Charm, or ingratiation: visiting writers at home or going up to them at book parties and telling them exactly what they want to hear. What they desperately want to hear. And being patient, because it doesn’t always work. There are assholes who’ll give you a pat on the back and then act like they’ve never seen you before in their lives. There are some hard, cruel, vicious bastards out there. But they aren’t all like that. You have to be patient and keep looking. The best are the homosexuals, but be careful: you have to know when to stop and exactly what you want, or you’ll end up taking it up
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