Militant Hick was writing a book called PENURY AND LIMBO IN PANAMA CITY: A PRETTY FAIR COUNTRY WRITER IN A SUBGENRE FILLED WITH SECOND-RATERS.

Who wanted to read that? It was protesting too much.

A sore loser, who couldn't hack it, calling his betters names, out of bitterness and spite. Envy. He was like e-man@secondbest.org, ranting in a self-published newsletter.

Actually, he was a lot like e-man@secondbest.org, ranting in a self-published newsletter. He called the web page he posted PENURY AND LIMBO at The Daily Bulletin: A Newsletter on the State of the Culture, or, How To Write World Literature from Parker, Florida.

Parker is a suburb of Panama City. PENURY AND LIMBO aspires to be world literature. How to write it when you can't sell a word you write?

The book is about the conditions of production of the book. About vocation and career in conflict--a universal theme.

Hick was having to do it jakeleg and for-the-nonce. He wanted to do it right, and for all time.

A goat wants horns but he dies buttheaded.

You don't always get it right.

Just keep doing it, and hope for the best.

If not this book, the next one.

Quality floats to the top, like cream. Or a turd in a punchbowl.

Don't get your dauber down.