How to Fail in Literature

A >> Andrew Lang >> How to Fail in Literature


It is not an easy goal to attain, as the crowd of aspirants dream, nor is
the reward luxurious when it is attained. A garland, usually fading and
not immortal, has to be run for, not without dust and heat.




FOOTNOTES


{1} As the writer has ceased to sift, editorially, the contributions of
the age, he does hope that authors will not instantly send him their MSS.
But if they do, after this warning, they will take the most direct and
certain road to the waste paper basket. No MSS. will be returned, even
when accompanied by postage stamps.

{2} I have made a rich selection of examples from the works of living
English and American authors. From the inextensive volumes of an eminent
and fastidious critic I have culled a dear phrase about an oasis of style
in "a desert of literary limpness." But it were hardly courteous, and
might be dangerous, to publish these exotic blossoms of art.

{3} _Appreciations_, p. 18.

{4} It was the custom of Longinus, of the author of _The Bathos_, and
other old critics, to take their examples of how _not_ to do it from the
works of famous writers, such as Sir Richard Blackmore and Herodotus. It
seems altogether safer and more courteous for an author to supply his own
Awful Examples. The Musical Rights in the following Poems are reserved.

{5} Or, if you prefer the other rhyme, read: _And the wilderness of
men_.

{6} It is a teachable public: since this lecture was delivered the
author has received many MSS. from people who said they had heard the
discourse, "and enjoyed it so much."