KS: My advice is again conflicted. Practically I would say move to Brooklyn and get a job in publishing and network your ass off. Or plod through an MFA program, hunt for teaching gigs, apply for residencies, and play the soul and genital shriveling game of credentialism. Sadly, so many have taken these routes we now have a glut of well-qualified well-connected people without an individual thought in their heads!
So, my less cynical suggestion is to find a vocation that pays in accordance to your lifestyle and to be self-supporting and maybe even a contributor -- to a family or your community, your customers or clients. BUT in your private time, writing when you can -- write what you really want to. The happiest people I know are either scientists and musicians or those with a solid skill base, whether it’s carpentry, financial planning, or computer programming.
In my adult years I have had mixed success with advertising. I have earned good money but I have never been a high-flying international copywriter and I have seen many younger fiction writers establish successful careers while I piled up rejections and aborted projects. If I had it to do over again, I think I would’ve pursued journalism. I turned my back on a journalism scholarship to Northwestern because in my drug years I didn’t think it was “cool.” There are great disciplines to be learned in journalism, interesting people to meet at every level, and a larger perspective that is invaluable.
For young people who don’t yet have family responsibilities, I’d recommend the “surfer” lifestyle. Move somewhere you can live cheaply, live to write the way surfies live to surf, and work for money as much as you need to.
For maturer age people with families, I recommend treating your writing career like a small business. If you can afford it, make a contract with your partner for total support for a period like two years -- and then evaluate the results. Many successful writers like Karen Joy Fowler have followed this basic business model. Not everyone will succeed, but 75% of all small businesses fail, too. It’s at least a working model.
In the end, the best writers will always be people who know things and who have lived through things. So, lots of sex, lots of reading, lots of listening, lots of flailing around. Art is supposed to be messy.
And as a final comment, whether it’s depressing or encouraging, let me make this assertion: there is not one writer you will ever even hear about who did not have simple brute Luck to thank.
For more from Kris Saknussemm, read his essay, "Five Tips to Avoiding Total Disaster as a Novelist."
