Part 11 (1/2)

The poem describes a fight between two s.h.i.+ps, the French s.h.i.+p, _Temeraire_, and the English s.h.i.+p, _Quebec_. The English s.h.i.+p was destroyed by fire; Farmer, the captain, was killed, and the officers take prisoners:

They dealt with us as brethren, they mourned for Farmer dead, And as the wounded captives pa.s.sed each Breton bowed the head.

Then spoke the French lieutenant: ”'Twas the fire that won, not we.

You never struck your flag to _us_; You'll go to England free.”[41]

'Twas the sixth day of October, seventeen hundred seventy-nine, A year when nations ventured against us to combine, _Quebec_ was burned and Farmer slain, by us remembered not; But thanks be to the French book wherein they're not forgot.

And you, if you've got to fight the French, my youngster, bear in mind Those seamen of King Louis so chivalrous and kind; Think of the Breton gentlemen who took our lads to Brest, And treat some rescued Breton as a comrade and a guest.

But in all our stories, in order to produce desired effects we must refrain from holding, as Burroughs says, ”a brief for either side,”

and we must let the people in the story be judged by their deeds and leave the decision of the children free in this matter.[42]

In a review of Ladd's ”Psychology” in the _Academy_, we find a pa.s.sage which refers as much to the story as to the novel:

”The psychological novelist girds up his loins and sets himself to write little essays on each of his characters. If he have the gift of the thing he may a.n.a.lyze motives with a subtlety which is more than their desert, and exhibit simple folk pa.s.sing through the most dazzling rotations. If he be a novice, he is reduced to mere crude invention--the result in both cases is quite beyond the true purpose of Art. Art--when all is said and done--a suggestion, and it refuses to be explained. Make it obvious, unfold it in detail, and you reduce it to a dead letter.”

Again, there is a sentence by Schopenhauer applied to novels which would apply equally well to stories:

”Skill consists in setting the inner life in motion with the smallest possible array of circ.u.mstances, for it is this inner life that excites our interest.”

In order to produce an encouraging and lasting effect by means of our stories, we should be careful to introduce a certain number from fiction where virtue is rewarded and vice punished, because to appreciate the fact that ”virtue is its own reward” it takes a developed and philosophic mind, or a born saint, of whom there will not, I think, be many among normal children: a comforting fact, on the whole, as the normal teacher is apt to confuse them with prigs.

A grande dame visiting an elementary school listened to the telling of an exciting story from fiction, and was impressed by the thrill of delight which pa.s.sed through the children. But when the story was finished, she said: ”But _oh!_ what a pity the story was not taken from actual history!”

Now, not only was this comment quite beside the mark, but the lady in question did not realize that pure fiction has one quality which history cannot have. The historian, bound by fact and accuracy, must often let his hero come to grief. The poet (or, in this case we may call him, in the Greek sense, the ”maker” of stories) strives to show _ideal_ justice.

What encouragement to virtue, except for the abnormal child, can be offered by the stories of good men coming to grief, such as we find Miltiades, Phocion, Socrates, Severus, Cicero, Cato and Caesar?

Sir Philip Sydney says in his ”Defence of Poesy”:

”Only the poet declining to be held by the limitations of the lawyer, the _historian_, the grammarian, the rhetorician, the logician, the physician, the metaphysician is lifted up with the vigor of his own imagination; doth grow in effect into another nature in making things either better than Nature bringeth forth or quite anew, as the Heroes, Demi-G.o.ds, Cyclops, Furies and such like so as he goeth hand- in-hand with Nature, not inclosed in the narrow range of her gifts but freely ranging within the Zodiac of his own art--_her_ world is brazen; the poet only delivers a golden one.”

The effect of the story need not stop at the negative task of correcting evil tendencies. There is the positive effect of translating the abstract ideal of the story into concrete action.

I was told by Lady Henry Somerset that when the first set of children came down from London for a fortnight's holiday in the country, she was much startled and shocked by the obscenity of the games they played amongst themselves. Being a sound psychologist, Lady Henry wisely refrained from appearing surprised or from attempting any direct method of reproof. ”I saw,” she said, ”that the 'goody'

element would have no effect, so I changed the whole atmosphere by reading to them or telling them the most thrilling medieval tales without any commentary. By the end of the fortnight the activities had all changed. The boys were performing astonis.h.i.+ng deeds of prowess, and the girls were allowing themselves to be rescued from burning towers and fetid dungeons.” Now, if these deeds of chivalry appear somewhat stilted to us, we can at least realize that, having changed the whole atmosphere of the filthy games, it is easier to translate the deeds into something a little more in accordance with the spirit of the age, and boys will more readily wish later on to save their sisters from dangers more sordid and commonplace than fiery towers and dark dungeons, if they have once performed the deeds in which they had to court danger and self-sacrifice for themselves.

And now we come to the question as to how these effects are to be maintained. In what has already been stated as to the danger of introducing the dogmatic and direct appeal into the story, it is evident that the avoidance of this element is the first means of preserving the story in all its artistic force in the memory of the child. We must be careful, as I point out in the chapter on Questions, not to interfere by comment or question with the atmosphere we have made round the story, or else, in the future, that story will become blurred and overlaid with the remembrance, not of the artistic whole, as presented by the teller of the story, but by some unimportant small side issue raised by an irrelevant question or a superfluous comment.

Many people think that the dramatization of the story by the children themselves helps to maintain the effect produced. Personally, I fear there is the same danger as in the immediate reproduction of the story, but by some unimportant small side issue raised by an irrelevant question or a superfluous comment.

Many people think that the dramatization of the story by the children themselves helps to maintain the effect produced. Personally, I fear there is the same danger as in the immediate reproduction of the story, namely, that the general dramatic effect may be weakened.

If, however, there is to be dramatization (and I do not wish to dogmatize on the subject), I think it should be confined to facts and not fancies, and this is why I realize the futility of the dramatization of fairy tales.

Horace E. Scudder says on this subject: