FORTUNES IN AUTHORS

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 June 1927, Page 9

FORTUNES IN AUTHORS

CASTLE BOUGHT WITH BOOKS. Is there money in authorship? Sometimes, yes; more often, no. Successful writers have sometimes piled up big fortunes; on the other hand, some of the greatest geniuses have found it difficult to secure a bare living. For “Paradise Lost” Milton received £lo', his widow later getting a further payment of £B. The price paid by an American syndicate to a very popular English writer of humorous stories is £3OO per story. George Gissing, who painstakingly wrote novels that are now regarded as classics, lived and died povertypursued. A. S. M. Hutchinson is said to have made £lOO,OOO from “If Winter Comes” alone. One reason why the modern popular writer sometimes accumulates riches from his inkpot is the fact that a, successful book may be filmed, dramatised, and translated. All these things mean handsome royalties. But even in the days before these developments there were writers who made lots of money. Alexander Pope received £lO,OOO for his translation of Homer, a sum equal to £30,000 today. The “Decline and Fall” brought Gibbon, the historian, £lO,OOO. Macaulay made £25,000 out of his “History of England.” But fiction, naturally, supplies the most startling instances of big monetary returns from the inkpot. When he had established himself, Charles Dickens made £lO,OOO a year, leaving, when he died about £lOO,OOO. And he was not careful about money. Sir Walter Scott, finding himself, through no fault of his own, in debt, set to work to pay off his creditors, by writing novel after novel. He went on until he had paid off over £lO,OOO and became a fairly well-to-do man again. But the strain broke up his health. In our own times there, are many instances of the fickleness of fortune. For many years Joseph Conrad had to write in dire poverty. Few of his books sold more than 1500 copies when first published. The turn came when he was nearing the end of his life; he left nearly £20,000. Sir James Barrie, who started as a pressman, netted £40,000 from his immortal “The Little Minister” alone. Kipling, who started in the same way, now receives £lO.OO for a short story. Sir Hall Caine, starting without money, managed to buy himself a fine castle. What he makes is not known. But since several of his novels have sold half a million copies, he must be a rich man. J. J. Bell, the Scottish humorist, received £5O for all rights in “Wee MacGregor,” which made a fortune for his publishers. When Mrs Rice wrote “Mrs Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch,” she probably hoped for an adequate return. Did she ever dream of the £20,000 which that very human story actually brought her?

John Davidson, the poet, ended his life because he could not induce the public to buy the poems the critics praised so highly. But Mrs Ella Wheeler Wilcox, the American versifier, made a five-figure income from rhymes at which the critics sneered. Contrary to general belief, fame in writing does not always bring wealth. Francis Thompson, the poet, made less in a year than many an unknown journalist makes in a poor month. Among living authors who may safely be said to have made a big fortune from their inkpots are Arnold Bennett, John Galsworthy, Somerset Maugham, Edgar Wallace, Ethel M. Dell, I. A. R. Wylie, A. S. M. Hutchinson, E. M. Hull, Sir J. M. Barrie, F. Bernard Shaw, and Sir Hall Caine. There are many others equally famous, equally fortunate. Did a man ever set out to write a “best seller” and succeed? Probably not. Most books which achieve vast circulations do so because, whatever their intrinsic literary value, they were written in absolute sincerity by their authors,