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He had been in [the world] and he had watched it and it was his duty to write of it; but now he never would.
Harry has many memories from his youth that he meant to turn into stories. These memories are profound, intimate, and meaningful—in other words, they are very much worth writing and sharing. However, Harry has failed to record them, and his fatal infection will keep him from ever sharing his stories with the world. Harry’s feeling that he had a “duty” to record his life suggests that his failure to write about his most pressing and intimate experiences was not just a creative failing but also a moral one.
There wasn’t time, of course, although it seemed as though it telescoped so that you might put it all into one paragraph if you could get it right.
As Harry grows increasingly ill and closer to death, he becomes obsessed with attempting to write one last time. He realizes on some level that it’s too late, but another part of him feels that, if he could just hold his pen, he would be able to distill the most important facets of his life into a single paragraph. Just this one paragraph of honest and genuine insight would be enough to help Harry die with the reassuring knowledge that he has done his duty by sharing a truthful account of his human experience.
