The Society of Authors (SoA) is a United Kingdom trade union for professional writers, illustrators and literary translators, founded in 1884 to protect the rights and further the interests of authors. , it represents over 12,000 members and associates. The SoA vets members' contracts and advises on professional issues, as well as providing training, representing authors in collective negotiations with publishers to improve contract terms, lobbying on issues that affect authors such as copyright, UK arts funding and Public Lending Right. The SoA administers a range of grants for writers in need (The Authors' Contingency Fund, The Francis Head Bequest and The P.D. James Memorial Fund) and to fund work in progress (The Authors’ Foundation and K Blundell Trust), awarding more than £250,000 to writers each year. The SoA also administers prizes for fiction, non-fiction, poetry, translation and drama, including the Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award. The SoA acts as the literary representative for the estates of a number of writers. This list includes George Bernard Shaw, Virginia Woolf, Philip Larkin, E. M. Forster, Rosamond Lehmann, Walter de la Mare, John Masefield and Compton Mackenzie. Authors of all kinds are eligible to join, whether they are already established or at the beginning of their careers. History The SoA has counted among its members and presidents numerous notable writers and poets, including Tennyson (first president), George Bernard Shaw, John Galsworthy, Alasdair Gray, John Edward Masefield, Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells, J. M. Barrie and E. M. Forster. Bernard Shaw was an early member who took a prominent part in action and discussions, founding the League of Dramatists in 1931 as part of the SoA. The Authors' Licensing and Collection Society was also formed after much action by the SoA. Well known contemporary members include Philip Pullman (SoA president from 2013 to March 2022), Malorie Blackman, Neil Gaiman, Philip Gross, Judith Kerr, Hilary Mantel, J. K. Rowling and Lemn Sissay. The Society of Authors' quarterly journal, The Author, was first published in 1890. Its first editor was novelist and historian Walter Besant, the SoA's founding Chair. He was succeeded by George Herbert, author Denys Kilham Roberts, author C. R. Hewitt (writing as "C. H. Rolph"), the theatre critic, biographer and newspaper editor Richard Findlater, author Derek Parker, novelist Andrew Taylor, novelist and publisher Fanny Blake and novelist and publisher Andrew Rosenheim. Since November 2012 the journal's editor has been