Page:The Modern Writer.pdf/38

 of dead impulses and is taking new life.

In prose the movement is expressing itself in a growing number of men who are really trying to be honest to the materials in which they work.

Let me explain what I mean by that, if I can.

I think you will all agree with me that in an older day in America, when a great majority of the men who worked in the the crafts, the blacksmiths, silversmiths, shoemakers, harness makers, saddle makers, builders of vehicles, furniture, etc., worked in small shops, with a few apprentices to help, there was a feeling in the workman that later was pretty much destroyed.

The factory came and swept the individual workman aside and with him went much of the old workman's feeling toward tools and materials.

The workman in the Ford factory, for example, has nothing at all to do with