paying the rent

  • A Body Is a Bill to Pay

    A Body Is a Bill to Pay

    If my body is a bill to pay, my voice will be singing the receipts.

  • CA$H 4 GOLD

    CA$H 4 GOLD

    I will not end up like these woman, I promise myself, left behind and living in some suburb. I will not be anyone’s baby. I will be a real artist instead, a writer.

  • Those Who Serve

    Those Who Serve

    To me, service is a transaction, and when you serve with real commitment, you might be on the receiving end of an appreciation that feels like a form of love.

  • The Rumpus Interview with Russell Banks

    Russell Banks discusses his new book, Voyager: Travel Writings, why we are never free from our history, and how writing saved his life.

  • VISIBLE: Women Writers of Color: Jaquira Díaz

    VISIBLE: Women Writers of Color: Jaquira Díaz

    Jaquira Díaz discusses the challenge of writing about family members, her greatest joy as a writer, and her literary role models.

  • The Commune

    The Commune

    Our house, we believed, was a microcosm of that country. Every month, we’d gather at the kitchen table for our house meeting, where we, like politicians, unveiled our big plans for change.

  • On Playing Games, Productivity, and Right Livelihood

    On Playing Games, Productivity, and Right Livelihood

    One week last spring I said it out loud for the first time: “Sometimes I play so long, my fingers go numb.”

  • Bookslut Bids Farewell

    Well the only reason Bookslut was interesting was because it didn’t make money, and when I realized the sacrifices I was going to have to make in order for it to make money, it wasn’t worth it. It used to…

  • Used-Car Salesman

    Used-Car Salesman

    I wondered if he understood my joke, or its evasion, but surely he knew a used-car salesman always fudged his story. In fact, the car had been in my possession all of three weeks. Also, it didn’t exactly belong to…

  • More Money, More Problems

    What happens when writers suddenly face a windfall? Bad things. That’s why the Whiting Awards include a financial planning workshop for winners. Winners of the 2016 Whiting Awards each received $50,000. For authors who are struggling as freelancers or adjunct…

  • Living Wages Cost More Money

    A new study has revealed why academic adjuncts are paid so little: living wages would cost universities a lot more money. A new study says that converting adjunct faculty to tenure track positions would cost $27 billion dollars. The study…

  • Living the Frugal Writer’s Life

    Over at Lit Hub, Sunil Yapa shares some guidelines on living cheaply as an up-and-coming writer. High up on his list: living outside of the United States: I believe at some point all writing roads pass through New York but you don’t…