Literary World Unveils Doomsday Machine
This just in:
Amanda Craig, novelist, quoted, approvingly, in the Guardian.
At risk of being vaguely practical – yes, I know, it’s the Guardian – one does have to wonder how long this theoretical strike would have to last in order to have any discernible effect. I mean, novelists generally work quite slowly, with books typically years apart.
Not the most viable line of work, then. Perhaps some choices need rethinking.
And a million no-name support bands shouted, “Yes! Yes! Yes!”
Update:
Spotted by Chester in the comments – Fintan O’Toole, literary editor of the Irish Times, calls for a “national arts strike” to extort further cash from the taxpayer. “The public has to be reminded that it really does care,” says he. And until more wallets land on the bonfire of publicly funded art, the nation’s creative titans should “close the arts centres” and “hold no poetry readings.”
Snork.
“You’ll have a national philosophers strike on your hands!”
And we only just barely survived the attack of the art world Death Star.
I am confused. Authors want to be paid for showing up at events that give them free publicity and pimp their “works”, and among them the unknown authors are incensed that at those events where they do get paid, the big names get paid more, so the unknowns want to “go on strike”, i.e., not show up and take advantage of free pimping.
So if unknown authors go on strike, how would anyone know ?
Go on strike. Right. In a world where millions of copies of books exist physically and are available in new and second-hand bookshops, in libraries, or just a click away on Amazon.
I’m an avid reader, and if no more books were published from this day on, there’s enough out there to last me the rest of my life.
See the problem, Amanda?
The literary world does seem to attract and then foster an extraordinary sense of self-importance and entitlement.
And on a practical level, you have to wonder how long this strike would take to have any discernible effect. I mean, novelists generally work quite slowly, with books typically years apart.
I have nearly finished writing my current book, and they want me to strike?
Nah, I am going to Scab.
“go on strike” is lefty bollocks in this case, yes. I do find it rather remarkable these authors, who feel the festivals aren’t rewarding enough to attend, don’t have the gumption to just politely decline, next time they are asked. See if the festival will up their offer, else save themselves the bother.
Are they really dragging themselves to fruitless engagements every year?
I’d love to hear them try and purswade authors who weren’t invited to speak initially to join them on the picket line. “No, you don’t want to speak here . You want to sacrifice your opertunity so they’ll pay me more to hog the spotlight, And those are not the Droids you’re looking for.”
The aurhors’ strike turned ugly today as striking authors started leaving one star reviews of work published by so called “scab” authors on Amazon.
By happy coincidence, the Nottingham Contemporary gallery in the UK is live-streaming (13:00-17:00 GMT) a symposium of “leading artists and academics” called Feeding off Contradiction: Self Managed Socialism in Focus
Apparently, it is about:
self-management (autogestion), an economic and political system which was central to Yugoslav socialism, placing a certain amount of decision making in the hands of the workers themselves
You have to love that phrase “a certain amount of decision making”, don’t you? It’s exploring answers to this question that literally no-one else is asking:
Can some of the working methods of self-management be applied to artistic practice today, in a different political system, in a different geography, over thirty years later?
Are they really actually mourning the loss of Tito’s Yugoslavia in a British art gallery?
The Agony of the Long-distance Artiste:
“Yeah on a level I can appreciate Shakespeare but you can’t deny the laziness involved with the attachment to that canon. the incessant rehashing it at the expense new work is yet another trope of conservatism, void of innovation and once again, pitched at old people. I didn’t claim that anyone was stopping me producing ‘modern art’ (the correct term here is contemporary but I’ll let it slide this time gramps) however the ageism is going to catch up with this Government and cost them the seat of power. you guys on that bandwagon will be the losers. And yeah as Anna said grant or not I get tax dollars anyway from, you know, working. All in service of you kindly old bits of crust.
Posted by: Luke Devine | August 10, 2015 at 18:19”
Piss off, kid.
Damn, mojo, I was just looking that post up and thought of reposting a different comment from it myself. I often think of Mr. Devine whenever David has an addition to the “Classis Sentences” series. One where he describes interpretive dance as “hell fun”. To this day whenever the subject of interpretive dance comes up I OCD on that sentence. It’s like a Spice Girls chorus that way. God, do I need help.
And we only just barely survived the attack of the art world Death Star.
Missed that one. Hysterical. 🙂
Please let all “fairness and equality” authors go on strike, withdraw their books and threaten to never write another word. Please, please, please.
If they do then I might have a better chance of selling one or two more of my books. Also, they will have to stop wasting time dreaming and do something socially useful like sweeping the streets. Pretty much win-win for everyone, I’d think (though there would eventually be a surfeit of books on the Politics of Street Sweeping, or — oh noes! — Street Sweeper Pron. ‘Fifty Shades Of Grime’?)
Missed that one. Hysterical. 🙂
Yes, it’s still juicy. Setting aside the ludicrous vanity on display, it’s the realisation that Ms Connell and Mr Devine were presumably chosen by Vice magazine as exemplars of young talent. And their works – such as they are – are supposed to persuade readers that any reduction of taxpayer subsidy to such people endangers the future of culture.
And again, these clowns aren’t outliers. They are legion.
Googling ‘Students on strike’ results in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Quebec_student_protests
It’s not that people don’t want students to “strike”, it’s that “strikers” disrupt the educations of people who are in university to actually learn something of value, not to make a political statement and posture for peers and handlers.
I suspect this may be a disconnect between “commercial” authors (who make money by selling books) and “academic” authors (who write books to gain grants and academic positions). The commercial author sees FREE PUBLICITY! and is happy to go and participate, pass out some bookmarks, and deduct the whole thing from his taxes. But the academic author sees the conference as another academic event, for which they should be compensated. Where’s the honorarium? Those cheap bastards!
Ms. Craig hasn’t quite grasped the nature of the “trade show.” Normally, exhibitors pay the shows for the opportunity to display their wares.
All in service of you kindly old bits of crust.
Luke Devine, Professional Arrogant Twit.
The use of ‘unionise’ is a poor choice of words but I don’t see too much harm in authors coming to collective agreements about getting paid when so many do struggle to make a living when they’re trying to get established. And it’s far preferable to seek to get more money from paying customers than holding out the begging bowl to the likes of the Arts Council and blithering about holding mirrors to society etc.
But this bit had me face palming the most:
Craig pointed to a study carried out by the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society last year that found the average earnings of a professional full-time author were only £11,000 per year. “Part of the poison of these festivals is that they’ve been paying big names more than little names. If it’s a literary festival, we are all performing, we all ought to be paid the same..”
So, nobody is ever at the top of the bill, eh?
So there’s a flip side to this argument that I recently encountered…
https://aphilosopher.wordpress.com/2016/01/13/inequality-incentives/#comment-119861
Has the Prime Minister called a meeting of COBRA over this threat?
One word: shrug.
The only power we have as authors is if we unionise and go on strike.
Well, after all, food and housing shouldn’t be a problem:
Are we to be denied the content of her mind?
Also, from the article,
“Part of the poison of these festivals is that they’ve been paying big names more than little names. If it’s a literary festival, we are all performing, we all ought to be paid the same..”
I’ll scream and scream until I’m sick………
Let’s see now, would I rather hear a talk by someone like Jim Butcher or JK Rowling, or someone like Amanda Craig? Hmmmmmmmmmm. So difficult to decide where to put my money….
And I have to say, I’ve gone to little festivals where I doubt any author got paid, and found these “little” authors’ books, and ended up buying them and keeping track of when their latest will come out. I wouldn’t do that if they hadn’t shown up to show us their books.
Given the rise of self-publishing via e-book readers, they do sound a little like buggywhip-makers railing futilely, don’t they?
I missed this line, from the director of the Hay festival:
Classy.
Interesting outpouring of loathing and contempt for writers visible here. The fact is that professional novelists are badly paid. There are a few outliers, like Stephen King and Dan Brown, but most write fiction primarily from a compulsion to communicate. It’s a disease, akin to vanity; the very same that causes our host to air his views in public.
No individual writer is entitled, merely by virtue of having written, to anything, whether it is being read or getting an appearance fee. But those who work for nothing queer the pitch for those trying to scrape a living, and those who mooch off an author’s desire for exposure at any price are simply cheapskates. If a festival is a commercial enterprise, then surely the prime attraction deserves a cut of the profits.
Here is a nice rant on the subject by Harlan Ellison:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mj5IV23g-fE
Interesting outpouring of loathing and contempt for writers visible here.
I don’t think the mockery is aimed at writers per se, but rather at a particular attitude, an unrealism, that’s not uncommon among writers and artists. The comment about striking being an example. That, and the general point of people choosing a line of work that is hugely speculative, of marginal and shrinking economic value, and in which it is notoriously difficult to make even the most basic living, and then complaining, as if surprised, that it is difficult to make even the most basic living.
The comparison that comes to mind is with teenagers’ dreams of being in a world-touring, stadium-filling pop band. And as anyone who’s ever been in a dodgy band can attest, aspiring stars will probably find themselves doing numerous gigs for free, or for expenses, or for a couple of drinks, in the (often vain) hope of exposure, name-building, networking, etc. And if little-known, unsuccessful bands started muttering about not being paid on a par with the headline act, and about the possibility of striking, I doubt there’d be an avalanche of public sympathy.
The fact is that professional novelists are badly paid.
Actually, all novelists–actually all people who do work in exchange for money–are paid precisely what their work is worth. Not a penny more or less. Payment is simply a measurement of value to the payor. Concepts like “good” or “bad” which are moral concepts have nothing to do with it. Complaining that I only receive X for my output or that X is not “fair” is like complaining about the unfairness of the speed of light.
Found this comment at TF’s YouTube link rather telling:
This man was one of my favorite authors for many years….then I met him personally. The snark that is so cogent and funny can be turned upon you in a heartbeat for the sake of personal meanness and you don’t have to be doing anything wrong. He’s right about this subject. He can also be a HUGE arsehole. That may be where the thumbs down are coming from.
From what little I have second hand knowledge of, this is quite common among writers. Artists in general, musicians and such, as well but especially with solo-artists such as writers, and I presume painters. Which is why they really NEED professional representation to front for them. Perhaps if they weren’t such arseholes…or cheapskates…
It starts off as a not unreasonable point about authors giving their services for free at literary festivals which – in theory – make money from these authors being there, but sadly it then turns into a whinge about “Someone’s getting paid more than me!” Oh dear.
If a festival is a commercial enterprise, then surely the prime attraction deserves a cut of the profits.
That’s part of their beef, though. That the authors who could reasonably be described as a festival’s “prime attaction” get paid a lot more than the less popular writers. They feel like everyone should get paid the same, which is just not the way it works.
“Here is a nice rant on the subject by Harlan Ellison:”
IIRC, the little troll is not shy about refusing attempts to get him to write for free, as a “charitable donation” or some such. God love ‘im.
But note that he can do this because 1) he’s staggeringly talented and so b) much in demand.
These whiny little slugs, not so much.
PS: I highly recommend a docu on Harlan, “Dreams With Sharp Teeth”
“we all ought to be paid the same”
Reminiscent of the sh**-for-brains authors who pointed at the Soviet Union as a model: “Look how morally superior those socialists are: The government pays authors so they don’t have to be wage slaves of the marketplace.”
@ R. Sherman
Actually, all novelists–actually all people who do work in exchange for money–are paid precisely what their work is worth
I would argue that most novelists do not work primarily for money, though like anyone a writer needs to pay the bills. The motivations are analysed by George Orwell here:
http://orwell.ru/library/essays/wiw/english/e_wiw
Speaking as someone with experience of the publishing industry, I can say that writers often get shafted. Agents tend to be lazy and moreover value their relationship with commissioning editors over their responsibilities to their clients; authors tend to be unworldly and unaware of what is being done to them contractually, and prefer to write rather than get involved in the business side of things.
The advent of computers has made the piracy of copyright work simple. Whatever one’s views on the morality of copyrights, they do permit and encourage the creation of original work that is of value to society as a whole. Authors are now in a situation rather like many musicians’, who nowadays make more money from live appearances than CD sales. If benefiting financially from live appearances is denied to authors, even more of them will have to give up. Mind you, there are probably quite enough books in the world as it is, leaving aside the torrent of self-published ebooks!
@ David: Point taken.
@ wtp: Yes, he’s well known for general arseholery, but in this instance he’s right.
Authors are now in a situation rather like many musicians’, who nowadays make more money from live appearances than CD sales. If benefiting financially from live appearances is denied to authors, even more of them will have to give up.
It’s certainly true, now more than ever, that many career musicians survive on live work, not album sales or downloads; though I’m not sure what the literary analogue of touring is, or how credible it is as a living. I suppose the problem, as with the art world, is one of massive oversupply. There simply aren’t enough galleries and art consumers to accommodate the number of people who wish to be artists. Last time I checked the figures, here in the UK we churn out somewhere in the region of 20,000 fine art students every year. Quite what those people expect to do for a living, and for a subsequent retirement, isn’t clear to me.
Since Anthony Trollope wrote fiction while working for the Post Office, and T S Eliot wrote his magnificent poetry while working as a banker and (later) an editor, why do so many aspiring novelists imagine the tax-payer such subsidise their vocation?
If benefiting financially from live appearances is denied to authors, even more of them will have to give up.
I don’t think anything is being denied to anyone here. It’s just that a live appearance by Author X has a very, very low market value (approaching zero in most cases) unless that author is Rowling or King or someone of that ilk. Unionizing isn’t going to change that.
Last time I checked the figures, here in the UK we churn out somewhere in the region of 20,000 fine art students every year. Quite what those people expect to do for a living, and for a subsequent retirement, isn’t clear to me.
Nor me. But doubtless some cynical tutors will see their ‘teaching’ of these ‘students’ as the incubation of socialist revolutionaries.
but in this instance he’s right
No, I don’t think so. He does have a point but to Sherman’s argument above, no one is owed a living. I have a similar argument with a philosophy professor who constantly whines about students not coming to his class. I point out to him that this is an indication that the students are not interested in what he has to say. That they only register for the class because it’s required, it’s an easy pass, and/or someone else is paying for it. Then he gets mad, says I’m mean, and stops responding to me. Oh well.
As was stated elsewhere above, these festivals are very akin to trade shows. When I go to say, a home improvement trade show, I may see something I very much like by one contractor but don’t get around to making a decision until months later and end up going with someone more local to my home to do a very similar job. Yet that trade show contractor actually paid out a good sum of money for that booth and addtionally spent his time there for free. Yet someone else benefitted by getting the work. Now as you say, things do get more complicated when dealing with ideas because ideas, songs, etc. are easy to replicate once they are out there. But we all have ideas, even us crazy people. And as you say there are quite enough books in the world as it is. For most of human history the time and effort required for a writer to support himself, or get support, to write then a publisher would have to weigh the then considerable cost of producing a large enough volume of books to meet a market in a society where illiteracy was very common and there was not much encouragement from society to that market to read books. Today the cost barriers to authoring a book are next to nil. The physical/time effort is next to nil (no paper, no heavy typewriter, no white-out or whatever, far less time editing the edits). Yet the fame/monetary expecations and perceptions have not changed. Demand has obviously increased, but supply is well beyond the need.
Of course, authors are not prohibited from organizing their own festivals or hiring an organization to organize one for them. Then they set their own rules on what the cost of admittance would be and how much the contributors would be paid. But then again, that’s a lot of work…and we’re back to the original problem.
Ah, something else I meant to add and Theophrastus essentially says similar in Trollope wrote fiction while working for the Post Office, and T S Eliot wrote his magnificent poetry while working as a banker and (later) an editor…Dickens, Twain, etc. etc. etc. held real jobs for some time, which had a positive effect on their work and perceptions and greatly informed their writing. They also lacked any “festivals” and such to promote their work. I’m guessing these modern festivals are to some extent taxpayer subsidized via the venue or ease of permitting or such. Writers of the past, the vast majority of them anyway, and I would say the vast majority of the good ones, did so with little else but their talent. I’m sure you can find exceptions, but I really don’t see where “festivals” are needed to sell books. If so, the authors should fund themselves.
Wtp
Agreed. I deeply admire Trollope for his dedication. Every morning, he arose early and wrote 800 words before going to work. No agonising, no special pleading, no public lending rights, no literary festivals: just hard work and talent.
Today the cost barriers to authoring a book are next to nil. The physical/time effort is next to nil (no paper, no heavy typewriter, no white-out or whatever, far less time editing the edits).
Sorry, that is simply not true. Yes, the word-processor has relieved a lot of the physical labour (pounding rather than tapping keys, retyping pages, etc.), but the chief effort in writing a book has always been the time needed to compose and edit it. It varies wildly, but a 80,000 word novel by a readable author will take possibly six months or a year to finish. To get to that state of expertise, he/she will have put in an apprenticeship of a minimum of 1,000 hours at the keyboard, and probably much more.
Aside from the deadbeats accepting “writer in residence” gigs, and a few prostituting themselves to local government in other ways, authorship is one of the very few areas of the arts relatively untainted by state funding. I agree that the writers who inspired the foregoing debate are immature and didn’t think their position through, but when all around them there are “artists” with their snouts in the trough – said trough often controlled by the sort of people staging literary festivals – they probably feel hard done by, especially given the dismal returns for their labours from traditional channels.
I have a job, quite a busy one, but have spent perhaps 2000 hours learning a language over several years. If I had the talent I could have easily devoted that time to writing a novel. Too many artists, like politicians, have no real-world experience or perspective and are in a parallel universe to the people they are trying to represent.
Yes, the word-processor has relieved a lot of the physical labour (pounding rather than tapping keys, retyping pages, etc.)
I wasn’t clear there. I was speaking more metaphorically, if that’s the right word. Obviously, I’m not a language guy. What I was getting at was not the physical labor involved in pressing keys nor the mass of the device per se, but the idea that a typewriter was an old, iron-age technology, relatively expensive in its day. A mid-20th century typewriter cost about $100 when the average salary was around $1400/yr. A base model computer today runs what, $150? And the average salary is well north of $2100/yr. Even the minimum wage in the US is about five times that. The research (heh) is right at your fingertips if you find a wi-fi hotspot, so theoretically quality of composition should be enormously better…kinda like I did just there to find out what a typewriter cost in 1940, what the average salary was, etc. And the editing to which you refer, as I said above is far simpler, easier done with today’s tech. Pretty much all you need today is an idea (everyone has a few of those) and the desire to see the thing through. Resources are no longer a limitation for a far greater number of people. Thus the explosion in supply relative to Dickens’ day.
Damn, i’m forgetful…So what I was driving at was that, taking your ballpark figure, the 1000 hours needed at the keyboard, or the 6 months to a year for the 80,000 word novel would have required far more than 1000 hours and more than 6 months to a year back in the day. All that retyping pages, etc. I’m sure took a good bit of time and paper that is no longer wasted. Hell, I’m sure even paper is much cheaper today than it was back then. Not that anyone needs it anymore.
So what I was driving at was that, taking your ballpark figure, . . . .
Jerry Pournelle, paraphrased from memory;