The low value of the invaluable

There was an encouraging article in The Guardian last week about how popular children's books are, how much children like to read physical books, and what a large share of the publishing industry they represent. All good things. Yet a careful reading of the article reveals a few familiar contradictions:

• In 2016, sales of children’s titles rose 16% to £365m
• All book sales rose 7% - so the rise in children's books is disproportionate (and the rise in adult books clearly less than 7%)
• Children's books now represent 24% of sales in paper books.

Unfortunately, it's not clear whether 'sales' means volume (number of books) or value (amount in £). It's easy to raise sales if you sell books for 25p each, an increasing trend that has escaped from the discount stores into the mainstream. But let's go with the optimistic bit and ignore the volume/value issue for a moment.  This suggests the nation values children's books, which must be a good thing.

There is even a new print magazine for children, Scoop, which has confounded expectations by surviving for a year. It's edited by children's publisher par excellence Sarah Odedina, and if anyone could pull it off, she can. Scoop is a collection of writing - fictional and factual - commissioned from  a variety of writers. Here the usual snipes sneak into the Guardian's account: it's supported by 'heavyweights such as the playwright Tom Stoppard, plus children’s writers such as Raymond Briggs.' Since when was Raymond Briggs less of a 'heavyweight' than Tom Stoppard? Oh, of course, he writes for children... He has far more readers than Stoppard, is far more relevant to a magazine for children, but let's dismiss him anyway. I'm sure parents are going to be more likely to buy their kid a magazine with articles by Tom Stoppard than by someone who, you know, writes for children.

But that's all OK because the magazine also publishes some bits by children (no comment - I wouldn't do that, but I can see why they might choose to) and 'pays all contributors, high and low, the same rate – 10p a word.' Equal payment is a good thing generally, though I query the suggestion that something written by a professional with 20 years' experience is worth the same as something dashed off by a ten-year-old. But paying only £100 per 1,000 words is not a good thing in any circumstances. The lowest rate for magazine writing - for small, low-circulation magazines - given as reasonable by the National Union of Journalists is £250/1000 words. A quick look at their collected figures for reported fees puts Scoop in the bottom 20% over the last three years - but then, it's for children, so what do you expect? (This makes it, in NUJ terms,  a 'category D' publication, a classification that 'covers a multitude of sins, down to those that are either very small or very stingy': 'some get away with paying £150 per thousand - especially those that hold a virtual monopoly on a specialist field or where the field is infested with enthusiastic amateurs.')

This is symptomatic of a wider problem, that affects not just children's writers but all writers - though it's often worse for children's writers because we're not, you know, 'real' writers like Tom Stoppard. The time and effort spent crafting something so compelling it will turn children on to reading and open up potential for their whole lives is not as valuable or impressive as the time and effort spent amusing the literati in a London theatre for a couple of hours, obviously. It's rather depressing that even an article on the wonderfulness of children's books takes these attitudes for granted. The public might love us and our books/words - they just don't want to pay for them or acknowledge that there is any expertise involved in producing them. Even, it seems, people who write for the Books section of the Guardian (which under a 'house agreement' dating to 2012 pays a minimum of £312/1,000 words - words for adults, obviously.)

TIME TO MAN-UP! – Anna Wilson

A couple of things have happened this week which have made me think about how I promote myself as a writer who also happens to be a woman. I would like to share these things to get your opinions, which I know will be many and varied!

On Wednesday 26^th March I went to an event organized by the wonderful Bristol Librarians. It was, as much as anything, to say a fond farewell to Margaret Pemberton and to thank her for her inspirational and tireless work in the Library Services over the years.

It was also a fantastic opportunity for authors to network, as it was advertised as ‘Speed-dating with Librarians and School Teachers’ – every bit as scary as it sounds, but not quite as dubious.

We children’s authors were invited to bring along samples of our work and be prepared to talk about our books and what we can offer for events. Every five minutes or so, a bell would be rung and the teachers and librarians would move on to another author. Clearly the idea was for us to sell ourselves convincingly in a succinct and engaging manner in order that the teachers and librarians would remember us, buy our books for their establishments and hire our services for events.

I was on a table with Che Golden, whose Mulberry pony books are hilarious, action-packed tales about (in her own words) ‘evil’ ponies - definitely ‘not your average pony books’. She has also written a series about ‘homicidal’ fairies, the first title of which The Feral Child, has sold in the US and already has a large fan base. Sitting with us was Rachel Carter: her debut novel for 9-12s, Ethan’s Voice, has been extremely well received. Rachel is a Bath Spa graduate from the MA course, Writing for Young People. She is a talented writer with more stories in the pipeline.

So, of course, the three of us sat there telling the teachers and librarians how marvellous we were, blowing our own trumpets and generally setting out to impress . . .

Did we, hell. (I know Che and Rachel will agree, because we discussed it afterwards!) We were bashful and self-deprecating, we had brought no books to sell and we shared each other’s business cards as we had not thought to bring much in the way of promotional material.

Then there was John Dougherty: he had a stack of books to sell and a pile of beautifully put-together, carefully thought-through leaflets which helpfully and concisely laid out what he does, how much he charges, what a school can hope to get from a day with him and how good he is at doing it. He had added selected quotes from happy readers, teachers and librarians who could testify to how good he was and what benefits his visits had brought to their schools. It was brilliant! And it gave a very professional impression. (I have since showed his leaflet to friends and family who have said, ‘Why don’t you do this?’ Why, indeed?)

Che and I also discussed events and festivals with Wendy Meddour (author of the wildly funny Wendy Quill books). Wendy said at one festival she was on after two well-known, hilarious male authors, and that it made her anxious as it was ‘like following two stand-up artists’.

I went home thinking, ‘Why is it that women writers do not put themselves out there as confidently as men?’

The next morning the headline below featured in the Guardian. It provoked some heated debate on Facebook amongst a few female authors I know:

Discover the Booktrust 2014 Best Books awards shortlist!

David Walliams, Jeff Kinney and Jonathan Green [sic] make the shortlist for the Booktrust's Best Book awards – which children's books do you think should win?

To see the complete article, click here: http://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2014/mar/27/booktrust-best-book-awards-2014-shortlist

Apart from the glaringly obvious mistake that it is in fact John Green’s name on the list, not the mysterious Jonathan, the thing that riled me and more than a few of my friends was the lack of women’s names in the headline. If you scroll down through the shortlist, you will see many prominent women writers included on the list, some of whom (Lucy Cousins, Joanna Nadin, Sarah McIntyre, for example) are well-known, well-loved writers who have already won or been nominated for prestigious awards, and so are hardly also-rans who deserve to be tacked on after the men.

Both the article in the Guardian and the ‘speed-dating’ event made me wonder about how we women promote ourselves. I know that in an ideal world it would be great if there was an entirely level playing field to start with, and it would also be lovely if publishers did not leave the lion’s share of promotion to us authors who really only want to get on and write rather than be cajoled into the role of performing monkeys . . . But with John Dougherty’s leaflet sitting on my desk and Wendy’s words about men’s events being ‘like stand-up’ ringing in my ears, I did wonder what I could do to change things for myself.  

My husband works in the food industry: I asked him if women were as backwards at coming forwards in business as I felt I was in the book world. His reply:

‘Oh yes, the women I work with admit that if they have only 20% knowledge on a certain subject, they will hold back until they feel they know about 80% before they voice an opinion, whereas I would say that men are happy to chip in confidently with their views when they know only 20% of what they are talking about.’

This would certainly back up what teachers have said to me about the differences in male and female behaviour in the classroom, too. Girls will tend to sit quietly and wait until they are sure they know the answer, whereas boys will have a go even if they are not 100% (or even 80%) confident.

So, I have made a decision. If I want people to take my writing seriously, pay me what I charge for events and (maybe one day) put my name in a newspaper headline, I shall have to take a leaf out of the men’s book and talk myself up a bit.

As Caitlin Moran says in her marvellous book, How to Be A Woman:

‘The boys are not being told they have to be a certain way, they are just getting on with stuff.’

Now, where is that excellent leaflet of John Dougherty’s? I feel a copy-cat session coming on . . .

Find me on the web at http://annawilson.co.uk

Blogging at http://acwilsonwriter.wordpress.com

All the World's A Stage - Anna Wilson

I have been thinking a lot recently about the importance of drama in English teaching. It was reading Polly Toynbee in the Guardian a few weeks back which sparked off this particular train of thought. The thrust of her article was about what the delightful Mr Gove plans for the future of our children's education, but about halfway in she makes specific points about the value of drama in schools.

'Gove pretends it's for schools to choose – but drama, dance, art and now literature will slip away. Confident top schools may keep these subjects, but average schools, under intense pressure to perform in core EBacc exams, will let the rest slide.'

It is easy to see how, facing such pressures, schools may be forced to relegate drama to 'club' status rather than keeping it in with the main-stream timetable. But what a shortsighted view. Drama is invaluable to a child's development - indeed, I would go so far as to say it is a natural part of a child's development and surely a step on the way to producing a confident reader.

Sit and watch a young child at play, and what is he or she doing if not acting out stories? Play is drama for the young child. It is how he or she explores the world around, tries out different scenarios, puts him or herself in another's shoes. And it is intrinsically bound up with storytelling.

When I go into schools to talk about writing, I do a lot of 'acting out' of the various scenes in my life which have wound their way into stories. I could simply stand in front of a school assembly and tell them 'this happened, and then this and then this', but in acting out how my tortoise must have felt when my dad glued a length of fishing line to its shell to 'stop it escaping', I think the story has more impact than my simply telling it. It allows the audience to put themselves in the place of the poor tortoise who had no say in my dad's crazy plan. And it makes the kids laugh. And remember my talk. One teacher emailed me after an event to tell me that the children were acting out my stories in the playground later that day.

Toynbee again:

'What is "low value" about drama? […] Ability to speak out, perform and pretend is essential for most jobs, from estate agent upwards. Employers complain that young people mumble, slouch and don't look them in the eye, prizing the "soft skills" that elite schools teach through drama and debating. Emotionally, drama teaches children lacking in empathy to put themselves into others' shoes, to express fears. But ever fewer schools employ specialist drama teachers: English teachers may or may not have an aptitude. Shakespeare is on the curriculum, no longer to be examined, but dead on the page without performance to breathe life and sense into it.'

'Dead on the page'. Is this how we want future generations to think of writing? Boring, dull, immovable, immutable shapes on the page? That was my own experience as a pupil in an old-fashioned grammar school, whose teaching methods had not changed since the 1950s; a decade Gove so keenly looks back to as a model for future generations' education.

We studied Macbeth for two years in the run-up to O-level English and he and the rest of the cast remained mummified on the page for me to the point where I gave up reading and dropped English like a hot potato as soon as I could. How differently I would have felt had I had the teacher my son had four years ago - a woman who is as passionate about drama as she is about reading and writing, and who had my son dress up as one of the witches and learn the cauldron scene in Act 4, scene 1 with his friends. He was only eight years old at the time, but he understood Macbeth's motivations and emotions so much better than I did at twice his age.

So drama is a 'soft skill' is it? I would argue that Gove might do a lot better in his own line of work if he went along to a couple of plays or even took part in one. He might at least learn a bit of empathy, if nothing else. Or is that wishful thinking?

Anna Wilson
www.annawilson.co.uk

Caught read-handed... by Nicola Morgan

Recently, the Guardian reported the story of author Terry Goodkind, who "turned to Facebook to name and shame a fan who pirated a digital version of his latest novel".  As usual when a case of theft is revealed, there were arguments on both sides, regarding whether words should be free or authors should be entitled to protect their work and earn from it. Paulo Coelho is quoted as calling on "pirates of the world" to "unite and pirate everything I've ever written". Coelho has every right to say this of his own work - he is exercising the degree of control (or lack of) that he chooses.

However, I do not recall him calling on pirates of the world to pirate steal everything that anyone else has ever written. 

And this is what the proponents of the "words should be free" argument so often forget. Surely the choice should be made by the creator of the content? Otherwise it's theft.

Whether or not illegal downloading increases sales is utterly beside the point. It may well do so. All my self-published ebooks are DRM-free, not because I want them to be stolen but because I want my readers to be able to read them on any device in as many places as they wish, and if the price I must pay is that some people will steal, that's a price I'll pay. That does not mean that I am happy with anyone stealing it, or that I can afford to be stolen from. But frankly, even that misses the point: theft is still theft however much the victim can absorb the loss. 

Recently on my Crabbit At Home blog, I linked to an excellent but long piece arguing why illegal downloading is morally wrong, but to be honest, when will we stop making the arguments so complicated?

Taking something without the owner's permission is theft and theft is wrong. I grant that if you'd die without the stolen item, it's forgivable. But it's still theft. And last thing I heard, books may be important but you don't generally die for the lack of one.

It really is that simple.  

Recently, I downloaded the remarkably wonderful Adblock program, a piece of free software which instantly removes all adverts from my internet experience, including those dreaded "belly-fat" ads on Facebook. After I'd downloaded, I was given the option of paying a contribution, if I wished. I paid $5.

A few days later, I received this email (my bold):

Hi Nicola
I wanted to say thanks for paying for AdBlock at http://chromeadblock.com/pay. I wrote AdBlock hoping to make people's lives better, and you just told me that I managed to do it :) Thank you very, very much!  

It's been over a year since I quit my job, asking my users to pay what they can afford for AdBlock to fund its development. Most users (like, 99%) choose NOT to pay, so you should know that I appreciate your support that much more!

In any case, Katie and I feel that this is important work, so I'll keep working on AdBlock as long as I am able.  Thank you! :D

99% of people choose not to pay? I'm not sure whether I'm shocked or just mildly surprised. I'm sure that the vast majority of these, however, would not dream of downloading illegally. Would they?

Those are quite different scenarios, different choices by the creators, but each is about the struggle of the creator to earn from his or her work.

When we buy a book, we have several choices, of format, of price and of retailer, new or secondhand. Or we can borrow free from a library or a friend. It seems to me those are sufficient choices to make illegal downloading a purely selfish and/or ignorant crime that never has any justification. 

It seems to me that if we value creation, it is morally right to respect the creator and not steal from him. Many creators - Paulo Coelho and the Adblock guy, for example - are being extremely generous in their offering. Many writers, especially those who control their own output, are being similarly generous, trying to offer many options in price and free downloads. Other writers, whose books and pricing are controlled by their publishers, behave generously in many other ways, for example by going to great lengths to give up time to campaign for libraries - including school libraries, where we don't earn PLR, and none of us grudge for one moment a book lent free in a school library. 

That's what genuine book-lovers do. They do not steal from writers.