SOURCE: "My Types—Irvin S. Cobb," in The Forum, Vol. 58, October, 1917, pp. 471-86.

In the following essay, Pendennis interviews Cobb, discussing with him the inspiration for his characters.

Looking like Cyrano de Bergerac, in white flannels; hovering like a lazy bumble-bee over the honey-pots of literature, on a dreamy morning in August, Cobb prolonged his reputation for being the best newspaper man in the country.

Cyrano de Bergerac, as you remember, was a poet with a gift for wit in seeing life and a gallantry for believing well of his fellow-men. He should have been a Southerner. There was in him that slumbering soul of the rebel, slow to be roused, outwardly calm as the smooth face of the Mississippi, but deep and wide and threatening.

Irvin S. Cobb was born in Paducah, Ky., and although Illinois was just across the river, that did not inspire Paducah. When...