“ And—in all the noisy babble of commercialism—the writers of our own generation who are worth most on a publisher's list respond to the true publishing personality as readily as writers did before the day of commercial methods. All the changes that have come into the profession have not, after all, changed its real character, as it is practised on its higher levels. And this rule will hold true—that no publishing house can win and keep a place on the highest level that does not have at least one man who possesses this true publishing personality. ”

“ The artist cannot tease the mind with the vague influence of description, as can the author, nor can he veil his products with the pleasing glamour of unreality. Without haze his work stands forth, bold facts in half-tone reproduction and printer's ink, fighting an uncertain fight at best with the imagination of the reader. ”

“ Nevertheless, there has always been an unlucky tendency on the part both of writers and readers to overstate this non-mechanical nature of poetic works, whether in prose or verse, and to give the processes of this production that air of mystery—not to say miracle—in which art is always tempted to veil its methods. There is an anatomy of the book, which is not its life, but is just as real as its life, and only less essential. There is an architecture awaiting the book while it is still in its author's brain ”

“ Whether the direct purpose of an improvement has been to increase the working speed of the press, to lessen the necessary operating power, to simplify the mechanism, to strengthen the parts, to lighten the pressman's labor, or to better the quality of printing, the ultimate aim has always been the same. It has been the constant incentive to invention and the standard for judging the adaptability of a press. ”

“ In the process of manufacture a book passes through so many hands that if the finished product is exactly in accordance with the plan that existed in the mind of its designer, he is justified in looking upon it with the satisfaction felt by an artist who has worked well. After a book is issued, however, it is quite another and equally important a matter to sell it, and this part of book publication requires as much thought and perhaps more dogged persistence than the other. ”

“ The commercial traveller who sells books has no fault to find with the people with whom he deals. By the very nature of his calling the bookseller is a man of reading and culture; now and then among them you find a man of rare culture. So genuinely friendly are the relations existing between seller and purchaser that a travelling man has the feeling that he is making a pleasure trip among friends. Such relations are no mean asset to the salesman, although they are not wholly essential. For it is to the bookseller's interest at least to examine the samples of every publisher's representative. ”

“ It is only when author, paper maker, printer, and binder have done with their share in the exploitation of literature that the publisher finds that the current which had been urging him gently onward has set against him. Of making many books there is no end, but the profitable marketing of the same is vanity and vexation of spirit. ”

“ On new books other than fiction, where the sale could not be expected to reach more than a few thousand, there would be no business justification in spending so much. Such books have more or less to make their own way.
Publicity is an essential part of the publishing business, and the breadth of its field, as well as the proper way to apply its influence, is beginning to be more correctly understood. Fortunately, for all concerned, the author as well as the publisher and the book-buying public, it is a power that can work only for good, and in a good cause. ”

“ And it is quite true, on the other hand, that the distinction and comely appearance of a circular will prejudice in favor of the book. Moreover, a circular's service can be rendered only when it attracts attention, and what is spent in aiding it to catch the eye, through making it artistically beautiful and printing it in color, will bring its return and more in the added efficiency produced. There are, doubtless, people who would not be affected by bad printing, but people of taste, the people who most influence the sale of books, are sure to be antagonized. ”

“ One fact has developed from the thousands of book advertising campaigns, and it is this—that you cannot force a really worthless book down the throat of the American reading public however much money you put into advertising. You may create a big sale for a very light and frothy story, with little to recommend it from the literary critic's point of view, but you can be sure, if it succeeds, your novel has certain positive, if rather superficial virtues, either in the story, in the local color, or in the method of telling. ”

“ The American press is notably fair, notably discriminating, and notably independent. It gives its own views fearlessly, and resents any efforts made by publishers to get their own adjective-besprinkled puffs printed. In rush seasons it will make use of publisher's description, after carefully blue-pencilling obtrusive adjectives, but it goes no farther. In fact, the newspaper-review part of publishing publicity is best left alone. The book must do the work itself. ”

“ It is best to find out what people will take the book, and advertise (p. 272) it to them. The process of emasculating your presentation of it by cutting out everything that would keep anybody from reading it is a dangerous one. The dislikes of the world of readers are too many for one to be able to dodge them all, and, after all, most of us like a positive rather than a negative volume. Just because many people do not read essays,—to take an extreme case,—is no reason for avoiding the statement that yours is a volume of essays. ”

“ Each publishing firm has developed through its experience its own principles of the psychology of public opinion, its own idea of the qualities a book should possess, and its own way of getting at the people. Results are frequently so surprising that one is inclined to class publishing among the games of chance. It is certain that everybody cannot make a success at it, and there is no doubt that it requires a definite endowment of genius. ”

“ Books are not valuable merely because of age (excepting those printed in the fifteenth century) , nor solely on account of their rarity. It is quite apparent that a rare book for which there is no demand can have no value. It is the combination of desirability and rarity which gives value, and that value fluctuates with the demand, being subject to the caprice of the collector or the fashion of the day. ”

“ He must supply her with deportment and breeding before her beauty can be truly imagined. Thus it may be explained that the measure of an author's conception and clearness often determines the qualities in an illustration. The true illustrator is sensitive to faults in the delineation of character, and, although he may not be aware of it, his work will show it. Of course it often happens that an artist is taken up with ideas of technique and, author or no author, will make his pictures in just such a way; but such work is hardly illustration and serves itself better standing alone. ”

“ Illustration is and always has been the art of the people. It makes clearer to the imagination their stories and their songs, it mirrors their manner of life, interests, and pursuits in a way that brightens what would otherwise often be commonplace. ”

“ The publisher is learning to regard his travelling man as more than a salesman. He is asking him, now and then, to assist him in the selection of a manuscript, to aid him in planning the letter-press, and binding of a book. For by the very nature of his work the traveller is the one man in the publisher's employ who has a comprehensive grasp of the many branches of this alluring, but not very profitable, business. ”

“ Some books are not made for great sellers; they are written for the keen enjoyment of a select educated few; and if so presented that they fall into the hands of the popular novel devourer, they will surely be condemned, and the condemnation will reach and have its effect upon many who should legitimately have bought the book. On the other hand, a novel of no literary quality thrust into the hands of a person of bookish tastes will make an influential enemy, who will doubtless have among his followers many persons to whom the book would appeal. ”

“ During the last thirty years a magnificent work has been done in suppressing and destroying the filthy literature that was almost openly sold in the streets of many of our largest cities. Too much credit cannot be given the society that took the matter in hand. I believe that nearly every dealer to-day aims to keep his stock free from demoralizing books; but in the nature of things the line of demarcation cannot be drawn with entire satisfaction to all. About twenty years ago an itinerant dealer was arrested in a New Jersey town for selling a certain book. ”

“ Here are men who can give thousands of dollars for a single book, if they choose, and add it to an already extremely valuable collection.
"It is pleasant to see these men and their representatives sitting in the auction room, and poring, over their catalogues. There are times when they must not be disturbed, or spoken to. Great issues depend upon their utmost attention. Not Izaak Walton, the many rare editions of whose one great book they rapturously fish for, ever fished more intently for trout and grayling than they for the beauties of thought and of the printer's art. ”

“ Every day, artists of the highest intelligence find in illustration an opportunity to give the best that is in them, and the chances that illustration will reach the heights of perfection attained by other branches of art are exceedingly good.
The opportunities for an illustrator are without end, and the problems are beyond number. It is a difficult performance to hand out, to order, pictures in which human emotions stand counterfeited. ”

“ Models are either a great aid or a great drawback in the picturing of characters, for while they assist the artist by simplifying the labor of drawing, they often handicap him by intruding their own personality into the work, thereby spoiling the sense of character aimed at. When an illustrator allows this to happen, it does not matter how beautiful or accurate his sketch may be, he fails in the first essential of his craft, entering forthwith into the field occupied by painters and decorators, who can do the same thing very much better. ”

“ THE ILLUSTRATOR
By Charles D. Williams
It is only in comparatively modern times that the art of illustration has received the encouragement that makes for perfection. For this, the cheapening of the manufacturing cost in printing is mainly responsible. An illustration proper should always accompany text and in days past the making of a book was so costly in itself that the possibility of illustration was almost beyond thought. Only the wealthy could afford illustrated books and as their reading was very limited, naturally illustration was crowded to the wall. ”

“ A jobber has to be something of an optimist; he must keep his ear to the ground, and, like certain types of politicians, must be prepared to give the people what they want when they want it. He can of course help along the demand for good books and check that for poor literature, and, to his credit, he usually does this, but the book-buying public is truly democratic and in the main people are pretty definite in their wants. Oftentimes they can be led, but it is rarely that they will consent to be driven. ”

“ So, while the model is often a necessary appendage to the construction of a character, it is imperative that the spirit and sense spring from the artist, whose business is, not to reproduce the model, but to use it sparingly as he would a book of reference. ”

“ Writers like Lessing, Victor Cousin, Matthew Arnold, and Jules Lemaître have exercised in criticism a system which is quite as capable of exposition and analysis as that of the historian, the poet, or the novelist. In America this system has also done its best, without entirely prostituting its art, to meet the exigencies and claims of pseudo-literary production and its sympathetic, impressionable public. ”

“ The trade, I think, is coming more and more to be guided by the advice of such salesmen as have proved to be the possessors of judgment and honesty. By judgment is meant not merely the opinion that one forms of the literary value of a book, but that commercial estimate that a good salesman is able to make. ”