Publishing Field Report 0

Intro to a series of forthcoming posts relating my experience of 20 years in writing and publishing in an attempt to illuminate the business and process-related aspects of building a literary career

No matter who you ask, it’s pretty clear that no one has a real handle of what’s going on in the publishing industry in recent years. Especially for literary writers, it appears the options one has when it comes to forging a path for a career—much less just making work because you love to—have become as opaque as ever, a condition that should seem strange given the once romanticized democratizing possibilities of the internet and its tools.

Whereas even as recently as a decade ago, there used to be hundreds if not thousands of venues running the gamut from bedroom-based micro chapbook press to the big five, recently it seems there are fewer and fewer reputable/sustainable entities of any stripe. Magazines have suffered a similar fate, including not only the shutdown or tapering off of longstanding institutions but a relative lessening of new venues and opportunities.

The presses that do survive often seem overloaded to the point of rupture, forcing submissions windows open and close within hours out of a year; and given the glut of rising authors coming from MFA programs, there’s more demand than ever to be seen, resulting in what has begun to feel like the opposite of a free-for-all. More than ever, it would seem like you really have to get lucky on top of having time and will to do with work, and good luck surviving in the meantime, given how tight and irregular the rates and timelines of payments are even coming from publications considered dependable.

Have we finally entered an era where the artist is expendable to anyone but themselves? Considering the rate of replacement, the narrowing of truly independently run ventures, and the general low stakes of literature in general in competition with more easily consumed media, it’d be challenge to argue against the fact that no matter what your level of accomplishment or skill, it’s as difficult a time to ‘make it’ as a writer as it has ever been.

How can this be so? It’s inarguably easier than ever to launch a website, to work from home and own your time, to get access to texts and resources—so then why does it feel like we all have our heads clamped in a vice? What makes us, as artists, willing to bow down and take it on the face for a chance at the slice of a bigger pie that even the baker seems to have realistically limited investment in? Is it simply something to be chalked up to the general trend of monocorporatization alongside the degradation of working-class living standards? Where yet might we find hope for something more than an echo chamber co-opted by suits? Is the novel dead, or is the real assault taking place in our own attentions?

Like most any working writer with a pulse, these sorts of thoughts have been an all-but unavoidable part of my consciousness in recent years. Having spent most of the 2010s working my way up publishing as much as possible, I reached levels of success I wouldn’t have ever expected when I began—publishing multiple books with major houses, being published or reviewed widely and in elite-tier institutions, even eventually making a sort of a living off my work. So why then, after spending the bulk of my adult life in pursuit of the dream and eventually finding what most others would call success, do I find myself questioning everything I’ve ever done, often furiously so, to the point of wondering why worry about publishing at all? If the writing is the point, and the source of the joy, and the business part is a tightening vice, why keep conflating the two? Is it really worth learning to wear two hats, or is the exchange of personal momentum for public visibility worth it in the long run?

In general, I think I’ve learned to live with this imbalance; to have accepted it as an unnecessary but patent problem, if one that with sustained effort and ambition, I’ve managed to surpass. The real problem, for me, is more systemic—if even I’m struggling to hang on in a suffocating system, how could other authors earlier on in their career ever manage to find nourishment and support? Are we doomed to sit here and continue watching the slow backsliding, until eventually no one even remembers, much less cares, about the free press and its necessity for the evolution the language and literary culture, hand in hand? What would I do now, knowing what I know, if I had to start over?

One thing I do know about a broken system is that silence and inaction breeds decay. Alongside the proliferation of digital access, a whirlwind of sources and feedback have created a kind of echo chamber around the practice of creating, quickly turning any whiff of aesthetic inquiry into one that should be monetized, co-opted into image. Rather than unionizing like film writers, literary writers tend to pull the ladder up behind them, likely because the answer to “how one makes it these days” has no one answer, nor even a recruitable path besides the bottom line of needing intense fortitude in equal part to mere aesthetics such as craft, practice, and approach.

Over the coming months, in an attempt to open source some light toward transparency therein, I’m going to use this “Publishing Field Report” column here on Dividual to share and explore what I’ve learned from 20 years of writing and publishing as a full-time pursuit. I’ll begin with how I got into writing in the first place, how I developed a practice, my approach to publishing and how it developed, and how I created both space and time for the work alongside making a living.

Following that, I’ll share my experience with agents and editors, including breaking down the ups and downs of my experience with a variety of micro and major publications and presses one by one. At the end, I’ll attempt to draw some conclusions about how standards have changed and how others might approach their own work and careers, as well as some ideas toward improving the whole, building community, and increasing awareness of the challenges and pleasures of living as a working writer.

Though some posts will be for paid subscribers only, as much for my own privacy as anything, I’ll aim to make the most applicable posts available to all. I encourage interested readers to submit questions along the way and I will do my best to answer as many as specifically as possible. Despite the ever presence of strangling bullshit, I’d argue that there’s also never been a better or more ripe time for literary innovation than right now; the pendulum has swung far enough to the right, and all that’s really wanting in forcing it back toward the upside is the weight of those who aren’t waiting to be bought off. Perhaps the real question is: What are you in for?