brooding over the problems of his craft--which is writing

"Here [in Pierre], as in Moby-Dick, the action of the plot is subservient to the activities of a self reflexive narrator at the time of writing.  His methodological metaphors form a special area around the events of the story where the writer sits brooding over the problems of his craft and linking the meaning of his story to the methods which produce it." --Edgar Dryden, Melville's Thematics of Form: The Great Art of Telling the Truth (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1968) page 118.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?

I. F. "Nay, Friend, I belong to earth—from thy flight descend not lower:  as your old fashioned friend, I feel interested in your surface wanderings; but let your double-refined poetry and romance go 'to the D—.'" 
-- December 1851 Scenes Beyond the Western Border

* * *

I. F.  "Never was there such an escape! In fact you.did not quite escape, and nearly spoiled your honest but faint description of natural beauties by a lamer flight. Your 'almost happiness!' and 'burden,' of life did you mean? for I never saw one lighter mounted on a finer horse! But I really congratulate you on arriving so safely in a sober 'camp' in the midst of this very flat earth"
-- April 1852 installment of Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army

* * *

I. F. "... I see you have been making copious notes?"

C. "Yes: do you apprehend that any effort of enthusiasm can add embellishment to the subject?"

I. F. "I must confess, not. There are natural beauties; such as the colouring of sky and cloud, which painter or poet scarce dare attempt to express; nevertheless, there may be in the effort an ill done—an apparent straining for effect, which may deceive a reader into the suspicion of exaggeration." 
-- June 1852 installment of Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army

 * * *

As for myself, with my pipe and 
pen, and my plum bush — my occupation appears. No- 
thing disturbs me, but that a luckless brood of magpies 
inhabit my plum bush. Heavens! how they chatter! ...

But here comes Frank again: well, rest is evidently not a time for dull narrative.

F.  "Most industrious of scribblers, I give you good evening!  How charming, for a change, is our old friend, Siesta!  I hope the beautiful nymphs of this happy valley, if they suffice you, hovered over your dreams.  But, in truth, I think you dream all day, when no wild bull is a-foot. Hast thou, most favored mortal, tempted an Egeria from her sacred fountain and grove to meet thee, where others groan in very spirit, in the hot and dusty stony barrens?"

C.  You are quite overpowering!  Your dreams surely were spirituous.  But a truce to day-dreams; light as they are, the whole world granteth them not a foundation spot!"

--August 1852 Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army

 * * *

But now, “the morn is up again,”—and we have marched many miles fasting, and have been attracted through a turbid river by the sight of grass, and have stopped for breakfast under some cotton woods,—and in their shade I am scribbling with a pencil—

F.—“Yes, and fine work you are making of it!  The day should commence with the morning, and the brighter the better; not with the nightmare of a sleeper, who should have watched."
--March 1853 installment of Scenes Beyond the Western Border

 * * *

Here Frank came in.

"I saw you wandering off, at sundown; have you been attempting a photograph of the calm scene?"

C.—" Ah! no bantering now—there is a dreamy art of more pretension still;—that would paint the heart;—that would fix the wandering thought;—that would delve for discoveries in the deep mine of man's nature!

"But I have been writing, Frank, something for your especial approval; I have been setting forth grim realities,—and most philosophically. I did strike at last, but most naturally and truly, a little vein of—"

F.— "—Poetry, perhaps? by the merest accident in the world."

C.—"Nature is poetry! For what are sunsets often gorgeously beautiful, or delicately lovely, beyond all representation? For what, the endless variety, the exquisite combination of resplendent colours, of tints and hues of beauty in flowers and birds? Not for utility, Frank, but to soften our hearts—to refine and elevate our thoughts. Poetry is Worship!"

F.—"Well, let me hear your specimen of 'grim reality.' If you could only realize the charm of simplicity! For poetry I generally go to Job, David, or Isaiah."

I read to him my day's experiences. He listened impatiently; and at last broke out— "You are incorrigible! Do you call that abstraction, the real?"

C.—"Surely it has a mournfully same, and daily reality!"

F.—" And how easily by a mere turn of expression, you could have given it the interest of a simple narrative!"

C.—" Well, I'm too indolent; for, if commenced, I might imagine myself bound to keep it up; and I scribble by no rule, and with no object but pastime; and, to compare in some future day the old with the new tone of mind."

F.—"And a rather singular acquaintance will the old gentleman make! Pray why then did you trouble yourself with the dry abstract of our daily doings?"

C.—" Thank-ye for solving—in your complimentary way—a question of my own! I will tell you: I am convinced that written descriptions, not only from carelessness or design, but from inherent imperfection, invariably paint very feebly; and from consciousness of this, are dashed with discoloured exaggerations; they deceive more than they enlighten the imaginations of those who are unable to apply the convictions and the tests of some experience; you perceive, then, that I was experimenting?"

-- August 1853, final installment of Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army