ENPages
page_0001
SHOTOVER EDGE, HEADINGTON, OXFORD.
May 3. 1921
Dear Mr Buchan,
One of the penalties you have incurred by making my acquaintance is that I am going to consult you about the publication of a book which is now completed.
It is not a novel, though it has some of the features of one. There are five 'Legends', called collectively "the Legends of Smokeover" and linked together in sequence after the manner of the five acts in a drama. As the title suggests the atmosphere is that
page_0002
of a big industrial city, with Plato's city of God nearby, the thought passing continually from one to the other. The chief characters are a betting man, a profiteer, a Professor, a schoolmistress and a boy.
I sent it to my old publishers, Williams & Norgate, not liking to change. They at once offered to take it as it is on a fair royalty, but made suggestions for altering it which would have injured its character and which showed that they or their reader did not understand the quality of the book. I feel under no obligation to make my work "convincing" to people who
page_0003
read in trains and tubes, which is what they thought I was after. The result is that I have got out of humour with them & withdrawn the book from their hands.
There are four other publishers who have asked me to give them books, but I know too little of their methods and points of view to feel sure of my ground. I am prepared to have the book condemned as unprofitable copy in the publishers' sense, but I wish the condemnation to come from somebody who knows what he is doing.
Knowing my work, as you were kind enough to say you did, perhaps you
page_0004
could advise me in the matter. I should trust your judgment. But I hesitate to ask you to read a thing of 100,000 words, my own life being made a burden by such requests. What I want is to find a publisher who, if he pushes the book at all, will understand what he is pushing and not expect one's imagination to conform to the standards of Ethel M. Dell.
So there it is! If the whole thing bores you do not hesitate to say so. I am not thin skinned about these matters.
Yours sincerely
L.P. Jacks.
