The Project Gutenberg EBook of How I write my novels, by Mrs. Hungerford

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: How I write my novels

Author: Mrs. Hungerford

Release Date: December 25, 2008 [EBook #27621]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOW I WRITE MY NOVELS ***

Produced by Daniel Fromont

[Transcriber's note: Mrs. Hungerford (Margaret Wolfe Hamilton)
(1855?-1897) "How I write my novels" (from Mrs Hungerford's
_An anxious moment_ pp. 275-282)]

To sit down in cold blood and deliberately set to cudgel one's brains
with a view to dragging from them a plot wherewith to make a book is (I
have been told) the habit of some writers, and those of no small
reputation. Happy people! What powers of concentration must be theirs!
What a belief in themselves--that most desirable of all beliefs, that
sweet propeller toward the temple of fame. Have faith in yourself, and
all me, will have faith in you.

But as for me, I have to lie awake o'nights longing and hoping for
inspirations that oft-times are slow to come. But when they do come,
what a delight! All at once, in a flash, as it were, the whole story
lies open before me--a delicate diorama, vague here and there, but
with a beginning and an end--clear as crystal. I can never tell when
these inspirations may be coming; sometimes in the dark watches of the
night; sometimes when driving through the crisp, sweet air; sometimes a
word in a crowded drawing-room, a thought rising from the book in hand,
sends them with a rush to the surface, where they are seized and
brought to land, and carried home in triumph. After that the 'dressing'
of them is simple enough.

But just in the beginning it was not so simple. Alas! for that first
story of mine--the raven I sent you of my ark and never saw again.
Unlike the proverbial curse, it did not come home to roost; it stayed
where I had sent it. The only thing I ever heard of it again was a
polite letter from the editor in whose office it lay, telling me I
could have it back if I enclosed stamps to the amount of twopence
halfpenny, otherwise he should feel it his unpleasant duty to 'consign
it to the waste-paper basket'. I