How old is too old for a writer to debut?

[The Bluestocking]

Just stumbled across this article saying:

"Do first-time writers have a sell-by date? You could be forgiven for thinking so. This week Buzzfeedposted a list of“20 under 40 Debut Writers You Need To Be Reading”. Making a debut is a huge achievement at any stage in life, and it would be churlish not to celebrate all of them, but something about the age limit makes me uneasy."

http://www.theguardian.com/books/20...-under-40-lists-young-joanna-walsh?CMP=twt_gu
I was myself surprised at the emphasis on age as a factor. One would think that of all the Arts, age would be the most valuable thing a writer can have because every additional year of living brings life experience which may well translate into telling better and deeper stories.

Thoughts?

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I think, perhaps, if you were writing the kind of book where selling your personality would matter, then age could factor in. But writers of genre fiction? Readers don't usually know or care.

 

[Droflet]

What Teresa said.

 

[j d worthington]

Or non-genre fiction, for the matter of that. A debut at any age is suitable... even if the writer is dead, if they've left behind a body of work, it may take off once some is published.

In other words, there simply ain't no such thing as being "too old" for a writer to debut....

 

[HareBrain]

Frank McCourt is often given as a reassuring example here -- he published Angela's Ashes at the age of 66. I think there was also a well-known author who started after 70, but her name has slipped my mind. These were both at least a couple of decades ago, and things might have changed, though I hope not.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

I see no evidence of this is terms of most debut novelists I know, and I know the question of age has never been asked by either my agent or any publisher who's offered. Of course, that may be because I'm friendly with those of a contemporary age (although I'm not, I have friends of many different ages), but I think it takes a while to learn the skills of writing and publishers know this.

But, publishers also want a career author! So, perhaps, debuting in your eighties would be a barrier.

 

[Kerrybuchanan]

Watching with interest since I started writing at 49 and it will probably be years before I have anything worth publishing. If ever.

 

[Karn Maeshalanadae]

The day one stops breathing is the day that is too late.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

You can have a successful début when dead. Even if there is an afterlife, perhaps you wouldn't much care.
Very many top writers not published or successful till their 40s.
It's one occupation where the younger writer is at a disadvantage due to lack of experiences of people, places, situations etc.

 

[Abernovo]

I think there was also a well-known author who started after 70, but her name has slipped my mind. These were both at least a couple of decades ago, and things might have changed, though I hope not.

Mary Wesley? Good writer, and produced several novels.

I think she cited experience giving her the material to write about so (pent up and ready to come out after all those years), as per Ray and Karn's posts, above.

 

[Karn Maeshalanadae]

Well, my post, I suppose, was a comment about when it would be too late to start the craft, rather than debut. Same with the visual arts as well, actually...

 

[Venusian Broon]

From my understanding the 'Best young (British) novelists' list was something contrived by the magazine The Granta in 1983. They then repeated this every ten years. Either you see it as the magazine getting the up-and-coming zeitgeist with the 'fresh intake' or it's just a gimmick to give them something to write about, showing us the people they will likely fawn over for the next few decades.

Here's the 1983 list: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/nov/17/fiction.features3. Interesting tag line the Gruan has in that list, I see.

For the full lists: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granta#Granta_Best_of_Young_British_Novelists

Personally I side with the gimmick interpretation of things. But then I'm 43.

 

[Brian G Turner]

One would think that of all the Arts, age would be the most valuable thing a writer can have because every additional year of living brings life experience which may well translate into telling better and deeper stories.

Totally agree. Plus it takes most people years to learn to write competently.

 

[Toby Frost]

For some reason this reminds me of a headline I once saw in Private Eye: "Kidnapped Man Has Very Attractive Sister".

 

[Susan Boulton]

Well, I will be 60 when my first novel is published. And I hope there will be quite a few more over the next few years.

 

[thaddeus6th]

If you're good enough, you're young (or old) enough.

 

[chrispenycate]

I'm just hoping 'a bit older than I am now'.

 

[Lilmizflashythang]

There's no such thing as too old. Forgive my bluntness, but most teenage writers have...problems with their writing. Take Christopher Paolini for example. I liked the movie "Eragon," but when I read the first two books of his "Inheritance" series, I found him to be immature and willing to use magic to make Sapphira obsolete. After all, how many parents or parental figures actively attempt to, oh what is the word, ah, sabotage a child's life from the time that they come into their care?

 

[Ursa major]

You can have a successful début when dead.

When long dead....

John Kennedy Toole died in 1969, aged 31. His debut novel, A Confederacy of Dunces was published in 1980 and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981. His second novel, The Neon Bible**, was published in 1989; Toole had written it when he was just sixteen.


** - The reasons for its publication are complicated, and were not entirely connected to its quality. See the Wiki article on it (linked above).

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Interesting ... but not my cup of tea.