Where is everyone getting politics from? We must be reading different New Yorkers.
I didn't know it was a secret that Conde Nast's pubs including the New Yorker, like most mainstream markets actually, are super liberal left-wing publications. Not that I am complaining or even commenting negatively on that fact, but simply observing out in the open -- because if you want to get your words in there, you better not be writing outside that party line.
All editorial content from the cover art to the fiction to the poetry carries that party line. Look at the snarling Cheney pumpkin on the cover of this week's issue, and ask yourself if you've ever seen such a thing done for a Democrat? No, of course not. It wouldn't fit the party line, and the cover artist knows that. And just the same, you have to write for the market.
Here's one quick fiction example, the Stuart Dybek story "If I Vanished" from Jul 1:
http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2007/07/09/070709fi_fiction_dybek
Scroll down just a bit and you'll get something about "the Marlboro Man mythos of the genocidal, racist, anti-environmental,
Heil Adolph Coors’s right-wing all-American West."
That's perfect, that's it right there -- the perfect summation of the kind of political slant you had better have. I don't recall ever reading a story in there that doesn't have something like that in it. It's often more subtle, sure, but they always have to have it. And you will never ever see the opposite, whatever that may be -- a hero complaining about liberals or something while he waxes on about Ronald Reagan.
A 5,000 word short bought by The New Yorker is good money by anyone's standard.
Depends what you compare it to. Sure it's very good money, just looking at the single check outside of all contexts. But it's a very rare check, and it's not one that's liable to repeat itself -- whereas a lot of pubs pay the exact same rate for much easier, much more repeatable work. And for the reputation that the New Yorker has, that getting a story in it is the greatest feat a contemporary writer can accomplish, the pay is less than great -- it's actually kind of bad, considering the fact that any number of magazines and other markets pay the same rate for much easier work. That's the point I'm making.
It's also terrible money by the standard of a writer working in 1960, or 1945, or 1922 -- writers got paid more money
unadjusted for inflation for the exact same work in those years as they do today. A $7,000 check in 1925 is enough to buy you a
house. I think that's worth pointing out.
How many of us on this board have sent in submissions to the New Yorker (lots) but how many of us have made a sale (none)? But how many of us have had other assignments that paid a dollar a word or even more and were much much easier to get (many)?
Even if you do ever sell a story to the New Yorker, how long will it be before you ever repeat it? You'll be selling your fiction to the lesser markets and lucky if you get $250 or whatever it is most of the upper-tier markets pay. As opposed to nonfiction where if you can deliver a 5k word feature to a buck-a-word or better market, you're welcome to repeat it for as long as you're able.
I never had a problem earning a living as a nonfiction freelance writer. It isn't too difficult to take in a thousand a week -- you'll be working for it, and constantly worrying about next week's deal, but it's very doable even for an average writer, and the result is certainly enough to live on although you better set aside for health care.
But the problem is, I was working my tail off on stuff I didn't love -- that I actually came to hate -- with very little time for the "real" work that I knew was my one true dream. I have colleagues who have no ambitions for stories or novels and they earn 70k and in a few cases even more annually at what they were doing.
This year I've finally been able to give that up -- no money is worth throwing away your life and the pursuit of what you believe your talent is. So I'm selling a novel, writing another one, selling dozens of stories. But in pursuit of that I've not found anything at all out there that pays anything like nonfiction did. The only way to do it, as far as I can tell, is to sell a successful novel and then come out with another one because otherwise the money is just not there. You have to teach or make your living doing something else, and keep sloughing away at fiction on the side and whenever you can. If anyone out there is able to support themselves and/or their families by selling fiction to magazines or other publications, I'd love to hear about it.
Certainly enough to buy two pounds or so of Royal Beluga.
Not if you also have to pay your rent, and find a market to sell your next story to, and all the other 5k word stories you've sold this year took in only $250 each. That's the point I'm making.