Youth and Egolatry by Pio Baroja — Read

The beginner in letters makes his way up, as a rule, amid a literary environment which is distinguished by reputations and hierarchies, all respected by him. But this was not the case with the young writers of my day. During the years 1898 to 1900, a number of young men suddenly found themselves thrown together in Madrid, whose only rule was the principle that the immediate past did not exist for them.

This aggregation of authors and artists might have seemed to have been brought together under some leadership, and to have been directed to some purpose; yet one who entertained such an assumption would have been mistaken.