recked at
twenty-two on a desert island. I say twenty-two because I do count as
valuable the academic influence that only begins to be effective after
eighteen."

"And what is your notion about this literary Crusoe?" asked Maurice.

"Well, I fancy that his work would not suffer at all, that it would
ripen, just as certain fruit ripens independently of sun, that he would
display in fact quite normally the characteristic growth of the artist."

"But where would he obtain his reaction?" Maurice asked.

"From himself. If that isn't possible for some people I don't see how
you're going to make a distinction between literature and journalism."

"Some journalism is literature."

"Only very bad journalism," Guy argued. "The journalistic mind
experiences a quick reaction, the creative writer a very slow one. The
journalist is affected by extremes; and he is continually aware of the
impression they are making at the moment; contrariwise, the creative
artist is always unaware of the impression at the moment it is made; he
feels it from within first, and it develops according to his own
characteristics. Let me give you an example. The journalist is like a
man who, seeing a mosquito in the act of biting him, claps his hand down
and kills it. The creative artist isn't aware of having been bitten
until he sees the swelling ... big or small, according to his
constitution. It is his business to cure the swelling, not to bother
about the insect."

"Your theories may be all right for great creative artists," said
Maurice. "And I suppose you're willing to take the risk of stagnation?"

"I'm not a great creative artist," said Guy, quickly. "At the same time
I'm damned if I'm a journalist. No, the effect of Plashers Mead on me
has been to make me long to be a man of action. So far it has been
stimulating, and without external help I've been able to reach the
conclusion that my poems were never worth writing.... I wrote because I
wanted to; I don't believe I ever had to."

"Then what are you going to do now?" asked Maurice.

"I'm probably going to work in London at journalism."

"Then, great Scott! why all this preliminary tirade against it?"

"Because I don't want to bluff myself into thinking that I'm going to do
anything but be a strictly professional writer," said Guy. "Or else
perhaps because I don't really want to come and live in London at all,
but go to Persia. Dash it all, for the first time in my life, Maurice,
I don't