Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General Introduction
- Introduction to Volume 2
- Chronology of the Life and Major Works of Andrew Lang
- A Note on the Text
- Acknowledgements
- I CRITICS AND CRITICISM
- 2 REALISM, ROMANCE AND THE READING PUBLIC
- 3 ON WRITERS AND WRITING
- 4 SCOTLAND, HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY
- 5 THE BUSINESS AND INSTITUTIONS OF LITERARY LIFE
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (March 1886)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (August 1886)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘The Teaching of Literature’, The Pilot (April 1901)
- APPENDIX: Names Frequently Cited By Lang
- Explanatory Notes
- Index
‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
from 5 - THE BUSINESS AND INSTITUTIONS OF LITERARY LIFE
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 October 2017
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- General Introduction
- Introduction to Volume 2
- Chronology of the Life and Major Works of Andrew Lang
- A Note on the Text
- Acknowledgements
- I CRITICS AND CRITICISM
- 2 REALISM, ROMANCE AND THE READING PUBLIC
- 3 ON WRITERS AND WRITING
- 4 SCOTLAND, HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY
- 5 THE BUSINESS AND INSTITUTIONS OF LITERARY LIFE
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (March 1886)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (August 1886)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘At the Sign of the Ship’, Longman's Magazine (July 1893)
- ‘The Teaching of Literature’, The Pilot (April 1901)
- APPENDIX: Names Frequently Cited By Lang
- Explanatory Notes
- Index
Summary
Dear Smith,
You inform me that you desire to be a journalist, and you are kind enough to ask my advice. Well, be a journalist, by all means, in any honest and honourable branch of the profession. But do not be an eavesdropper and a spy. You may fly into a passion when you receive this very plainly worded advice. I hope you will; but, for several reasons, which I now go on to state, I fear that you won't. I fear that, either by natural gift or by acquired habit, you already possess the imperturbable temper which will be so useful to you if you do join the army of spies and eavesdroppers. If I am right, you have made up your mind to refuse to take offence, as long as by not taking offence you can wriggle yourself forward in the band of journalistic reptiles. You will be revenged on me, in that case, some day; you will lie in wait for me with a dirty bludgeon, and steal on me out of a sewer. If you do, permit me to assure you that I don't care. But if you are already in a rage, if you are about tearing up this epistle, and are starting to assault me personally, or at least to answer me furiously, then there is every hope for you and for your future. I therefore venture to state my reasons for supposing that you are inclined to begin a course which your father, if he were alive, would deplore, as all honourable men in their hearts must deplore it. When you were at the University (let me congratulate you on your degree) you edited, or helped to edit, The Bull-dog. It was not a very brilliant nor a very witty, but it was an extremely ‘racy’ periodical. It spoke of all men and dons by their nicknames. It was full of second-hand slang. It contained many personal anecdotes, to the detriment of many people. It printed garbled and spiteful versions of private conversations on private affairs. It did not even spare to make comments on ladies, and on the details of domestic life in the town and in the University. The copies which you sent me I glanced at with extreme disgust.
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- The Edinburgh Critical Edition of the Selected Writings of Andrew LangLiterary Criticism, History, Biography, pp. 291 - 294Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2015