Well, enter the world of publish or perish I thought to myself as a
brilliant creative writing professor from the university told me her true life
tale. You see, she taught creative writing at the University extension center,
but she had not published any fictional works of her own after many years of
teaching, and therefore could not get tenured, and since the pay wasn't that
great, she quit.
That's really too bad I thought to myself, and as a writer, I think I
might've gotten off my butt, realizing that my future depended on it, along
with my retirement and pension, and come up with a novel, even if it meant
slaving away and locking myself in a room.
Of course, I am on my side of the fence, and she is on hers, and it's easy
to make a judgment calls when you're not in the middle of things. It makes
sense that the university would want their professors, especially in creative
writing to have published works, as those paying for those degrees, and their
parents who may be footing the bill will want success of their own, and they will
want to learn from those who have achieved. Even if there is a big difference
between teaching and doing.
Now then, I have purchased the writer's guide every year since 2002, and I
have noted that many of the companies that were publishing fictional works in
2002 are no longer in business today, and it seems like every week or so I read
about another publishing company, major newspaper, or even a textbook publisher
going out of business or filing bankruptcy. This makes it very hard for those
that need to publish or perish, especially if they need to write more than just
research reports, studies, and papers. You see the point there, and how hard it
would be today to get a publisher? Not easy, not even a little bit, and I don't
care who you know.
Having belonged to a rather large and well-known writers club in the past, I
know how difficult it is to get published - I've heard all the stories. I've
also talked to Screen Writer's Guild members and the tough time they had
selling their first screenplay. It's not easy, and if you are teaching at a
university, most of your mind and your time is taken up on other things - just
think of the onslaught of reading all your student's work - major time
commitment, and that's an understatement.
Thus, this additional burden to get published is going to get tougher in the
future. Further, I imagine the universities are making the requirements tighter
because they are having problems themselves staying within their budget, and
trying to keep the tuition costs down. This means that bar keeps getting higher
- ouch.
What does all this mean? It means that a good many University writing
professors, and professors of literature may have a more difficult time in the
future with the academia standard that we know as; Publish or Perish. Indeed I
hope you will please consider all this and think on it.