Original subtitles

[MUSIC PLAYING]

What you really want to know is,

how do you take your radiant manuscript,

get it turned into a book, have people provide

some sort of income from it for you,

so that you can write another book?

so that you can write another book?

And in the world that we live in today,

there's various ways of doing that.

You can get an agent.

Tends to be chicken and egg.

If you have a published book, you'll get an agent.

If you have an agent, you may have a published book.

But what if there isn't an entry point for you yet?

There is, of course, always self-publishing

There is, of course, always self-publishing

via the internet, and there is the other route,

which is sending your manuscripts

into literary magazines, which are, however,

deluged with manuscripts.

So it's not easy, and some of it, let's face it, is luck.

You happen to be in the right place at the right time.

Your book happens to hit a nerve.

People respond to maybe something

People respond to maybe something

you published in the "New Yorker" that happened recently,

and bingo, you've got a publishing contract.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

How to find an agent?

Well, there is-- there's old agents, middle-aged agents,

and young agents.

But of all of those, what you need

is to go with the one who loves you.

Somebody may want to just collect you to add you

Somebody may want to just collect you to add you

to their, quote, "stable."

That may not necessarily be the one you want.

Someone may take you on hoping to make a quick sale,

and then when they don't make that quick sale,

you find that they're not really answering your emails very

quickly.

That's probably not the one you want either.

How do you know who that special person will be?

How do you know who that special person will be?

It's sort of like the movies.

Bells go off.

They they have to love you.

You have to love them, at least enough to form a good working

relationship.

So you don't want to be just a commodity for them,

but you also don't want to be their best friend.

I think it's harder in some ways than it

was when I was in my 20s and starting out

because, in those days, not very many people wanted

because, in those days, not very many people wanted

to be writers, whereas now a lot of people do,

and they can even go to writing schools

or take online courses to help them do that.

I don't think there's any one secret formula that

will make that happen for you.

Time and place, the moment, luck,

connecting with someone who actually can see what you've

done, can see the worth in--

done, can see the worth in--

of what you've done--

these are all-- they're all variables,

and there's no way of making it.

There's no surefire way of making it happen.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

How valuable is it for you to be able to speak

in an intelligible way about your book?

I was in at the beginning of all of this,

I was in at the beginning of all of this,

so I go back to the point at which you would find yourself

on the radio show, and the person would say to you,

I haven't read your book.

I'm not going to, and why should anybody bother with it?

What would you say?

So you probably won't be put in a position like that

anymore because I don't think people are that aggressive

anymore about writers.

And if they're going to have them on the show at all,

they're not going to be that rude to them.

they're not going to be that rude to them.

But it did used to go on quite a bit,

especially if you were, excuse me, female.

A little tip-- it's quite frequently the interviewer

will not have had a chance to read your book,

and if they're a pro, they will confess that.

They won't try to wing it, and you

will say, just ask me these three or four questions,

and we'll be fine.

There's also workshops in how to present your work,

and people will coach you in that.

They'll help you learn how to speak into the mic.

They'll help you learn how to speak into the mic.

They will remind you that you should have a big numbers watch

and not go over the time set because if you do,

you're going to be cutting into some other writer's

allotted time.

You'll make yourself quite unpopular.

So all of these things can be learned and studied,

and if you are a female person, don't go up

and if you are a female person, don't go up

on stage in a really short skirt--

just saying-- if you want people to be paying attention

to your work.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Don't believe the billboards good or bad.

They're just somebody's view.

If you think that a particular individual has it in for you,

and they're always writing bad reviews of your book,

and they're always writing bad reviews of your book,

you might ask them why they're so obsessed.

But I've written a lot of reviews,

but I'm not a professional reviewer,

so I don't write bad reviews.

I will only write a review of a book if I, first of all,

have enjoyed it, and second, have

something to say about it because you

can enjoy a book quite well but have nothing particular to say.

How do you deal with bad reviews?

I think, when you're young, these things

go like an icicle into your heart

go like an icicle into your heart

because you think that, maybe, there's some truth in them,

or else you feel very maligned.

So I think of a nice Buddhist meditation app

on your phone is very helpful.

Time passes like a ripple.

It fades away.

Somebody in England wrote a very acute thing,

which was the only person who sees

all the bad reviews of your book is you--

you and, to some extent, your publisher.

you and, to some extent, your publisher.

So the rule about that is if it's a good review,

the publisher takes credit for it, and if it's a bad review,

it's your fault. There's a wonderful book

that you can read.

It's called, "Mortification-- Writers

and Their Public Shame," in which

writers write about all the awful things that have happened

to them in public.

And once you've read that, you'll realize that whatever is

going to happen to you cannot be nearly as bad.

I think my favorite was a poet who had--

I think my favorite was a poet who had--

his slim volume had just come out,

and he'd given the proverbial reading in the bookstore

with maybe three people in attendance.

On his way out, feeling quite dejected

he saw a rack of second handbooks for sale.

Much to his surprise, there was his just-published volume.

So curious, he picked it up and opened it,

and there on the fly leaf, it said, to mom and dad, love him.

and there on the fly leaf, it said, to mom and dad, love him.

His parents had flogged his book.

So it's not going to be that bad for you,

and you can cheer yourself up quite

a bit by reading this book.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Suppose you have a reasonably successful, or even

a very successful, first novel, your next task

will be getting over the second novel hurdle, which is often

will be getting over the second novel hurdle, which is often

quite hard for people, particularly when

they're young because reviewers and publishers will expect

you to write another version of what you've already written.

You may not feel inclined to do that.

We were in a bed and breakfast in Ireland one time,

and the breakfast was very good.

So we said, this is a very good breakfast, and the man said,

I used to be a chef.

I used to be a chef.

And we said, where were you a chef,

and he named a restaurant in the town.

And we said, we had dinner there last night, and he said,

and how was it?

And we said, oh, it was quite good.

He said, anyone can cook a good dinner once.

So the message to the first novel successful writer is now

do it again.

And once you've do-- done that, do it again.