Andre Schiffrin, veteran American publisher, expresses his anxieties in The Nation about the recently announced merger of Penguin and Random House, which, he says, sent shock waves throughout Western publishing.
Links of the week December 3 2012 (49)
Our new feature links to interesting blogs or articles posted online, which will help keep you up to date with what's going on in the book world:
3 December 2012
Since the 1980s, when Random House was purchased by Si Newhouse's Advance Publications, mergers have swallowed up most small and independent US and British firms. Publishing has been so dominated by the major conglomerates that another merger seems natural, the Times suggests. Indeed, others can be expected to follow. Rupert Murdoch has already expressed his disappointment at not having bought Penguin and his desire to buy another large firm to merge with HarperCollins, a subsidiary of News Corporation, which his family controls.
The middlemen between writers and publishers are concerned they'll be squeezed by the upcoming merger of giants Penguin and Random House.
Literary agents are the middlemen between writers and publishing houses. Manuscripts go to agencies, akin to actors sending off a portfolio. Agents sift hundreds of submissions and pitch them to publishers, negotiating a price for the ones accepted while taking a cut of the advance and royalties. They've been a vital link in the chain, but the recently announced merger between two giant publishers, the Penguin Group and Random House, may affect literary agents in dramatic ways.
In a powerful polemic in the Guardian, Jeanette Winterson argues strongly that we must save our libraries. Growing up in Accrington, she found refuge and inspiration in her local library. In an age of austerity, she says that the need to protect and reinvent libraries for the future is more urgent than ever.
I was born in Manchester. Brought up in Accrington, 20 miles north-east. I was adopted by Pentecostal parents who wanted me to be a missionary. I've been doing my best ever since.
The Accrington Public Library was a stone-built, fully stocked library, built on the values of an age of self-help and betterment. It was built in 1907 with money from the Carnegie Foundation. Outside were the carved heads of Shakespeare and Milton, Chaucer and Dante. Inside were art nouveau tiles and a gigantic stained glass window that said useful things such as "INDUSTRY AND PRUDENCE CONQUER".
The library held all the Eng lit classics, and quite a few surprises such as Gertrude Stein. I had no idea of what to read or in what order, so, staring at the shelves that said "English Literature in Prose, A-Z", I just started alphabetically. Thank God her last name was Austen".