Details

Title

Fiction Writers on Fiction Writing

Subtitle

advice, opinions and a statement of their own working methods by more than one hundred authors

Author

Hoffman, Arthur Sullivant

Physical Description

429 p. ; 20 cm.

Place of Publication

Indianapolis

Country

United States

Publisher

Bobbs-Merrill Company

Edition

First edition.

Date of Publication

1923 Show more1923-01-01T00:00:00.000Z
1923-01-01T00:00:00.000Z Show less

Collection

L.M. Montgomery Institute. Ryrie-Campbell Collection.

Donor

Donated by Donna Jane Campbell. Scans used with permission from Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University.

Note

In the early 1920s, Arthur Sullivant Hoffman began writing a guidebook to fiction writing. Hoffman, a veteran editor for a variety of magazines, was attempting to combat the rise of “machine-like” fiction that “poured across” his desk. In the process of building his guidebook, 'Fundamentals of Fiction Writing' (1922), he sent a formal questionnaire to 116 authors, including L.M. Montgomery, in order to build an appendix of helpful, expert advice for authors. Hoffman thought that a few responses from a handful of successful writers would greatly improve the usefulness of his guide. After all, he said, “no one else in the world can bring us so quickly to the real heart of the matter or come so close to speaking the final word” than published authors themselves (2). But the authors’ answers proved “too valuable to be tucked away in the appendix for any book” (4). Instead, he collected all of their responses into this volume, 'Fiction Writers on Fiction Writing' (1923). Hoffman’s questions are detailed: “What is the genesis of a story with you —does it grow from an incident, a character, a trait of character, a situation, setting, a title, or what? That is, what do you mean by an idea for a story?” And the variety of answers offer a wealth of advice (sometimes even contradictory) from a variety of perspectives. Compared to some of the other authors included, Montgomery provided thorough, often practical, answers that illuminate her process and explain her approach to fiction writing. In contrast, a few other authors, Sinclair Lewis for example, offered only short answers. Hoffman asked, “What are two or three of the most valuable suggestions you could give to a beginner? To a practised writer?” Montgomery offered a page of advice, first suggesting that writers shouldn’t write “if they can help it” and only if they can’t. She also recommends finding trusted readers, revising and pruning, and cultivating a “note-book habit” (see pages 355-56). Lewis answered only, “Work, work, work.” Read together, Montgomery’s answers to Hoffman’s questions are perhaps the most detailed discussion of her craft available. Reading all of the responses together offers a fascinating peek into the minds of authors and into the world of publishing at the time. Montgomery is included with authors from a variety of backgrounds and genres: Ralph Henry Barbour (sports fiction for boys), Algernon Blackwood (ghost stories), Will Irwin (journalist, muckracker, memoirist), Harold Lamb (fiction and short stories of Asia and the Middle East), Sinclair Lewis (Nobel prize winning author of Main Street and other novels), Rose Macaulay (prolific writer of fiction and biography), and Booth Tarkington (writer and dramatist), to name a few. Note: The full-text of Montgomery’s answers are also reprinted in the first volume of Benjamin Lefebvre’s 'The L.M Montgomery Reader series, A Life in Print' (University of Toronto P, 2013).

Contents

Authors Whose Replies to the Questionnaire Make Up the Body of This Book:Bill Adams; Samuel Hopkins Adams; Paul L. Anderson; William Ashley Anderson; H. C. Bailey; Edwin Balmer; Ralph Henry Barbour; Frederick Orin Bartlett; Nalbro Bartley; Konrad Bercovici; Ferdinand Berthoud; H. H. Birney, Jr.; Farnham Bishop; Algernon Blackwood; Max Bonter; Katharine Holland Brown; F. R. Buckley; Prosper Buranelli; Thompson Burtis; George M. A. Cain; Robert V. Carr; George L. Catton; Robert W. Chambers; Roy P. Churchill; Carl Clausen; Courtney Ryley Cooper; Arthur Crabb; Mary Stewart Cutting; Elmer Davis; William Harper Dean; Harris Dickson; Captain Dingle; Louis Dodge; Phyllis Duganne; J. Allan Dunn; Walter A. Dyer; Walter Prichard Eaton; Charles Victor Fischer; E. O. Foster; Arthur O. Friel; J. U. Giesy; George Gilbert; Kenneth Gilbert; Louise Closser Hale; Holworthy Hall; Richard Matthews Hallet; William H. Hamby; A. Judson Hanna; Joseph Mills Hanson; E. E. Harriman; Nevil G. Henshaw; Joseph Hergesheimer; Robert Hichens; R. de S. Horn; Clyde B. Hough; Emerson Hough; A. S. M. Hutchinson; Inez Haynes Irwin; Will Irwin; Charles Tenney Jackson; Frederick J. Jackson; Mary Johnston; John Joseph; Lloyd Kohler; Harold Lamb; Sinclair Lewis; Hapsburg Liebe; Romaine H. Lowdermilk; Eugene P. Lyle, Jr.; Rose Macaulay; Crittenden Marriott; Homer I. McEldowney; Ray McGillivray; Helen Topping Miller; Thomas Samson Miller; Anne Shannon Monroe; L. M. Montgomery; Frederick Moore; Talbot Mundy; Kathleen Norris; Anne O’Hagan; Grant Overton; Sir Gilbert Parker; Hugh Pendexter; Clay Perry; Michael J. Phillips; Walter B. Pitkin; E. S. Pladwell; Lucia Mead Priest; Eugene Manlove Rhodes; Frank C. Robertson; Ruth Sawyer; Chester L. Saxby; Barry Scobee; R. T. M. Scott; Robert Simpson; Arthur D. Howden Smith; Theodore Seixas Solomons; Raymond S. Spears; Norman Springer; Julian Street; T. S. Stribling; Booth Tarkington; W. C. Tuttle; Lucille Van Slyke; Atreus von Schrader; T. Von Ziekursch; Henry Kitchell Webster; G. A. Wells; William Wells; Ben Ames Williams; Honore Willsie; H. C. Witwer; William Almon Wolff; Edgar Young

Topic

Fiction
Technique
Authorship

Genre

reference

Call Number(s)

509 REF-Hoffman