Howells, sneering down upon us troglodytes.

May 11 marked the anniversary of the death of one William Dean Howells (1837-1920). Good riddance. Regarded by some as “the major American novelist and critic of his age” and as the "Dean of American Letters" and the "Father of Modern Realism", Howells’ championing of Literary Realism while editor of The Atlantic Monthly slashed a gaping wound in American literature that has yet to heal. Before WDH, Americans read whatever struck their fancy with no particular guilt. After—thanks to Howells—there was American ‘literature’ and there was ‘trash’.

Howells began his career clerking and writing politicians' biographies. Gaining a European consulship thereby, he married a socialite at the US embassy in Paris in 1862. In 1866, he was made assistant editor of The Atlantic Monthly--the preeminent literary magazine of its day--and became a full editor in 1871. This was a turning point in the history of American literature. As the late Dave Wolverton pointed out:

"Because Howells was the editor of the largest and most powerful magazine of the time (and because of its fabulous payment rates, a short story sale to that magazine could support a writer for a year or two), his views had a tremendous influence on American writers."

Ol' Willie was now the literary tastemaker for the entire nation.

Howells would go on to nurture the careers of Henry James and Stephen Crane and other ‘Realists’ while at The Atlantic Monthly. The damage was done. He quit to concentrate on writing Realist novels. Meanwhile, WDH was also writing an editorial feature for Harper's Magazine on the side. In late 1886, a year after his most famous novel, The Rise of Silas Lapham, came out, Howells wrote this for Harper's:

*The Rise of Silas Lapham*. A novel where “nothing happens” according to its own author. Can you *feel* the excitement?

“In fact the American who chooses to enjoy his birthright to the full, lives in a world wholly different from the Englishman's and speaks (too often through his nose) another language: he breathes a rarefied and nimble air full of shining possibilities and radiant promises which the fog-and-soot-clogged lungs of those less-favored islanders struggle in vain to fill themselves with. But he ought to be modest in his advantage, and patient with the coughing and sputtering of his cousin who complains of finding himself in an exhausted receiver on plunging into one of our novels. To be quite just to the poor fellow, I have had some such experience as that myself in the atmosphere of some of our more attenuated romances.
Yet every now and then I read a book with perfect comfort and much exhilaration, whose scenes the average Englishman would gasp in. Nothing happens; that is, nobody murders or debauches anybody else; there is no arson or pillage of any sort; there is not a ghost, or a ravening beast, or a hair-breadth escape, or a shipwreck, or a monster of self-sacrifice, or a lady five thousand years old in the whole course of the story; ‘no promenade, no band of music, nossing!’ as Mr. Du Maurier's Frenchman said of the meet for a fox-hunt. Yet it is all alive with the keenest interest for those who enjoy the study of individual traits and general conditions as they make themselves known to American experience.”

Most online quotes of this screed leave out the first paragraph--which is basically an insult-laden polemic aimed at England and the English. I post it to provide some context for the second paragraph. Even granted that context, much of it is poorly-written and obscure. Keep in mind that this is Howells at his literary 'height'.

I will attempt to translate/decipher it for you, Gentle Readers.

"Nothing happens; that is, nobody murders or debauches anybody else; there is no arson or pillage of any sort; there is not a ghost, or a ravening beast..."

The first part might refer to Lord Byron or Walter Scott. Ghosts appear here n' there in English literature from that period. The "ravening beast" might refer to Stevenson's Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The main takeaway is that all of the situations WDH lists are supposed to be bad things. I don't know about you, but I would at least consider reading a novel with those elements listed on the cover. Take note that WDH somehow ‘exhilarates’ in novels where “nothing happens”.

"(...) or a hair-breadth escape, or a shipwreck, or a monster of self-sacrifice, or a lady five thousand years old in the whole course of the story"

Oh noes! Not a "hair-breadth escape"! I suppose "a shipwreck" could refer to Wallace's Ben-Hur, but Wallace is an American. I have never been able to ascertain what the hell "a monster of self-sacrifice" is.

Now we come to the big one. "[A] lady five thousand years old" can only refer to Ayesha, the central figure of H. Rider Haggard's She, which had exploded upon the Anglophone literary market that year. One can only imagine Willie's consternation and chagrin. Here was the antithesis of everything WDH had promoted and believed in for twenty years. Haggard soon followed up with a scathing rebuttal.

Haggard’s *She*, which, despite Howells’ best efforts, has sold fifty to one hundred times what *The Rise of Silas Lapham* has.

I suppose I've been remiss in really nailing down exactly what Howells believed in. He considered himself a Literary Realist. That style of literature is closely aligned with Naturalism. A good article on both styles can be found here. Also, once again, here is Dave Wolverton, with his take on WDH's literary philosophy:

"Howells contended that good literature could only be written if we did three things: 1) Restrict the kinds of settings we deal with. 2) Restrict the kinds of characters we deal with. 3) Restrict the scope of conflicts we deal with.
Is it so? Can no 'good' literature be written outside the scope of these dictates?
Regardless of the lack of reasoning behind his dictates, Howells's dictums form the nucleus of what is being taught as "good" literature in mainstream college literature courses [today]. These dictums also provide the framework for nearly all of what is published in the largest of the mainstream literary magazines—the New Yorker and the Atlantic Monthly, and in the smaller literary journals."

Being a fair-minded fellow, I'll provide some more drivel straight from the maw of the jackass regarding one facet of his philosophy. It makes a good addendum to his 'smiling aspects' screed above:

"I hope the time is coming when not only the artist, but the common, average man, who always 'has the standard of the arts in his power,' will have also the courage to apply it, and will reject the ideal grasshopper wherever he finds it, in science, in literature, in art, because it is not 'simple, natural, and honest,' because it is not like a real grasshopper. But I will own that I think the time is yet far off, and that the people who have been brought up on the ideal grasshopper, the heroic grasshopper, the impassioned grasshopper, the self-devoted, adventureful, good old romantic card-board grasshopper, must die out before the simple, honest, and natural grasshopper can have a fair field."

To me, this outlook could almost have come from an alien planet. WDH has erected this strawman of the "ideal grasshopper", which has (supposedly) been created by the descriptions of such by previous generations of authors. All of that must be cast away for "the simple, honest, and natural grasshopper".

So, we are to throw out the observations/descriptions penned by past men of genius—as judged by generations of readers—to make way for the very special 'mud pie'* creations of some mediocrity? Simply because that new creation breaks with the past? I don't think so. I'll grant that new takes on various subjects can be good, but there is no guarantee that 'change for the sake of change' is a good thing. None at all, in fact. 'Reinventing the wheel' comes to mind. WDH called the entire idea of 'literary genius' as being “a mischievous superstition”, as if denigrating a natural fact changes that fact.

What are we to make of WDH listing "heroic", "impassioned" and "adventureful" as obviously negative things to be found in literature?

Perhaps the most telling part is when William Dean Howells says that those who believe in and enjoy heroism and adventure "must die out before" his simple, honest and natural literary utopia can see the light of day. In political terms, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot held very similar views. WDH simply didn't have the power to carry out his dreams.

Who defines "simple" and "honest" and "natural"? Who can answer that? Howells the Great and Powerful in his Ministry of Truth, perhaps?

In 1888, two years after the 'smiling aspects' essay wherein he attacked anything heroic or adventuresome in literature, Howells expressed his abhorrence for his native land:

“I am not in a very good humor with 'America' myself. It seems to be the most grotesquely illogical thing under the sun (...) I now abhor it, and feel that it is coming out all wrong in the end, unless it bases itself anew on a real equality.”

Ah, "equality". There is the friction, Gentle Readers of the DMR Blog. How can one have "real equality" when heroes exist in literature? Just as Brian Stelter will never win a race against Usain Bolt or Martin van Creveld will never lose in a military debate versus Mark Milley, some humans excel others. When one reads about exceptional and heroic literary characters like Conan or Imaro, you are reading thoughtcrime, which is preventing you from making Howells' literary and political utopia a reality. Of course Stelter is "equal" to Bolt. Of course.

Howells in all of his condescending, smug elitism.

In the mind of Howells, heroism and standing above the crowd was a dangerous thing—except in his case. So was anything 'exotic'. Adventures in distant lands and times was verboten. Fantasy had no place in his worldview. When one boils it all down to that, it is quite obvious why WDH persecuted those writers who, as Leigh Brackett put it, "engaged in the rough trade of heroes". No Poe-ish Antarctica or Longfellows' Hiawatha or traversing the deeps with Captain Nemo for you, Gentle Readers. Certainly no journey to Kor with Holly and Vincey.

Some DMR Blog reader may say, "What has all this to do with me?" A perfectly reasonable question. The answer is that it has a lot to do with what you read as a child and what children are reading now. Teachers and librarians are products of the US academic system. That system has now bought into the crap Howells peddled for almost one hundred and fifty years. What schoolkid learns about Achilles, Odysseus, King Arthur or Robin Hood now? How many schoolboys have been entirely turned off of reading by what has been assigned in classrooms for the last century? All thanks to a man who hated heroes and America.

An author whom I respect tried to argue with me over Howells and Wolverton's essay about Howells. He said that what is currently taught in Literature and Creative Writing courses doesn't quite match up with Howells' dictates and doctrine. I replied that the methods have changed somewhat, but the intent and the result are the same: the demonization of the individual seeking adventure in line with what constituted 'heroism' before Howells hijacked American literature. The ones who now trash-talk Allan Quatermain, John Carter, Tarzan, Conan and Druss are the mutated spawn of one William Dean Howells. Not exactly the same, but they carry his literary DNA and continue fighting his battles. Such tragic mutants hate the very concept of the individually competent and heroic.

Ask yourselves, “What might have been?” Without the constant pressure of hordes of indoctrinated English/Creative Writing teachers, how many gifted authors might have turned their powers to the good? Author Evan S. Connell comes to mind. Gustave Flaubert, while much earlier, seems to have succumbed to the same Realist/Naturalist pressures. I’m sure there were/are literally legions of other writers turned aside from the exotic and the adventuresome and the heroic. Despite those who say otherwise, the spirit of Howells still guides American literature, like some unquiet and unwelcome ghost.

I sincerely hail all those who, like myself, managed to evade the snares and lies put before us in childhood and who sought out adventure despite all that.

Dave Wolverton’s groundbreaking essay on WDH can be found here.

Highlights from Haggard’s rebuttal to Howells—with some commentary from yours truly—can be found here.

*'Mud pie' is an old phrase of mine. It goes back to my childhood, when my sister would present a mud pie to my mom, at which point my mother would exclaim, "That's great, honey!" It is a metaphor for all of those untalented/underinformed/midwit individuals who present their views online and automatically expect praise for them.