ABSTRACT
Very clever and very painful is Mr George Gissing's latest, New Grub Street. Mr Gissing always writes well, and it is therefore invariably a pleasure to read his books; but in the present case this pleasure is discounted not only by the depressing nature of his theme, but by the irresistible conviction that much of the author's pessimism and many ofhis incidents and inferences are only too likely to be true. The book is one long study ofliterary failure on the part ofmen ofgenuine ability and scholarly requirements, and of pecuniary success in the same calling by a man whose style is flashy, attainments mediocre, and principle conspicuous by its absence. Disappointment, failure, grinding poverty, sordid struggle, misery, illness, afHiction, self-slaughterthese are the lot of most of the denizens of New Grub-street, while
social success, the love of a beautiful woman, professional reputation and monetary value, come to the man who makes, but a trade of literature, who is mean, selfish, crafty, caddish to a degree, and whose literary work is ofthe most meretricious, catchpenny style. The ordinary reader of circulating library fiction will probably not care to read Mr Gissing's three volumes, despite their occasional glimpses of love interest; but those who are in the literary world, and know something of the struggles, the ambition-worthy and unworthy-the despair, the fitful triumphs, all the pains and penalties and few prizes of the literary life of unknown men, all the cruelty inflicted-intentionally or unintentionally-by malicious or careless reviewers, all the heartrending anxieties and occasional gleams ofhappiness which come to a conscientious worker in the field ofcontemporary literature, will read Netv Grub Street with an intense interest, augmented by the recognition ofan unexaggerated truth of some at least of its sad pictures. Discouraging to the last degree to all but writers who have made a name, and who are not prepared to sacrifice their literary conscience, ifthey possess one, and follow Jasper Milvain's example of writing simply to make money, New Grub Street may answer a good purpose if: in addition to interesting those who are already in the literary arena, it should dissuade or even terrify aspirants from rushing heedlessly into an already hopelessly overcrowded calling, in which successes are rare, and failures, both deserved and undeserved, the rule.
