Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).
increasingly being an academic feels like working for an anxious business
I wouldn't give up anything yet, but do your best to research the possibilities parallel with your current work. It may indeed mean, as pocossin suggested, finding new ways to be creative in your present job as one outcome. However, there's no reason why you can't explore more deeply the routes to freelance work. Sure, this could increase the work load in the short-term but it's worth it in the end.
If you want to write books, look at exactly what the few large legit publishers still in business are publishing now.
In fact, I have written two published novels and have an agent for the next.
Publishing is a mess. I have huge problems with it as an industry. My first novel was rejected 14 times for not being enough like some other novel which had sold well. Sometimes I feel they may as well be selling soap. Thank you Trojina, you're right, I am not an ingenu in this. If I did it, I would have made very sure I had enough financial stability while ceasing to work full time. It is the sense of not having a stable source not just of income but actually of support which would trouble me.
Being an academic these days is very, very difficult to do creatively. I could dance on my desk after hours but honestly it would feel more like a nervous breakdown than a moment of creative self-expression.
My first novel was rejected 14 times for not being enough like some other novel which had sold well.
Completely agree with your thoughts.
I'd only reiterate an alternative view on the subject of publishing as a mess. I'd agree, that would be so, even ten years ago. But not now. I'd even say, there's never been a better time to get into writing/publishing. Why? Because the publishing business - like the music biz - has been going through a complete technological revolution mostly via e-books and self-publishing and blogging platforms. There are those now who have self-published, marketed, advertised and set up their own blogs and who have made a nice bundle whilst being creative to boot. Many have then got snapped up by the publishing houses. This is happening a lot.
So, while there's reasons to be very jaundiced about the publishing of old, we are in a different world now, where in some ways, the industry is having to adapt to writers rather than the other way around.
Of course, there are many "if's" and "but's" of all kinds ... but if you've published before then by-pass the publishing houses all together this time around and self-publish along with a blog platform. if your project is appealing - even to a niche audience - you'll be surprised how big an opportunity this could be.
Apologies if this is all obvious to you - I thought I'd just get it out there just in case and for others reading this thread in the future.
Thank you, Topal. Some of that I had thought about it but is so helpful to have it reiterated and developed - now is a time of collapse and possibility simultaneously I guess. The old system does feel decadent. Even my agent is basically in service to fashion - there's little sense of representing a writer for their own sake.
I think I'm having a bit of a hexagram 21 moment actually - just in the sense that I am feeling that nowadays we all are on this highly bourgeois treadmill based around mortgages. I feel one has to differentiate necessity and desire. I have already made the decision not to have children, as I never grew up wanting them. In return for a less biologically complete life (in one very limited sense!) I hope to have a measure of freedom from that treadmill. I don't want to hand my life over to an institution any more, but I know people who would say to that, "Who do you think you are!?"
Clarity,
Office 17622,
PO Box 6945,
London.
W1A 6US
United Kingdom
Phone/ Voicemail:
+44 (0)20 3287 3053 (UK)
+1 (561) 459-4758 (US).