Denzel Washington once said in a motivational speech at a university in the States, that you should set yourself goals, daily goals, weekly goals, monthly goals. The goals I had set myself, I feel, were unrealistic. How is it that I have earned two degrees and am still only working doing unskilled labour for minimum wage beneath a bunch of Eastern European thugs and young teenaged tyrants? Furthermore, my illusions and rose-tinted view of the criminal justice system have also been rapidly shattered due to reading the Secret Barrister's works. The theory is far detached from the reality, and although it is easy to poke holes and critique a system which otherwise works well in many cases, the under-funding of the CPS and the police have left quite a mark on the UK's criminal justice system, and it is not - I feel - a place where I may be welcomed with open arms and become 'one of the family'. I'm a commoner. I was educated at a regular school. Barristers are ‘anxious to give the impression of legal pedigree’ and ‘snobbery is ingrained’ (Anonymous, 2022, pp.35-36 cf. pp.41-42 [Nothing But the Truth]). My education since then has led nowhere. Moreover, Hades has become increasingly frustrating lately, so much so that I've been applying for new jobs (again unskilled labour for minimum wage - but what else are you going to do with your master's degree in classical Latin in Dark Age Britain? Not a lot, is the true answer). I am living proof of this very real fact.
However, there is something which I am extremely good at, and that's writing. Prosaic nonsense (novels, short stories, whatever) or indeed the much more heavenly and divine writing style (and indeed more challenging to write): elegant poetic forms, I'm really rather gifted at writing, by the grace of God, and indeed well trained.
In any case, I truly hope that I get this kitchen job I applied for, because I've had it with the simpleton from the village, the voiciferous and vitriolic oompa loompa and the foul mouthed Lilliputian and Wild One. There is, however, the fact that one of my colleagues holds a degree in web design from the University of Bath (he is a nice chap, having attended an excellent school - and I mean extremely good, outmatched by only one other around here: Malborough, which is very nobby indeed). Having attended the very finest schools, holding a degree in a useful subject from one of the better universities, naturally he does unskilled labour for minimum wage: because this is Dark Age Britain: there’s absolutely no doubt about that. The gentleman-scholar has agreed to help me with my eBook and book formatting, for a fee of course (which I offered), and this only after much gentle persuasion. So, instead of hammering away at yet another four years of being poor, fronting £1,614 per module (plus interest!), I've decided, after much deliberation, to put the brakes on this degree idea. I can always pick it up another time. There are other - much more important - things I could be doing, like learning how to drive and getting a car, for a start. (It should be noted that this other gentleman-scholar drives, and so of course, he does unskilled labour for minimum wage, naturally).
I can use what I've learnt on the law course (much of which I have decided to research happens to fall just before the time in which my female detective series is set) to finish my female detective stories, and publish some of those. (They are the greatest pieces of prose work I have ever written). A keen knowledge of the law during this period is useful for a writer of detective stories. Moreover, I already have many books which are either complete or very nearly complete: translations, and indeed my magnum opus the national epic: Boadicea: Queen of the Iceni. I can become a writer, it's possible, if only thanks to my colleague at work that writes well written well optimised code. What's more, I have already bought a book on HTML5 and CSS3 (thinking I was going to have to do it all from scratch myself), so can edit and the code at will, and learn a lot in doing so. I am quite content to be a writer and translator. I even found another colleague at work (who's since quit to do freelancing accounting on the side, in addition to becoming a chartered accountant). This person used one word, in the description of her work, which I prize most highly: honesty. Yes, I have found an honest accountant. She described my business as precisely what it is, in quantative methods' terms: 'a micro-entity'. Therefore the accounts for my firm, at least to begin with, will be easily done, perhaps even in a day for a whole year. I need to have my finances in order, and the tax return all done well in order to be able to survive. I will need to register the business, and begin trading.
I have heard from other writers that don't sell very many books indeed, that they simply write more books and more books, until they have enough passive income streams to be able to write for a living. I don't intend to do that with sub-standard novels (as they do), but only with extremely well written, re-drafted, well-structured, well-planned, well-researched works. For example, one of my translations was the subject of my final dissertation at university on the master's degree, therefore, shall we say, "I know a little bit about it" (to use British understatement...). If one searches for this work at the university's library, one only has one result returned. That's it. I had to go the extra mile to research this work, asking fellow colleagues and friends that are academics to get hold of some of the rarer papers on the topic. Moreover, I have invested much time and money in acquiring books on the work, so I have a large pool of rich information from which to draw on. This edition of this work will also be comparatively cheap (the only two other translations - barring one other, done over two hundred years ago - retail for £25 or £170!). I will, of course, undercut the competition considerably, just like Denzel Washington's character in American Gangster, "I'm a Renaissance man." I sell the highest quality product (far outweighing anything the competition has to offer) at a cut down price. Why? Because I can. Self-publishing earns the author many more royalties than traditional publishing. "I'm a Renaissance man." Remember also, that this is just one book I have already translated. There are numerous ones completed already.
So what's the goal for 2023? I'm looking at gaps in the market, books that there are no other translations available anywhere else (in physical form at least). I'll corner the market on those. There is also another book, on the syllabus, of which there is only one other translation available, done over fifty years ago and a pretty inaccurate one at that (in places at least). I can make it out of Hades, claw my way back up to the Light, like Orpheus and Eurydice. I have to just have one thing: faith. Keep pushing, keep working, keep on keeping on. The law was a nice little hobby and everything (which would have cost a mere £15,000, what a bargain, eh?) but mmmmmmm.... no. I think not, somehow. For what? For example, the junior criminal barristers were lately on strike for working for less than minimum wage, effectively (this is also mentioned in the Secret Barrister's works - so this has been the case for years now), one all the overheads of doing the job are factored in (not least of which a £500 wig!). Moreover, many university lecturers went on strike just the other day over pay (there have been many strikes over the past half a dozen years by university lecturers, I might add), so that job is out of the window. Yesterday I noticed a work opportunity on the university's law website. It was becoming a prison guard working for free! This is slavery, which ever way you cut it. Yet this is the way things have been for a very long time. For example, read Pliny the Youngers letters to the Emperor Trajan (10.19-20), writing perhaps at the beginning of the second century of the Christian Era, to which Trajan replied, nihil opus sit, mi Secunde carissime, ad continendas custodias plures commilitones converti. perseveremus in ea consuetudine, quae isti provinciae est, ut per publicos servos custodiantur. ("There should be no work [of this kind], my dearest [Gaius Plinius] Secundus [minor], to have switched many [slave-]prison guards for soldiers. We should persevere in the custom which is at that province of yours (Bithynia), that they [the prisoners] should be guarded by public slaves" [10.20.1 - my translation]). Therefore, this tradition which the university advertises and the state endorses, is a very ancient one. Why not use slave labour to take care of prisoners?
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