INDUSTRY

Is Screenwriting Dead? From JohnAugust.com.

May 27, 2012

Self-explanatory title, no? Here are some choice bits. Check out johnaugust.com for the full meal deal.

I had a president of production ask for a free rewrite before he gave it to his chairman. Not a polish. He had notes. True multi-week notes. That doesn’t strike me as a producer’s polish. That strikes me as flat-out abusive.

…that seems to be what people want. If I can’t magically say, “Yes, here is my crystal ball, it outperforms THE HUNGER GAMES, don’t worry about it,” they just shut me down.

I know a lot of young writers in my general boat, and to be honest I think all of us are trying to get out of features and into TV.

There is it. Read it and weep.

Is Screenwriting Dead? from johnaugust.com

And a tiny url for your sharing pleasure: http://tinyurl.com/d3lsrus

April is National Poetry Month

April 5, 2010

We’re sure, being the literary wunderkinds that you are, you already knew that April is National Poetry Month, the month when “publishers, booksellers, literary organizations, libraries, schools and poets around the country band together to celebrate poetry and its vital place in American culture.” That’s from the official website of National Poetry Month, www.poets.org, presented by the Academy of American Poets.

While poetry’s “vital place” may sometimes be questionable in these times but you wordsmiths and lovers of lyrical artistry know the value poetry has for your own work…don’t you? (Hint: if not, it’s time you found out.)

National Poetry Month(2009 poster)

Now go write some haiku or something.

And a tiny url for your sharing pleasure: http://tinyurl.com/6pb6s95

Declan Burke on Indie Publishing

March 14, 2010

On authors, editors, and the state of the Publishing Union, author Declan Burke (Crime Always Pays and The Big O) says it better than most in a recent guest column in Irish Publishing News:

…like-minded writers should get together and set up a co-op, akin to the United Artists studio of early Hollywood lore. In theory, it can be done: e-publishing and print-on-demand are just two elements of contemporary technology that allow writers to circumvent the publishing circus and go straight to readers.

He also quotes author Henry Porter from a related post on the Guardian Book Blog:

What worries me is the loss of income for writers in what is a pretty healthy market, the loss of good editors from publishing houses and the disdain for writers by retailers – people who depend on them. If they are not careful the core talent of the book trade may well combine in new types of ventures – collectives and transparent relationships where writers and editors go into business together on a 50:50 basis and are enabled by web platforms, ebooks and print on demand… disintermediation of a more radical sort.

Hey, that’s a great idea.

“So You Say You Want A Revolution?” in Irish Publishing News (with links to the original post on his blog)
“As I start to write my latest book, I fear for the future of publishing: Retailing pressure and the emergence of the ebook are threatening the future of authors and their work” by Henry Porter at The Guardian Blog (observer.guardian.co.uk)

And a tiny url for your sharing pleasure: http://tinyurl.com/79u7ocy