But he wrote in 1986, "the magazines had gone out of business, and I was suddenly in the position of having to write a whole book in order to get what used to be my fee for just one story."
Wish-granting in process courtesy of Mozilla's Grant For The Web, dweb nerds, and the co-operative economy :)
"contribute to COMPOST, the first author-owned publication on dweb (and web) – in addition to pitching articles you'll contribute (compensated) hours toward shaping the mgmt/strategy of the magazine COMPOST" -- https://twitter.com/spacedflashes/status/1323625620849438720
"We're excited to host this project! Party popperParty popperParty popper Follow along at :tada::tada::tada: @COMPOSTmag and sign up for the newsletter" -- https://twitter.com/HyphaCoop/status/1314200989793214464
"! https://compost.digital is accepting pitches for creative work, their first issue themed "fertile grounds". timely theme and thoughtful way of approaching media making — they are developing a values-based publishing model. (also they pay!!! key info)" -- https://twitter.com/xrw/status/1326214767925555200
/shilling for a fellow co-operator's project
I always like coming back to his Shape of Stories talks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oP3c1h8v2ZQ
Here's a longer one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOGru_4z1Vc
It's interesting to see the difference in him with age. He seems to giggle more as an older man.
Slaughterhouse 5 is a brilliant book, but as a historical source it is only valid as far as Vonnegut personal experience goes. The information taken from Irving's book is very dubious, for example Irving wildly inflated the number of dead.
It is very important to remember the Dresden bombing which was a horrible war crime. Unfortunately, even up to this day there has been little self reflection on the Dresden bombing from official government sources. Same for the horrible and similarly unnecessary nuclear bombings of japan. So it is a good thing one of the best American writers ever born got to witness it, so that it cannot be swept under the rug.
Another thing I got from the interview is that it must have been so nice to have these magazines to pay writers good money for short stories. Getting the equivalent of six weeks' salary for a short story is absolutely amazing. And this mind you is not some type of government sponsorship or charitable grant it is all free enterprise -- the magazine made money giving writers so much for their short stories. Most of the best american fiction writers got started writing stories for magazines.
I do hope eventually something like this develops on the internet for the modern world.