E-text prepared by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan,
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THE CRAFT OF FICTION
BY PERCY LUBBOCK
JONATHAN CAPE
ELEVEN GOWER STREET, LONDON
First Published 1921.
THE CRAFT OF FICTION
I
To grasp the shadowy and fantasmal form of a book, to hold it fast, toturn it over and survey it at leisure—that is the effort of a criticof books, and it is perpetually defeated. Nothing, no power, will keepa book steady and motionless before us, so that we may have time toexamine its shape and design. As quickly as we read, it melts andshifts in the memory; even at the moment when the last page is turned,a great part of the book, its finer detail, is already vague anddoubtful. A little later, after a few days or months, how much isreally left of it? A cluster of impressions, some clear pointsemerging from a mist of uncertainty, this is all we can hope topossess, generally speaking, in the name of a book. The experience ofreading it has left something behind, and these relics we call by thebook's name; but how can they be considered to give us the materialfor judging and appraising the book? Nobody would venture to criticizea building, a statue, a picture, with nothing before him but thememory of a single glimpse caught in passing;[2] yet the critic ofliterature, on the whole, has to found his opinion upon little more.Sometimes it is possible to return to the book and renew theimpression; to a few books we may come back again and again, till theydo in the end become familiar sights. But of the hundreds and hundredsof books that a critic would wish to range in his memory, in order toscrutinize and compare them reflectively, how many can he expect tobring into a state of reasonable stability? Few indeed, at the best;as for the others, he must be content with the shapeless, incoherentvisions that respond when the recollection of them is invoked.
It is scarcely to be wondered at if criticism is not very precise, notvery exact in the use of its terms, when it has to work at such adisadvantage. Since we can never speak of a book with our eye on theobject, never handle a book—the real book, which is to the volume asthe symphony to the score—our phrases find nothing to check them,immediately and unmistakably, while they are formed. Of a novel, forinstance, that I seem to know well, that I recall as an oldacquaintance, I may confidently begin to express an opinion; but when,having expressed it, I would glance at the book once more, to besatisfied that my judgement fits it, I can only turn to the image,such as it is, that remains in a deceiving memory. The volume liesbefore me, no doubt, and if it is merely a question of detail, a nameor a scene, I can find the page and verify my sentence. But I cannotcatch a momentary sight of the book,[3] the book itself; I cannot lookup from my writing and sharpen my impression with a straight,unhampered view of the author's work; to glance at a book, though thephrase is so often in our mouths, is in fact an impossibility. Theform of a novel—and how often a critic uses that expression too—issomething that none of us, perhaps, has ever really contemplated. Itis revealed little by little, page by page, and it is withdrawn asfast as it is revealed; as a whole, co