>Certainly
>including Blake, who it should be noted was incredibly envious of more
>popular engravers.
Quite likely Blake was envious of their income - and poets must be
allowed their petty human vices. He was called a "madman" by the
Examiner, so must be allowed a little spleen.
If you could be bothered, you could probably make quite a long list of
writers popular in their day whose work never saw another century - there
were for example quite a lot of 19th century "poetesses" who were
incredibly popular - and the badly selling hardy perennials, like Kafka.
Then you could make another list of those who sold well in their day and
still sell. Then another of those who never sold well in any day.
I'm not sure what any of that would prove.
Patronage has always been the order of the day for artists, with all the
discomforts that it implies. But hey, it's better than working in a
factory. I've tried the job thing, btw; I am a qualified journalist, and
have worked for all the media proprietors in Australia (three). It
didn't work for me.
Best
Alison
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