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Notes -
Is Septimus Smith supposed to be…“cool”? I can see “tragic” or “romanticized,” but not “cool.” Woolf sketched a society in tension with its Romantic ideals, childhood follies given pride of place. She may show compassion for this Literary Bloke—but compassion is not the same as approval.
The starving author was never guaranteed cultural cachet; by the standards given here, he was always making an irrational choice. Lloyd is bemoaning an era which never really existed. He can’t back up his vibes with statistics because he’s looking at an enormous selection effect. “Remember when men used to be cool, alpha males, who smoked unfiltered cigs and dominated bestseller lists?” I’m sure some of them were. Septimus Smith represents the rest.
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