Gordon Haber

What does the fox pay? Image: NYPL Digital Gallery

Here’s Alison Lurie writing on Fay Weldon for the NYRB:

“There are now over three hundred college writing programs in the United States. But no matter how much the population increases, people will not need more writers: they can all read multiple copies of the same books. As a result of this imbalance, only about one percent of graduates from writing programs go on to write for a living, whereas 90 percent of medical school graduates become self-supporting doctors.”

There’s a lot to unpack in that paragraph–it’s impressive how many things Lurie gets wrong in three sentences. But I want to talk about the “one percent of graduates from writing programs [who] go on to write for a living.”

Is that the measure of success as a writer?

Because I can think of one colleague who supports himself with writing. He’s a good writer and he had a giant fluke hit. Everybody else–save for those with wealthy families or high-earning spouses–have some kind of day job: teaching, editing, playing poker, etc.

When I lived in LA, success was defined by a very simple metric: the writers making money were successful, the writers who weren’t, weren’t. But outside of Hollywood, thank goodness, the idea of success is murkier.

I spent a long time feeling bad because I didn’t earn a living through writing. Until I realized that I was (a) writing (b) publishing and (c) getting paid for it. These simple facts put me ahead of 85-90% of American writers.

I don’t point that out to be competitive (although I am a competitive SOB). I’m only saying that I released myself from a lot of unhappiness by understanding that almost nobody makes a living from writing, and if that’s your standard of success, you’re setting yourself up for misery.