Me and some of my friends in New Orleans make a living writing poetry for people on the spots with some typewriters. (Although I just do it as a summer gig since I’m currently in college)
Managed to make a few thousand dollars during the months for only busking about 8 hours a week. Planning on doing more hours next summer.
Working currently on finishing up my 3rd collection of poetry which will be one of the first things I think I can stand by within a decades time. Really want it to be perfect. Will be easy to sell it to people who ask if they can read more of my stuff and have already dropped 20 bucks on just one poem.
The amount of gigs by people that liked my stuff for weddings or events was insane.
I’m literally only 19, some of my friends have been making a living on their art for years.
Stop listening to the twats who say it is impossible to make a living off your words.
My main advice is that while yes online and social media followings are good, they do not make any money. Was doing it for free for 3 years. Use those more as a way to keep yourself constantly writing and maybe make contacts long distance who you enjoy the work of.
If you plan on making it, you have to put yourself out into the real world. That’s how you can make connections quick and easy.
Anyways, I know this shit is very preachy and bragadocious seeming. I just was annoyed with all the self-pity poste don this board that does nothing but discourage others from pursuing their passions.
Caricaturists can make a few bucks drawing their shitty cartoons for tourists in the right season too, I'm not sure what either of your summer jobs have to do with actual art.
Henry Torres
Where can I read the types of poems you write on the street?
Andrew Thompson
>literal street art
Gavin Wood
this is now a pasta.
Blake Peterson
Daww shucks. Thank user. Desu.
Blake Wright
Fuck off
Also, good luck with your career and I wish you nothing but success
but fuck off this board
Julian Phillips
I wish I had even half the confidence of a mediocre pseud who busks on the streets of New Orleans. Unfortunately I'm a talented sinc (short for sincere) so I'm crippled by self-doubt and the constant need to improve. I could never entertain the idea of sharing bad writing with others and then charging them money for it
Tyler Sanchez
Piece I wrote for a lady who wanted a poem written for their wife who had just lost their mother a couple of weeks prior. Still keep in contact with them. Nice people.
Brayden Sanchez
>in the reigning capital of rain
Lincoln James
I literally tell the people to pay whatever they feel like it’s worth. I don’t have a set price.
The amount of topics people gave me helped me in becoming more proficient.
I hope you can overcome your self-doubt bud and I’d love to read whatever it is you write.
David Williams
>you are the bloom that puts shame to nagasaki boom. lol
Xavier Allen
I literally tell the people to pay whatever they feel like it’s worth. I don’t have a set price.
The amount of topics people gave me helped me in becoming more proficient.
I hope you can overcome your self-doubt bud and I’d love to read whatever it is you write.
Daniel Hernandez
fuck this is so bad
Xavier Turner
I'm just like you, and I'm pretty sure we're doing god's work. Too much shit out there to add our own.
Jayden Davis
kek
Daniel Wright
You look like you have the G.R.I.D.
Asher Butler
Where's your poet hat, user?
Connor Garcia
It's not a compliment.
Wyatt Edwards
Not a big fan of hats to be honest.
Ian Sanders
ebin bait
Hunter Edwards
>can't use a typewriter >tries to write poetry on one anyway Fix your ribbon; steady your pace and pressure.
Colton Rodriguez
Thanks user. May need to look into a different one. Keys require different pressures so it results in it being not as uniform as I would like.
Austin Rogers
>poetry >it's just bad prose
Aaron Nelson
this. and take your fucking typewriter with you
Evan Green
The problem is you and the ribbon; learn how to use a typerwriter.
Jeremiah Reyes
yeah, good luck with that user
Parker Green
you're probably about 50 years too late for this sort of stuff pal but who am I to judge
Asher Adams
can we make this a typewriter thread? i have a royale (is there an e on the end of that?) in the basement which seems to work fine but it's ribonless. i went to staples, i think, i can't keep office supply store names straight, and they stocked ribbons but their ribbon wheel was maybe half the diameter of those holding the petrified ribbon i removed. will they work, or do i need the same-sized wheel, and if so what store can i source it from?
also have a tanklike sigma at my apartment but some of the keys on it stick
Hunter Garcia
I, too, have seen the film Before Sunrise.
Adam Cook
>kerouac died for this
Ian Jenkins
Maybe it's because I'm autistic and incapable of forming lasting human relationships, but I've always thought the Before trilogy was some of Linklater's worst work. I prefer School of Rock
Charles Johnson
i like before sunset but the others dont really do it for me. i didnt like boyhood either. tape was good.
Mason Sanchez
Heres the thing, people who read poetry would never pay you for that garbage, so I don;t know what the qualifier is that what youre selling is of any quality at all. This "busking" isnt quite the same as a performance art on the street, people can generally tell when youre playing out of tune, and simply wouldnt toss you a dollar.
you are the 50 cent store of art, this is performance eiffel tower prints from homesense
Cooper Allen
Alright kid you went and shat up my thread about writing as a job and now you're making a thread about yourself like a tremendous faggot.
>I know this shit is very preachy and bragadocious seeming
Then don't post it. You only did this because you thought we would praise you for being so "special." You just come off as an immature kid who thinks he's artistic because he tricks plebs into thinking he's good at writing. You're so full of yourself that it's just embarrassing. There's no value whatsoever in slapping together words that sound similar. You have nothing to say and you care more about your image than you care about poetry. Might as well stand on a street corner with an acoustic guitar and sing the lyrics of rap songs over generic ballad chords. Oh and also: way to show your real identity on an anonymous site. Gtfo.
Nathan Russell
This thread is comedy gold.
Mason Walker
lmfao shut the fuck up
Alexander Perry
Where do you go to college
Daniel Wright
Its better than it is bad, at least you had the sense and decency to make it heartfelt and touching, with all the comments I was expecting it to be worse, even considering all the debbie downers and edgy bullys here.
Tyler Parker
lets see your poetry dip
Carter Watson
...
Grayson Sanchez
...
Jayden Collins
peep this
Colors
What I say, surely could not have been It made me feel sickly, that seaweed forest green Why was I so surprised, I expected any type Perhaps wet sand, or a banana gone too ripe
Lo, I thought Id seen it all, from home to bathroom stall Exotic colors, like piquant basketball. Once, all I thought was “Whack”, after dropping a stack That looked demonic, a bluish almost black
I always anticipate the sight, leaning forward to wipe But i once I nearly fainted when I saw that it was white If theres one thing in life that i’d recommend you do, Its to expect the unexpected when you lean to see your poo.
Henry Clark
I had an acquaintance who hired one of ya'll to write her and a friend a little testament to their relationship, apparently it was great.
Power to you OP. But most of the people here don't really have the guts to do anything like that.
Isaac Murphy
I am blasting jizzropes of negativity onto your face, now
Noah Cook
I'm proud of you for taking the time to do that. But your counterargument is shit. Entirely unfounded and assumes its own conclusions.
Jonathan Ward
I honestly just wanted to respond with that image, no hard feelings
I ain't with yelling I ain't even mad I ain't screaming, catching feelings, and breathing bad, yeah My favorite phrase is "so what?" I'm stone-cut, I'm bad to the bone, no need to blow up Calm before the storm or something I ain't cried since '94 or something
Bentley Scott
do you have to pay taxes
Jack Walker
>There's no value whatsoever in slapping together words that sound similar. au contraire mon frère, i'd argue rhyming reflects the symmetry of creation itself
Daniel Wright
Rupi Kaur is making bank off her poetry. As did Rod McKuen.
Fernando Pessoa never made a single centavo off of anything he published, and it seems he didn't give a shit much about publishing at all. He shoved all his best work into a chest after doing his day job.
I'm sure others can name poets who did much of the like.
What's your fucking point? That someone can make money writing poetry? So could I, writing the interiors of greeting cards. I know someone who did that.
Why should making money off your art, getting publicity, etc. etc. be a goal? Why shouldn't a writer be engaged in some sort of day job?
The above video is an experiment in which famed classical violin soloist Joshua Bell busked in a busy subway anonymously. He got all of 25 bucks for his efforts.
You don't have to search hard on youtube for videos of guys playing shitty pop music on something like PVC pipes in goofy outfits attracting huge crowds while busking.
What makes money is the spectacle, not the content.
Here's an experiment for you. Drop the manual typewriter and hipster garb and trappings and dress up in business casual and offer to write people poetry on a Dell laptop. See how much money you make then, especially someplace where there isn't a huge population of pretentious white bohos with excess money to burn on novel frivolities like New Orleans. You don't even have to change the content of your poems.
You're not getting paid for poetry, son. You're getting paid to provide the public spectacle of a "poet". That's all fine and dandy, but at least own up to it.
Protip: When you poetry busk London, dress in Byron cosplay and write using a goose quill on parchment paper. You'll make even bigger bank.
Chase Price
>mother is a guiding dumbledore
Luis Garcia
bad place to busk and they put a wet floor sign in front of him and thats not a type of music you listen to just one snippet of and appreciate overall stupid experiment
Benjamin Fisher
>He got all of 25 bucks for his efforts.
How much do buskers usually make? There's this one guy I encounter who is so bad that I would pay him to not play if I owned the establishments he plays in front of.