reading. In nine cases out of ten they “don’t know.” And if they ever did know, during one unusual moment of brain-activity, they “forget.” The thinking faculty is, with them, like a worn-out sieve, through which everything runs easily and drops to waste. The news of the day, be it set forth never so boldly in no matter what startlingly stout headlines, barely excites their interest for more than a second. They may perhaps glance at a couple of newspaper placards and lazily observe, “Russia at it again,” but of the ins and outs of policy, the difficulties of Government, the work of nations, they grasp absolutely nothing. Thus it happens that when they are asked their opinion on any such events of the hour as may be making history in the future, they display their utter ignorance in such a frankly stupid fashion that any intelligent enquirer is bound to be stunned by their lack of knowledge, and will perhaps murmur feebly: “Have you not read the news?” to which will come the vague reply: “Oh, yes, I read all the newspapers! But I really don’t remember the particulars just now!” What they do remember—these “cultured” persons, (and the more highly they are cultured, the more tenacious appears to be their memory in this respect)—is a divorce case. They always read that carefully over and over

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 again. They comment upon it afterwards with such gusto as to make it quite evident to the merest tyro, that they have learned all its worst details by heart. If they can only revel in the published shame and disgrace of one or two of their very “dearest” friends, they enjoy and appreciate that kind of mental fare more than all the beautiful poems and idyllic romances ever written.

The “million” have long ago learned to read,—and are reading. The last is the most important fact, and one which those who seek to govern them would do well to remember. For their reading is of a most strange, mixed, and desultory order—and who can say what wondrous new notions and disturbing theories may not leap out sprite-like from the witch’s cauldron of seething ideas round which they gather, watching the literary “bubble, bubble, toil and trouble,” wherein the “eye of newt and toe of frog” in the book line may contrast with something which is altogether outside the boiling hotch-potch,—namely that “sick eagle looking at the sky” which is the true symbol of the highest literary art. But the highest literary art, particularly in its poetic form, is at a discount nowadays. And why? Simply because even the million do not know “how” to read. Moreover, it is very difficult to make them learn. They have neither the skill nor the patience to study beautiful thoughts expressed in beautiful language. They want to “rush” something through. Whether poem, play, or novel, it must be “rushed through” and done with. Very few authors’ work, if any, can be sure of an honest and unprejudiced reading, either by those whose business it is to review it for the

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 press, or those whose pleasure it is to “skim” it for themselves. “They have no time.” They have time for motoring, cycling, card-playing, racing, betting, hockey and golf,—anything in short which does not directly appeal to the intellectual faculties,—but for real reading, they can neither make leisure, nor acquire aptitude.

This vague, sieve-like quality of brain and general inability to comprehend or retain impressions of character or events, which is becoming so common among modern so-called “readers” of books, can but make things very difficult for authors who seek to contribute something of their utmost and best to the world of literature. Most men and women who feel the “divine afflatus,” and who are able to write in a style above the average, must be conscious of a desire to rise yet higher than any of their own attempted efforts, and to do something new, strong, and true enough to hold life and lasting in it when other contemporary work is forgotten. It is the craving of the “sick eagle looking at the sky” perhaps, nevertheless it is a noble craving. In taking an aim, it is as well to let fly at the moon, even if one only hits a tree. But when fiery-footed Pegasus would fain gallop away with its rider into the realms of imagination and enchantment,—when the aspiring disciple of literature, all aglow with freshness and fervour, strives to catch some new spirit of thought as it rushes past on its swift wings, or seeks to create some fair consoling idyll of human circumstance, then all the publishers stand massed in the way and cry “Halt!” “Don’t let us have any great ideas!” they say—“They are above the heads of the public. Be domestic—be 

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matrimonially iniquitous,—be anything in the line of fiction but ‘great.’ Don’t give us new things to think about,—the public have no time to think. What they want is just something to glance at between tea and dinner.”

Now this condition of affairs, which is positively disastrous to all literary art, is brought about by the lack of the one vital point in the modern education of the British and American people,—namely, that they have not been taught “how” to read. As a result of this, they frequently pronounce a book “too long” or “too dull,”—too this, or too that, without having looked at more than perhaps twenty pages of its contents. They will skim over any amount of cheap newspapers and trashy society “weeklies” full of the unimportant movements and doings of he and she and they, but to take up a book with any serious intention of reading it thoroughly, is a task which only the thoughtful few will be found ready to undertake. What is called the appreciation of the “belles lettres” is indeed “caviare to the general.” Knowledge brings confidence; and if it were made as much the fashion to read as it is to ride in motor-cars, some improvement in manners and conduct might be the happy result of such a prevailing taste. But as matters stand at the present day, there are a large majority of the “educated” class, who actually do not know the beginnings of “how” to read. They have never learned—and some of them will never learn. They cannot realize the unspeakable delight and charm of giving one’s self up to one’s author, sans prejudice, sans criticism, sans everything that could possibly break or mar

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 the spell, and being carried on the wings of gentle romance away from Self, away from the everyday cares and petty personalities of social convention, and observance, and living “with” the characters which have been created by the man or woman whose fertile brain and toiling pen have unitedly done their best to give this little respite and holiday to those who will take it and rejoice in it with gratitude.

Few there are nowadays who will so permit themselves to be carried away. Far larger is the class of people who take up a novel or a volume of essays, merely to find fault with it and fling it aside half unread. The attitude of the bad-tempered child who does not know what toy to break next, is the attitude of many modern readers. Nothing is more manifestly unfair to an author than to judge a book by the mere “skimming” of its pages, and this injustice becomes almost felonious when the merits or demerits of the work are decided without reading it at all. For instance, Smith meets Jones in the train which is taking them out to their respective “little places” in the country, and says:

“Have you read So-and-So’s latest book? If not, don’t!” Whereupon Jones murmurs: “Really! So bad as all that! Have you read it?” To which Smith rejoins rudely: “No! And don’t intend! I’ve heard all about it!” And Jones, acquiescing feebly, decides that he must “taboo” that book, also its author, lest perhaps Mrs. Jones’ virtue be put to the blush at the mention of either. Now if Smith dared to condemn a tradesman in this way, and depreciated his goods to

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 Jones in such wise that the latter should be led to avoid him altogether, that tradesman could claim damages for injuring his character and depriving him of custom. Should not the same rule apply to authors when they are condemned on mere hearsay? Or when their work is wilfully misrepresented and misquoted in the press?

It may not, perhaps, be considered out of place here to recall a “personal reminiscence” of the wilful misrepresentation made to a certain section of the public of a novel of mine entitled “Temporal Power.” That book had scarcely left the printer’s hands when W. T. Stead, of the Review of Reviews, wrote me a most cordial letter, congratulating me on the work, and averring that it was “the best” of all I had done. But in his letter he set forth the startling proposition that I “must have meant” King Edward, our own gracious Sovereign, for my “fictional” King, Queen Alexandra for the Queen, the Prince of Wales for my “Prince Humphry,” and Mr. Chamberlain for the defaulting Secretary of State, who figures in the story as “Carl Perousse.” I was so amazed at this curious free translation of my ideas, that at first I thought it was “Julia” who had thus persuaded Mr. Stead to see things upside down. But as his criticism of the book had not yet appeared in the Review of Reviews, I wrote to him at once, and earnestly assured him of the complete misapprehension he had made of my whole scope and intention. Despite this explanation on my part, however, Mr. Stead wrote and published a review of the book maintaining his own fabricated “case” against me, notwithstanding the fact that he held my

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 denial of his assertions in his possession before the publication of his criticism! And though a dealer in meat, groceries, and other food stuffs may obtain compensation if his wares are wilfully misrepresented to the buying public, the purveyor of thoughts or ideas has no remedy when such thoughts or ideas are deliberately and purposefully falsified to the world through the press. Yet the damage is surely as great,—and the injury done to one’s honest intention quite as gratuitous. From this little incident occurring to myself, I venture to say in reference to the assertion that people do not know how to read, that if those who “rushed” through the misleading criticism of “Temporal Power” had honestly read the book so criticized for themselves, they would have seen at once how distorted was Mr. Stead’s view of the whole story. But,—while many who had read the book and not the review, laughed at the bare notion of there being any resemblance between my fictional hero-king of romance and the Sovereign of the British Empire, others, reading the review only, foolishly decided that I must have written some “travesty” upon English royalty, and condemned the book without reading it. This is what all authors have a right to complain of,—the condemnation or censure of their books by persons who have not read them. For though there never was so much reading matter put before the public, there was never less actual “reading” in the truest and highest sense of the term than there is at present.

To read, as I take it, means to sit down quietly and enjoy a book in its every line and expression. Whether it be tragic or humourous, simple or ornate,

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 it has been written to beguile us from our daily routine of life, and to give us a little change of thought or mood. It may please us, or it may make us sad—it may even anger us by upsetting our pet theories and contradicting us on our own lines of argument; but if it has taken us away for a time from ourselves, it has fulfilled the greater part of its mission, and done us a good turn. Those who have really learned to read, are no encouragers of the Free Library craze. The true lover of books will never want to peruse volumes that are thumbed and soiled by hundreds of other hands—he or she will manage to buy them and keep them as friends in the private household. Any book, save the most expensive “édition de luxe,” can be purchased for a few shillings,—a little saving on drugged beer and betting would enable the most ordinary mechanic to stock himself with a very decent library of his own. To borrow one’s mental fare from Free Libraries is a dirty habit to begin with. It is rather like picking up eatables dropped by some one else in the road, and making one’s dinner off another’s leavings. One book, clean and fresh from the bookseller’s counter, is worth half a dozen of the soiled and messy knock-about volumes, which many of our medical men assure us carry disease-germs in their too-frequently fingered pages. Free Libraries are undoubtedly very useful resorts for betting men. They can run in, glance at the newspapers for the latest “Sporting Items” and run out again. But why ratepayers should support such houses of call for these gentry remains a mystery which one would have to pierce through all the Wool and Wobble of Municipal Corporations

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 to solve. An American “professor”—(there are so many of them) spoke to me the other day in glowing terms of Andrew Carnegie. “He’s cute, you bet!” he remarked, “he goes one better than Pears’ Soap! Pears has got to pay for the upkeep of his hoardings, but Carnegie plants his down in the shape of libraries and gets the British ratepayer to keep them all going! Ain’t he spry!”

Poor British ratepayer! It is to be feared he is easily gulled! But,—to return to the old argument—if he knew “how” to read—really knew,—he would not be so easily taken in, even by the schemes of philanthropy. He would buy his books himself, and among them he might even manage to secure a copy of a very interesting volume published in America, so I am given to understand, which tells us how Carnegie made his millions, and how he sanctioned the action of the Pinkerton police force in firing on his men when they “struck” for higher wages.

Apropos of America and things American, there is just now a pretty little story started in the press on both sides of the water, about British novels and British authors no longer being wanted in the United States. The Children of the Eagle are going to make their fiction themselves. All power to their elbows! But British authors will do themselves no harm by enquiring carefully into this report. It may even pay some of them to send over a private agent on their own behalf to study the American book stores, and take count of the thousands of volumes of British fiction which are selling there “like hot cakes,” to quote a choice expression of Transatlantic slang. It is quite

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 evident that the Children of the Eagle purchase British fiction. It is equally evident that the publishers who cater for the Children of the Eagle are anxious to get British fiction cheap, and are doing this little deal of the “No demand” business from an acute sense of urgency. It is all right, of course! If I were an American publisher and had to pay large prices to popular British authors for popular British fiction (now that “piracy” is no longer possible), I should naturally tell those British authors that they are not wanted in America, and that it is very good and condescending of me to consider their wares at all. I should give a well-known British author from £100 to £500 for the sole American rights of his or her newest production, and proceed to make £5,000 or £7,000 profit out of it. That kind of thing is called “business.” I should never suspect the British author of being so base as to send over and get legal statements as to how his or her book was selling, or to take note of the thousands of copies stacked up every day in the stores, to be melted away as soon as stacked, in the hands of eager purchasers. No! As a strictly honourable person, I should hope that the British author would stay at home and mind his or her own business. But let us suppose that the American publisher’s latest delicate “feeler” respecting the “No demand for British literature” were true, it would seem that Americans, even more than the British, require to be taught “how” to read. If one may judge from their own output of literature, the lesson is badly needed. Ralph Waldo Emerson remains, as yet, their biggest literary man. He

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 knew “how” to read, and from that knowledge learned “how” to write. But no American author has come after him that can be called greater than he, or as great. Concerning the art of fiction, the present American “make” is, whatever the immediate “catching on” of it may be, distinctly ephemera of the utmost ephemeral. Such “literature” would not exist even in America, if Americans knew “how” to read. What is called the “Yellow Journalism” would not exist either. Why? Because a really educated reader of things worth reading would not read it—and it would therefore be a case of the wicked ceasing to trouble and the weary being at rest.

There is a general complaint nowadays—especially among authors—of the “decadence” of literature. It is true enough. But the cause of the “decadence” is the same—simply and solely that people cannot and will not read. They do not know “how” to do it. If they ever did know in the bygone days of Dickens and Thackeray, they have forgotten. Every book is “too long” for them. Yet scarcely any novel is published now as long as the novels of Dickens, which were so eagerly devoured at one time by tens of thousands of admiring readers. A short, risky, rather “nasty” book, (reviewers would call it strong, but that is only a little joke of theirs,—they speak of this kind of literature as though it were cheese) finds most favour with the “upper” circles of society in Great Britain and America. Not so with the “million” though. The million prefer simpler fare—and they read a good deal—though scarcely in the right way. It is always more a case of “skimming”

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 than reading. If they are ever taught the right way to read, they may become wiser than any political government would like them to be. For right reading makes right thinking—and right thinking makes right living—and right living would result in what? Well! For one thing, members of councils and other “ruling” bodies would be lazier than ever, with less to do—and the Education Act would no longer be necessary, as the fact of simply knowing “how” to read, would educate everybody without further trouble.

Dear Sir or Madam,—read! Don’t “skim”! Learn your letters! Study the pronunciation and meaning of words thoroughly first, and then you may proceed to sentences. Gradually you will be able to master a whole passage of prose or poetry in such a manner as actually to understand it. That will be a great thing! And once you understand it, you may even possibly remember it! And then,—no matter how much you may have previously been educated,—your education will only have just begun.