FIELD AND STUDY 



his page is vital and gives the impression of an 

 original and attractive personality. Again we speak 

 of the style and the thought as being separable, but 

 they are one as the line of a pearl is one with the 

 substance. There is a world of good writing which 

 yet differs from literature as a tree differs from a 

 pile of lumber. Lucidity as a requisite of style cer- 

 tainly stands first, and next that which is insep- 

 arable from it, simplicity. In my own case I try to 

 get language out of the way as far as possible, and 

 to put my mind directly to that of my reader. 

 Hence, when I have been told that my page does 

 not seem like writing, that it offers no resistance, 

 and so on, I feel highly complimented. I would 

 have it fit the mind as water fits the hand. Deliver 

 me from language as such, from fine phrases; in 

 short, from conscious style. The author must not 

 know that he is writing, but seem only to be speak- 

 ing. The moment he knows he is writing, his words 

 begin to rattle and sound hollow. I do not want to 

 hear or see or feel the machinery. I want the perfect 

 product. I want the writer to be so intent upon what 

 he is saying, so single of purpose, and so honest with 

 his reader, that he takes no thought of his style as 

 such; he takes thought only of how to convey his 

 meaning in the clearest, freshest, most direct and 

 vivid manner. O to be natural, to have the quality 

 of freshness and inevitableness, of the unlabored, 

 the spontaneous ! To be brisk and not flippant, to be 



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