Hazard of New Fortunes, a — Volume 2 by William Dean Howells
page 46 of 132 (34%)
page 46 of 132 (34%)
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bad. Then the text had some chance."
"Old legitimate drama days, when ugliness and genius combined to storm the galleries," said Fulkerson. "We can still make them bad enough," said Beaton, ignoring Fulkerson in his remark to March. Fulkerson took the reply upon himself. "Well, you needn't make 'em so bad as the old-style cuts; but you can make them unobtrusive, modestly retiring. We've got hold of a process something like that those French fellows gave Daudet thirty-five thousand dollars to write a novel to use with; kind of thing that begins at one side; or one corner, and spreads in a sort of dim religious style over the print till you can't tell which is which. Then we've got a notion that where the pictures don't behave quite so sociably, they can be dropped into the text, like a little casual remark, don't you know, or a comment that has some connection, or maybe none at all, with what's going on in the story. Something like this." Fulkerson took away one knee from the table long enough to open the drawer, and pull from it a book that he shoved toward Beacon. "That's a Spanish book I happened to see at Brentano's, and I froze to it on account of the pictures. I guess they're pretty good." "Do you expect to get such drawings in this country?" asked Beaton, after a glance at the book. "Such character--such drama? You won't." "Well, I'm not so sure," said Fulkerson, "come to get our amateurs warmed up to the work. But what I want is to get the physical effect, so to speak-get that sized picture into our page, and set the fashion of it. I shouldn't care if the illustration was sometimes confined to an initial |
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