Let’s Be Honest – ‘Marry Well’ Is Still The Best Advice For Writers

After working in the publishing industry this past decade, and being an author myself, one of the first things I love to do when I open a novel is flip to the “acknowledgements” page, usually at the back of the book. Quite often, there’ll be a notably personal line to someone, which reads something along the lines of: “Without you, this book would never have happened.” This is to celebrate that person.

In a 2021 Irish Times interview, author and book reviewer Sarah Gilmartin discussed the precarious nature of being a freelance writer and how it can be tricky to “stay afloat”. She spoke of receiving grants from the Arts Council and also mentioned her husband has a “good job”. The interviewer, Niamh Donnelly, said her partner, similarly, had a good job.

I know several writers who have partners working in law, construction and medicine. I know they met them through fortuitous romantic alignment and I have no doubt they are very much in love. However, for a writer, this is possibly the happiest accident that can occur. As Donnelly states, tongue in cheek, in her article: “We conclude that ‘marry well’ might be the best advice for a budding freelancer.”

This line made me smile with its Jane Austen undertones, as if all writers should be like Mrs Bennet, seeking rich suitors, because advances of a few thousand won’t pay the bills, any more than £5,000 would’ve sustained the five Bennet sisters. One could almost write, “It’s a truth universally acknowledged …”

And yet, it isn’t funny. Writing is a tough game. Words Ireland, supported by The Arts Council of Ireland, did a 2021 survey of pay, conditions and diversity in Irish literature. This paragraph, in particular, made for sobering reading:

“The median gross income earned in 2019 by Emerging, Mid-career and Established writers and illustrators from their creative work in 2019 was €500. This means that half of them earned less than this. The median for Mid-career and Established writers and illustrators who might be expected to earn a substantial portion of their annual income from their creative work was €2,000.”

What this means in real terms is most writers earn less than minimum wage for the hours they invest in their work. From my time working in the publishing industry, I know that the average advance on a work of fiction will be a few thousand euro, based on possibly thousands of hours of work. Statistics over the past decade show this is not an improving situation. Because of this, grants, bursaries and writing retreats matter and thankfully there have been good increases in the number of supports from agencies. However, the pot is small and there are a lot of mouths to feed, which makes Donnelly’s words wise rather than humorous.

[ Irish Writers’ Union issues pay scales to address low incomesOpens in new window ]

This financial issue hits literary writers most of all. They may get lauded for their great novels but as the sales don’t always match those of their more commercial counterparts they aren’t immune to the financial realities of life. Award-winning writer Donal Ryan, in a candid interview in 2018, had this to say: “Most writers struggle their whole lives. It’s a tough business.” The bottom line is, established writers can no more live on “exposure” than those at the outset of their careers.

This is not a new story. Ernest Hemingway would not have had the time to write were it not for the rich women he was involved with. Marcel Proust would never have written In Search of Lost Time without generational wealth. James Joyce often took money from others, with little intention of repaying it. So often, the artist relies on someone close to them who is either wealthy or somehow grounded in a practical sense.

Civic patronage is a millenniums-old practice. However, the most significant unsung support is domestic patronage. And maybe it’s time to put those “Acknowledgements” on the first page of all published novels, not that back page. It’s time for a few bronze plaques for these supportive family members. Because the truth is, great books are not written by single artists, somehow self-supporting, as if semidivine figures, immune to the practicalities of life.

As Michel de Montaigne wrote: “On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.” None of us mortal humans escapes reality. Some may be looking at the stars while they stand in the gutter with the rest of humanity. But they won’t be looking up for long if someone doesn’t maintain the gutter.

[ The English woman who bankrolled James JoyceOpens in new window ]

If you are to become a writer, particularly a literary one, it is doubtful yours will be the primary income in the household. Unless you have a second position, possibly as an academic, it’s unlikely you’ll be approved for a mortgage or even for a personal loan. Most writers live without knowing how they will financially survive in three or four months’ time, not unlike Wilkins Micawber in David Copperfield, forever trusting “something will turn up”. Yet, it’s exhausting to live in this way.

I believe it would be an intolerable way to live if I didn’t have my husband, who does not work in the arts, who deeply values what I do and reassures me in my fearful moments, “Don’t be worrying. We’ll be fine.” I know what he means by that. If all else fails, he has my back. I am yet to avail of that fallback plan, and do all I can to avoid it. However, I cannot underemphasise how that feeling of security matters.

I would never advise anyone, writer or otherwise, to pick their partner for mercenary reasons. To do so would be a path to misery. However, if you possibly can, try not to fall in love with another artist. I’m thinking of Amy March in Little Women (in the 1995 film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s book) who, when challenged by her sister about her declaration that she will be “disgustingly rich” when married, replies: “Well, it isn’t like being stuck with the dreadful nose you get. One does have a choice to whom one loves.”

I understand the temptation might be there to date another writer. You may have romantic notions you’ll spend your evenings cuddled up together discussing the latest Murakami. You won’t. You’ll both spend your time worrying about if your application or latest manuscript will provide income that will keep the wolf from the door for yet another day. Because “something will turn up” is a fragile belief to sustain over financially challenging decades, and nothing ruins creativity like anxiety.

[ From the archive: Writers need time – here’s how to beg, borrow or steal itOpens in new window ]

In a way, I offer no solution to this conundrum. If there were solutions, I think minds brighter than my own would’ve come up with them by now. In fact, they have done their best with bursaries, grants, retreats, et cetera. Yet this article is not to simply bemoan the challenges of being a writer but to celebrate those who support artists. We likely wouldn’t have Joyce or Hemingway or Woolf if it weren’t for the patient, long-suffering supporters in their lives. They provided the love, the stability and the financial security that allowed these greats to take practical risks, the benefits we and future generations will continue to experience.

My only practical advice for emerging writers is this. It isn’t where to look for love, but where not to look for it: book launches. Because it is a truth universally acknowledged that single writers looking for love should avoid other writers.

Jamie O’Connell is a writer who, with his husband, John Hallissey, owns Bean & Batch in Kenmare, Co Kerry @beanandbatchkenmare on Instagram