Article April 26, 1900 Issue

Literary Genius Shifting

Boston Herald

New York , March 16, 1900.—Regarding what a diplomat might call the "sphere of influence" in literature, and a peculiar change which is coming over it, a member of the firm of Doubleday & McClure said to a representative of this paper, "Formerly, New England, and particularly Boston, was the source of supply for American literary work. It will, no doubt, surprise you to know that this is being rapidly changed.

"A generation ago North Carolina in the South and Indiana in the North were regarded as the least intellectual of our states. But the times change. North Carolina is preparing, and Indiana has already given us James Whitcomb Riley, Lew Wallace, and, among others of note, Booth Tarkington, whose book "The Gentleman from Indiana,' is selling at the rate of a thousand a week. As Americans, we rejoice in the rising western authors. We publish the works of Frank Norris of 'Frisco, Markham, 'The Man with the Hoe,' of the same state, and William Allen White and William R. Lighton, Kansas-Nebraska men.

"So, you see, no particular section of our big country has a monopoly of literary talent. It is a gratifying symptom that the great West has already leisure for literary work."—Boston Herald.

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