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Acolyte, v. 3, issue 4, whole no. 12, Fall 1945
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cate that the effectiveness of his writing is not due simply to its usual fascinating antiquarian and supernatural themes but is the natural and unaffected expression of great talent and artistry. "The ripe old manner, the detachment, the urbanity of these stories are qualities that delight the literary sense," (17) says one reviewer. Mary Butts, the author of the only long essay on James up to now, goes even further in her estimation of him: It is the writer's belief that if Doctor James had chosen to write stories about any other subject under the sun, he would be considered the greatest classic short story writer of our time... If his stories were about anything else (which Heaven forbid) Doctor James would be praised for something of the same qualities for which we praise Horace and Catullus and Villon, for something terse and poignant and durable, and looked at with both eyes wide open....It reminds one of what Lytton Strachey has to say about the art of Racine, purposely avoiding the ambitious comparisons, the striking phrases of the Romantics; content with the far harder business of understatement and classic permanence of effect. (18) In view of his remarkable (though largely unrecognized) literary gifts, it may be wondered, in conclusion, why James wrote only ghost stories--why he "never cared to try any other kind." Here we enter the field of pure speculation, but a few suggestions may be hazarded. Although none of his stories were based to any degree on personal experience (except "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad", which was suggested by a dream), the groundwork for them was probably laid in his mind during his childhood with his reading of the gloomy supernatural stories of Joseph Sheridan LeFanu, who made such an impression as to remain his favorite author all his life. Then came his early and life-long researches as antiquary--a scholar in medieval manuscripts and buildings--which, as we have seen, is a field closely connected with and admirable as a background for the writing of weird fiction, because of the manifold common associations between the supernatural the past. Somehow he happened to write his first two ghost stories and, when they proved an instant success, was urged to write more, particularly by the boys he loved to read to at Christmas. He liked writing ghost stories; those we wrote were greatly admired by everyone; and so he continued writing them, one a year, as a habit. But his real career was as a scholar, and he never had time or felt inclined to take up fiction writing seriously and try anything more conventional or profound. He always took a rather casual attitude toward his stories, regarding them as merely a hobby indulged in for the pleasure of his audience. "I am told", he says, "that they have given pleasure of a certain sort to my readers: if so, my whole object in writing them has been attained," and "in evolving them I have not been possessed by that austere sense of the responsibility of authorship which is demanded of the writer of fiction in this generation..." (8) Thus not being a conscious artist by profession, he had no literary ambitions to impel him toward other forms of writing. None of these influences, however, explain the characteristic sardonic grimness of his stories. Perhaps some of it might be interpreted as a rebellion against modern rationalism, for James was a devout Christian and student of the humanities and apparently had no great love for science (he satirized scientific education in "An Evening's Entertainment"). More than that, behind his gentle, easy-going exterior, there there may have dwelt a private, personal bitterness of some kind, not strong enough to distort his personality, which was well-adjusted to -- 23 --
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cate that the effectiveness of his writing is not due simply to its usual fascinating antiquarian and supernatural themes but is the natural and unaffected expression of great talent and artistry. "The ripe old manner, the detachment, the urbanity of these stories are qualities that delight the literary sense," (17) says one reviewer. Mary Butts, the author of the only long essay on James up to now, goes even further in her estimation of him: It is the writer's belief that if Doctor James had chosen to write stories about any other subject under the sun, he would be considered the greatest classic short story writer of our time... If his stories were about anything else (which Heaven forbid) Doctor James would be praised for something of the same qualities for which we praise Horace and Catullus and Villon, for something terse and poignant and durable, and looked at with both eyes wide open....It reminds one of what Lytton Strachey has to say about the art of Racine, purposely avoiding the ambitious comparisons, the striking phrases of the Romantics; content with the far harder business of understatement and classic permanence of effect. (18) In view of his remarkable (though largely unrecognized) literary gifts, it may be wondered, in conclusion, why James wrote only ghost stories--why he "never cared to try any other kind." Here we enter the field of pure speculation, but a few suggestions may be hazarded. Although none of his stories were based to any degree on personal experience (except "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad", which was suggested by a dream), the groundwork for them was probably laid in his mind during his childhood with his reading of the gloomy supernatural stories of Joseph Sheridan LeFanu, who made such an impression as to remain his favorite author all his life. Then came his early and life-long researches as antiquary--a scholar in medieval manuscripts and buildings--which, as we have seen, is a field closely connected with and admirable as a background for the writing of weird fiction, because of the manifold common associations between the supernatural the past. Somehow he happened to write his first two ghost stories and, when they proved an instant success, was urged to write more, particularly by the boys he loved to read to at Christmas. He liked writing ghost stories; those we wrote were greatly admired by everyone; and so he continued writing them, one a year, as a habit. But his real career was as a scholar, and he never had time or felt inclined to take up fiction writing seriously and try anything more conventional or profound. He always took a rather casual attitude toward his stories, regarding them as merely a hobby indulged in for the pleasure of his audience. "I am told", he says, "that they have given pleasure of a certain sort to my readers: if so, my whole object in writing them has been attained," and "in evolving them I have not been possessed by that austere sense of the responsibility of authorship which is demanded of the writer of fiction in this generation..." (8) Thus not being a conscious artist by profession, he had no literary ambitions to impel him toward other forms of writing. None of these influences, however, explain the characteristic sardonic grimness of his stories. Perhaps some of it might be interpreted as a rebellion against modern rationalism, for James was a devout Christian and student of the humanities and apparently had no great love for science (he satirized scientific education in "An Evening's Entertainment"). More than that, behind his gentle, easy-going exterior, there there may have dwelt a private, personal bitterness of some kind, not strong enough to distort his personality, which was well-adjusted to -- 23 --
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