It's enough for you to do it once for a few men to remember you. But if you do it year after year, then many people remember you and they tell it to their children, and their children and grandchildren remember and, if it concerns books, they can read them. And if it's good enough, it will last as long as there are human beings.

Do you remember how old Ford was always writing how Conrad suffered so when he wrote? How it was un metier de chien etc. Do you suffer when you write? I don't …

Scott took LITERATURE so solemnly. He never understood that it was just writing as well as you can and finishing what you start.

You see it's awfully hard to talk or write about your own stuff because if it is any good you yourself know about how good it is - but if you say so yourself y…