Back to AtD The balloon of experience

[Mark Kohut]

We all remember the change in existential--or just professional?-- 
status that the Chums go through in AtD. Soon, I will be posting 
some particulars, but, until then I have found this.  

From Henry James' preface, in his famous prefaces to the NY editions 
of his works: (but found in a collection called The Future of the Novel by 
Henry James):  

The Balloon of Experience......a number of pages but near the end it reads:  
"the balloon of experience is in fact of course tied to the earth and, under that necessity 
we swing, thanks to a rope of remarkable length, in the more or less commodius 
car of the imagination; but it is by the rope we know where we are, and from the 
moment that cable is cut we are at large and unrelated: we only swing apart from 
the globe---though remaining as exhilarated, naturally, as we like, especially 
when all goes well. The art of the romancer is, "for the fun of it, " insidiously to cut 
the cable, to cut it without our detecting him."  
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