Basically, particularly in Britain, it's a hegemonic thing that people who write tend to come from the leisure classes. They can afford the time and the books.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Fiction writing, and the reading of it, and book buying, have always been the activities of a tiny minority of people, even in the most-literate societies.
I think the reason working-class people don't write books is because they are encouraged to believe that only certain people are permitted to write books.
I never expected to earn money out of writing. In fact, the idea of getting published was too bourgeois. Then, in England, I realised that writing a book was something you could do without it being laughable.
There is a whole industry in America of people who want to write, and those who teach it. Even if the students don't end up writing, what's good about them taking the courses is, they become great readers, learning to appreciate the writing.
Because of England's lack of social mobility, unless they make truly heroic efforts, writers who are privately educated and then go on to Oxbridge or an institution like the BBC will generally embarrass themselves when they attempt to have a go at working- or lower middle-class characters.
Travelling is difficult, and writers tend to want to stay at home and do their work.
I became fascinated by the fact that people write to give away rather than write to be read. It's the difference between playwrights and novelists.
Writing nonfiction of various kinds has been instructive and entertaining as well as paying the rent.
Writing a book is such a full-time job. If you're away for a few days, you have to start again.
I think people become consumed with selling a book when they need to be consumed with writing it.