erely an epithet
expressing self-satisfaction.

Similarly, the habit of deriding as "conventional" plots constructed in
an earlier convention, is ridiculous. Under this head Dickens in
particular has been assaulted; I have assaulted him myself. But within
their convention, the plots of Dickens are excellent, and show little
trace of amateurishness, and every sign of skilled accomplishment. And
Dickens did not blunder out of one convention into another, as certain
of ourselves undeniably do. Thomas Hardy, too, has been arraigned for
the conventionalism of his plots. And yet Hardy happens to be one of the
rare novelists who have evolved a new convention to suit their
idiosyncrasy. Hardy's idiosyncrasy is a deep conviction of the
whimsicality of the divine power, and again and again he has expressed
this with a virtuosity of skill which ought to have put humility into
the hearts of naturalists, but which has not done so. The plot of _The
Woodlanders_ is one of the most exquisite examples of subtle symbolic
illustration of an idea that a writer of fiction ever achieved; it makes
the symbolism of Ibsen seem crude. You may say that _The Woodlanders_
could not have occurred in real life. No novel could have occurred in
real life. The balance of probabilities is incalculably against any
novel whatsoever; and rightly so. A convention is essential, and the
duty of a novelist is to be true within his chosen convention, and not
further. Most novelists still fail in this duty. Is there any reason,
indeed, why we should be so vastly cleverer than our fathers? I do not
think we are.

V

Leaving the seductive minor question of ornamentation, I come lastly to
the question of getting the semblance of life on to the page before the
eyes of the reader--the daily and hourly texture of existence. The
novelist has selected his subject; he has drenched himself in his
subject. He has laid down the main features of the design. The living
embryo is there, and waits to be developed into full organic structure.
Whence and how does the novelist obtain the vital tissue which must be
his material? The answer is that he digs it out of himself. First-class
fiction is, and must be, in the final resort autobiographical. What else
should it be? The novelist may take notes of phenomena likely to be of
use to him. And he may acquire the skill to invent very apposite
illustrative incident. But he cannot invent psychology. Upon occasion
some human be