Marketing
I read with interest about Jason Wilson, who sells what he writes directly, taking up position on King Street in Newtown, Sydney (although I wouldn’t have normally characterized a writer as a “busker”; it’s not like he does a little dance if you buy a story). It’s catching on, apparently, as pointed on in the International Herald Tribune’s recent piece on Adrian Brune, who’s doing the same thing in New York (occupying the usual venue for these activities: the subway). It reminds of me the early 80’s, back in the day when I harbored some literary pretentions, which were usually satisfied by the desperate struggle to keep up with the underground literary scene, one that was exploding out from everywhere, not just the Lower East Side and East Village neighborhoods they’d retreated to following the initial yuppie boom. I wonder if this doesn’t now constitute a trend, and if so, does that have implications for understanding the time we are now a-livin’ in? (Sorry, Mr. Dylan.) The Beats had the initial throes of the Cold War and the buttoned-down social mores to drum against, and the hippie/Yippie factions were electrified by Vietnam and political malfeasance well into the 1970’s. I’m not sure precisely what drivers were at work during the 80’s, when I was chasing down long-gone journals of bad poetry (usually; there was some good stuff, too, but as always when there’s a bit of a glut going on, there’s more bad than good). Perhaps we’re on the verge of a new exciting time in literature, although I admit to having been looking lately more to the internet as a (re)source than to the street. (Props to Gianna at She Sells Sanctuary for the IHT link.)