Arthur Conan Doyle: A Life in Letters
Page 25
When it did, A Study in Scarlet turned out to be one more disappointment for him.
I knew that the book was as good as I could make it, and I had high hopes. When Girdlestone used to come circling back with the precision of a homing pigeon, I was grieved but not surprised, for I acquiesced in the decision. But when my little Holmes book began also to do the circular tour I was hurt, for I knew that it deserved a better fate. James Payn applauded but found it both too short and too long, which was true enough. Arrowsmith received it in May, 1886, and returned it unread in July. Two or three others sniffed and turned away.
‘My poor “Study” has never even been read by anyone except Payn,’ he had complained to his mother. ‘Verily literature is a difficult oyster to open.’
Finally, at the end of October, he received an offer from Ward, Lock & Co., but it was scarcely a flattering one. ‘Dear Sir,’ they wrote, ‘We have read your story A Study in Scarlet, and are pleased with it. We could not publish it this year, as the market is flooded at present with cheap fiction, but if you do not object to its being held over until next year we will give you £25 for the copyright.’ He wrote asking for royalties instead, and was refused.
‘It was not a very tempting offer,’ Conan Doyle remembered in his memoirs,
and even I, poor as I was, hesitated to accept it. It was not merely the small sum offered, but it was the long delay, for this book might open a road for me. I was heart-sick, however, at repeated disappointments, and I felt that perhaps it was true wisdom to make sure of publicity, however late. Therefore I accepted, and the book became ‘Beeton’s Xmas Annual’ of 1887. I never at any time received another penny for it.
There turned out to be precious little publicity value in it either. ‘The book had no particular success at the time,’ he said with British understatement twenty years later,* and the fantastic prices brought today by the very few surviving copies of that Beeton’s Christmas Annual are due to most of its purchasers pitching what was merely a pulp magazine into the wastepaper basket after the holidays.†
‘The Study in Scarlet is still in the publishers hands and I’ve heard nothing of it,’ Conan Doyle told Lottie in February 1887; ‘I am writing spasmodically at many things.’ The year was spent trying to expand his medical practice, seeking a publisher for Girdlestone in vain, and waiting for his detective story to appear in November.
But he began an historical novel, Micah Clarke, about the unsuccessful 1685 Monmouth Rebellion to overthrow King James II. He loved historical novels far more than detective stories, since becoming enraptured with Sir Walter Scott’s novels as a boy. And this time he was onto something that would make a literary splash. By March 1888, he was writing to his mother about it in very optimistic tones.
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA, MARCH 1, 1888
Micah Clarke started off yesterday to the publishers and may luck go with him! What a blessed relief to have got done with him. Since July last I have been on a steady treadmill. The copying out I began on the first of January and finished on the last days of February, which is good work for 670 close pages, when a man has as many calls as I, to say nothing of going to Taunton. Now I shall have a few days rest, though I must really disburden myself of the story of the ‘Sign of the Sixteen Oyster Shells’, which is lurking at present somewhere in the back parts of my cerebellum, & promises as far as I can make it out in the obscurity, to be good. Micah’s full name and title is
Micah Clarke
his statement
As made to his grandchildren Gervas Reuben, and Joseph, during the hard winter of 1734.
Wherein is contained
A full report of certain passages of his life, together with some account of his journey from Havant to Taunton with Colonel Decimus Saxon, the adventures which befell them during the Western rebellion, and their intercourse with George, Duke of Monmouth, Lord Gray, and other persons of quality.
Compiled day by day from his own narration by Joseph Clarke and never previously set forth in print. Now for the first time collected, corrected, and given to the Public by
A Conan Doyle
How’s that for a title?*
I hope to come to terms with Ward Lock & Co after all about the blocks.* We’ll have to take our pay for them by the results of the sale. They needed them all to be traced, so Ball and I traced them all between us, which was good wasn’t it. One, depicting Jefferson Hope making Drebber swallow the pill, I did entirely myself.
Got a letter from one Gordon, telling me that he was commissioned by Warne and Co to get some boy’s books done—Would I do one of 40,000 words for 30 pounds to be ready in 2 months. I replied that I was much engaged & thought their terms too low, but would do one of 50000 words for £50. Reply was that my letter had been forwarded to Warne, and I might hear directly. I am not very keen on it.
I wrote to Fairley about Ball’s practice as you suggested, and there is every chance of his coming down in the next week or two to look into it. Then when the weather is warmer I hope the Doctor will spare us a week also. I sent him a book which I thought fairly good. What a swindle ‘The Mystery of a Hansom Cab’ is. One of the weakest tales that I have read, and simply sold by puffing.
[P.S.] I am sending you a tale of Stevensons. Not quite up to his usual mark.
Fergus Hume’s Mystery of a Hansom Cab was an enormous success, and Conan Doyle’s view probably reflects his disappointment over his own detective story, aggravated by the squabble with Ward Lock over payment for the illustrations that his father had done.†
His friend Henry Ball the architect was departing Southsea for several years’ travel around the world, at the end of which he intended to start a high-toned practice in London—a plan that would inspire a similarly significant career move in Conan Doyle, as he hinted to Lottie:
Micah Clarke gets on and I have some hopes of Blackwood taking it. They saw the 1st volume and wrote for the second but I have not told the Mam for fear it may all end in nothing. That would be grand would it not? I have succeeded in coming to terms with Ward Lock & Co for Papa’s drawings for the Study, but that also I wont tell the Mam until all fear of disappointment is past. Things are generally looking rosy in a literary point of view. If Micah were successful it would change the whole plan of our lives for a time—but its time to talk of our plans when we see what Blackwood has to say.
The Scottish publisher Blackwood’s was not quick to say anything, and other matters remained rocky.
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA
I finished my vol. II in the recopy last night so I have given myself a holiday today which I shall endeavour to spend in the open air so far as I can, but I thought I would like to take advantage of it to write to you, and let you know our small news.
Micah—no word from Blackwood yet. I shall send on today and ask them whether they would like the second volume.
Study in Scarlet. Ward & Lock are perfect Jews. They wanted me to take three guineas for the whole six block and the six tracings therefrom! Did ever you hear of such an offer. I would sooner burn the blocks a thousand times. I wrote back a very civil letter to say that my father’s usual price was £5 a page—That as I was interested in the success of the work I had determined to let them have these at £3 a page, but that I had not the right even if I had the will to depreciate his work so in the market. As to their offer, I said, it was so incredible that I thought there must be some mistake. I have had no answer yet. Why if Ball did all the tracings I would be bound to give him a box of cigars or a good pipe or some little sign of gratitude, and where would the 3 guineas be then? Did you ever? Are they not Jews after having had such a windfall as the book must have been to them to try & do me on the pictures like this. Oh, Mam, we must try & retain the copyright of ‘Micah Clarke’. I believe it would be an income in itself. Everyone who hears Micah comes under the spell. Mrs Prideaux was wild about it. I do think it is fresh & original. More like Dumas perhaps than any English author I can think of.
Ball is selling his
practice & going off on the travel to improve himself as an architect. He intends to have 3 years wandern-Jahre all over Europe and Asia. I think it’s the best thing he could do as he has £500 a year of his own and is a very steady fellow. He then intends to start in London and aim at the very top of his profession. So do I if Micah should come off—but that’s a pretty big if.
Little Touie is flourishing—very busy as usual. Well, I am off for a good long walk by the sea shore. Ball gives a paper at the Literary & Scientific tonight—I do hope it goes off well. I’ll send you a report of it.
[P.S.] Mr Besant, Walter’s brother, sent round the other day to say that he wanted to know me. Such a nice fellow he proved to be—I quite fell in love with him.*
And to Lottie, he spelled out his plan if Blackwood’s accepted Micah Clarke:
[W]e may then, I think, take it as proven that I can live by my pen. We should have a few hundreds in hand to start us. The next step would be to quietly sell the practice. For this I might get two or three hundred. I should then store the bedroom & drawing room furniture with Mrs Hawkins, sell the balance, possibly to the buyer of the practice, and so be off. I should go to London and study the eye. I should then go to Berlin and study the eye. I should then go to Vienna & study the eye. I should then go to Paris and study the eye. During all this time I should be living on my pen and the little Capital collected. Having learned all there is to know about the eye I should come back to London and start as an eye surgeon, still of course keeping literature as my milk cow.
You see, dear, there is so little to aim at here. No room for success. If I were successful as a general practitioner it would be fatal to me as a writer. Now as a specialist I could succeed & yet have time for my books, because their work is done indoors and is highly paid.
But of course all this is mere dreamland tho’ it may take shape. All depends on Micah.
‘I’ve taken to the eye, my boy. There’s a fortune in the eye. A man grudges a half-crown to cure his chest or his throat, but he’d spend his last dollar over his eye. There’s money in ears, but the eye is a gold mine.’
—The Stark Munro Letters
But Blackwood’s dashed his hopes for the time being. He submitted the novel to other publishers, and started writing another one, The Mystery of Cloomber—a psychic tale which found a publisher in 1889, but which its author soon viewed as a mistake.*
to Charlotte Drummond SOUTHSEA, APRIL 12, 1888
Poor old Shakespeare! I fear it is all up with him. Alas and alas for the good burghers of Stratford! Alas too and alas for the globe trotting Yankees who have come from the other end of the world to gaze upon the habitation of the man who did not write the plays! What a topsey-turveydom it is! There were many reasons before this to think that Bacon was the true author, but if the Cryptogram on being tested proves to be true it is simply conclusive.*
Blackwood were complimentary about Micah Clarke, but thought it would not appeal sufficiently to the populace. I trust and think that the event will prove them wrong. If the populace may be judged from the folk to whom I have read it it will just suit them. It has now gone to Bentley from whom I have not heard. Meanwhile I am as limp as a wet rag. It is no doubt a pleasant power to be able to interest others in the creations of one’s own mind, yet it has the drawback that a great reaction sets in when the work is done. I have been as mooney and stupid as an owl ever since Micah left me. In fact if you come to look into it it is really like the abstraction of a part of a man’s own spirit & brain since my whole life and energy for 8 months have been squeezed into that book.
It was disheartening. ‘I remember smoking over my dog-eared manuscript when it returned for a whiff of country air after one of its descents upon town,’ he wrote years later in Memories and Adventures, ‘wondering what I should do if some sporting, reckless kind of publisher were suddenly to stride in and make me a bid of 40 shillings or so for the lot.’ But finally, late in the year, Micah Clarke found a publisher, Longmans, thanks to its reader, Andrew Lang, who assessed submissions for the company. A versatile and influential Scottish author and editor best known today for his work in folklore, he was a practising historian as well, and Micah Clarke appealed to him as a novel and as history both.
In the autumn, with Micah Clarke on its way at last, Conan Doyle found time for a whirlwind family excursion to Paris:
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA, NOVEMBER 14, 1888
Only got home from Paris today and, as you may imagine, found any number of things to do, to say nothing of the fact that I am advertised to give a lecture on Meredith next Tuesday and have not written one word of it. Our little trip was a success. Nem & the mother paid for Lottie, so I had only to pay for myself.* We were very comfortable. Saw over Versailles, Le petit Trianon, Louvre, Pantheon, Luxembourg, Tour D’Eiffel, Musée de Clunny, Invalides, Musée Grevin, Le Cirque Nouvelle, the Huguenots at the Grand Opera, Panorame de Bastille, Panorame du Gravelotte &c &c. Feel much the better for the run.
Ward Lock & Co coolly inform me that they owe me nothing on the pictures. I have written again.
I send you a little bracelet which I bought you at the Palais Royal. Antique metal is the fashion at present over there. Nice letters from Longman & their reader Andrew Lang. They want to shorten Micah and so do I, but don’t quite see how. The Problem will be out in a week or two and I hope Micah by a little after Xmas.
[P.S.] Got a good idea for a story in the Louvre.†
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA, NOVEMBER 20, 1888
Longman wrote to say that the book was 170 pages longer than ‘She’ and would need pruning.* I then cut away about 10 pages and said that if their reader could make any suggestion as to what could be cut away I wd consider it. The outcome of this is that I go to London tomorrow to meet Andrew Lang (their reader) and lunch with him at the Savile. I am afterwards to go on to Longman’s and see him, so I shall have a busy day. It looks as if they meant to set to work to get it out instantly, so we shall soon see if it will make any headway. If it meets with fair success I think it will be time to see whether I might not make a bid to establish myself in London. I think I see my way clear but there’s no use going into details until we see whether Micah comes off or no. I am quite content to remain here, so in any case I won’t be disappointed.
You must not say that Cloomber is as good as the Pavilion,† for you should never let your kind maternal feelings cloud your critical judgment. The Pavilion is far the better: 1) Because the characters of Northmour Cassilis, Clara &c all stand out very clear, which none of mine do 2) Because it is strong without preternatural help, which I think is always more to an author’s credit 3) Because it is more compact and the interest never flags for a moment. I think however that if you said Micah was better than either Kidnapped or The Black Arrow you might not be wrong.
I got that fiver out of Ward Lock & Co. No more due, they say. It seems never to have got on Smiths stalls.‡ I lecture on Meredith tonight. He is, in my opinion, a head & shoulders above any living fiction writer.
If statistics could be taken in the various free libraries of the kingdom to prove the comparative popularity of different novelists with the public, I think that it is quite certain that Mr George Meredith would come out very low indeed. If, on the other hand, a number of authors were convened to determine which of their fellow-craftsmen they considered the greatest and the most stimulating to their own minds, I am equally confident that Mr Meredith would have a vast preponderance of votes. Indeed, his only conceivable rival would be [Thomas] Hardy.
—Through the Magic Door
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA, NOVEMBER OR DECEMBER 1888
I went to London on Wednesday and saw Andrew Lang—lunched with him at the Savile Club, the other two at our table being Besant & Saintsbury the latter being, I believe, editor of the Saturday Review. We had a chat about Micah afterwards. Lang is very much gone upon Saxon. Warns me that I shall be accused of stealing the character from Dugald Dalgetty.* Thinks him great fun. Proposed that I sh
ould shorten the book by cutting out all about the Alchemist—the old Cavalier chap who lived on Salisbury Plain, who puts the comrades up for a night. Also proposed that I should leave out the dinner at the Puritan Mayor’s. To both of these I rather demurred, but I promised to do what I could to shorten them, and with that understanding we parted. I wrote to him when I got back reiterating my objections, & sending him the picture of himself & Rider Haggard from the Pall Mall, which he had not seen. From him I went to Norton Longman, a man of 35, very cheerful and agreeable. He said his old printer had had occasion to glance over Micah and had been very much struck by it—‘Never known him so struck’ said Longman ‘but we must not speak to you too much like this or you may be disappointed.’ Both he & Lang dwelt on the large element of chance, whether a book succeeds or no. So I got back home the same day. Meredith’s lecture went off very well. I sent Meredith a report. Am hard at work shortening Micah. They will have it out by February.
to Mary Doyle SOUTHSEA, DECEMBER 1888
Lottie went off all jolly yesterday morning. Her visit has been a great pleasure to us, and, I hope, to her as well. We have settled down into our humdrum routine & shall miss her much for a long time.
Micah’s proofs begin to come. Another will go to you today. I have cut out somewhere about 50 pages, making it, I think, stronger. I have on the other hand an appendix of ten or twelve pages. It will be quite exciting when it comes back, won’t it.