gabriellefaust.com
twitter.com/Gabrielle_Faust
facebook.com/gabrielle.faust
myspace.com/gsfaust
cafepress.com/GabrielleFaust
The Starving Author Diet
January 13th, 2009 by Gabrielle Faust received 10 Comments »
The Starving Author Diet
by Gabrielle S. Faust
Being an working author is not a glamorous job. Anyone who tells you differently is lying through their teeth. Long hours by yourself behind a computer laboring away on articles, short stories, essays and novels, half of which will not see the light of day while the other half we receive very little compensation for. The average article a writer crafts, which could take up to a week to research and write, will only receive $20 to $40. Barely enough money to fill up your gas tank. But we are recklessly committed to our passions enough to accept the fact that in order to be a working author, we must make tremendous financial sacrifices. We are content, we are happy so long as we are able to write. Or so that used to be the case. In this new world economy it has become increasingly hard for the author (and any other artist for that matter) to making a living off of their talents, as meager of a living as it may be. Magazines and websites are being forced to cut back on the number of articles they can accept from their freelancers due to the fact that advertising revenues are at an all-time low. Yes, the new American Great Depression is making it all but impossible for the working author to keep a roof over their head or food on the table. It’s a terrifying time to exist in this country for anyone, but when your livelihood is based on the number articles you write per month and that number has suddenly been slashed in half or worse, it’s a predicament that has forced many a great writer to have to turn their back on their passion in order to save themselves from homelessness.
I was just speaking with a good friend of mine the other day about this situation. He is an award winning horror author and a columnist for several predominant sci fi and horror publications and even he is feeling the crunch all to poignantly. We kidded about being on the “starving author diet” and washing our clothes in the bathtub to save money at the laundry-mat (seriously, we do this). In an iPhone-Bluetooth-XBox world, it’s hard enough to keep people engaged in the written word without the economy forcing us to retire our pens. But, in truth, what else would we writers do today? There are no other jobs for us out there. There are no jobs, period. We are over-qualified for the menial tasks (which don’t pay more than minimum wage these days anyways) and not “corporate” enough for the higher paying jobs. In other words, many of us have developed reputations in the genres we are committed to, which are befuddling to the straight-laced, white-tie corporate world. They instantly deem us “weird” or “unstable” simply because of our dedication to writing horror or science fiction. So, where do we authors fit and what will become of us in the years to come? I know that there is no other place for me. I am writer and will continue to write no matter what the economy or the world tells me otherwise, even if it means losing another 5 pounds on the “starving author diet” before it’s all said and done…
Tags: economy, jobs, life, starving artist, writing
Posted under: A Word From Gabrielle Faust
I feel your pain immensely! I am a starving writer, currently I am in the US Army, been in for 5 years already and it is my source of income as meager as it is, it’s a living. I don’t care if I ever get paid a cent for my writing, it is a strong passion of mine that I couldn’t stop if I wanted to. Just know that I sympathize with you.
Yes, it’s a strange world for we authors right now. I just keep thinking about what writers and artists used to go through during the times of the Great Depression. But I’ve heard that the depression we are going through right now is in many ways much worse than the original one because we have so much more to lose and it is far harder to survive now that everything is so expensive.
Honestly, at this point Gabrielle, I’d be thrilled to get a minimum wage job! Of course, things today are nowhere near as bad as they were during the Great Depression (when unemployment was as high as 24%) – yet. To be sure, the job situation is still agonizing, but let’s be honest and admit that it could be (and could get) much worse.
I feel your pain as well. I graduate from college in a few months, and am facing the very real prospect of having to live out of my car for an indeterminate period of time just so I can afford to feed myself. I still find the time, energy, and spirit to write, somehow; maybe it’s blind stubbornness, but I can’t imagine ever having to “give up” being a writer.
I know what you mean! I’ve been told I’m over-qualified for the minimum wage jobs, but even then, those jobs wouldn’t pay my bills. So it’s a lose-lose situation. Of course it could be worse. It can ALWAYS be worse. It’s just a time of adjustment for the American, and world, economy. That’s why I’m interested to see what other artists and writers are doing to keep themselves afloat until the tides turn. I’ve been freelancing wherever I can, but even that is drying up because of marketing budgets being slashed left and right. Marketing is always the first department to get slashed…
And I’m the contrarian in the group, a classical musician. I am poised to do better than ever this year because I’ve been reframing my thoughts about my career and my possible market. I’ve also been using other skills I’ve learned in my field to develop music projects that are going to make me long-term passive income. Through networking I’ve found people to help me develop my ideas and get these projects off the ground, and I expect my income to double.
The fact is, large corporations are on their way out, something I’ve been saying for at least five years. We’re all going to be in small businesses, and it’s up to us to figure out how this market provides us with opportunities disguised as problems. If magazine budgets are being slashed because revenues are down, it’s time to put your creativity to work and imagine what new market that will open for you. If marketing dollars are drying up, how does that work to your advantage?
People will always need writing and all the other arts: as the economy becomes worse, more people will turn to escapist fiction; more people will want to improve their home environments as they will spend more time there; more people will want to provide their own entertainment, which means learning how to do lots of things, which means a great market for things like basic cookbooks, basic skills manuals, etc. This doesn’t even include family reading time! So shake all those negative thoughts out of your head and let your imagination run free–if you’re starving, what would to pay money to read? There’s your opportunity in this market.
I apologize if anyone is offended by these comments but I’m trying to help you see things in a different way so that you’ll be more successful. I’ve earned quite a bit from writing this year and expect to do much, much better financially than I have in a long time, both from writing and music.
I don’t disagree with you. It is the time to reinvent ourselves as creatives in the new economy. I think I said as much in an earlier response this week. That is why I really started this discussion, to see what other people were doing. As I’ve mentioned, I freelance where I can and spend half of my day every day looking for new avenues to tap into to make money. I ran my own design business for 4 years so I know how to network. The problem, I think, now is that 1) people have been blindsided by layoffs and other economic disasters which have left many of us, myself included, in a precarious predicament and 2) there is no outside surplus of funding to start independent ventures.
Great post. I actually just started a blog which is essentially focused on this topic, from a musician’s perspective (Corey Coleman’s Starving Artist Survival Blog – coreycoleman.blogspot.com). I’m sort of at that threshold of either being completely reckless and living out of my car in a city more favorable to creative types or getting a “real job”. If only this were the 18th century and the patronage system was still intact!
Hopefully the end result of all of this for artists will be a tighter-knit community and a more vigilantly cooperative environment! The internet is probably a big part of the solution.
Indeed, I wish that patronage was still alive and well! Who knows, maybe with this new turn of economic depression that will become stylish amongst the ultra wealthy again!
We artists can be hopeful! 
Hello. Great job. I did not expect this today. This is a great story. Thanks!
I never thought about it this way. Thanks for the new point of view.