What does "non-commercial writer" mean? It seems so amorphous as to be anything.

> James Foster Wallace committed suicide

David Foster Wallace, and he was certainly a commercial writer. He's actually pretty famous for his commercial writing about tennis in particular.

> JD Salinger

He went into exile because his debut novel was so fabulously successful that he couldn't take the pressure of a follow-up. This seems like he'd be the very definition of a commercial writer, that his debut novel is extremely commercially successful.

To be fair, Tolstoy made it to 80 and a bit.

And Hemingway did not drink himself to death, though I suppose he could have, given the time--but he used a shotgun.

I should say that a fair number of respected writers lived long and perhaps happy lives.

And if the implication is somewhat tinged with "lack of success leads to unhappiness," Hemingway's father blew his own brains out, so it's less that Hemingway was unhappy with his literary results and more genetically predisposed to shooting his head off.

(Hemingway was, also, definitionally a commercial writer, as he was literally a war correspondent. I.e., someone writing serves commerce.)

Hemingway committed suicide after having his brain fried with repeated ECT sessions (and back then, it was far more intense) and quite probably suffering from dementia, either environmental or inherited.

He was also burdened with chronic physical injuries, incurred in multiple serious accidents over his long life.

Also he had been under FBI surveillance, which he was apparently aware of.

EM Forster lived a long life and seems to have found some happiness. Joseph Heller wrote one of the best American novels of the 20th century, and while he had medical issues later in life, I don't think he suffered from hard living.

Also, I don't know why you think "non-commercial" matters.

I think writers are similar to other people; the outcomes vary. We tend to notice the most atypical cases.

First one that comes to mind is Kobo Abe

> I am curious if there was a single non-commercial writer anywhere in the world that ended up happy.

What does "non-commercial" writer mean? Do you mean someone who is not selling their work for money? Or do you mean someone who is not working on advertising?

I am really confused by "non-commercial" as well. Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald were professional writers in the modern sense. Hemingway started off as a newspaper reporter. F. Scott Fitzgerald was a Hollywood screenplay writer.

Yeah. It is a very amorphous constraint. Also what does "ended up happy" mean? Does Victor Hugo count? He was celebrated by the masses, had a long-long and productive life. But he had the misfortune of outliving his spouse, and by all accounts he was quite lonely in his last years. Does that count as "ended up happy"?

Or what about Terry Pratchett? As far as I know he died surrounded by his loved ones. But he died due to Alzheimer's disease, which must have been terrifying.

But if we can't call someone as successful as Victor Hugo or Terry Pratchett "non-commercial" then maybe someone obscure? Do you need to be published to be a writer? I don't think so. My friend's dad wrote a really funny, and heartfelt story about the history of their family. Never published it, probably nobody will publish it ever. I still count him as a writer. And he died surrounded by friends and family. Does that count as "ended up happy"?

> But he died due to Alzheimer's disease, which must have been terrifying.

I wonder. Having had a parent go through this, one of the small mercies, at least for them, was that they themselves were not aware of what was happening. Their world felt normal to them. Instead, they thought everything and everyone else around them was becoming confused, crazy and hostile.

But then, this is just one data point. As they say, when you have seen one case of dementia, you have seen one case of dementia.

Nobody knows your friend’s dad. How are we supposed to guess if he ended up happy? If we use Kerouac and F. Scott Fitzgerald as examples of people who did not end up happy, maybe he did. Or maybe he died totally miserable pining for a woman he met when he was 14. We don’t know and that’s the great mystery of strangers.

It doesn’t help your comment much to start off talking about amorphous constraints when you conclude with something even more amorphous.

And finally, I’m sure they’re talking about literary fiction.

> Nobody knows your friend’s dad.

What an astute observation. Almost as if you got my point. Some writers are unknown to the whole world.

> How are we supposed to guess if he ended up happy?

I didn't ask if he did. I asked if what I described counts as "ended up happy"?

> It doesn’t help your comment much to start off talking about amorphous constraints when you conclude with something even more amorphous.

Perhaps if you give it an other read you will realise that what I'm doing is unpacking what I find amorphous about the question. Who is a writer? Who can we truly say that they have ended up happy? So yes, of course you will find much ambiguity in my answer.

But if you can't handle it imagine that all I said: Victor Hugo, Terry Pratchett.

I’m not going to engage with this.

Maybe going into exile meant happiness to Salinger.

I have the impression that Toni Morrison had a happy later life.

Denis Johnson published his important works after quitting drugs and alcohol. I also have the impression that his later life was happy.

Especially in that era, and perhaps also true a bit today, a lot of the famed novelists were recruited to write screenplays, and many of them were extremely unhappy despite the money. So whether or not it’s commercial has nothing to do with it.

Hemingway didn’t drink himself to death. He blew his head off with a shotgun.

Borges seemed pretty happy in his old age.

I suspect that when you say “non-commercial”, you’re talking about literary fiction. If so, yes there are a lot of tragedies within the field. David Foster Wallace is certainly one, as were Fitzgerald and Kerouac. J.D. Salinger had some interesting personal habits I don’t agree with, but he largely became a recluse to hide from fame.

But outside of those examples, you will find a large number of literary fiction writers who actually lived relatively normal lives. William Carlos William was a doctor as well as a writer - he served as Head of Pediatrics at a hospital in New Jersey for almost forty years until he died. Margaret Atwood turns 85 in a couple of weeks - her long term partner recently died but she’s still somewhat active on Twitter sharing information about the situation in Ukraine.

And I could keep going.

Writers are human and so express the full range of humanity, from dying young via suicide or alcoholism, to having successful medical practices and family lives.

> Hemingway drunk himself to dealth

"Drunk up 'til his death", maybe.

Pynchon seems happy

What has the old Pine-Cone been up to these days?

Chilling in Manhattan with his family

“Happiness writes white.”

One of these is not quite like the others...

Cormac McCarthy seemed to be quite content with his life.

Which is fascinating, considering his subject material.

I think troubled people can be vastly creative. Or maybe vice versa.

The username submitting the post is suspicious, so at least one non-commercial writer must have ended up immortal ;)

Dostoevsky died happily married.

Tolstoy choose the best way he trust.