Prolific writers
Frequent writer or polyscribent is a term for academics and writers who publish on a large scale. The term is usually meant derogatory, because it is assumed that with a fast and productive way of working, the quality of the results must necessarily suffer. Scientific publications is therefore the relevance denied, while in the literature of trivial is assumed schematically constructed works that serve the simple entertainment.
history
The critique of prolific writing found its locus classicus in Seneca's letters to Lucilius : “The scientist Didymos wrote four thousand books ; I would be unhappy if he had read so much unnecessary information . "
science
If you want to become a private lecturer or professor , you have to give presentations at scientific congresses and publish in specialist journals. This can tempt young and established academics alike to write more than they actually have to say. In the English-speaking world, the problem is described with the keyword Publish or perish . In connection with publications with little information content, the Least Publishable Unit is also mentioned .
literature
There are also prolific writers in fiction , trivial literature and journalism . A characteristic feature here is the creation of extensive texts in a short time, as is caused, for example, by the deadlines for booklet novels or magazines. When classifying a writer with an extensive oeuvre as a prolific writer, it is important to pay attention to whether the works were created through continuous but careful work over many years of life, or whether they were produced in quick succession.
Famous examples of prolific authors in literary history are Heinrich Clauren , Felix Dahn , Karl May , Jules Verne , Heinz Konsalik , Enid Blyton , Georges Simenon and Alexandre Dumas the Elder .
Certainly to be assigned to prolific writing are z. B. the booklet novel authors Robert Kraft ( inter alia Detective Nobody , Wir Seezigeuner , Atalanta ) and Hans Warren (actually: Wilhelm Reinhard, Rolf Torring's adventure , 445 booklets in the period 1930-39). Karl May's early colportage novels such as Das Waldröschen can also be regarded as the result of a fast, deadline-oriented working method.
In the professional self-publishing of eBooks there has been a tendency towards prolific writing in recent years. This is because an author's backlist only gets enough attention when new works appear in quick succession. For this reason, some authors often publish shorter texts and later compile them into anthologies. Successful German self-publishers who bring out a new novel almost every month are, for example, Marcus Hünnebeck , CR Scott , Nancy Salchow , Ivo Pala , Freya Miles and DC Odesza (who also publishes as Yuna Drake and Lexy v. Golden ).
swell
- Alan Graham Apley : Watson Jones Lecture: Surgeons and Writers . The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery [Br] 67-B (1985), pp. 140-144 (translated by Rüdiger Döhler in: Bulletin of the German Society for Orthopedics and Traumatology 4/1986, pp. 46-56).
- Gerald Denk Giebel: Instructions for successful and meaningless publishing . Chirurgische Allgemeine , Volume 11, Volume 4 (2010), pp. 248–250.
- Paul Heintzen: "You should have a profile ..." - a contribution to the carnival season . Zeitschrift für Kardiologie 91 (2002), pp. 276-282, doi: 10.1007 / s003920200025 .
Web links
- Kerstin Strecker: A frequent writer, so what? Thomas Brezina takes children seriously and has no problems with being very successful . Die Welt May 6, 2006. ( Online ).
- Rachelle Gardner (Literary Agent): The dilemma of the profilic writer . [The prolific writer's dilemma]. ( Online ).
- Kyle Buchanan: Meet Allan Loeb, the most prolific screenwriter in Hollywood . [A meeting with Allan Loeb, the most prolific writer in Hollywood. Interview ( online )].