It has always seemed to me that God would have made a continent to reward such a search, had it not already existed.
Unless you set forth on the sea of literature, with the spirit of a Columbus in your soul, you may as well give up the idea of finding the Port of Glory. If you do set forth with that spirit, you need ask no mortal influence.
God is the only influence genius needs.
Perseverance the only method.
To find the way to success alone, is the test of talent.
Some influential author might give you the entreé once to a magazine. But editors and publishers are men of purely business instincts, and they will not accept work on the recommendation of any third party, which they think their public will not like. Their constant effort is to find what that public does like, and the unknown author has an equal advantage with the genius, if he sends such material.
An author once told me that he "trapped" twenty manuscripts and sent them out to editors, and all came back unread, as his "trap" proved.
Since he sent them forth with such doubts in his mind, it is no wonder his trap succeeded and his manuscripts failed.
No great literary fire of purpose could be in the mind of a man who spent thought and time on such a plot to trick an editor. And because there was no great flame, the inanimate manuscripts were returned unread. For even a package of paper sends out its "aura," and invites or repels attention.
If you are discouraged by the people who tell you that "everything has been written," and that you can only be a faint echo of greater souls, then you do not deserve success. I have no doubt the croakers of that day told Shakespeare the same.