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Nika Kuchuk's avatar

An interesting study, and certainly a timely lens to think about writing as a profession—especially given the Cambrian explosion of writing on the internet, yet “writing for a living” becoming increasingly the domain of the relatively few, as so many recent conversations on Substack and elsewhere highlight.

I wonder, too, how these trends would fare compared against general numbers regarding literacy, for example, and literacy broken up by gender and class as well. It seems inevitable to me that writing would begin, at least, as an elite occupation simply because only the very elite were literate to begin with (elite and clergy, of course, who were often drawn from elites too). Folk of more humble classes (I also can’t think of a better term!) would rely instead on oral traditions such as tales and songs, which are much harder to track and trace, in their pre-written-down forms.

I’m also curious about what other factors would help contextualize the interesting graphic you’ve presented. Political movements, perhaps? I.e., is there a correlation between increased literacy or populist movements, for example, and the periods of relative openness for writers to enter the field? Or, if not political movements, then maybe broadly socio-economic or even technological opportunities?

Certainly a fertile field of research! I am looking forward to hearing more about your work on this, and the patterns that emerge :)

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Michelle Ma's avatar

A lot has to do with parental investment versus flat out demographics. Mao's parents invested heavily in school, and they lived hardly better than an average peasant. Their house was tiny, tiny, and they bathed in a nearby duck pond. Horace's father was once a slave. He saved heavily for his son. Virgil came from agrarian stock. Those are just a few examples.

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