The Starving Artist's Survival Guide

By Marianne Taylor, Paul Weil, Laurie Lindop

Book Overview

A Blackened Chicken Soup for the Artistic Soul
Passion, humiliation, and depravity are the cornerstones of the artistic spirit. How else to rationalize one's deliberate choice to face a life of unsigned rejection letters, calls from worried parents and collection agencies, and cups and cups of ramen noodles? Being a noble artiste is a rough gig. It's one part denial, one part masochism. And it gets all the respect of being a fry cook, without the convenient minimum wage. Only a fool would agree to such soul crushing -- until now.
The Starving Artist's Survival Guide boldly reassures both the dreamer and the doer that you are not alone. Regardless of whether you are a painter, a poet, a musician, a writer, an actor, or simply paralyzed by an English lit or fine arts degree, help has arrived. Topics include the pros and cons of various artistic day jobs ("People love clowns, except for the 80 percent who want to beat them up and the 20 percent who do"), coping with form-letter rejections through the healing power of haikus ("You, blinking red light, / A call back from my agent? / No, just goddamn Mom"), a survey of artists' dwellings (from the romanticized loft to Mama's rent-free attic), and most important, "Holding On: Ten Good Reasons to Keep Your Head out of the Oven."
Both celebrating and satirizing the pretentious poor, The Starving Artist's Survival Guide recognizes that the best way to cope with self-inflicted poverty is with unbarred humor, not macram and coupon clipping.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1416908269
• ISBN13: 9781416908265
• Release Date: December 2005
• Publisher: Gallery Books
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.4" x 7.0"

Customer Reviews

dark humor, thought provoking

I too, bought this book thinking it was light humor. It's much more than that even though I laughed out loud several times reading it. Much of the humor is dark and thought provoking. I saw my own predicament in many of the descriptions. I recommend it to any creative person.

Unexpectedly entertaining.

I bought this book mostly as a kind of joke. Most of my friends and I classify ourselves as starving artists, so I thought this book would, at the very least, be an eery window into our lives. What I got was not just a mildly amusing look at the life of the stereotypcal "starving artist," but in many cases, I was laughing out loud. Not only that, but the authors have infused wonderful accounts of real artists as examples for the various topics they discuss. Even though much of the advice is light-hearted and probably not meant to be taken too literally, there's a good portion of it that is as useful as it is entertaining. What started out as a book I bought on a whim became a book that I have declared one of the best books I've ever read. Okay, that may be a bit melodramatic, but I'm an artist...aren't I entitled? ;-) Bottom line? If you are an artist or know an artist who has ever struggled, GET THIS BOOK...if nothing else, you'll have a few laughs and your lack of success (and quarters for laundry) won't seem quite as grim.

A must read for anyone who is or knows an artist!

A funny look a the nitty gritty issues of life mixed with facts about what the (now) famous did in similiar situations. Lots of fun ( & sometimes helpful) suggestions for handling everything from critiques to living situations. Great fun to read!