on Anne R. Allen:
Rudyard Kipling needed a literary agent
As last September ended, a report from the Association of American Literary Agents painted a bleak picture of the American literary agent — working long hours and struggling to pay the bills, worrying for their future.
Among the members of the author community who had ever received a rejection slip from an agent, reactions ran the gamut of emoticon abbreviations, from LOL to RAOTFL to LMAO.*
These people get paid to read books! What are they whining about?
And who needs an agent anyway?
Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog 
On the other hand, our humble author could self-publish, thereby reclaiming all that money that would otherwise be wasted.
Once upon a time there was a place in the publishing ecosystem for agents and a reasonable living could be made, but even then it was a select few.
If an author still insists that traditional publishing is the way to go, there are enough reputable publishing houses out there that accept submissions, where they can get directly rejected rather than waiting for their agent to tell them. OK that last bit was /s, but not by much. 🙂
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Tongue-in-cheek as this may be, I think authors can, in many cases, represent their own books. It takes a quality, publication-ready manuscript and a lot of researching editors and their interests acquisition-and presentation-wise. But it can be done.
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I’ve no agent but like many others have queried agents and agencies. I’m aware there’s literally millions of books out there. Anybody that opened their doors would be overwhelmed. I have a one-book deal with Spellbound. Probably make enough to buy popcorn (which I don’t eat) for the next movie I watch online. But I guess I don’t know how the majority of booksellers make enough to live on. I’m grateful for crumbs. If agents can make a living selling something you have created that’s wonderful news. Full stop.
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