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CHAPTER V
THE GOSPEL OF INFINITE PAINS
It was the Roman poet, Ovid, who once said, at least in substance, "It is a fact that some authors cannot correct. They compose with pleasure and with ardour; but they exhaust all their force. They fly with but one wing, when they revise their work; the first fire does not return."[1]
What was true in Ovid's day has been equally true in all periods of literary production. There are always certain authors, eminently brilliant some of them, who not only cannot revise, but rather pride themselves on their inability to do so. Byron, for instance, is a striking case
- ↑ Quoted in this form by Disraeli, Curiosities of Literature, who goes on to cite numerous interesting cases of industrious revision.
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