The Truth about Writers and Writing

Written in the heydey of the 20th century magazine era, Lemuel De Bra’s The Truth about Writers and Writing is an interesting article from 1924 about the realities of writing from someone who made their living writing magazine fiction stories.

In a lot of ways, things were far easier for writers in De Bra’s time- it was an era where printed fiction was still the main entertainment media and even radio hadn’t quite taken off yet. People read, and they read a lot, so writers could make their living doing something they loved without having to quite jump through the hoops they do in the modern publishing industry.

But, at the same time today might not be such a bad time for writer’s either. The possibilities of connecting people with stories through the internet are still being explored, and who knows? We might just be on the verge of another renaissance in the print media. Net fiction hasn’t quite caught on yet because people still like printed books, but once the non-print experience is as comfortable as the print one perhaps we can see a day when more people can again make a living writing for others.

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