I came across an article on Salon.com earlier today, where a female writer named Ann Bauer opened up about the circumstances that allowed her to pursue writing full-time; namely, her husband’s high-paying job. She went on to describe how she struggled to be a writer for years, raising her children and supporting a spouse with addiction problems, and only “made it” as a writer in her late 30s when she married a second time. Ann’s story made me start thinking about writing and privilege, and the relationship between the two. I wanted to blog about this to (hopefully) deepen the conversation and share my own experience.
First off, I think it’s really important to explain exactly why this conversation is necessary, and the reason is: misinformation. In Ann’s article, she uses several anecdotal examples to illustrate the kind of misinformation that exists in the publishing industry, without going into much detail about why it’s harmful. I wanted to expand on those cases. In both examples, Ann describes how a famous author responded when they were asked: how were you able to support yourself? …can you guess how they responded? Both authors brushed off the questions with remarks like it was “hard work” or “tough”—skipping over the fact that they were able to build careers for themselves because they were either (a) very rich, (b) very well-connected, (c) semi-rich, but could nonetheless afford years of expensive schooling in creative writing. Those crowd members who knew the facts simply laughed, and the conversation moved on…without educating the question-asker.
This situation—where successful writers conceal their true circumstances in some attempt to “save face”—frustrates me and it’s not just because I wish I was in their position. These days I spend about half my time online, reading articles about “how to make it as a writer”. The honest articles are the worst, because they don’t pull the punches: if you want to make money writing full-time (they tell you), you have to be willing to produce pulp for whatever website will hire you. You have to be able to pump out thousands of words daily. You have to accept the low wages and the shitty stories, until you hit the big leagues (if you ever do).
It isn’t my intention to gripe about the difficulties of being a writer. After all, I am doing what I love best and I am privileged enough to have a family willing (and able) to support me in that endeavour. I shouldn’t be the one griping. But I do want to highlight the gap between expectations and reality in professional writing—especially the way these expectations are projected by “success cases” in the industry. Many aspiring writers think that if they plug away at their laptops for long enough, they will eventually get the recognition they deserve. There are thousands of articles out there, selling this same dream: work hard and you will eventually succeed. 10 Tricks For Making It As A Writer. But while I think it’s important to encourage young writers (and I take heart from all the encouragement I’ve received over the years), this vision simply isn’t realistic. It takes more than just time to succeed as a serious writer. You need connections, you need training, but, most importantly, you need the leisure to develop your voice and your ideas. And unfortunately, these things require money.
History is full of exceptional individuals who can prove me wrong, but my point is that you shouldn’t plan on being an exceptional individual. When you start building a career for yourself, you need to be realistic about your future. In my attempts to find a stable job writing—which allows me to pursue personal projects on the side—I repeatedly run across the same problems: the interesting jobs don’t pay anything, the reasonable jobs don’t pay enough, the challenging job don’t give you any free time, and the jobs that hit that magical “Goldilocks” zone in the middle aren’t hiring. Breaking into the writing profession is a grind and (as I write this in my parents’ kitchen) I know I wouldn’t be able to do it without financial support. But this reality isn’t reflected in the narrative presented by the industry.
Ann Bauer’s point about sponsorship is an essential one, echoing back to medieval norms about patronage and the arts. Before there was a mass market demand for entertainment, talented musicians, painters, and writers catered to select audiences. They would be given money by wealthy patrons to support themselves. Most of the great historical works of art is a product of this arrangement: the works of Shakespeare, Mozart, Michelangelo (among countless others). Small wonder that so many of the books produced today are empty page-turners. Writing a “great” book is hard work and rarely makes sense from a financial perspective. Most people don’t have the opportunity to even make the attempt. They’re too busy trying to earn a living.
If we want great literature, we need to sponsor talented writers. When you look at the pool of globally-renowned writers, many of them owe their success to foundations like the MacArthur Foundation or PEN International. There are opportunities available for sponsorship, but they’re highly competitive and most of them are (understandably) looking for authors who’ve already taken that first step. The fact that they were already in a position to take that step is often overlooked.
Despite the cynicism of this post, all I’m asking for is an awareness of the facts. I would like to see authors and other writers talk about the people and circumstances that allowed them to succeed. Young writers need to understand that they will be reliant on others, if they want to make it. They need to have the humility to ask for help and look for financial aid (in the form of grants or support from various organizations). I hope that one day I’m in a position to give a proper answer to those kids asking: “how did you support yourself?”, so that I can tell them that writing is a privilege and that you can’t do it without support from others. A successful writer is not a genius who exists in a vacuum. They’re someone who has connected with dozens of people over time, and who continues to be supported by them, in many ways.
Thanks for reading!
