Publishing is a very mysterious business. It is hard to predict what kind of sale or reception a book will have, and advertising seems to do very little good.
Meaning of the quote
Publishing books is very unpredictable. It's difficult to know how many copies a book will sell or how popular it will be. Even advertising the book doesn't seem to help much in determining its success.
More quotes from Thomas Wolfe
Death the last voyage, the longest, and the best.
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Loneliness is and always has been the central and inevitable experience of every man.
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Culture is the arts elevated to a set of beliefs.
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One belongs to New York instantly. One belongs to it as much in five minutes as in five years.
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Most of the time we think we’re sick, it’s all in the mind.
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Perhaps this is our strange and haunting paradox here in America – that we are fixed and certain only when we are in movement.
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The reason a writer writes a book is to forget a book and the reason a reader reads one is to remember it.
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A young man is so strong, so mad, so certain, and so lost. He has everything and he is able to use nothing.
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Is this not the true romantic feeling; not to desire to escape life, but to prevent life from escaping you.
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Publishing is a very mysterious business. It is hard to predict what kind of sale or reception a book will have, and advertising seems to do very little good.
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If a man has talent and can’t use it, he’s failed. If he uses only half of it, he has partly failed. If he uses the whole of it, he has succeeded, and won a satisfaction and triumph few men ever know.
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You have reached the pinnacle of success as soon as you become uninterested in money, compliments, or publicity.
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