Brent Hartinger is a playwright and the author of four novels, all forthcoming from HarperCollins. The first to be published is Geography Club, about one teen‘s efforts to start a gay-straight alliance at his high school. Horn Book Magazine called it “pitch-perfect” and said, "This is the most artful and authentic depiction of a gay teen since M.E. Kerr's groundbreaking Charlie Gilhooly in I'll Love You When You're More Like Me." Explore the inner workings of Brent's mind at "Brent’s Brain," his website.
THE HIGH COST OF ART copyright by Brent Hartinger - printed with permission If any school is ever foolish enough to ask me to give the commencement address at their graduation ceremony, I already know what I’m going to say: "My fellow graduates. When I graduated from college, I told the world that I wanted to make a career as an artist--specifically as a writer of fiction. Every adult in my life told me I was nuts. Can't be done. Ridiculous. Nothing but a pipe dream. "I ignored them and went off to follow my heart. Fifteen years later, I’m here to tell you I was right, and they were wrong. If you really want a career in the arts, you can have it. "But you're going to pay a price. "What kind of price? Let me count the ways. "If you choose a career as an artist, you will face constant rejection. For novel, play, and screenplay writers like me, the system has become so mucked up by submissions from virtually everyone who owns a computer that most agents, producers, and publishers no longer take any aspiring writer seriously; they simply don't have the time to sort through the endless stacks of material. As a result, I once calculated that I had sent out some nine thousand letters and made countless more phone calls soliciting interest in my novels, plays, and screenplays. Virtually all of those letters and phone calls ended in rejection--oftentimes rude, blunt, ego-bursting rejection. As an anecdote, 'nine thousand rejection letters' sounds funny. But the reality can be an all-engulfing cloud of aggravation and despair. "Once every thousand years, the stars will line up, and lightning will strike, and you'll find a four-leaf clover, and you'll be given a chance to perform or display your art. But then, somewhere between completion of the project and its public presentation, something will go terribly wrong, and you'll still end up being rejected. Or maybe everything will go perfectly, absolutely right, but the public will be unable to understand or appreciate your art. Since most good art is personal, the failure of your art to connect with audiences will feel like a personal rejection of you. "If you choose a career as an artist, you will be poor for a long, long time, maybe your whole life. The fact is, Americans don't value artists much. If money is a priority, try your hand at (men's) basketball, baseball, or football. I have both fiction and screenplay agents, and I've successfully run the writers' gauntlet and had books published by major publishers and plays produced and screenplays optioned, and I regularly win awards for my writing. In other words, I’m pretty successful at what I do--more financially successful than ninety-nine percent of my fellow artists. But I still never order wine at dinner, and sometimes I drive or ride miles out of my way to find a particular cash machine so as to avoid the two-dollar fee that my bank dings me whenever I use the 'wrong' machine. |
"Some artists do make big money. A
few of my writer friends have become millionaires through their art.
But without exception, their spectacular successes came only after
decades of unrelenting poverty. When you average these earnings over
twenty years, they all would have made more money as postal carriers. "If you choose a career as an artist, you will spend a lot of time alone. I can't speak for all artists, but writers lead very solitary lives. I've been known to go whole weeks without talking to anyone except my significant other and the woman who scans my membership card as I’m walking into the gym. I’m constitutionally suited for this; I like spending time by myself. But even I sometimes start to go a little nuts sitting in my office all day with no companion except the face of Xena, Warrior Princess, emblazoned on my coffee mug. "Are you self-directed? You'd better be, because if you choose a career as an artist, you will often go for weeks or months or years without any direction or feedback or appreciation at all. As an artist, entire years of your life will be guided by nothing but some fleeting vision and your own sheer tenacity. "I’m a driven person. From the third to the eighth grade, I wrote and published my own independent school newspaper, and rarely missed a week. But even I have often--often!--thought that making a decent living in the arts is simply beyond me. Before I started making any real money from my writing, I had to write seven plays, eight novels, twelve screenplays, and a hundred short stories. I also had to attend about a thousand conferences and seminars and classes, and spend a year living in Los Angeles and a month living in a closet-sized bedroom (literally) at the YMCA in New York. "Any other sacrifices you'll have to make as an artist? Well, children are probably out. Some artists do it, but I honestly can't imagine how they fit two such all-consuming passions into their lives. It seems to me that either one or the other must surely suffer. "If you choose a career as an artist, you will definitely sacrifice friendships. There will be plenty of fine people you'll have to heartlessly jettison from your life just to stay on top of your art and, more importantly, the business of your art. And unless your primary relationship is another artist (as mine is), you'll probably go through a string of frustrated, angry boyfriends and girlfriends who will eventually come to the insulting conclusion that your art is more important to you than they are. And it will be. If you want any chance at all to make it in the arts, it has to be. "All in all, there's an incredible price to be paid if you choose a career as an artist. And for what? The chance to introduce yourself as a painter at cocktail parties? (You won't go to nearly as many as you think you will. You'll be home slaving away on--you guessed it!--your art.) "But if you're an artist, none of this will matter. Because being an artist isn't something you choose. It's something you are. And, of course, there's no price to pay that's too high to be allowed to be who you are. All of you artists out there already know that. "And so, my fellow artists, go out there and make good art. And good luck. Trust me—you'll need it." |
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