“It’s all right. I came back.”

Sorry wrong play. In this one, it’s Anne Writer, in a black shift, moaning and pulling her hair out (while rocking on the floor surrounded by fluttering pages thick with type). Anne Writer turns to her mother (in slinky gold gown with black lacquered cigarette holder causally dangling from her exquisite hand). “Why won’t any one read my 500,000 word epic poem on the atomic bomb?”

“The slush pile passed on in 1991, darling. Stop throwing paper into the coffin. It makes you look mentally deficient.”

“JK Rowling was rejected 12 times. I think I can…I think I can…publish.” Anne glares at her mother with a wild look in her eye.

“She had an agent, darling. Now rub the ink stains off your fingers, we’ve a nice young man coming for dinner.”

And there’s the crux of it…Thank you Wall Street Journal for telling us writers we need an agent. Many more thanks for the lovely interviews with Joshua Ferris and Joyce Carol Oates.