The Steam Papers: Notes on Elemental Grammar
To My Long-Suffering Confidant Being a Discourse Most Urgent Upon the Discovery That All Literature Springs from the Eternal Argument Between Fire and Rain My Dearest, Most Patient Friend, I write to you in a state of such intellectual agitation that my very pen trembles, and I fear these pages may bear witness to the fevered condition of a mind that has stumbled upon what I can only describe as the fundamental secret of all literary creation . The clock has just struck three, yet sleep remains as distant as reasoned discourse, for I am possessed by a revelation so complete, so all-encompassing, that I dare not close my eyes lest this understanding dissolve like morning mist before I can properly commit it to paper. You will think me quite mad—and perhaps rightfully so—when I confess what has consumed my thoughts these seven sleepless nights: the absolute conviction that every poem ever composed, every novel ever written, every drama ever staged represents nothing more—and ...
