knew "how" to read, and from that knowledge learned "how" to write. But no American author has come after him that can be called greater than he, or as great. Concerning the art of fiction, the present American "make" is, whatever the immediate "catching on" of it may be, distinctly ephemera of the utmost ephemeral. Such "literature" would not exist even in America, if Americans knew "how" to read. What is called the "Yellow Journalism" would not exist either. Why? Because a really educated reader of things worth reading would not read it—and it would therefore be a case of the wicked ceasing to trouble and the weary being at rest.
There is a general complaint nowadays—especially among authors—of the "decadence" of literature. It is true enough. But the cause of the "decadence" is the same—simply and solely that people cannot and will not read. They do not know "how" to do it. If they ever did know in the bygone days of Dickens and Thackeray, they have forgotten. Every book is "too long" for them. Yet scarcely any novel is published now as long as the novels of Dickens, which were so eagerly devoured at one time by tens of thousands of admiring readers. A short, risky, rather "nasty" book, (reviewers would call it strong, but that is only a little joke of theirs,—they speak of this kind of literature as though it were cheese) finds most favour with the "upper" circles of society in Great Britain and America. Not so with the "million" though. The million prefer simpler fare—and they read a good deal—though scarcely in the right way. It is always more a case of "skimming"
