penny-a-liner

[ pen-ee-uh-lahy-ner ]

/ ˈpɛn i əˈlaɪ nər /

a hack writer.

Origin of penny-a-liner

1825–35; penny-a-line (of writing) paid for at the rate of a penny per line + -er¹

"Clear enough, I think," said Van, when I raised my eyes from the protracted periods of the penny-a-liner.

Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 62, No. 384, October 1847 |Various
That aspiration and fervor are now so much the rule that the least penny-a-liner can judge the new poet?

The Journal of Arthur Stirling |Upton Sinclair
The penny-a-liner has long been the butt of a heartless world.

About London |J. Ewing Ritchie
Mr. Hughes speaks, in the style of a penny-a-liner, of Tennyson's "amazing and unparalleled popular influence."

Flowers of Freethought |George W. Foote

Motherhood to-day is on the lips of every penny-a-liner, every social patchworker and political climber.

The Social Significance of the Modern Drama |Emma Goldman

penny-a-liner

rare a hack writer or journalist