“For the same reason that a man who chances upon an occasional phrase can’t write an epic. Literature isn’t luck; it’s the result of substantial effort.”
“Others have written who had other things to do than write.”
He wondered if, after all, he was overrating difficulties in order to shield a lack of courage. “Yes,” he said, “but out of their office, or shop, or factory, their life was their own. They went home—to some kind of home. At any rate, it was theirs. A snotty’s life is never his own. He lives in his office the whole twenty-four hours. He never ‘goes home.’”
“Then what are you going to do?”
“Nothing.”
“So you give up?” she asked.
“Yes. What can I do?”
“And you are not nineteen yet. What’s your life going to be?”
“I may get to like it. Perhaps in the senior ranks it will be better.”
“It won’t.”