With private tutors, and then amidst the best university surroundings, Stewart Edward White’s education was obtained under advantageous auspices. He read and traveled a great deal, and had time to indulge his love of outdoor life. His first production was a story entitled “A Man and His Dog,” and under the advice of Professor Brander Matthews, of Columbia, he offered it for publication. It was bought by _Short Stories_ for $15. This was Mr. White’s first income from literary work. Then, after a trip to the Hudson Bay country, he wrote a story entitled “The Claim Jumpers,” which was published in 1901 and met with an encouraging reception. “The Westerners,” which was finished later, was bought for serial publication for about $500. This was a distinct advance in his literary affairs, and when “The Blazed Trail” was published in 1902, Mr. White came truly into his own. “The Blazed Trail” was written in a lumber camp in the depth of a western winter, and it was composed during the early hours from four A. M. till eight, before he put on his snow-shoes for a day’s lumbering. “The Conjurer’s House” came out in 1903, and in that same year “The Forest,” which Mr. White regards as one of the most instructive books he has written. It is the story of a canoe trip. The immediate success of “The Forest” led to the writing of “The Mountains,” which told the adventures of a camping trip in the Sierras. Then “The Mystery,” “Camp and Trail,” “The River Man,” “The Rules of the Game,” “The Call of the North,” “The Rediscovered Country,” “The Adventures of Bobby Orde,” “The Gray Dawn,” “The Leopard Woman,” and other books followed. In all his books he told the vigorous story of life in its primitive forms. “Gold” is a picture of the madness of ’49. “The Dawn” is a story of California, “The Leopard Woman” a romance of the African wilds. In his later books, Africa became to Mr. White a very real and commanding subject--and one that still holds him in its lure.
Mr. White produces his books fast and in highly finished form. He is essentially a realist. Human achievement, with all its vital interest and meaning, laid hold early on his imagination and gave to his stories their all-pervading sense of truth to life. As a critic has said, “One puts down a book by him with a feeling of having read through experiences, dramatic and full of romance, yet never breaking the bounds of probability--and that is fine art.” Mr. White’s home is in Santa Barbara, California, and his field of active experience includes a substantial part of the whole surface of the earth.