Literature as a Profession: Depression-Era Views Toward Writing

When we think of the Harlem Renaissance, we think of a flourishing literary period. We rarely take the time to consider the POST-Renaissance, the fall from these heights. In the case of the New Negro Renaissance, there was a decisive and abrupt decline as the excitement of the 1920s was stifled by the weight of the Great Depression. In this post, I'll look at literary views in the 1930s, a time when jobs held precedent over sonnets.

I am getting my information from a literary column published in the Atlanta Daily World under the title Literary Flashes and later Along the Literary Front. It began in June of 1934 and continued until January of 1937, at a time when Hitler is rising to power in Germany and Roosevelt is instituting his New Deal policies. It's interesting that the later title for column, "Along the Literary Front", almost sounds militaristic (think All Quiet on the Western Front). Week after week, this column preaches cooperation and practicality in writing above individual genius. Rather than the kinds of publications like Fire which aimed in 1925 to ignite the imagination of blacks with new, shocking ideas, this Depression-era literature seeks to establish writing as a paying profession. Like those in other disciplines during this time, writers are searching for one thing: Stability.

The first thing this column makes clear is that black readers do NOT and have NOT supported black authors. The New Negro  Renaissance was funded and energized by white followers, and once the Negro fad went out of fashion, black authors had no one to buy their books. White patrons disappeared and black patrons were never there to begin with. Rather than blaming a faulty education system or lack of initiative among black writers, this column again and again blames the black consumer public for the literary drought, criticizing their utter lack of patronage of their own artists.

Responding to Frank Marshall Davis' question: “Has the Golden Age of the Negro… come to an end?”, one columnist responds:

“We believe that, at least temporarily, the answer to Mr. Davis’ question must be in the affirmative. Of course, the WHY of this situation is controversial. We know that fads come and go and we are now wondering if the so called “New Negro Renaissance” of 10 years ago was not merely a fad. If so, then we have the answer to the question “Why?” regarding the present situation: The answer is simply that the fad has passed.”

The column goes on to explain that publishing house records show that blacks rarely buy books of black or white authors. When the New Negro was a hot topic in white literary circles, publishers were eager to publish works by black authors. However, once whites moved on to the next fad, the audience evaporated. With black consumers unwilling and unused to buying books, publishers had no reason to risk their assets by publishing black authors. The 1930s was not lacking in writers - it was lacking in readers. 

Later columns detail how truly difficult and grim the situation was for a young writer breaking onto the literary scene. After working tirelessly to write the manuscript for a first novel, unknown authors often had to foot much of the publishing bill in order to get a contract from anyone. They rarely made back the money. After success, publishers were willing to bid for the rights to their work. However, success was not guaranteed and few people had the patience or the resources to wait for years before the "payoff" arrived. 

The column urges writers to cast aside their pride and make money any way they can. Shallow romances, corny greeting cards - any genre was fair game as long as it put food on the table. How different this is from the W.E.B. Du Bois "Talented Tenth" who worried so much about representing black culture as high, sophisticated, and elite!

“Each year, thousands of dollars are paid to writers for sentimental verses to go on holiday and birthday cards while a considerable amount is paid by popular magazines particularly the love story publications, for equally sentimental verses. Many a writer dreams of eventually winning fame and fortune with a book of serious poetry, but will never realize this dream. It is well to aim high in the field of poetry, but silly to completely ignore the more ordinary and popular aspects of this field as represented by light, sentimental verse writing.”

My favorite light genre advocated by this column is "love-pulp". Love-pulp was the 1934 name for books like Twilight or perhaps 50 Shades of Gray. You know exactly what it means. I like this term though because it makes me picture some mushed up fruit or orange juice. Counter intuitively, high-pulp percentage writing offers low brain protein, unlike its citrus equivalent.

Here's another term, "Escape literature":

“The serious authors of the race are needed, and there can hardly be too many of them, but, obviously just at this time, the race is in greater need of authors of “escape” literature.”

“The everyday life of the Negro group in this country is almost hopelessly rooted in problems of a serious nature, and the literature which will more nearly attract the greater number of Negro readers is that slanted for sheer entertainment. Come on, Negro writers, and let’s get busy slanting for the “light” literary stuff.”

This may seem like giving up, aiming low in literature to sell copies rather than setting your sights on artistic greatness. However, artistry was simply not the most desirable attribute in a writer. Writing in any age, including today, is a difficult, unstable profession. The Depression only heightened the uncertainty and desperation of writers. Finding a way to get a steady paycheck was admirable.

Writing becomes more and more similar to other professions, as this column leaves behind the exalted "genius in the attic" stereotype to assume a collective, somewhat formulaic approach to the business of writing:

“Writing is a profession even as medicine, law, music and others. To be a successful lawyer or doctor, it is necessary for one to study prescribed courses in those professions… Likewise, to be a successful author it is necessary for one to study authorship… The work of the so-called “born writer”, or any other sort of writer, is absolutely worthless (from the monetary viewpoint) if it does not comply with the modern formulas as taught in many of the best courses.”

Writing can be taught. It does not flow down from the Muses, or emanate from the trees. It is a craft honed by long days of study and hard work. And you are not alone - The main purpose of this "Literary Flashes" column is to provide a platform for writers to publicize their work, meet each other, and discuss strategies for supporting themselves through their work. The columnist encouraged writers to submit their names, addresses and information on any manuscripts in progress or completed. Then the columnist acted as the middle man, promoting any submitted manuscripts in hopes that a publisher would pick them up. The column is written to create a community among writers. In fact, it is clearly not written for the average reader, but rather is an advice column and meet-up forum for writers only. For that reason, it does not publish much poetry or short stories to entertain the reader. It's a column that talks about literature, rather than being literature itself.

Here's a good explanation of this collective mentality:

In registering with LITERARY FLASHES, you are wisely associating yourself with many already successful authors as well as many ambitious beginners... Negro writers are few and scattered. There is nothing more beneficial than association with those of your own aspirations. LITERARY FLASHES offers all writers this valuable association with one another.

It's interesting that even writing during the Depression has a tendency to unionize of sorts. This is seen most obviously in the name of the group which published this column : the Negro Writer's Guild. The word "guild" makes me think of stone masons in the Middle Ages. It is odd to think of writing, something I consider very personal and creative, as a field with apprentices, teachers, and a tight-knit fraternal structure.

It's a difficult balance: if writers are only respected for being creative, groundbreaking and alternative, they will have a hard time making enough money. However, if they only produce fluff, what's the point? The ideal situation is a writer who makes enough money through "pulp" writing to finance their more creative projects, but light, commercial writing takes time and does not provide assured financial success either. This was not a barren literary period like this column's depressing views suggest: William Faulkner and Carson McCullers wrote amazing works during this time; Frank Marshall Davis brought out his first book of poems, Black Man's Verse, in 1935. However, the outlook is still pretty bleak, and, sad as it is, this column shows that literary output depends just as much upon economics as it does on individual creative genius.