Advocacy and Authors
By Porter Anderson (@Porter_Anderson) | May 18, 2018 |
‘The Spirit of the Printed Word’ is one of Arthur Crisp’s murals in the reading room of Canada’s Parliament Building. Image: Parliament of Canada, House of Commons
Torching for It
Murals are among some of the West’s most interesting public art.
This one is The Spirit of the Printed Word by Arthur Crisp, 1921. It’s in the reading room at the Canadian House of Commons. I came across it during our coverage at Publishing Perspectives of the Canadian Parliament’s hearings on the 2012 Copyright Modernization Act–which has led to terrible losses (some $50 million annually) for authors and their publishers.
Crisp’s Spirit shows us the allegorical figure lifting high her “torch of knowledge” and her mirror, which the curators’ commentary tells us “reflects the news of the world.”
No fool she, Spirit has engaged, as you can see, two small boys to do all the work. I readily join her in commending this labor approach to you. The guys appear to be slogging through the business of lugging stacks of paper and handling typesetting. These kids need Kindles.
There’s a deco-sleek pigeon gliding by near Spirit’s torch on the right, a bird said to represent the transmission of information. On the left, there’s a more fluttery dove, symbolizing good tidings.
Notice that a mural is work of aesthetic advocacy. And in his testimony to the Canadian parliament committee, John Degen, who heads the Writers’ Union, said that some Canadian authors have stopped writing because the copyright exceptions assigned to education have simply gutted their copyright-revenue earnings.
That’s a case in which trade- and textbook authors are watching their publishers get nothing for the use of their titles in close to 100 school districts and ministerial areas of Canada. It’s an obvious moment in which author advocacy is critical. Degen is up to the mark, too.
“Fully 80 percent of our licensing income has simply disappeared,” Degen told the legislators, “because schools now copy for free what they used to pay for. Each year in Canada more than 600 million pages of published work are copied for use in educational course packs, both print and digital, and the education sector is essentially claiming all of that work for free. The world’s authors are also watching this process with great interest and considerable anxiety.”
If anything, what the Canadian copyright crisis reminds us is how loosely an author corps is formed in a national setting, and how vulnerable it can be to unthinkable policy blunders like the Copyright Modernization Act of 2012.
And that gets us to our provocation today.
Who’s on Your Advocacy Mural?
Provocations graphic by Liam Walsh
In terms of industry players on the policy level, authors are the ones from whom we hear the least frequently. Publishers are better organized and in Canada were integral to the development of the copyright revenue agency that’s now under attack in that country. The publishers association’s folks speak eloquently to the issue, they’re terrific advocates, actually, for themselves and their authors.
But one of the defining factors in any picture of the publishing business has been that it’s an industry based on the voluntary submission of its fundamental product, the content, by people it does not know (until they turn up with a manuscript) and do not employ (until they get into a contractual arrangement). It’s a peculiar business model. I always like to compare it to the auto industry. Imagine those folks sitting around waiting for someone they’ve never heard of to turn up with their next bestselling car design.
What this does mean is that authors, at the broadest level, have trouble with organized advocacy because they’re all working as individual operatives out in the deep field, often far from the centers of publishing power. That, of course, is where organizations like the Authors Guild in the States and the Society of Authors in the UK come into play, both with rapidly growing and effective programs.
Yes, authors are also busy and most of them may well be happier working on the writing than the business of advocacy. But in a political dynamic as unstable as the American system is today, if a run were made at copyright regimes as has occurred in Canada, what kind of advocacy could you count on? Who would lobby for your interests?
Beyond the important services of a good literary agent–if you don’t have one, don’t stop until you get one–where’s your advocacy? I’m asking more than telling today.
Do you think that authors, as a class of the trade publishing workforce, need more advocacy for their interests and concerns? Are you a member of the Author’s Guild or Society of Authors? Do you know their projects? Do they fulfill your needs? What part of an author’s life and work needs more and better advocacy most?
Our comments section awaits your pigeons and doves, so get those tidings headed our way. And why don’t we see if we can get a Writer Unboxed group price on hiring those small children who do all the work? That’s the Spirit.
[coffee title=”Wish you could buy Porter a glass of Campari?” icon=”glass”]Now, thanks to tinyCoffee and PayPal, you can![/coffee]
@Porter_Anderson is a fellow of the National Critics Institute. He is Editor-in-Chief of Publishing Perspectives, the international news medium of Frankfurt Book Fair. He co-founded The Hot Sheet, a newsletter for trade and independent authors, which now is owned and operated by Jane Friedman. Priors: The Bookseller‘s The FutureBook in London, CNN, CNN.com and CNN International–as well as the Village Voice, Dallas Times Herald, and the United Nations’ WFP in Rome. is a recipient of London Book Fair’s International Excellence Award for Trade Press Journalist of the Year. PorterAndersonMedia.com
I’m not a member of the Author’s Guild. In fact, I could use some education about what exactly it does for authors. I am, however, a member of Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, and the Historical Novel Society. These organizations do advocate for their authors in various ways.
Yes, I think that authors in general could benefit from more advocacy, though I don’t know what that would entail. Most writers are paid very little for their work–no long-term security, no benefits of any kind, and so on. A precarious life for those trying to live by the pen!
Thanks for raising this issue, Porter.
Hi, SK,
Thanks for reading and leaving a note. You give me a good idea – maybe I’ll do a bit of an introduction to what all the Guild is doing in a future column. The organization has about 9,000 members now and is making some fine strides under Mary Rasenberger’s leadership.
The points you’re touching on are completely valid in terms of advocacy — contracts and what they pay to authors, the lack of benefits, the instability of a writer’s life, all should be the kind of thing that organization can help with, though many authors accept their status as single agents without looking about for the kind of strength they coud amass in various areas.
Sister in Crime, Mystery Writers, and the Historical Novel Society are all good organizations, though probably classifiable more as promotional of their fields and writers than as advocacy groups. (Nothing wrong with promotion, mind you, just a different thing.)
Thanks again!
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Hi Porter, as always you are on the right side of things, honoring the efforts of those of us who sit day by day working on a novel, poetry, articles and often getting little for our efforts. I blog and present good content, researched content and this is all out of my love of writing. Someday I want an agent, a person to advocate for me in a place where the internet so increased those who are writing (a good thing) that the competition is intense. I belong to Women’s Fiction Writers Association and have joined other FB groups to share my essays. I will always write. But I could use an advocate in this world of print. And I do my best to support other writers. It’s what we all need to do.
Hi, Beth,
Thanks for the good input here, and it’s great that you’re a member of the Women’s Fiction Writers Association. I’d highly recommend you consider the Authors Guild because it has more than 9,000 members and is the oldest outfit of its kind in the States, recognized by the industry as the author-advocacy body of record. There’s an emerging writer membership available, too, for those who are working toward their first publication, and this is quite new. Here’s some info.
Thanks again, and all the best,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
The other night I was a guest at the fundraising banquet for the Authors Guild Foundation. (I am a member.). The Guild does tremendous work educating and advocating for authors, most especially with regard to copyright.
At the beginning of the evening, the authors in the room were invited to stand. (I stood.) About a third of the banquet attendees rose. Huh, I thought. Where are all the authors?
Of course, the $1000 per seat ticket price may have had something to do with that, but your provocation is on the mark, Porter. Authors imagine themselves powerless, unwelcome and unheard. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
Here’s an idea. Imagine the letter you would write to anyone of influence. Now imagine your signature. Now imagine under that “Author of…” and the titles of one or two of your books. See? Authors are respected and authorship has authority.
Now imagine your words. Now there’s real power!
Hey, Don,
Thanks for the good comment, and very glad you could be at the Authors Guild’s gala this week.
I agree with you that authors have potential lobbying power and in the States, the guild is the leading body for that, hands down. At The Hot Sheet this week, we’ve written about their work on making it easier for writers of short works to get them copyrighted afforably, for example, and their work on fair contracts has been terrific. Likewise in the UK, the Society of Authors is a terrific organization working on authors’ behalf.
Fareed Zakaria has an interesting piece in the Washington Post this week in which he talks about Steinbeck in ‘East of Eden’ writing of how in rural America at the time, marrying a schoolteacher was a great point of pride for a young man and his family — while today, schoolteachers get scant respect, are terribly paid (at rates going down in the last 15 years), have to carry second jobs, and are highly prone to burnout, buying some $479 average per year of classroom supplies from their own pockets. A terrible situation. As Fareed puts it, we go out of our way (rightly) to thank our military workers for their service, but we don’t even thank public schoolteachers. It’s an incredible story of not only our economy but also our regard failing our teachers.
As you note in your comment, being able to cite yourself as an author can draw some respect and hold some cachet. I think, however, that authors should look at what’s happening with teachers very carefully. We know that author pay is going down (the English study was a bellwether), with advances shrinking and the sheer number of people working in the field now so big as self-publishing leverages the aspirations of more folks. I’d like authors to become more aware of how important it is to take care of the regard the public seems to have for writers. As various social media make it easier to interact with authors, they, too (like celebrities) can lose some of their former luster of the job in public regard, and that will be no more helpful to writers than it is to teachers.
That’s a long way to say that I think the importance of advocacy is rising and such outfits as the guild need the support of the business and community to keep growing and deepening what they do.
So I’m really glad you’re a member of the guild and that you’re impressed, as I am, with what they’re doing. Having a good, unified, collective voice ready to speak for each of our authors can only be good these days and in the future.
Thanks again,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
I first read the version of your post that was sent out by email and was surprised to see that you wrote: “Most readers of Writer Unboxed, I think it’s fair to say, are trade authors–or authors who at least have aspirations of being published by trade publishers–as opposed to indie writers.” I suspect many of us are independents like myself. Sometimes the upside of being published by trade publisher doesn’t outweigh the downside.
I’m an author/publisher of a traditional mystery series and live in Canada. I’m not a member of the Author’s Guild, and although I would certainly qualify for regular membership, I can’t see how it would be of much benefit to me as a crime fiction writer. I’ve chosen to belong to Sisters in Crime and Crime Writers of Canada because their benefits are tailored to crime writers, plus to the Independent Book Publishers Association, which also provides benefits to someone in my position.
Perhaps one reason most Canadian authors haven’t spoken up about the Canadian copyright issue is that they don’t feel it affects them. I can see where writers of short stories or non-fiction would feel differently. I can’t imagine any teacher or professor copying chapters from one of my works of fiction. I do think the current 10% level is unfair and was ill-considered, and hope that the organizations fighting to change it are successful.
To be honest, I haven’t given the need for advocacy much thought, although I appreciate that Sisters in Crime does its best to advocate for women crime writers. Ironically, it’s a little hypocritical on my part because my own current favorite crime writers are men (that has not always been the case), and from the start I chose to use initials rather than my first name in order not to immediately reveal my gender. (It works. Many male reader reviews mention that they don’t normally purchase books by women writers but were sure the book was written by a man until they finished the book and saw the ‘about the author’ page.)
To answer your final question, I would love it if readers were willing to pay more for independent fiction, but market forces are at work. I understand it. It might be different if I were wealthier, but I have to have enjoyed a previous book by an author before I’ll take a chance on paying over $14 for a work of fiction. Sad, but true.
Thanks for the post. It certainly made me think.
Ruth
Hi, Ruth,
Thanks for your input here. I do think that most of our readers at Writer Unboxed are trade or aspirational in that direction–and for that reason, I decided to adjust the column I’d written, since I felt its independent author basis in the original might limit readership. It’s hardly the case that there are no independent authors readind us here, of course, and Writer Unboxed is for everyone writing, all are most welcome.
I’m glad that you’re as successful as you are, and I agree that Sisters in Crime does some fine things for its membership, indeed.
Canada, of course, has a fine organization called the Writers Union of Canada, which you may want to look into. They have been a part of the parliamentary committee testimony about the copyright crisis (John Degen of the union spoke to the committee).
the reason to join an advocacy organization is that it’s designed to support professionals in writing in legal and political settings. Most even have group insurance policies available and other potentially valueable offerings. The Authors Guild is carrying forward a contract initiative to work with publishers on making contracts more fair, for example, and supports both independent and trade authos in lobbying settings, as the Writers Union does.
The reason authors should be interested in the copyright dilemma of the Canadian Copyright Modernization Act is solidarity. Believe me, if the government can enact legislation that makes many writers stop writing (you can read John Degen explaining this in my write-up here), I would suggest that you need to be concerned. Not a writer of something that teachers might use? Fine. There are many other ways that the deterioration of copyright protection can wreck a career and I recommend you look at how important such protection is to the work of all creative people in all societies.
The digital dynamic is threatening copyright protections in many parts of the world, Canada is simply the worst example.
Every writer needs to be aware and concerned and informed on this issue, and I hope you’ll find yourself interested in what your colleagues are going through.
Many thanks for reading me and for commenting, Ruth, all the best with your work.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson @PubPerspectives
As a former president of Sisters in Crime, I am a firm believer in writers banding together to advocate for their interests, whether related to copyright laws, library funding, or review space. I believe SinC’s 30+ year review project — tallying reviews of crime fiction in major publications and publicizing the results — has directly resulted in a more equitable share of review space for women crime writers, which means more readers asking for books by women in libraries and bookstores.
Right now, I’m deeply concerned about the increasing practice of publishers of crime fiction cutting advances to the point that many writers who previously could afford to write full-time or with only a part-time job no longer can. Advances, of course, are critical because of the gap between the time of contracting and when royalties begin to flow. This practice seems to be increasingly prevalent in the traditional mystery, where most authors are female. I would like to know if authors in other genres are seeing a similar trend, and welcome ideas for a response.
(I am not currently on the SinC board, and am speaking for myself, not the organization.)
Hello, Leslie!
Terrific to find you here, and sorry for the crazy delay in answering — the trade show and book fair season is very heavy this year.
First, thank you for your service in your former leadership roles with Sisters in Crime. I agree with you that – not unlike VIDA, which was honored last week by the Authors Guild), the Sisters in Crime data-gathering effort in terms of reviews of the field has had an impact. This is a perfect example of good advocacy at work.
I wonder if you’re a member of the Authors Guild? If not, I strongly recommend you consider membership.
One of the most disturbing elements seen in the entire industry — not just in mystery or involving female authors — is the contraction of advances. The guild is addressing this in several ways with the publishing community, in part throught its Fair Contract Initiative. The shrinking of advances is a huge problem (the UK — the world’s other leading English-language market — is seeing the same thing).
As you say, banding together. And one reason I like what the Authors Guild does is that it’s set up as a legal and politically responsive organization. Its own attorneys work on these and many other issues, and Mary Rasenberger, the executive director of the organization, was formerly with the copyright office in Washington and is an attorney, herself. In other words, the guild has 9,000 members being served by an entirely professional staff for the purpose of career development and writer advancement, cutting across all genres and all businesses — journalists, for example, can be members, as well.
The guild, I feel sure, could use your specialized experience from your genre sector. If you’d like me to get you in touch with someone there, let me know on Twitter or at porter at publishingperspectives.com
Thanks again,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson @PubPerspectives
I’ve been receiving posts from ‘ALLi’ The Alliance of Independent Authors for a while, and thanks to your report I became a member within the hour.
Hi, Veronica,
What good news that you joined ALLi, I hope you’ll find its work helpful.
All the best with your work.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson
Forgive my sweeping generalization, Porter, but advocacy efforts – like membership organizations and contests – are successful for traditionally published authors, not indies.
What indie authors want – aside from those who seek trad contracts – is inclusion. As long as we are shut out entirely from membership groups and book awards, I’m not sure what else there is to fight for. And many of those groups and award organizations have made it clear they do not seek indie authors because they don’t want to deal with more submissions.
I tried to join a statewide author organization, only to find that I could only purchase a non-voting membership, regardless of experience or sales.
ALLi has been helpful, more than helpful, though I’m not sure they frame a lot of what they do as advocacy (which after all includes education). And I believe it is. I’ve gotten one award from my fine local writers organization and spoke on a panel for them last year. I fully expect another award from them next year. But advocacy is not on their radar.
That said, advocacy efforts require a clear purpose and I don’t see much consensus on issues. Some pop up within genres, but as for an arching overall issue (or two or three)? I don’t see it. (Hating Amazon isn’t advocacy)
And of course many authors don’t want to deal with anything that’s not specifically writing, whether it’s marketing or advocacy. It will always be a small group that leads the charge.
Maybe you can enlighten me on common ground issues.
Hey, Viki,
And forgive me for sweeping your generalizations back at you, LOL, but I think that independent authors’ advocacy efforts can be as effective as those of and for trade authors, but that two things are likely at play here:
(1) Independent authors need to learn the value of genuine legal and political advocacy, and come to terms with the fact that they simply must work together and put aside the sorts of personal and varied interests that tend to pull them apart.
(2) Independent authors, in my experience, have a better chance of valuable lobbying work when working in the context of a wider all-authors organization (Authors Guild in the US, Society of Authors in the UK, Writes Union of Canada) than when trying to create advocacy-for-indies as a separate thing. This is because the main advocacy forces have been in place for decades and are recognized. When they call, the phone is picked up.
As you know (and if not, let me be the first to tell you), the Authors Guild has and welcomes independent authors. They are not shut out.
Same at Writers Union of Canada.
Same at the Society of Authors in the UK.
Those are the three leading such organizations in the English-language (the biggest) world marketplace.
And what we’re talking about here is, as I know you know, not the genre-based promotional and community-supportive advocacy of many fine organizations (the RWA is an example, of course) but of legal, political, career-conditions advocacy. These are the organizations that speak to the US Congress and the parliaments of the UK and Canada on their writers’ behalfs. They do the scientific studies about earnings, and produce legally researched perspective and guidance on what writers are experiencing in their markets and the world. Read more here.
ALLi is a bit unhappy with me at the moment (well, some in the group are) because I see it more as an educational and professionalizing boon to self-publishing, not an advocacy effort of the kind that the guild and society are (each around a century old or older). That’s nothing against ALLi, although many disagreements are taken particularly hard in the independent world, as you know. :)
I do think I need to perhaps get at this more formally in my next piece here at Writer Unboxed. I’m finding far more folks unaware of the kind of advocacy going on and available to them than I thought I would.
No, hating Amazon is not advocacy, you’re absolutely right. But imagine what might happen if a professionalized lobbying force were created among independent authors who sell their content on Amazon and through Kindle Unlimited. Say, a few thousand Kindle indies ready to perform as a unified body in levying some pressure for what they needed. That would take cohesian, group spirit, professionalism, and big, big nerve. And it could be effective.
When you ask about what the guild is working on, please see this page first. These are the main issue-umbrellas under which their activities occur. And then, as you’ll know from reading The Hot Sheet, they work on various situations arising in these arenas.
You might remember we wrote about a case in which the guild negotiated payment for authors of short fiction that had been unpaid for years by a major magazine of science fiction based in Eastern Europe. Here is what they’re working on in Washington this spring — one is a new copyright capability that would let authors who create many short works (articles, stories, etc.) copyright them in batches, rather than one at a time, potentially saving thousands of dollars.
You recently mentioned the situation with authors trademarking words. Here’s the guild’s legal judgment (they have their own legal team)
Here are member benefits all in one place.
You need not feel pressured to join, of course, but the more broadly and widely the guild’s membership expands to embrace the range of industry activity authors are producing, the better it will be in helping writers of all kinds.
Worth investigation, I think, and thanks for asking about it!
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson @PubPerspectives
I was a member of the Authors Guild for several years, but I didn’t think they did much for me personally, and I didn’t agree with a lot of their advocacy efforts. They seemed more interested in criticizing Amazon than in pushing publishers for better standard contracts. Then they raised their dues substantially, so I quit.
It may be that there’s too little agreement among authors about what’s most important, or too little faith that we could actually achieve things like better royalty rates. What with Indies and traditionally published authors, different genres, people writing for children and adults, work-for-hire in educational publishing, business writing, magazines, etc etc, it’s hard to find common ground for goals.
Hi, Kris, thanks for your comment.
I wonder how long ago you were a member of the guild? During the Turow presidency in particular, the guild was, yes, sometimes very anti-Amazon and might have been seen as little else by some. It has changed radically since then.
As I’ve documented, particularly in a lot of stories at Thought Catalog, the guild began to change in 2015 with the arrival of Mary Rasenberger as its executive director, and during Roxana Robinson’s presidency. It has gone on to deeply reconstitute itself and to recalibrate what its doing. In fact, as it rolled out its Fair Contracts Initiative — flying right into the faces of the publishing houses, even authors who had been outspoken critics of the guild made it clear they were impressed.
No group will ever offer everything every member wants. Impossile. But this is a case in which I can tell you with factual clarity that an organization has changed. It still may not be what you’d like. But it’s absolutely worth a look.
Thanks for reading and commenting.
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson @PubPerspectives
ABSOLUTELY.
You’re speaking my language and heartbeat here, Porter. I’ve always thought that authors need a serious union. Not what’s called a union now, but a real union with real weight and negotiating power on a block scale, advocating for author rights on the policy and publication contract level. In many cases, draconian contracts beggar the very people who make so many rich.
I’m on board, man.
Hey, Lance,
Thanks for the input, and glad you see this need, too.
In another comment, I was trying to suggest what might happen if independent authors could find a way to organize to such a degree as to present a unified labor force to Amazon, for example. Things could change. The nature of much of the indie sector, of course, is that while community is a prized thing, working together in lockstep and putting aside things that each writer might feel to be important is very hard.
Social cameraderie, mutual moral support is in good supply, in other words, among indies. Labor action is a lot harder to get to.
Which is why I was telling Viki that I think the best hope for advocacy-minded writers, indie or not, lies in the large organizations like the Authors Guild (9,000 members), Society of Authors, and Writers Union, which are about legal and political action, not about genres and literature. Nothing wrong with genres and literature. But when it comes to workforce conditions, art isn’t the issue: labor is.
That’s a scary leap for a lot of writers, of course.
But real advocacy comes with the selflessness of professional egalitarianism and the force of genuine lobbying experts — it’s more than everybody just being swell togther. :)
Cheers, sir,
-p.
On Twitter: @Porter_Anderson @PubPerspectives