And you tell me that the author is an independent man nowadays! And can earn his living with his books!
It is your privilege to think that, if you choose; but perhaps you will not mind hearing what I tell you—that the author can find no way to a living more degrading to him than the earning of it with his books. I have shoveled snow, and shoveled manure too, in the streets, and shoveled food for swine in a restaurant. But I never did anything so degrading as I should have had to do if I had tried to earn my living with my books.
Oh, the author may be independent, may he! And you will escape with that fine platitude, and with that bitter mockery! And never think that the author's independence is but the fine phrase for your own indifference!
Again it is your privilege to think what you choose; but again perhaps you will not mind hearing what I tell you—that there can never be any man in this world more dependent than an author, if he be a true author. A true author is the singer and dreamer of society; and who is there more dependent than the singer and the dreamer—who is there less powerful and less cunning in the things of the body?
Why, the author gives up his whole life for your joy and help, he consecrates himself, he lashes and burns and tortures himself—for your sake! And you spurn him from you, and tell him he is “independent”!
Here is the truth, here is the crux, here is the whole thing in a sentence. A publisher is not in business for the furtherance of Art, or for the uplifting of humanity, or for the worship of God. He doesn't mind doing these things incidentally, of course, when the fortunate occasion arises; but do you think if he had his choice between publishing a new Paradise Lost to be read fifty years from date, and publishing a biography of a reigning prince, or a treatise on gastronomy, or a new dime novel by Marie Corelli in a first edition of a hundred thousand copies—do you think he would hesitate, now really?