Classic Articles on Writing

Fenimore Cooper Sucks at Writing by Mark Twain  It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent and let persons talk who have read … [Read more...] about Fenimore Cooper Sucks at Writing by Mark Twain

I Am Not An Animal Expert! by Jack London This is one of our historical articles from writers that we just had to publish. Jack London, one of our most beloved American writer's seems to have shared the modern day views of the media. Apparently news people of his day mixed London up with either a Zookeeper or Veterinarian. London was not  thrilled will the assumptions, so he … [Read more...] about I Am Not An Animal Expert! by Jack London

Mark Twain on First Getting Published (1906) My experiences as an author began early in 1867. I came to New York from San Francisco in the first month of that year and presently Charles H. Webb, whom I had known in San Francisco as a reporter on The Bulletin, and afterward editor of The Californian, suggested that I publish a volume of sketches. I had but a slender reputation … [Read more...] about Mark Twain on First Getting Published (1906)

Born in 1770; died in 1850; graduated from Cambridge in 1791; traveled on the Continent in 1790-92; settled at Grasmere in 1799; married Mary Hutchinson in 1802; settled at Rydal Mount in 1813; traveled in Scotland in 1814 and in 1832; traveled on the Continent again in 1820 and in 1837; became poet laureate in 1843; published his first volume in 1793 and his last, "The … [Read more...] about What does it mean to be a poet? by William Wordsworth

 When I Met Oscar Oscar Wilde  by W. B. Yeats My first meeting with Oscar Wilde was an astonishment. I never before heard a man talking with perfect sentences, as if he had written them all over night with labour and yet all spontaneous. There was present that night at Henley’s, by right of propinquity or of accident, a man full of the secret spite of dulness, who interrupted … [Read more...] about When I Met Oscar Oscar Wilde by W. B. Yeats

THE WRITER HIMSELF  by Robert Saunders DowstCritical Faculty—Cultivation of Genius—Observation and Information—Open-mindedness—Attitude Toward Life—Prejudice and Provincialism—The Social Question—Reading—Imagination.Accessible as are the data of the fiction writer, the facts and possibilities of life, their very accessibility places him under strict necessity to sift … [Read more...] about THE WRITER HIMSELF by Robert Saunders Dowst

Why The Blind Man in Ancient Times was Made a Poet  by William B. Yeats A description in the Iliad or the Odyssey, unlike one in the Æneid or in most modern writers, is the swift and natural observation of a man as he is shaped by life. It is a refinement of the primary hungers and has the least possible of what is merely scholarly or exceptional. It is, above all, never too … [Read more...] about Why The Blind Man in Ancient Times was Made a Poet by William B. Yeats

RUPERT BROOKE: by Henry JamesNothing more generally or more recurrently solicits us, in the light of literature, I think, than the interest of our learning how the poet, the true poet, and above all the particular one with whom we may for the moment be concerned, has come into his estate, asserted and preserved his identity, worked out his question of sticking to that and … [Read more...] about RUPERT BROOKE: by Henry James

The pretty fable by which the Duchess of Orleans illustrates the character of her son, the regent, might, with little change, be applied to Byron. All the fairies, save one, had been bidden to his cradle. All the gossips had been profuse of their gifts. One had bestowed nobility, another genius, a third beauty. The malignant elf who had been uninvited came last, and, unable to … [Read more...] about Byron’s Life Explained by Lord MaCaulay