My mistake was
that of numberless men nowadays. Because I was conscious of
brains, I thought that the only place for me was London. It's
easy enough to understand this common delusion. We form our ideas
of London from old literature; we think of London as if it were
still the one centre of intellectual life; we think and talk like
Chatterton. But the truth is that intellectual men in our day do
their best to keep away from London--when once they know the
place. There are libraries everywhere; papers and magazines reach
the north of Scotland as soon as they reach Brompton; it's only
on rare occasions, for special kinds of work, that one is bound
to live in London. And as for recreation, why, now that no
English theatre exists, what is there in London that you can't
enjoy in almost any part of England? At all events, a yearly
visit of a week would be quite sufficient for all the special
features of the town. London is only a huge shop, with an hotel
on the upper storeys. To be sure, if you make it your artistic
subject, that's a different thing. But neither you nor I would do
that by deliberate choice.
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