What Are You Doing Right Now? (210 Viewers)

pitbull

Senior Member
#350,001
Jul 26, 2007
11,045
#350,001
Dostoevsky said:
2) I studied economics and it reminds me of finding a job with that degree here. I mean, I can't get a job if I don't have experience in the field. At some point it does make sense, but it other it makes no sense whatsoever because I'm never going to get experience unless you offer me that job. So far I had a couple of different jobs, working outside of the field, and I gotta say I always stood out despite zero experience in the field. It's a gamble, maybe, but otherwise it's just people fading out because zero chances were given.
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What kind of job are you looking for within that field? In my experience, degree in economics is one of the few useful degrees as companies are actually requesting this, I've yet to see a job ad requesting a person with a degree in History, Philosophy, Philology or Political science though.

You can't even get an internship in a bank or something? If you really stand out, it's hard to imagine they wouldn't hire you after a month or three.
 

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Dostoevsky

Dostoevsky

Tzu
Administrator
#350,002
May 27, 2007
88,988
#350,002
pitbull said:
What kind of job are you looking for within that field? In my experience, degree in economics is one of the few useful degrees as companies are actually requesting this, I've yet to see a job ad requesting a person with a degree in History, Philosophy, Philology or Political science though.

You can't even get an internship in a bank or something? If you really stand out, it's hard to imagine they wouldn't hire you after a month or three.
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I've been on it for the past couple of years, I don't want to repeat myself, sounds like the biggest whining. :D But let's just say it's my country and not the degree it self.
 
Post Ironic

Post Ironic

Senior Member
#350,005
Feb 9, 2013
42,253
#350,005
Dostoevsky said:
Thanks for that great post.

And no, I haven't published anything so far nor I have studied literature. While I totally agree with the big idea of your post, here's what I don't get and I think ruins literature:

1) Given they are well educated, those who work for publishing houses, I think it's their job to realize if a book is good enough to earn profit (for them). If so, I don't see why would they reject a novel to begin with, as it's in their interest.

2) I studied economics and it reminds me of finding a job with that degree here. I mean, I can't get a job if I don't have experience in the field. At some point it does make sense, but it other it makes no sense whatsoever because I'm never going to get experience unless you offer me that job. So far I had a couple of different jobs, working outside of the field, and I gotta say I always stood out despite zero experience in the field. It's a gamble, maybe, but otherwise it's just people fading out because zero chances were given.

3) Let's say I get rejected because, well, I never published anything and I'm just among plenty of those who submitted their manuscript without having their name unknown. At some point, I'd understand why is that. On the other side, though, it feels horrible to see other 200-500 books getting published by the SAME people like myself, also unknown, just because they had the money to pay their printing costs. Like I said, plenty of publishing houses automatically accept your manuscript if you say you're paying the costs. It might be a good book. But it might be shitton of books that are pure garbage and are getting published, ruining the whole point of literature and quality reading, just because they had the money? That's just so wrong. It makes me think how they don't care about the quality of the book at all, nor about their own reputation, since they are ready to publish literally anything.

But I do like the options that you named. It makes sense.

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Been thinking about that for a long time.

I just don't understand how something can be translated well enough so it doesn't ruin the original. Not only the person translating needs to have native English, but IMO he needs to love and be in the business of literature so he captures the essence of the original. And that's very rare and hard work. You need to be in the authors skin to see what he sees. I think if I translated mine with google translate (even if it's excellent) it would be a disaster. :D

Especially when it comes to poetry. No wonder Goethe learned Serbian to understand some. IMO it's impossible to capture the 100% of it.
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In bigger publishing houses, this is true. They are well-educated enough and well-versed in the industry to make those predictions and take chances. But in those publishing houses, they generally don't accept manuscripts from unpublished writers without an agent. The debut novels and collections of stories they publish aren't often really debuts, as the new writers they are willing to publish most often have extensive publication history in literary journals and reviews, and/or education in literature or creative writing.

In the sort of places that work as a vanity press, or in conjunction with a vanity press, it's highly unlikely they even read your manuscript, and if they do, it's a page or two to make a decision on whether it's worth reading more. They receive a ridiculous number of unsolicited manuscripts, the vast vast majority utter dross, and pretty much everyone is only offered the vanity press option.

The problem is one of sheer volume. Literacy rates are at their highest ever. Which means more people read (though this is sadly beginning a downturn with the digital age), but also that more people write. The romanticism of becoming a writer exists for a lot of people. So the number of people writing rubbish and wanting to become published writers is kind of silly. There isn't a market for such rubbish. There isn't a market for their books even if they were half-decent writers. So vanity presses exist purely as profit machines, and to allow people to get that brief sense of euphoria at having their writing "published" and then they can sell/give their book to family and friends, and usually fail to sell another copy.

It sounds like you are holding on to romantic notions of a 19th century style book industry, with publishing houses taking chances on unknown writers, caring about reputation, and the good of literature, and so on. Unfortunately the only companies who care about such things today are those who publish already well-respected authors. The rest, they just care about profit.

I have trouble letting go of those same notions. It's a little soul-crushing to try to be pragmatic and cynical about literature and art.
 
Osman

Osman

Koul Khara!
#350,012
Aug 30, 2002
61,489
#350,012
Thanks boyos.

So far I gotten so many expensive whiskeys as gifts, don't have the heart to tell my coworkers it's not my style :D

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