writers earnings

Sundog Rising!

Reflections on living the life literary by the Urban Sundog

Earning the Big Bucks

There was a feature article in the newspaper lately about how much money the average Canadian writer makes.

If you’re vastly successful? Expect about $10,000 a year.

Once I stopped laughing, I remembered a different article I read on the Internet a few months back. It said that the average successful American writer could expect to make $12,000 a year. Presumably in US funds. So once again our cousins to the south leave us in the dust! Not that we’re really choking over it much in this case.

But the other issue the American article pointed out was that writers could expect to earn less money as they got better at their craft over their careers. Say what?

Apparently as writers become more technically proficient and imaginative at their craft, they become less “readable” in the popular sense. Therefore the better you get, the less you earn.

The thing to do to really make the cash is to rapidly achieve a degree of vaguely accessible mediocrity and then never waver from that the rest of your life. Stand fast!

As I make no money from my writing at the moment, I can only hope that that means I went from incompetent to pretty good somehow bypassing the mediocre stage where you actually earn a living. I think there was a month or so, back in 2003 …

It’s a weird thing. I could have said, it’s a weird craft, or it’s a weird business, but you see, there’s the rub.

When you sit down to write, for most people it’s an attempt at artistic expression. You have a story to craft, to tell in the most compelling way you hope you can manage. And in the process you make the practice an outlet for your personal and creative self discovery.

When you sit down to read, it’s a business. There’s a lot of books out there. Publishers want to make sure the ones they’re putting out are the ones you purchase to indulge your entertainment passion.

So when the writer and the publisher come together, two contradictory impulses have to find common ground for the relationship to go anywhere. The publisher isn’t really interested in your journey to self discovery unless it’s profitable in the sales column. Perhaps you’d like to compromise that drive to discover your true imaginative voice and mode of expression in return for a little practical marketing then, hmm …?

There’s maybe 10,000 bucks in it for you if we can find the right middling effort. But for God’s sake, don’t go getting good on us.

However, if you’re a second rate goalie, defenceman, or forward in the National Hockey League employed by a mediocre team that practically never makes the playoffs year after year, we’ll offer you millions.

Let’s not go there.

*****

REALITY FICTION AND BEYOND!

You know what it’s like when you get one of those fat Russian novels stuck in your head and you just can’t get it out of your mind? “Anna Makerena” concludes on Monday, while we find out who the winners are on Friday, March 27th. Reality Fiction Three: The Interrupted Edition continues at:

http://realficone.blogspot.ca/

Tea. Lust. Intrigue. Talking about God. Opera. Must be Russian.

Episodes to Date:

Episode One: Dante-Ish — Mak’s Inferno

Episode Two: Chaucer-Ish — The Hermit’s Tale

Episode Three: Malory-Ish — Le Morte de Mak

Episode Four: Doyle-Ish — Mak the Kipper

Episode Five: Carroll-Ish — Madelyn in Wonderland

Episode Six: Stoker-Ish — The Down For The Count Shimmy

Episode Seven: Tolstoy-Ish — Anna Makerena

All with illustrations by the author. Working through the Contestants in order of their appearance. But there’s been some problems with the scanner, so appearances may be deceiving.