How To Reply To The Question at a Writers Workshop "Does Anyone Here Want To Become Rich and Famous?"

At a recent Writers Workshop which I attended in London, one of the delegates asked this question of all of us who sat at my table: "Is there anybody here who wants to become rich and famous?"

A silence followed, of about three seconds in duration, when it seemed that no writer present dared to admit to this hubris.

Then I spoke up, "Well, from the age of seven, I have wanted to become a successful published author and live by my writing."

Nine pairs of eyes swivelled in my direction. Surely, by now, life had taught me otherwise? For what does it actually mean to "live by" your writing? It means a significant amount of reliable money, which flows persistently into the writer's bank account over the course of many years.

And there is of course a universe of difference between living for your writing, and living by your writing.  It is a popularly-held belief that that the word 'novelist' is synonymous with 'huge advance and three-book deal', and 'bestselling author living in a mansion on an island with panoramic views of the ocean from his or her tower room laptop."

Nevertheless, you do need money to live. And if companies are prepared to pay a liveable amount of money, year in year out, to, say junior clerks and secretaries and post-boys, why should not the world also accord that privilege to creative writers? And of course it does, to a happy few. However, the reality is that when it comes to freely scattering their money, many choose not to send it in the direction of struggling authors, but rather prefer to donate it to the World of Faerie via the nearest wishing well. (Although, as a postscript to this, I might add that not everyone is slavishly devoted to this relationship with the supernatural. Witness Homer Simpson, for instance, visiting the wishing well with his son Bart to harvest all the coins so he can fill the missing gaps in Bart's coin collection.)

So my question is this: since humankind is obsessed with money – destroying relationships for it, acquiring it, spending it, throwing our lives away for it – why  sacrifice it to the water god? I suggest that instead they donate it to the story-teller, the bard of the community. Deep in the human psyche, folk religion demands that we offer up at least a nominal amount of what we most value to the water god in the hope that this will transform our lives. But may I suggest that instead of paying tribute to the world of Faerie, you pay tribute to the story-teller instead – and, perhaps, buy more new books…