Writing It!

Episode 42: “Two Years Ago I Quit My Life” with scholar and writer, Anne Boyd

January 28th, 2025  |  1 hr 9 mins

biography; literature; job market; tenure; literary agent; substack; followers; trade press

Less than a decade ago, Anne Boyd was a tenured literature professor and her book, Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy: The Story of Little Women and Why It Still Matters received a rave NYT review from Francine Prose. We talk with Anne Boyd about leaving academia and buying a one-way ticket to Paris. She has been traveling around Europe ever since, writing and exploring new genres, including fiction. We talk about the factors that led her to leave academia; NEH grants; how tenure changes job prospects; how she made her exit from academia work financially; getting those first ten pages ready for a literary agent; writing biography; creating a fanbase on Substack and making it into a community; drawing the attention of Elizabeth Gilbert; and why it all works even when it doesn’t work perfectly.