| 494 | 495 | 496 | 497 | 498 |
| 1 | 314 | 629 | 943 | 1257 |
|
make them talk as they do talk. I think you are the very greatest artist
in these tremendous mysteries that ever lived. There doesn't seem to be
anything that can be concealed from your awful all-seeing eye. It must
be a cheerful thing for one to live with you and be aware that you are
going up and down in him like another conscience all the time. Possibly
you will not be a fully accepted classic until you have been dead a
hundred years,--it is the fate of the Shakespeares and of all genuine
prophets,--but then your books will be as common as Bibles, I believe.
You're not a weed, but an oak; not a summer-house, but a cathedral. In
that day I shall still be in the Cyclopedias, too, thus: "Mark Twain;
history and occupation unknown--but he was personally acquainted with
Howells." There--I could sing your praises all day, and feel and believe
every bit of it.
My book is half finished; I wish to heaven it was done. I have given up
writing a detective novel--can't write a novel, for I lack the faculty;
but when the detectives were nosing around after Stewart's loud
remains, I threw a chapter into my present book in which I have very
extravagantly burlesqued the detective business--if it is possible to
burlesque that business extravagantly. You know I was going to send you
that detective play, so that you could re-write it. Well I didn't do it
because I couldn't find a single idea in it that could be useful to you.
It was dreadfully witless and flat. I knew it would sadden you and unfit
you for work.
I have always been sorry we threw up that play embodying Orion which you
496
Page
Quick Jump
|