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TI-IE. FICTION FACTORY
It’s the point of view makes the thing funny. The child
pulling the wings off a fly to see the insect crawl over the
window pane is amused; but I don’t suppose the fly sees
the humor of the situation. I could tell you tales of submit--
ting the same manuscript three times to an editor whom we
both know well, having it shot through with criticism the first
two times and then having it accepted and paid for at extra
rates within two years of the first submission, and without even
a word of the title changed! Is THAT the kind of an inci-
dent you want?
One of the funniest things that ever happened to me was
that an editor of a popular magazine used to say that my stuff
resembled Dickens, and when I wrote half-dime novels the
readers used to write in and say the same. The quality of mind
possessed by the scholarly editor and the street boys who read
‘Bowery Billy‘ must be somewhat the same-eh?
There was once a magazine that bore as its title the name
of a publisher as famous as any American ever saw, and the
editor bought a story of me at the rate of half a cent a word,
and owed me two years for it. Finally, one time when I was
very hard up I went to the office and hung around until I could
see the ‘boss’ and put it up to him to pay me. He did. He
knocked off 33 1-3 per cent for ‘cash.’ Pretty good, eh?
I tell you, Edwards, there’s nothing funny in the game that
I can see-not for the so-called literary worker.‘ The. gods may
laugh when they see a man with that brand of insanity on him
that actually forces him to write. But I doubt if the writer
laughs-not even if he writes a ‘best seller.’ For success en-
tails turning out other successes, and that is hard work. Ex-
cuse me! I am going back to the farm. I will write only when
I have to, and only as long as my farm will not support me-
I’ve got hold of a pretty good place cheap, down here with the
outlook of making a good living on it in time. Nopmore the
Great White Way, with the Dirty Black Alley behind it, in
mine! I am not going to carry my hat in my hand E"'0““d to
editors’ offices and take up collections for long. Besides, most
of the editors blooming now are just out of college and are
not dry behind the ears yet. They think that Johnny Go-bang,
who edited the sporting page in the . Podunk University
Screamer, knows more about writing fiction than the old fel-
lows who have been at it a couple of decades. And I reckon
they are right. They are looking for ‘fresh’ material; some of
it is pretty ‘raw’ as well as fresh. I fooled an editor the other
day by sending a manuscript on strange paper. written On 3
new typewriter, and with an assumed name attached. Soldothe
story and got a long letter of encouragement from thc sd1t01’-
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