I know from historian colleagues that the market in that subject is very tough so I think you're right to think that stepping straight into a lectureship or a postdoc is the exception not the rule. And many people never get there even if they pick up p/t teaching for years. I think there are several things that might be worth you thinking about.
How geographically mobile are you? The less you can move, the fewer possible institutions you can work for and so the chances of it working out diminish.
How prepared are you to work at institutions very different to the one you are at? For the majority of institutions in this country, teaching and admin form a large part of the day to day role in the humanities, research can get sidelined. And students will be much less well-prepared than you are used to if you have studied at elite institutions.
Being a lecturer is very different from dong a PhD or a postdoc, and for some people the admin side comes as an unpleasant shock. Would you relish running a degree programme or acting as the departmental main point of call for students in difficulties? Or is that wholly unappealing?
Here's a resource that I personally think is very useful on academic careers and whether it's the right choice:
I've found this webpage helpful in the past too! If I recall rightly, I do think I found it a little pessimistic though - like the default position was that you should leave academia because it's hard and probably not for you - but maybe its intention is simply not to paint an unrealistic rosy view of things.
I suspect it's realistic rather than pessimistic. There's quite a few surveys that suggest PhD students do not have a realistic picture of what the job is like (or the job market), so I think it's a useful set of resources.
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