Have your children ever had a writer in school?

[UnquietDad]

Did your child find it worthwhile?
if they did - please tell the head/G&T person over and over and bang on about how much they got out of it.

I think I may have talked about this last year, before I did it. Very successfully became part of a small team last year, doing Writing In Schools sessions with Y5. The kids loved it and did some great writing.

The school paid out of its G&T budget although we didn't exclusively always work with G&T. The Children's & Young People's Directorate of the LA helped us out with admin and getting schools involved. This year, they have not, so it's been up to us to contact the schools we want to work with, including those we have worked with before. I'm currently feeling like a double-glazing salesman and it's all going down like a cup of cold vomit.

I emailed 4 schools and have been making follow-up phone calls this week.

School A's G&T person wasn't there but I left my number and asked for a call back.

School B said straight away that they couldn't afford it. But budget comes in April so they will let me know if there is a change. Rrrright...

School C responded as if I were speaking in Serbo-Croat and their secretary seemed to display excessive dimness, not having any recollection at all of my email. I have sent the info again.

School D's secretary was a dragon - very short with me and said "if it came through I would have sent it to the relevant person." She VERY grudgingly acceded to my request for the head to get back to me.

What is it with these people??!

Problem is, nobody seems to believe it! They know (or can work out) that JKR earned about 6 million a year from UK royalties from her last book alone, and so they think lesser writers might be on about 1% of that, i.e. £60K... if only!!

£6,000,000???
Crikey

She signed some books for me years ago. I wonder if I should sell them.

I'm guessing, based on sales and likely royalties. Her personal fortune is far in excess of that, what with backlist sales and film/merchandising deals.

But even a "successful" author who's a bit more in touch with reality - say, Iain Banks or Terry Pratchett or Joanna Trollope or Ian Rankin - will be to the average author as, say, the head of the board of Waitrose would be to one of their shop-floor supervisors.

JKR is the richest woman in the UK isnt she? Richer than the queen?

But anyway, what i was going to say is about 30 years ago, when i was about 8 years old, we had Joan Lingard come to read to us and answer questions and i've never, ever forgotton it to this day.
I also remember once our teacher, who was an utterly jaded old cow, was off sick and so we were put in with the class up from us. The fantastic teacher read us a poem about plums in an icebox which i have also never forgotton, well i cant remember the whole poem obviously but i was amazed that someone would do this.

For Smum

This Is just to Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

William Carlos Williams

This one?

This is just to say
by William Carlos Williams

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

------
Yeah. Never been quite sure about that one. I mean...

write it out
without
the linebreaks
and it's
not
so great

anyone
can write
modern
poetry

And who
keeps plums
in an "icebox"
anyway?!

You got there first, barbarian!

barbarian, at publishers' skivvies!

Actually dh signed his first ever book contract last week, and I was at just how pitiful the amounts actually were. Admittedly this is a kids' book, non-fiction and heavily packaged with images, but even so. We could just about have a week in Cornwall on the proceeds, but definitely not anywhere warm that isn't a cheap package to Benidorm.

Congrats to Mr Frogs.

Yes, for some reason writers are the lowest in the food-chain. We, the people without whom there would be no publishing "industry" to speak of. For some reason it's OK to fob us off with less money than the tea-boy. I've never quite understood that.

oh thanks barb and unquiet, was hopinhg someone would do that! I remembered the bit at the end 'so sweet and so cold' think it was supposed to be a note someone had left for someone else thats why it doesnt look like much if you write it out without the breaks. 'icebox' was a very exotic word to me when i heard it !
lovely, thanks again, am going to print it out for DD1

I heard it as a child too smum and I remember being astonished at the glamour of plums for breakfast.

Dh is being stalked by a professional association who would like him to write them a book gratis Frogs
Not even a day trip to Bognor in prospect

A whole book?
I have just said I will not do a story for an anthology gratis. The request arrived on Christmas Eve and hoped I would be inspired over the holiday.
Flippin' cheek.

Since first being professionally published in 1993, I have written for free on two occasions - both for charity anthologies, because I knew the editor and supported the cause. I wouldn't do it in any other circumstances.

So have I done it in the past for children's charities but it is a very grey area re. translation rights, pb. reprints etc.
Also my agent told me that for the last charity anthology she was asked to find writers for the person who put it all together asked for and got a £50,000 fee saying they could not do all that work for nothing.
The editorial staff etc. who work on these anthologies do not contribute their time for nothing.

Oh I never knew that about authors getting (small) royalties on books lent from public libraries: that's interesting and heartening to learn - and makes me feel less guilty when we borrow a book rather than buying it

It's a tiny amount though! 5p on a hardback as opposed to 10% of the cover price.

A related matter - is anyone else on the Arts Jobs emailing list from the Arts Council and finding it utterly useless? I get about 25 messages in my Inbox from them every day, and half of them are for VOLUNTEER playwrights, translators, radio station minions etc. The rest are for short-term contracts in dance and stuff, usually based in either London or Brighton. I'm starting to think I'm not their target audience.

Try the National Assoc of Writers in Education (NAWE)
You can use their artists' search for suitable writers (humour, poetry etc)

Check this guy out
www.wordsmith-features.com

Alright, yes, it's me...

Well, I've got an author coming in just after half term to do two one-hour workshops with my keen readers/writers.

I've discussed it with her over the phone. UQD, Wordsmithy, anyone else:
What do you think I might have forgotten to tell her?

What are the most important things a visiting author needs to know for such an event?

(We had a guest speaker - unpaid volunteer - local independent bookshop manager - in to do 30 mins session with reading club last week, and she was fab).

Wordsmithy - crikey teaching teenagers to write humour: that's a tall order!

Do the students in your workshops produce some good material?

Once the myth is dispelled that writing is only for the gifted, they nearly all write something good. They then read out their work.
Never ceases to amaze me what they can do, if they just try.

UnquietDad - we had our author in today, and were very disappointed with her: I haven't yet decided how I am going to feedback to her.

It was a huge effort for me to put this on and organise it, and right now I don't feel like ever attempting anything similar again.

But in case I do, how could I go about finding a good author?

I had a reference recommending this woman!

Roisin, it is a bit cheeky but can I ask

1. What she did.
2. What you expected her to do.

Booktrust have a list of authors who will do author visits.