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| C. Kevin Thompson |
In last month’s Part 1 of “May This Blog Haunt You Pleasantly,” I stated how important it is for writers to read about other writers. Whether they were trailblazers or path-wideners, each writer has his or her own story. Being as human as we are, those stories paint for us pictures of triumph and tragedy…two things from which we can learn.
As I read Les Standiford’s The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits over the holidays, there were some things that jumped off the page for me, and I thought I’d share them here at Seriously Write.
Last time, we looked at Gleaning #1, which was:
Authors have always wished to get their works in as many readers’ hands as possible, sometimes at the chagrin of their publishers (if they are traditionally published) or themselves (if they are independently published). And if not handled properly, it can become an all-consuming fire.
One little tidbit I didn’t mention at the end of last month’s post was how all-consuming that fire had become for Dickens. By the 1850s, his relationship with his wife Catherine had become so estranged, they divorced after twenty-two years of marriage and ten children. Rumors tossed about suggested Charles had been involved in “an illicit affair” (is there really any other type when married?) with a younger woman. Dickens took such offense that he used the front page of his then current magazine, Household Words, to argue to the contrary. 1
As much as this writing life can become a soul-wrenching conflagration on a personal level, this passion we often champion at writers conferences can worm its way into the writer’s business relationships as well, which leads us our next point of interest:
Gleaning #2: The constant tension between authors and publishers will always be a constant. So, get used to it.
As many may or may not know, Charles Dickens lived a challenging life growing up. When Charles was a young lad of twelve, his father—who worked as a clerk for the navy and seemed to always struggle to pay the bills—was thrown in prison “alongside smugglers, mutineers, and pirates” for a debt of forty pounds, owed to a baker, which was a considerable sum in those days. (Aren’t you glad things have changed?) As a result, Charles was forced by necessity to take a job at six schillings a week, working in a boot-blacking factory, bottling the polish used to by military personnel and businessmen to make their shoes shiny. In this factory along the Thames, Charles would one day write of his experience:
Its wainscoted rooms and its rotten floors and staircase, and the old grey rats swarming down in the cellars, and the sound of their squeaking and scuffling coming up the stairs at all times, and the dirt and decay of the place, rise up visibly before me, as if I were there again. 2
This time of his life made an ineradicable impression, for it is found in various forms throughout his writings, and in none more famous than the sentiments of Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol (“Are there no workhouses? Are there no prisons? And the Union workhouses? The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigor then? Those who are badly off must go there. If they would rather die, then they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”)
It was after works like Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby that Dickens would walk around “black streets of London,” formulating the story of his Carol. He was excited about the tale being pieced together in the recesses of his mind. It was a bit of leap on his part, for no Christmas “books” had ever been written before 1843. Some essays by American author Washington Irving, written in January of 1820 and contained in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, had helped to revive the holiday’s traditions we know and love today. However, it is believed that Dickens’s work helped to launch the holiday into another stratosphere.
Celebrating Christmas like we do today, or even how Bob Cratchit and his family did in A Christmas Carol, was not a “thing” in 1843 England. The day itself was not very popular, unlike its Christian counterpart in the spring. Because the day was primarily of Roman Catholic origin with ties to the pagan celebration of Saturnalia, many protestants, both in England and especially in America, actually thought of the holiday as more of a devilish revelry than Godly celebration of Emmanuel, God with us.
These beliefs were amplified by the pagan traditions, such as wassailing, which looked very much like the trick-or-treating we witness today at Halloween. After a song was sung by a group of wassailers—who often came to the door a bit hammered—the home was to offer the singers goodies, like “figgy pudding,” for example. If the homeowners did not comply, they were met with behavior not befitting the holiday. The entire tradition had more of the look and feel of a bully taking the nerd’s lunch money in the middle school cafeteria than “a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time” of giving from “shut-up hearts.”
Nevertheless, Dickens felt the setting of Christmas to be the best for his newest endeavor. With excitement, he took his notes and idea to his publisher, Chapman and Hall. After hearing Dickens explain where his heart had brought him (Have you ever been there as a writer?), the publishers seemed less than enthusiastic (Have you ever been there as a writer?).
His friend and agent, John Forster, who was with him at this very moment, later wrote in his biography of Dickens, “Chuzzlewit had fallen short of all the expectations formed of it in regard to sale.” 3 Even though Forster believed Martin Chuzzlewit to be Dickens’ best work yet, the public felt otherwise as sales testified. Despite all this, Forster felt keeping the relationship with Chapman and Hall open and in good standing would be most beneficial for Dickens, allowing him to trust the process and focus on his part, the writing.
However, Dickens was already at odds with Chapman and Hall before he waltzed into their offices to sing his Carol. They had stated in earlier conversations they might have to draw an extra fifty pounds from his royalties stipulated in the contract for Martin Chuzzlewit. Dickens wrote to Forster after, “I am so irritated, so rubbed in the tenderest part of my eyelids with bay-salt, that I don’t think I can write.” 4
Have you ever felt like that? As if your publisher or agent was pulling your eyelids back and grinding the shards of bay-salt into them until they dissolved with your many tears? I’m sure all writers have felt that way at some point. Some more than others.
Chapman and Hall finally determined they were not interested in a Christmas book written in haste (remember, this is October of 1843, and Dickens had not even started writing it yet). The publishers also believed the story explained to them by Dickens to be a re-writing/re-telling of his former works, and it would have to be done in a cheap form under such time restraints. You could liken it today to having a large publishing house using CreateSpace-like print-on-demand in haste versus taking their time and producing a print run of several thousand hardcover copies.
Instead, Chapman and Hall gave their final ruling. If Dickens wanted to issue the story out to the public, it would have to be in a magazine owned by them and edited by him. This was the only way they would consider funding the project. Otherwise, they were not interested. Translation? Dickens would have to work off the publication of his newest story by writing it in installments, like he had done with his other works, while editing the new magazine for them. In other words, they would pay him—a contract would be written and signed, for sure—but they were going to get some collateral in the bank, namely his name on the cover of the magazine as not only the editor, but as one of the authors contained therein.
In his biography of Dickens, Forster wrote this of Chapman and Hall:
Publishers are bitter bad judges of an author, and are seldom safe persons to consult in regard to the fate or fortunes that may probably await him.” 5
I know every writer reading this believes Forster to be “right on the money” with his comment. Publishers tend to want to play it safe. They like riding the champion thoroughbreds again and again instead of taking a chance on a horse who has never run the big race. We all know this writing life is as much of a business as it is an art or a craft, and it seems it has always been that way.
I believe that if any of us (I’m talking about authors here) started our own publishing house, we may go into it with the war chant of “I’m going to do it differently.” However, we all know there are things within any business which dictate certain ends. There are reasons why things have been done certain ways for so many years. People typically do not continue to make deals that will ruin them financially while remaining in business for decades. Insolvency and longevity never ride the same train.
Yet, this roadblock did not stop Dickens. He instead decided to publish the book “on his own account.” He personally became responsible for all the production costs, as was pointed out in Part 1 of this series.
As a result, he got it done. And the world has been better for it. As we examined last month, he did not make near as much as he had hoped, but such is the life of what amounts to a self-published author. Chapman and Hall, in this instance, became somewhat of an Amazon KDP. They paid the costs up front and offered distribution channels, but Dickens—the author—ended up footing the lion’s share of the bill in the long run.
Do you have a story in you nobody else seems to see or understand with as much clarity? Do you have the wherewithal to power through the obstacles (this is with the understanding that God is in it)? It would seem that if the answer to both of those questions is yes, then you are in good writing company.
As the British say, “On you go!” We’ll see you next month with Part 3.
1 Standiford, Les. The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits. Broadway Books; New York, NY, 2017. pp. 210-211.
2 Ibid., pp. 2-3.
3 Ibid., pp. 73-74.
4 Ibid., p. 75.
5 Ibid., pp. 76-77.
(The Blake Meyer Thriller Series, Book 3)
A Perverse Tale. A Precarious Truth. A Personal Tribulation.
Supervisory Special Agent Blake Meyer is at an impasse. Bound and beaten in a dilapidated warehouse halfway around the world, Blake finds himself listening to an unbelievable story. Right and wrong warp into a despicable clash of ideologies. Life quickly becomes neither black nor white. Nor is it red, white, and blue any longer.
Every second brings the contagion's release closer, promising to drag the United States into the Dark Ages. Tens of millions could be dead within months.
Every moment adds miles and hours to the expanding gulf between him and his family. What is he to believe? Who is he to trust?
C. KEVIN THOMPSON is a husband, a father, a grandfather, and a kid at heart. Often referred to as “crazy” by his grandchildren, it’s only because he is. He’s a writer. Need he say more?
The first three books of his Blake Meyer Thriller series are out! Book 1, 30 Days Hath Revenge, Book 2, Triple Time, and Book 3, The Tide of Times, are now available! Book 4, When the Clock Strikes Fourteen, is coming March 2019! Book 5, A Pulse of Time, is coming November 2019! Book 6, Devil of a Crime, is coming summer 2020! The second edition of his award-winning debut novel, The Serpent’s Grasp, is available wherever books are sold! Also, his standalone mystery, The Letters, is coming in e-book, January 2020! Paperback in February 2020!
Kevin is a huge fan of the TV series 24, The Blacklist, Blue Bloods, NCIS, Criminal Minds, Broadchurch, Shetland, and Hinterland, loves anything to do with Star Trek, and is a Sherlock Holmes fanatic, too. It’s quite elementary, actually.
