'Stiff Upper Quip': Season Two

A look backwards, a look ahead

Hello SUQers,

And we’re back.

Firstly, I hope you all enjoyed your August, even without me sprinkling magical words in your inbox every week, and made the most of the oppressive weather. I certainly enjoyed it and made the most of the time to publish some new pieces here and here.

Now I’m settling down for another year on the newsletter, which also presents an opportunity to review the first. Firstly, ‘Stiff Upper Quip’ has been a success. I’m starting the second volume with 561 of you, which is really quite good for ‘Some Bloke You’ve Never Heard Of’.

Newsletter readership over the first year, complete with recent spike

I’ve had more positive comments about this newsletter than anything I’ve ever done, and those positive comments have made me feel increasingly confident about my writing as a whole.

Since I was very small, I’ve wanted nothing more than to write for a living; to tell people that I am ‘a writer’ and, above all, to devote my days to it. This newsletter has taken me somewhat further along the road to getting there. All of which means I’m committed to doing another year of ‘SUQ’.

Beyond that, though, the eventual development of this newsletter is somewhat up to you. Here I need to be honest and say that the current financials of writing this newsletter are not sustainable.

MONEY

To date, the whole enterprise has brought in about £400 in total, every penny of which I’m immensely grateful for, and to each individual person too. But it’s a lot of work for such sums: Writing the 42 columns of the first year took up about 30 working days, working out at a day rate per piece of about £13.30. This is before we get into the work of promoting and sharing the newsletter. Even acknowledging that being paid for labour you love counts double, that’s not the kind of numbers I can feed myself on – particularly if I’m trying to maintain high levels of quality.

So please:

If you can afford to pay for this newsletter, do. I appreciate that times are very hard but do upgrade to a paid subscription if it’s at all feasible.

What do you get if you do so? Well, to quote the old Zen Buddhist monk asked to advocate as to why a king should adopt his religion, ‘Precious little!’

However, you instantly get my eternal gratitude, I’ll send you a copy of my novel, and, when we reach 50 of you, paid subscribers will get one extra column a month. Particular thanks are due here to the elite band of cognoscenti who have already signed up to pay, and who I’m enjoying interacting with.

There is another outstanding way to support me: Buy my novel, ‘Midlands’. The growth of the newsletter convinced me to self-publish this book, a fictionalized memoir of my years as stand-up comedian in Germany, and so in July I released it as an illustrated volume available via Amazon here.

Buying the book is a great way to support the newsletter and if just 10% of you do that I’ll be way over expectations! And for those who have done – and a not too shabby 39 have so far – thank you so very, very much. Leave a review if you liked it, and even if you didn’t. Even a bad review helps prove that the thing’s being read!

My novel about comedy and growing up, available now

The final way to support me is to come and see me live. I’m doing my solo show in London this September 10th (tickets).

Alternatively said show, a delirious political fantasia (4*s - The Lancashire Post - review here) is portable and available for living room gigs. It’s long been a fantasy of mine to rock up and do my show in someone’s house, so why not ask? I’m also always up for podcast and promotional appearances. Finally, I remain ever willing to write for you elsewhere too.

For now, the plan is for subscriptions to SUQ to remain free, as the most crucial thing the newsletter can offer me at present is audience build, and it is certainly doing that. For years, I’ve tried to get my writing out through ‘official channels’ and it hasn’t worked – so my best chance of getting somewhere is if you lot help me by sharing and supporting me any way you can.

I’ll be honest, it is tough to be entering the twentieth year of a writing career with no agent, no real money and zero support from the publishing world. So if you like what I’m doing – trying to provide an intelligent and humorous voice in fraught times, trying to be fair and nuanced about what it’s like to live my life and indeed life now – you can make sure it reaches a bigger audience. Comment on the articles, link and share them. It all helps.

And, you know, telling me you enjoy it and want more is always welcome too.

Coffees always appreciated

TOPICS

As ever these days, content is downstream of marketing. However, the focus of this newsletter is also in part up to you – when it comes to subjects, I’m taking requests. When I first began this newsletter, just an innocent child of 38, I thought the focus would be much more explicitly comic. But the clearly funny posts have done the worst; what’s got the most views are the extremely personal pieces on difficult topics, such as this piece on failure which has nearly as many views as all the rest of the posts combined. I can legitimately say my writing about failure is my biggest success.

There’ll be more such pieces – and some on even more difficult topics – but not an infinite amount, as writing like that is extremely exhausting and also there’s not an endless amount of material like this in my past, thank goodness. Next in popularity have been the political posts, followed by reflections on place, and then bringing up the rear come culture and humour¹.

In terms of what people have requested me to write about, the number one request is to address conflicts about trans rights. Being candid, that’s not a subject that animates me as much as it does others, and I’ve already addressed most of my thoughts on it. I also think the conduct of the debate has had such a significant impact on how the debate has progressed that even intervening at present feels hopelessly unproductive. I genuinely don’t want to ‘affiliate’ myself to one side or other, not so much because I think one side is less wrong or right but more that they are having two different discussions. I also think the debate is likely to continue past, and in the UK may even be already at, the point where the law has settled on a compromise.

If, though, I feel I have something significant further to add, I will. But it’d have to be pretty good to not get paid for it. Ruining your career without even getting a decent fee is a bit of an ask.

Thinking about what to write about - feeling sad or being unsuccessful?

TARGETS

Despite my reserved British air, I’m an extremely ambitious man and I want to be recognized and renumerated for what I do. I despise being unknown. So here I’m setting a few targets for the newsletter for this time next year.

·        2000 total subscribers (= 3 x now)

·        Paying subscribers to have reached 50

·        Sold 100 copies of my novel

·        Used the newsletter to place other articles: Top target ‘The New Statesman’

I’ll update you on these after six months.

(Though please right now, nobody ask me to start a podcast. Unless you’ve got a considerable seed fund and also have a recording studio to donate).

So with all said and hardly anything done, I return to my desk to work up some more little crackers for you all.

I wish everyone an enjoyable second season of ‘Stiff Upper Quip’.

As ever

James

1. FYI, if anyone wants to republish any previous pieces from the letter, get in touch.