'Twas ever thus …

… The Millions : Sordid, Unprofitable, Unrewarding: On ‘New Grub Street’ and Cynical Literature. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

New Grub Street ought to be required reading for anyone interested in how cultural history repeats itself. This is partly a result of how clearly it reflects so many contemporary issues — a confusing publishing marketplace, a general lack of faith in the uses of literature — but also a result of the tone in which it treats them. As a frustrated, middle-tier writer with scores to settle, Gissing had no illusions about being exceptional. Like Marian Yule, he was half convinced of his own irrelevancy, and he wrote about his own era cynically and clinically, in a style that spared no one, especially himself.

There are plenty of worse ways of making a living than writing about books.