Gender Readings. Top Ten. Ренц Т.Г - 57 стр.

      “The wine-trade wouldn’t really suit you, would it? I spoke to
my publisher about you and there is a very good chance¾ if you began
with some reading...”
      “But I don’t know a thing about books.”
      “I would help you at the start.”
      “My mother says that writing is a good crutch...”
      “Five hundred pounds and half the paperback rights is a pretty
solid crutch”, she said.
      “This Chablis is good, isn’t it?”
      “I daresay.”
      I began to change my opinion of him — he had not the Nelson
touch. He was doomed to defeat. She came alongside and raked him
fore and aft.
      “Do you know what Mr Dwight said?”
      “Who’s Dwight?”
      “Darling, you don’t listen, do you? My publisher. He said he
hadn’t read a first novel in the last ten years which showed such
powers of observation.”
      That’s wonderful,” he said sadly, “wonderful.”
      “Only he wants me to change the tide.”
      “Yes.”
      “He does not like The Ever-Rolling Stream. He wants to call it
The Chelsea Set.
      “What did you say?”
      “I agreed. I do think that with a first novel one should try to keep
one’s publisher happy. Especially when, really, he’s going to pay for
our marriage, isn’t he?”
      “I see what you mean.” Absent-mindedly he stirred his Chablis
with a fork — perhaps before the engagement he had always bought
champagne. The Japanese gentlemen had finished their fish and with
very little English but with elaborate courtesy they were ordering from
the middle-aged waitress a fresh fruit salad. The girl looked at them,
and then she looked at me, but I think she saw only the future. I
wanted very much to warn her against any future based on a first
novel called The Chelsea Set. I was on the side of his mother. It was a
humiliating thought, but I was probably about her mother’s age.
      I wanted to say to her, are you certain your publisher is telling
you the truth? Publishers are human. They may sometimes exaggerate
the virtues of the young and the pretty. Will The Chelsea Set be read

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