WHO BUYS NEW BOOKS?

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 43, 15 November 1918, Page 4

WHO BUYS NEW BOOKS?

ARNOLD-BENNETT'S PROBLEM. In a volume entitled "Books and Persons" Mr. Arnold Bennett revives a series of essays which he wrote many years ago under the pseudonym of "Jacob Tonson" (borrowed from the name of a London publisher of the days of Dryden). He says he is still willing to stand by the sentiments expressed. In one of these essays Mr. Bennett wrote;— "Personally I extract eonie sort of a living—a dog's existence—from the eale of books—with my name on the titlepage. And I am acquainted with a few other individuals who perform, the same feat. I am also acquainted with a large number of individuals who have no connection with the manufacture or distribution of literature. And when I reflect upon the habits of this latter crowd I mn astonished that I or anybody else can succeed in paying rent out of what comes to the author'from the sale of books. I know scarcely a soul, I have scarcey ever met a soul, who can be said to make a habit of buying new books. I know a few amis who borrow books from Mudie's'and elsewhere, and I recognise that their subscriptions yield me a trifle. But what a trifle! "Do you know anybody who really buys new books? Have you ever heard tell of such a being? Of course there are Frunklinish and self-improving young men—and conceivably women—who buy cheap editions of works which the world ffill not willingly let die. . . . Such volumes are to be found in many renned and strenuous homes-oftener unopened than opened-but still there! But does this estimable practice aid the living author to send his children to school m decent clothes? Hβ whom I am anxious to meet is the man who will not willingly let die the author who is not yet dead." .