The Editor's Fence

THE EDITOR'S FENCE Acknowledgements Thanks for the material existence of the newsletter are due to Professor Barriss Mills, Head of the English Department at Purdue, and to the department 's secretarial staff. Thanks for its spiritual existence are due to so many people that their names would fill an entire issue. Special thanks are also due to many of the people who attended the meeting of the Conference on the "New Realists" in Madison, Wisconsin, September, 1957. Various cooperating scholars are quite inadequately thanked in appropriate places in the pages that follow for their interest and, often, hard labor. My colleagues Henry Salerno and Edward Schwartz have checked some general books and articles for me, and my wife has painstakingly searched major reference works and assisted in the preparation of the mailing list. Circulation This issue is being mailed to all persons with whom I corresponded prior to the meeting in Madison« I have added the names of many other scholars whose publications indicate interest in English fiction of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, several of the larger research libraries, and a number of editors of scholarly periodicals, No doubt, I have omitted from my mailing list many persons who would like to receive this biannual publication; no doubt, I have included many whose chief interests lie outside the scope of the newsletter and the conference it serves. The newsletter can only find its proper audience if those who receive the early issues will inform interested colleagues of its existence and if they themselves inform me of their continued interest. Eventually, my mailing list will be composed of the names of persons who indicate in writing their interest. For this purpose I have attached a subscription form at the end (no charge for the present). Baptism I sought the reaction of some thirty persons to several suggested titles for the conference to meet in New York in December, 1958. Almost all of those who replied wrote that the straightforward, although somewhat unwieldly, name at the bottom of the title page was acceptable. What the conference title more exactly means I explain later. The baptismal of the newsletter was a more painful ceremony. Various titles were suggested: Post-Victorian News, Edwardian-Georgian News, Interim English Fiction, English Fiction in Transition. No one, including the editor, was especially happy with any of these names. The label that finally faltered its way onto the title page, however, appeared to be the least objectionable. It is, in any event, not quite as inaccurate as some of the others, and it is saved from excessive vagueness by the parenthetical dates. But more on this subject in some of my later comments. The Academy of Projectors I shall welcome any suggestions for projects that the newsletter might concern itself with. For example, would the readers be interested in a bibliography of articles and reviews dealing with the Russian influence on the novel between 1880 and 1920? or the debates on realism that continued after the Vizetelly trials in 1888 and 1889? Similarly, what projects would the readers have the conference undertake in the future? For the New York meeting I have tentatively planned to have several people review the status of research on some three or four authors whose influence was especially marked between 1880 and 1920 and to suggest for further discussion the kind of studies that are especially needed of these writers. Editorial Policy Insofar as space and the quantity and quality of contributions allow I shall print short critical or analytical articles and bibliographies of news (not only items in print) on the following, and other, authors: A. Bennett J. D. Beresford S. Butler G, Cannan H. Crackanthorpe R. B. Cunninghame-Graham W, De Morgan F. M. Ford E. M. Forster J. Galsworthy W. L. George G. Gissing M. Hewlett W. H. Hudson S. Kaye-Smith R. Macaulay W. McFee C. Mackenzie W. S. Maugham W. B. Maxwell L. Merrick C. E. Montague G. Moore A. Morrison H. H. Munro 0. Onions E. Pugh M. Sinclair F. Swinnerton H. Walpole H. G. Wells R. Whiteing F. B. Young 1. ZangKill Since the newsletter is intended for the scholar-in-the...