Do you suppose I'm going to sit here, with all you fellows enjoying
yourselves, and not have my bit of fun? But it's hopeless, and I ought to
be ashamed of myself. There simply isn't anything in the world that I
should not be better employed in doing than in scribbling this stuff. I
know that; but all the authors I know say that writing a book is the part
they enjoy--they don't care about correcting proofs, or publishing, or
seeing reviews, or being paid for it. Very disinterested and noble, of
course! Now I should enjoy it all through, but I simply daren't publish my
last one--I should be hooted in the village when the reviews appeared. But
I am going to have my fun--the act of creation, you know! But it's too late
to begin, and I have had no training. The beastly thing is as sticky as
treacle. It's a sort of vomit of all the novels I have ever read, and
that's the truth!"
"I simply don't understand," I said. "I have heard you criticise books, I
have heard you criticise some of our work--you have criticised mine. I
think you one of the best critics I ever heard. You seem to know exactly
how it ought to be done."
"Yes," he said, frowning, "I believe I do. That's just it! I'm a critic,
pure and simple. I can't look at anything, from a pigstye to a cathedral,
or listen to anything, from a bird singing to an orchestra, or read
anything, from Bradshaw to Shakespeare, without seeing when it is out of
shape and how it ought to be done.
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