NO READER LEFT BEHIND
After Six Months Free, Paid or Gift Subscriptions Are Your Option
Six months ago, I started the Substack Critical Conditions by Wayne Robins. It was free to all to subscribe, to read, to forward, and to be shared. Because there is no advertising, Substack has appeal to both writers and readers. Subscriptions have grown steadily, and the pass-along readership is steadily reaching beyond 1,000 per column. Now I am offering a paid option, but no reader will be left behind. It will remain free to those who cannot or prefer not to pay for as long as it is feasible for me.
But writing is hard work, and writing well really hard. The columns I publish at least weekly (more often during long holiday and summer breaks from teaching, during which I get no income) take a few minutes to read but many hours to write. Days of preparation, note-talking, trying to decipher my increasingly unreadable handwriting. Then, there are many hours of editing, deleting excess, debating with myself what constitutes excess, or irrelevance, or not quite the "right fit." (I often heard that ugly phrase many times in dozens of job interviews in my 40s, 50s, and 60s).
No matter how many times I proofread, however, there are typographical errors, errant letters, aberrant grammar, and the occasional fact wrong. There is no copy editor, proofreader, section editor: It's the New New Journalism, on a tightrope without a net. My memories, that go back more than 60 years, are my memories, but I don't have total recall and can only check and recheck the internet so many times before I press "publish." I appreciate the feedback if I’ve erred on an important fact, and I correct it on the internet version ASAP.
In the wisest interview I've ever read, Maya Angelou discusses writing, with George Plimpton, in the Paris Review. She tells him:
"It must look easy, but it takes me forever to get it to look so easy. Of course, there are those critics—New York critics as a rule—who say, Well, Maya Angelou has a new book out and of course it’s good but then she’s a natural writer. Those are the ones I want to grab by the throat and wrestle to the floor because it takes me forever to get it to sing. I work at the language."
Placing this here makes me say: "Mr. Robins, I knew Maya Angelou, I have read Maya Angelou, and let me tell you, you are no Maya Angelou." I know that. I use this interview every year in my course Craft of Interviewing at St. John's University, because it's wonderful to read an interview in which a genius talks about her craft.
I have always worked hard at my craft, and like most professional writers, used to enjoy getting paid for it. Now magazines are disappearing and require younger voices, local newspapers have been devoured by vulture capitalists, who drain the resources (the staff), until the newspapers disappear, and the owners can reap huge profits by selling the real estate.
Critical Conditions was one of many working titles for a memoir that everyone who knew me has suggested I write. Other working titles included "God, Booze, and Rock and Roll," "Almost Almost Famous," "Finite Jest," "Gravity's Longbow" and "Led Zeppelin V".
My Substack is really that memoir, one essay at a time. I have years of material to share. If you've read this far, you know I've got some good stuff, and that I am finally discovering the writing and storytelling voice that feels authentic to me, that tries to bring the reader along on the journey.
And there is more of course: sometimes, suggestions on new music adults might enjoy, or my take on why kids like the music they do. I watch a tremendous amount of streaming TV shows, most of it in languages other than English, and I look forward to having more time to share suggestions of what to watch beyond the Netflix phenom du jour. (Why did I stop watching Squid Games? Because it made me sad. That is my review.)
You are most welcome continue to subscribe without paying. If it seems prudent, and I have time to be prolific, at sometime there will be paid-only benefits. But first I'd like to just ask that if you enjoy what I'm doing, and you are able to, I'd appreciate it if you helped to support the work. I might even suggest, this being gift-giving season, that you could continue to read free but buy an annual subscription as a gift for someone else. Of course, you could pay to subscribe as well as give a gift. That would be cool, too. The price for the rest of 2021 should be $5.99 a month, $30 a year, a 25 per cent discount on the $40 a year that will begin in 2022.
Whatever your choice, I am so grateful to you for reading and enjoying my work.
Wayne Robins