human
I have a feeling of swift change in art and literature here in America. This latest trip to New York has shocked and saddened me. To watch the struggle, to feel the bitterness and intolerance of the various groups--to find one clique of artists set against another, to know that most of those who come here will fail and die--is appalling. The City is filled with strugglers, students of art, ambitious poets, journalists, novelists, writers of all kinds--I meet them at the clubs--some of them will be the large figures of 1900, most of them will have fallen under the wheel--This bitter war of Realists and Romanticists will be the jest of those who come after us, and they in their turn will be full of battle ardor with other cries and other banners. How is it possible to make much account of the cries and banners of to-day when I know they will be forgotten of all but the students of literary history?