There are several varieties of maples, and
what I suspect is a Siberian elm, overhanging my small Toronto garden
and they are currently dropping thousands of seed pods. As I sweep up
pounds of whirligigs and confetti from the ground, the writer in me – or
perhaps it is the parsimonious Presbyterian – wonders if I cannot turn
this unlooked-for bounty into a metaphor for our culture.
It was a hard winter for some plants – the
ivy, usually so hardy, has half died away. I’ve often heard that trees
put out more seeds or cones when under stress, as though to ensure the
survival of the next generation even as they are dying. How do you
explain to consumers flooded with stuff that even as the digital miracle
produces more images, more text and more music than they could ever
possibly appreciate in a whole lifetime of looking and listening, our
culture is actually suffering real distress?
Writers
have long worried about the impact of e-books, online retailing,
self-publishing and industry mergers on their livelihoods. I’ve
speculated that internationally, we are heading toward a literary
culture divided between self-published wannabes and mega-bestsellers,
with less and less room for the mid-list.
That
poses a particularly acute problem for Canada because this is already a
smaller market and one that tends to produce literary novels rather
than genre fiction. Increasingly the anecdotes have poured in about that
respected Canadian novelist turning to teaching; this one trying her
hand at screenwriting.
Now the Writers’
Union of Canada (TWUC) is confirming what we’ve all suspected. It sent
out a survey to its members (who have all published at least one book
commercially) and almost half responded: Over all, the writers’ incomes
from writing have dropped 27 per cent since the last time they were
surveyed, in 1998.
Their average annual income from writing is now less
than $13,000 and half report they are working harder than before to make
the money. American and British surveys have reported similar drops.
Read more: Despite an explosion of e-publishing, Writers’ Union survey finds incomes have dropped - The Globe and Mail
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