Is it I, Henry Ryecroft, who, after a night of untroubled rest, rise unhurriedly, dress with the deliberation of an oldish man, and go downstairs happy in the thought that I can sit reading, quietly reading, all day long? Is it I,Henry Ryecroft, the harassed toiler of so many a long year?
I dare not think of those I have left behind me, there in the ink-stained world. It would make me miserable, and to what purpose? Yet, having once looked that way, think of them I must. Oh, you heavy-laden who at this hour sit down to the cursed travail of the pen; writing, not because there is something in your mind, in your heart, which must needs be uttered, but because the pen is the only tool you can handle, your only means of earning bread! Year after year the number of you is multiplied; you crowd the doors of publishers and editors, hustling, grappling, exchanging maledictions. Oh, sorry spectacle, grotesque and heart-breaking!
这是我吗?一夜安眠,从容起身，以老年人的方式不慌不忙地更衣，然后走下楼梯,内心因为想到可以整天安静地阅读而充满愉悦，享受着这样的生活的人是我一一亨利・莱克罗夫特吗?是那个多年来一直辛苦劳作的享利菜克罗夫特吗?
我不敢去想那些步我后尘、仍然过着笔墨生涯的人。我会因此而痛苦,但这又有何用处呢?然而，一旦往那个方向回顾,我就无法不想到他们了。哦,你们这些负担沉重的人,此刻正坐在那里,绞尽脑汁地写个不停;这样的写作，并不是因为你们的心中有什么不吐不快的想法,而是因为笔杆是你们所能使用的唯一工具,也是你们借以维持生计的唯一手段!你们的队伍逐年壮大,你们将出版社与编辑的门前围得水泄不通,推搡扭打,相互咒骂。哦,这凄惨、荒唐、又令人心碎的景象!
Innumerable are the men and women now writing for bread, who have not the least chance of finding in such work a permanent livelihood. They took to writing because they knew not what else to do, or because the literary calling tempted them by its independence and its dazzling prizes. They will hang on to the squalid profession, their earnings eked out by begging and borrowing, until it is too late for them to do anything else --- and then? With a lifetime of dread experience behind me, I say that he who encourages any young man or woman to look for his living to "literature" commits no less than a crime. If my voice had any authority I would cry this truth aloud wherever men could hear. Hateful as is the struggle for life in every form, this rough-and-tumble of the literary arena seems to me sordid and degrading beyond all others. Oh, your prices per thousand words! Oh, your paragraphings and your interviewings! And oh, the black despair that awaits those down trodden in the fray.
现在,为了维持生计而写作的人不计其数,但他们却无法从这种工作中获得稳定的生活。他们沉溺于写作,是因为他们除此之外一无所长,或者是因为写作这一职业的独立性和耀眼光环引诱了他们。他们紧紧抓住这种贫穷而悲惨的职业不放手,甚至靠乞讨和借贷来竭力维持入不敷出的生活,等到他们想做其他的事情时，一切都为时已晚一-然后呢?有了这一生的可怕经历,我认为,鼓励年轻人追求“文学”生涯,等于是在犯罪。如果我的话语具有任何权威性,我都要大声疾呼,将这一真理传入每一个人的耳中。为生活而进行的各种形式的争斗都是可恨的，而对我来说，文学领城里的这种混战,似乎远比其他任何争斗更加卑劣、可耻。哦,每千字你所得的报酬!哦,你的短评和采访记录!哦,还有那些在争斗中被踩下去的人,等待他们的将是一片漆黑的绝望!
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