The stat about how many classic books were actually written by first-time authors kind of blew my mind

I was browsing a writing stats website last night, killing time, and I saw that over 60% of what we call 'classics' were actually debut novels. I mean stuff like Frankenstein and The Great Gatsby. Here I am stressing over my third rewrite of chapter one, thinking I need to wait until I'm some veteran to write anything good. Has anyone else looked up weird facts about the publishing industry that actually made you feel better about your own writing?

2 comments

2 Comments

uma68520d ago

Read somewhere that J.K. Rowling was rejected like 12 times before Harry Potter got picked up. That one always gets me because you think of her as this big success story, but even she had to grind through the no's. Makes me wonder how many classics we almost didn't get because some publisher had a bad day.

elizabeth90020d agoMost Upvoted

But what if she just wasn't good enough yet, @uma685? I mean, think about it. Those 12 rejections might have pushed her to fix real problems in her manuscript. If someone picked it up on try number one, the Harry Potter we know might have been a total mess. That first book was charming but it wasn't exactly literary gold. Publishers aren't bored people killing art, they're trying to find stuff that actually sells. How many "classics" are just lucky breaks where someone got tired of fighting and went with the first okay thing they saw? The system is ugly but maybe it filters out some real junk too.