Everything I
do reminds me of something I have done before. If I could bring
myself to finish one of these books, I could get money and praise
enough. Many people would not know the difference. But the real and
true critic would see through them; he would discern that I had
lost the secret. I think that perhaps I ought to be content to work
dully and faithfully on, to finish the poor dead thing, to compose
its dead limbs decently, to lay it out. But I cannot do that,
though it might be a moral discipline. I am not conscious of the
least mental fatigue, or loss of power--quite the reverse. I hunger
and thirst to write, but I have no invention.
The worst of it is that it reveals to me how much the whole of my
life was built up round the hours I gave to writing. I used to
read, write letters, do business in the morning, holding myself
back from the beloved task, not thinking over it, not anticipating
the pleasure, yet aware that some secret germination was going on
among the cells of the brain. Then came the afternoon, the walk or
ride, and then at last after tea arrived the blessed hour. The
chapter was all ready to be written, and the thing flowed equably
and clearly from the pen.
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