The woes of a Russian novelist

It was not bad news from home that was depressing Vladimir.What was wrong with him was the fact that this was the eighty-second suburban literary reception he had been compelled to attend since he had landed in the country on his lecturing tour, and he was sick to death of it. When his agent had first suggested the trip, he had signed on the dotted line without an instant's hesitation. Worked out in rubles, the fee offered had seemed about right. But now, as he peered through the brushwood at the faces round him, and realized that eight out of ten of those present had manuscripts concealed on their persons, and were only waiting for an opportunity to whip them out and start reading, he wished that he had stayed at his quiet home in Nijni-Novgorod, where the worst thing that could happened to a fellow was a brace of bombs coming in through the window and mixing themselves up with his breakfast egg.

(from The Clicking of Cuthbert, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)