by Evan J
Photo by Evan J
Nisha Patel, an award-winning spoken word poet and Edmonton’s current Poet Laureate, recently used the hashtag #PoetryPaidMe in a series of social media posts that publicized her billable rates for poetry-related undertakings—performances, commissions, mentoring, etc. While this in itself is significant, what is more significant are the high prices she charges, and her justification for these prices, (rightfully) based on her expertise. The posts promote the need for the artistic community to have several necessary and overdue public conversations about the financial value of poetry, specifically about how poorly most poets get paid for their work.
Without getting too much into the history of arts funding and the Canadian public’s complex relationship with poetry, here is some background to poetry’s financial side. Here’s what happens before a poet gets paid:
For various reasons, publishers don’t make enough from sales. Consequently, they need money to survive, so they ask politically funded arts councils and (more fruitlessly) private donors for help. Politicians then decide how much (or, more accurately, how little) money to give these arts councils. Arts councils get some money, then hand a chunk of it down to publishers, who in turn distribute it amongst their (also underpaid) staff and authors. When the process is complete, a poet will make on average $40 for a poem published in a literary journal. For better context, after writing, thinking, editing, proofing, and submitting, poets are paid less than $5 an hour.
What this financial breakdown shows, and what Patel is reminding us, is that this system is obviously broken. While the last thing I want to do is degrade poetry by demanding it fit better into a capitalist box (to talk money and poetry in the same sentence is loathsome enough), proper financial compensation is a conversation that needs to happen. Most poets in Canada would indeed practice their craft for free (and most already do), but this should not be the reality for such an important pillar of Canada’s artistic community.
How to solve this problem is the big question, and I don’t have the answer yet. Literary journals, book publishers, and arts councils are also feeling the financial crunch. But passively accepting $40 per poem just because it’s the going rate, well, I don’t think that’s going to help. What might help, for starters, is if more pressure is applied to every level where money changes hands. Poets, like other artists, should be demanding equitable pay, if not more, from the entire industry. Many poets are experts in their artistic field, and, regardless of how the grant money is distributed in Canada, they deserve to be paid accordingly.
Additionally, the flourishing poetry community should, like Patel, start conversations about financial compensation. The quantity and diversity of poets are both growing fast, and it would be wonderful if these poets could converse with all parties—other poets, arts organizations, writers’ unions, festivals, other artists, etc.—about these issues. And in those conversations, real numbers should be thrown around and considered. It would be wonderful to see a variety of charts—maybe even using the charts from Patel’s posts as the templates —that offer equitable financial rates for all the activities poets are asked to undertake.
Even if it’s plainly visible how little money is currently involved in poetry, and even if it’s disheartening to see the publishers already so strapped for cash, more money will never appear and poets will never be paid appropriately until the poets themselves start to demand it.
*Evan J is an independent, contributing writer for Cloud Lake Literary. As of this publication date, Cloud Lake Literary does not have any form of public funding or grants. We follow industry standards and pay our writers and artists out of our own (volunteer) pockets alongside any advertising and subscriptions we can obtain and still run at a deficit. We recognize and believe that all poets, writers, and artists should be paid (and paid well) for their time and skill. Always seek payment for your work.