DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.51521#0031
03 )
read. If you mean to publish a novel with a title like that
you should feel a little nervous about Smith and Mudie.”
I liked Byron’s outspokenness and felt an intimacy
springing up between me and this long-bodied, short-
legged man with a cheerful rubicund face peering through
a huge black beard. Perhaps the fellow feeling sprang
from the fact that I had never seen anything like him
before. However this may be, the words came to my lips
easily which suggested that we should adjourn to an
empty compartment yonder where we could talk at our
ease. “Tinsley may be able to get your book past Mudie
and Smith. If he does you will make money, for your
book will attract, I hear that even from the title, but
their money is in the thirty-one-and-sixpenny novel and
it is a closed burrow. Even the two-volume novel enters
with difficulty.” “Good God,” said I. “Mr. Tinsley told
me he was going to give it to a reader on whose judgment
he sets great reliance, and by the deletion of a few pas-
sages I may get it passed into both libraries.” “But will
they buy in sufficient numbers?” Byron asked. “I have
another novel sketched out and all the characters de-
cided on.” “And what may the title be?” “A Mummer's
Wife.'' 1 ‘An excellent title but— ’ ’ Byron became thought-
ful and I waited. He said, “Drawing-rooms and actors
are incompatible, and if Tinsley, after he has got his
reader’s report, decides that your book is too risky, I ad-
vise you to see Mr. Vizetelly about it.”
read. If you mean to publish a novel with a title like that
you should feel a little nervous about Smith and Mudie.”
I liked Byron’s outspokenness and felt an intimacy
springing up between me and this long-bodied, short-
legged man with a cheerful rubicund face peering through
a huge black beard. Perhaps the fellow feeling sprang
from the fact that I had never seen anything like him
before. However this may be, the words came to my lips
easily which suggested that we should adjourn to an
empty compartment yonder where we could talk at our
ease. “Tinsley may be able to get your book past Mudie
and Smith. If he does you will make money, for your
book will attract, I hear that even from the title, but
their money is in the thirty-one-and-sixpenny novel and
it is a closed burrow. Even the two-volume novel enters
with difficulty.” “Good God,” said I. “Mr. Tinsley told
me he was going to give it to a reader on whose judgment
he sets great reliance, and by the deletion of a few pas-
sages I may get it passed into both libraries.” “But will
they buy in sufficient numbers?” Byron asked. “I have
another novel sketched out and all the characters de-
cided on.” “And what may the title be?” “A Mummer's
Wife.'' 1 ‘An excellent title but— ’ ’ Byron became thought-
ful and I waited. He said, “Drawing-rooms and actors
are incompatible, and if Tinsley, after he has got his
reader’s report, decides that your book is too risky, I ad-
vise you to see Mr. Vizetelly about it.”