In the essay "Writers and Money", collected in The Hall of Uselessness, Simon Leys writes
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From his own experiences, Chardonne concluded: "Any good book will sell 3,000 copies, no more, no less. We used to publish every year translations of some forty foreign novels. Invariably, one of these would suddenly sell 100,000 copies (which would pay for all our other publications)--and we never knew why.
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Earlier in the paragraph, Leys refers to Chardonne's then boss as "a notorious gambler."
""" From his own experiences, Chardonne concluded: "Any good book will sell 3,000 copies, no more, no less. We used to publish every year translations of some forty foreign novels. Invariably, one of these would suddenly sell 100,000 copies (which would pay for all our other publications)--and we never knew why. """
Earlier in the paragraph, Leys refers to Chardonne's then boss as "a notorious gambler."