Why Am I In This Handbasket?

I love the world of Pern and it's characters. I have read almost all of the books and I also own the People of Pern art book. This is a truly amazing work with portraits of all the major and a lot of the minor characters from the series. The original of Master Harper Robinton was purchased by Anne McCaffrey and has a place of honor in her home. If you like Pern at all then you really should see if your local library has this and go drool.

I say local library and not a bookstore or Amazon because I don't think I'll be spending any money on anything Pern related anymore unless it's used and the money won't be going to the McCaffreys.

I say the McCaffreys and not Anne because, while I still like and admire the author, her son, who seems to be managing the business end of things now, is an ass and I really don't want to be contributing to his inheritance.

This link

http://www.studio360.org/yore/show080401.html

EDIT 9/7/16 Studio 360 reorganized their site so the above linnk is dead. Here is the new one:
http://www.wnyc.org/story/151040-fan-fiction/

Takes you to an episode of the radio program Studio 360 which you can listen to if you have a halfway decent connection. The Fan Fiction piece from this episode features his harassment of a fan artist for putting pictures of dragons up on the 'net.

Now, The People of Pern book that I love so much had it's start with an artist showing Anne her own fan work at a convention art show and Anne loving it so much that she not only bought one of the paintings but gave the artist a chance to be published professionally and yet, here we have her business manager son threatening legal action over work that isn't even directly derived from the series but was original work that the artist had done after being inspired to draw dragons by being active in the fandom.

He has a right to defend legitimate copyright infringement, and it's his duty as her manager, but as described this wasn't copyright infringement. He strikes me as a bully who is more interested in maximizing his own profit from something he didn't create than he is in his mother's own love of fostering creativity among her fans.

I figure Anne probably has enough to live on for the rest of her life at this point so not spending money on Pern won't hurt her, and if I'm wrong and I hear about her being in financial difficulty I'll change my mind and I'm sure anybody reading this would do the same. I might even, once my mad wears off, decide to continue to buy her stuff as long as she lives but not past that point.

It's a shame someone as nice as she is should have to deal with a son like that.


Edited to fix a typo and insert something I meant to and didn't.

Or I Take Another Stab at Explaining About Unfinished Fics.

I get a thrill when I get an email notice that the next chapter of a story I'm following has been posted. At last my curiosity about what happens next will be satisfied, if only temporarily.

I like knowing that comments posted to a work in progress are useful. While the work is still being created comments can give the author encouragement that he or she is on the right track and give them new things to think about.

And yet, I try to avoid reading unfinished stories as much as possible. Right now there are only a handful that I'm actively following.

( Why?  )

On March 22, 2004 Neil Gaiman posted a link  to a piece by a woman calling herself “Jane Austen” in his blog. I'll wait while you read his comments and her rather long whine. Oh! And don't fail to follow the link to the Bookslut comments too. You'll have to scroll down a bit to get to them but it's worth it.

Now, maybe I was prepared to be less than sympathetic going in based on the comments in Gaiman's blog but I really wanted to smack Jane and tell her to grow up.

The declaration “I want to be a professional writer” changes meaning depending on who is speaking, and where they are on their journey towards meeting that goal. For this woman I suspect that it meant that she wanted a life of artistic freedom where she would carefully craft prose that would resonate in the souls of her readers. It could be serious or silly by turns but it would speak to universal themes. In other words, she wanted to be an artist. It is certainly possible to create works of artistic merit and sell them and to do so while staying true to your inner muse without compromising your vision, but as she learned the hard way, don't give up your day job.

She frequently mentions the business aspects of publishing in her article but then proceeds to demonstrate that she has failed to comprehend what that means to her as a provider of products for that business. Instead she wails about how awful it is that it IS a business and how all they care about is sales instead of quality. Well..DUH!

When 9 editors tell you that your work isn't commercial enough you should believe them instead of trying to find a 10^th who disagrees. Large publishing houses are in business to make money, not to offer patronage to deserving writers. If your work isn't commercial enough, that is, if it will not make them at least some profit, then there is no reason for them to buy your product. That's not cruel or unjust, that's just sound economics.

When this happens, if you want to be a professional writer – in this case meaning someone who derives the bulk of their income from writing – then you find out how you can change your manuscript so that it IS commercial enough or failing that write something else that will sell and market your artistic masterpiece to a small press for the pleasure of seeing it in print.

Shakespeare, that most lauded of literary heroes, wrote his work with an eye toward what would sell. He frequently included elements to appeal to the lowest common denominator (the groundlings), as well as things to stroke the egos of the nobles who might hire his troupe for private performances. You can produce good work that is also salable but you have to know your market.

If all you want is to write finely crafted books that are true to your artistic vision than go ahead and do it, but don't complain when a market that is geared toward what will sell at Wal-Mart and airport book shops doesn't buy it. You wouldn't try to sell hand-sewn, one-of-a-kind dresses to the buyer for JC Penney's, and this is the same sort of thing. Go to that funky little boutique near the university (a university press or other small literary publisher) and you'll both be happy.

There's also absolutely nothing wrong with writing for pure pleasure and posting your work on line for free. Of course you will still need to make a living doing something else, and it is unfair that people can't survive on genius alone, but that's life and it's something grownups accept and then get on with what they have to do to put food on the table and pay the rent.

If you do decide to try and make a profession of it then realize that it's a business, just like selling soap, just a lot more intellectually satisfying. Getting mad because reality failed to rearrange itself to fit your fantasy isn't going to change that.