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How easily everything was accomplished in those days. To be a poet:
that was a fixed point on his horizon. Any number of joyous lyrics, as
well as three plays not intended for the stage, had already dropped
from his pen. He was an extraordinary success among his college
friends; everybody liked him; he could say and do what he pleased. Was
he not the idol of a select group who admired not only one another but
also the satanism of Baudelaire, the hieratic obscenities of Beardsley,
the mustiest Persian sage, the modernest American ballad-monger? He was
full of gay irresponsibility. Ever since, on returning to his rooms
after some tedious lecture, he announced to his friends that he had
lost an umbrella but preserved, thank God, his honour, they augured a
brilliant future for him. So, for other but no less cogent reasons, did
his doting, misguided mother.
Both were disappointed. Those sprightly sallies became rarer; epigrams
died, still-born, on his lips. He lost his sense of humour; grew
mirthless, fretful, self-conscious.


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