Village books

While lying ill and very feeble within a few days of the
end, and not knowing whether it was to be the end or not, he said to
me:
"I am much better to-day. I don't feel at all as though I were
going to die. Of course, it will be all wrong if I do get well, for
there is my literary position to be considered. First I write
Erewhon--that is my opening subject; then, after modulating freely
through all my other books and the music and so on, I return
gracefully to my original key and write Erewhon Revisited.
Obviously, now is the proper moment to come to a full close, make my
bow and retire; but I believe I am getting well after all. It's
very inartistic, but I cannot help it."
Some of his readers complain that they often do not know whether he
is serious or jesting. He wrote of Lord Beaconsfield: "Earnestness
was his greatest danger, but if he did not quite overcome it (as
indeed who can? it is the last enemy that shall be subdued), he
managed to veil it with a fair amount of success.


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