The Editor's Fence

THE EDITOR'S FENCE 1. ELT Special Session on Critical Approaches to Fiction - 18801920 {MLA, Chicago, Dec 1977)¡ AReport: The twenty-first consecutive meeting of the ElT Special Session was held in Chicago on 29 Dec from 9¡00 to 10¡15 p.m. Four position statements relevant to the topic Critical Approaches to Fiction (1880-1920) had been pre-printed in ELT, XXi 4 (1977)¡ Bruce Bashford's "Oscar Wilde, His Criticism and His Critics"¡ John Halperin's "How to Read Gissing"; Charles Burkhart's "George Moore and His Critics"; and Robert C. Schweik's "Fiction in the Criticism of Hardy's Fiction." Bruce Bashford, who was detained in England was represented by Robert Denham. Although the physical circumstances under which we met were the worst we have encountered, the thirty participants and four panelists nevertheless made this one of the liveliest meetings we have had. Attitudes toward what might be the most appropriate critical method to apply to the four writers expectedly were diverse. Perhaps the chief point of agreement was that most cirticism of many authors in the ELT period was inadequate in some way, too limited or specialized. The artists between 1880 and 1920 confronted social , philosophical, and aesthetic chaos. To deal with the sense of confusion and to discover a new artistic or, sometimes, to modify a traditional artistic order, they experimented in all directions. The result seems to be that the artists of the period require that rare and, in our time, often denigrated kind of critic the eclectic critic or multi-critic, the non-specialist critic, the critic who does not, for the sake of consistency, ride a hobby horse and, in Robert Schweik's words, who often creates a critical fiction, though perhaps a brilliant one. 2. ELT Special Sessions; The End of Something: The twenty-first ELT Special Session on which I report above was the last of the annual meetings for which I shall assume responsibility. I urge individuals who wish to initiate a Special Session on any subject in the 1880-1920 period to do so independently. Hereafter I do not plan to pre-print any Special Session papers or position statements. I shall, of course, always be pleased to print a short notice of meeting times, topics, and the names of panelists and discussion leaders. My decision not to sponsor any more Special Sessions on a regular basis was made for many reasons. First, my editorial task of preparing the fourth number (the Special Session issue) of each volume of ELT has become increasingly more difficult and time-consuming. Solicited articles, despite announced June or July deadlines, usually do not come in until late August or even September; this leaves little time for me to request revisions of various kinds. Secondly, I need the space in the fourth number of ELT for refereed essays and to prevent a excessive backlog of accepted papers. Thirdly, an inordinate number of MLA Special Sessions now exists. The MLA Executive Secretary at one meeting could not resist the jocular remark that attendance was very high because everyone was on the program - a check of the program index undermines the intended humor of the remark. Finally, the Division on Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-century English Literature has existed for two years and is now empowered to sponsor up to three ancillary conferences or workshops - more proliferation. I seriously doubt that we have so much to say that is really worth hearing as to warrant such empire-building. Now that the ELT Special Session, upon its twenty-first birthday, has passed the coming of age, I will, as all good parents must, cut the apron strings. For the record, I list below the topics that have brought us together over the years: 1957 1958 1959 I960 I96I 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 Madison) The "New Realism" New York) Status of Research: Butler, Moore, Galsworthy, etc. Chicago) H. G. Wells Philadelphia) Theories of Fiction Chicago) The Artist as Hero Washington) Aestheticism and Decadence Chicago) Poetry: Content, Form, Quality New York) Rudyard Kipling: A Centenary Revaluation Chicago) Georgian and French Poets New York) The...