Page:The Craftsmanship of Writing.djvu/52

THE INBORN TALENT and what is not; the spirit of indifference which looks upon all kinds of writing indiscriminately as a marketable produce, that degrades authorship from a profession to a trade.

Or again, what has been your preparation, up to the time when you send off your first essay or poem or story, stamps enclosed, to take its chances with some editor? Does your real apprenticeship begin now with its toll of disappointments and delays; manuscripts that grow soiled and shabby and one by one are consigned to the waste-basket? Or have you been unconsciously apprenticed to literature from early childhood, surrounded by an atmosphere of books, absorbing, because you could not help it, correct ideas of form and technique from the daily conversation around you? Are you still in the first enthusiasm of youth with your views of life still mainly rose-coloured dreams? Or [ 38 ]