Comment by Den_VR

Oh yes, “think of the authors.” That’s propaganda, an idyllic myth.

Literary output and quality have never been solely contingent on authors making a living from their work. The necessity of authors making their livelihood writing is the idyllic myth. Literature can, and has, bloomed from both the pen of the pauper and the privileged.

Jane Austen made perhaps £600 from her writing. Kafka kept a full-time day job and saw zero literary income in his lifetime.

Not to say there’s not people that haven’t made fortunes from those examples, but it sure wasn’t the author.