Wednesday, May 19, 2010

No Long Term Career for Authors

In literature it makes no sense to talk of 'a career' in the sense of a life that can be managed by the exercise of prudent thought. Writers who flourish at the peak of their powers for longer than a decade, or even two, are rare birds. ... There are exceptions. Writers who work in a genre, John le CarrĂ© for example, or PD James, are more likely to sustain a run of quality and a sequence of winners. 
Robert McCrum on The Guardian blog examines the reality of an author's long-term publishing prospects and it's quite depressing.

4 comments:

Admin said...

I always admire authors and writers (especially women) who have the perseverence...which I don't think I can cahallenge. Your blog is a challenge to my mind. Help to inspire me...

Ellen Whyte said...

Writing to make a decent income is tough though: unless you are lucky enough to be promoted by a big company.

Hey thanks for putting up the notice!

bibliobibuli said...

thanks Noranimah - glad i'm helping to challenge your mind - that's a real compliment.

Au and Target - it is hard work. i never managed to do more than earn some nice pocket money writing, yet the mental effort put a big strain on my little brain!

if you're writing genre fiction rather than literary fiction you might find this article somewhat comforting.

Anonymous said...

There's no long-term for actors or singers or footballers either, but they seem to do quite well for themselves after they retire.