Guardian Family: Confessions of a Full Time Mother

[morningpaper]

Confessions of a Full Time Mother

"Kirsty Gunn is not working on her next novel. She is not a columnist for the London Review of Books. She has chosen instead to disappear from the professional world and embrace a domestic life just as rich and interesting and inspiring ... "

PAH! She's opted out of the professional world - well except for this article and the book she has just written about her "year as a full time mum" - full time that is, except for the 30 hours a week that her children are at school in which I presume she fannies about writing drivel like this.

At first I thought it was an ironic joke, but sadly not. Perhaps she is friends with that woman who survived the concentration-camp conditions of Fulham after that breeze blew her wooden grapes off the sideboard...

sdd was a baby at 12, and still really at 14. At 15 she is, as ds puts it, 'a lady', but she's still lovely and ds feels just the same about her as he did when she was tiny.

Xenia's comment re: writers' earnings... '

Oops... pressed post message instead of paste - hang on a mo...

Xenia's comments re writers' earnings 'I once saw a list of authors' earnings, really quite famous people and it was shockingly low, much lower than you'd expect for people with this supposed "fame".'

I know the husband of a not-very-famous author - Sally Prue - and apparently she recently received £75,000 for the film rights to her first book. (She's written 5 or 6 altogether and has earned quite a reasonable amount from the actual books already.)

That's not exactly poverty stricken, is it?

fortyplus - it's not exactly poverty-stricken, but not exactly typical.

And there was I thinking I'd start writing kids' stories...

Some of Sally's are weird to say the least. he first one is 'Cold Tom' - that's the one she's had the most money for.

I bet loads of parents think that at some point they can give up their job and write stories for children. It's actually one of the most competitive and difficult ends of the publishing market and hugely hard to get into or sustain a career in. And even when you do, it's very poorly paid.

So's writing romance fiction - but it's FUN(NY).

And that lady with the blog from the North was given £70k for her first book - yes I know there are a few good deals. I can't remember the amounts I read but it might have been £50k or something for someone who is a "good" writer and copies of books sold was not very high, many fewer than you'd think despite publicity.

The thing is with writers' earnings is that they are as potentially variable as actors' earnings, musicians' earnings, craftspeople's earnings... A lucky minority get a hit of some sort, either by completely random chance, or having an original idea that somehow fits in with the mood of the majority. A larger number make a reasonably steady but not enormous living out of whateveritis. And an awful lot more make a few quid here and there, with the occasional bigger paycheck that keeps them striving.
But none of it has anything to do with either superb ablity or how much effort you expend, unfortunately.

Quite right madamez - no correlation between effort and earnings. If only writers got performance-related pay! (rather than sales-related.)

Xenia - publicists always talk up writers' deals anyway! It sounds better to say "a six-figure deal". In the US there is a system of "coded" descriptions for deals in partcular income brackets - e.g. "nice deal" means a certain range, "very nice deal" another, and so on. It's not quite the same here.

'A lucky minority get a hit of some sort, either by completely random chance, or having an original idea that somehow fits in with the mood of the majority.'

Or they know someone in the industry who works to their advantage . . .

Not many authors get to sell film rights! Most are just poor and miserable and intense and spend years re-writing the same boring book over and over again until their editor is happy and then they've earnt about 7k a year

rubbish job

The article I read in effect it had a couple of "famous" writers who were earning less from their writing than I was earning from my bit on the side dull commercial type writing. But I don't suppose most people write novels for the money but because they enjoy it. The starving writer the garrett isn't a myth.

Although many of the are not starving, because they have a rich hubby earning a whack-off City salary while they indulge their little "hobby" at home, and that 7k a year is just right for paying Tilly and Humphrey's school fees. No pressure to be "main earner."

I think I'm right in saying that Sally Prue was working full time as a teacher when she wrote her first 2 novels. Her husband worked for the same company that I did before children - so I would imagine that he's on a slightly better than average salary, but by no means a highly paid city type.

Of course I can't comment on writers in general, though a friend of dh's is best pals with Michael Morpurgo, who seems to be quite comfortably off.

Maybe it's only children's authors who get paid decent money?

'Maybe it's only children's authors who get paid decent money? '

I think Stephen King and Ian Rankin would beg to differ .

expat - well I did put a

I think 40+ was joking.

But Michael Morpurgo is bound to be doing well - he sells well and was the Children's Laureate. I'm sure Jacqueline Wilson is doing very well for herself too, and Philip Pullman. But that's the problem - everyone can name 4 or 5 "known" writers who are comfortable. It's those languishing in the more obscure sections of the bookshelves who need our support, and our royalties - some of them are literally living under the minimum wage.

Had you heard of Sally Prue?

So did I .

FWIW, Stephen King was supported by his wife's teacher's salary for a while.

He felt pretty lousy abuot that, though.

I wonder if Xenia would say that he was prostituting himself to her? Or is it ok because he's a man?

I hadn't heard of Sally Prue. Anyone who gets a film deal is doing "exceptionordinarily" well.

I think she was quite amazed herself! It is a strange little tale in print - I could imagine it translating quite well to the screen. Her husband has been - to use an expression I hate - 'gobsmacked' at her success. She didn't start writing until her forties.

I never said there was anything wrong with prostitution by the way. It's one of the most transparent transactions there is and a proper use of the free market and often given women the only route to power and money they have.