AUTHOR'S EARNINGS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 4 January 1923, Page 8

AUTHOR'S EARNINGS.

*r GORY TALES BRING £100,000. I In spite of the golden prizes which occasionally fell to the lot of a popular writer, the truth remains that literature, in all its grades, is the worst paid of all the professions, with the exception of the Church. This is proved once more by the very small fortune left by George R. Sims, one of the f most industrious writers of our time. The life-earnings of the most successful writer seem quite pitifully small, for it is doubtful whether any living writer has actually made £100,----000 by his books alone, apart i'ronu their dramatisation. ' '-, It is one of "life's little ironies" that one, of the largest fortunes made in recent times by a writer is credited to Harlan P. Halsey, whose blood-curd-ling tales have been the delight and bane of American errand-boys • for years. "Old Sleuth," as he was familiarly known, wrote no fewer than 600 stories recounting the adventures of "Flyaway Ned." "Firebomb Jack," "Magic Dick, the Boy Detective," and similar heroes of the highway. , The author of this "gutter" literaI ture lived in regal style in one of the handsomest of New York houses, sur- | rounded by rare paintings and tapes- ; tries, curios, and statuary, and every j costly evidence of wealth. | It is instructive to contrast with jHakey's £100,000 the £5 for which Milton sold his immortal "Paradise Lost," and the £200 a year which Sir ( Walter S-ott was glad to earn in his early writing days.