T. E. Lawrence Correspondence – Page 297

3 To H.Williamson (Ltde) 2/4/28 If you send them; but do discount my opinion. The Arab business was a frock in my living; and if I did the wonders they ascribe to me; then, it was wholly by accident, for in normal times I'm plumb ordinary. I don't believe the yarns they tell. Only it seems I don't believe the yarns they tell. Only it seems concei... to refuse to accept public opinion about oneself. I wonder what you will do about money. Farke will not have made much; & the more carefully you write the less you are likely to earn. Do you notice how the writers who are very simple make ten times so often as Tchekhov Tolstoi, and Turganev, I'm thinking of, and Tol- stoi, and Balzac: though Balzac rewrote all his nov- els in proof, & but he wasn't thinking about their form, so much as of the forms of the characters in them. I wish I could think clearly enough about all the writers of the world: as it's more than a living chance which makes one seem good and another bad: if only there was an absolute somewhere; the final standard by which everything could be measured. At present we have ever so many surveys of literature; but they aren't so much surveys as sentimental jour- neys across it. For a survey one must have a meas- ured base: and instead of that we have just opinions & opinions. My brain is like a damp sponge, so I'm going to stop. After I've read the Old Clog I'll send you a proper letter, if I can. Yours TLC