Conversations in the Book Trade: Books, art, art-books, and ... authorial movies.
Sunday, January 24, 2016
Saturday, January 23, 2016
Nature/ La nature/ 자연/ Природа/ 自然 - Baram video series - stills
Copyright © 2015 Finn Harvor. Please contact me at fharvor at yahoo dot com if you wish to share.
Shannon Culver - ebook consultant, industry analyst
QUESTIONS
March 15, 2014
1 Since the beginning of the 21st
Century, the publishing industry has existed in a state of tumult.
The industry has contracted, sales have fallen, and, now, in part
because of the ripple effects of the economic crisis of October 2008,
the industry is faced with dual the challenges of a depressed economy
and changing reading habits, as people spend more and more of their
leisure time social networking with smart phones and tablets.
But are the problems faced by literary publishing really simply the result of a few bad years? After all, some of the problems facing the industry go back much further: the cutting of the mid-list, beginning with what Adam Bellow called the "Great Midlist Contraction of the 1990s," the ascendancy of the deal, new generations with reduced interest in reading for pleasure, and the "TV-ization" of popular culture.
But are the problems faced by literary publishing really simply the result of a few bad years? After all, some of the problems facing the industry go back much further: the cutting of the mid-list, beginning with what Adam Bellow called the "Great Midlist Contraction of the 1990s," the ascendancy of the deal, new generations with reduced interest in reading for pleasure, and the "TV-ization" of popular culture.
What is your take on the current
depressed state of literary publishing? Is it nothing to worry about?
Is it just a passing phase? Or is it an intractable problem -- in
other words, is it the new normal? And if the latter, what can be
down to counter-act it?
There are pros and cons to the
proliferation of smart phones and tablets. On the one hand, it's true
that people have more options as to how to spend their leisure time,
and time that might be spent reading may instead be used on social
media sites, or playing games online. On the other hand, though, if
people are reading digitally and have their account loaded onto their
device, they have potentially more opportunities to read than in the
pre-digital era as well, because they are more likely to have a book
on hand when stuck in a waiting room, or on transit.
Literary publishing is undoubtedly in a
period of flux right now, and it may be less viable now for an author
to make a living from writing alone, or to receive a six or seven
figure advance for a book, but I don't think that the industry is in
crisis. Great writing is happening, and new publishing initiatives
are starting up all the time to bring that work to readers.
The multi-national houses are cutting
their mid-lists, but in a lot of cases, independent publishers are
snapping up the authors dropped from the bigger houses, and the work
is still being published.
2 How much potential do you think
the Internet has as a vehicle of publishing? It's clear that there is
a place for online criticism; the lit-blogosphere is dominated by it.
But not many people read short stories or novels online.
Will the Internet really become the
medium in which serious people both publish and read fiction? Or is
this a technological pipe-dream, and is it more a question of using
the Internet as an effective means to sell and distribute printed
books?
I think serious people already are
reading and publishing fiction online. Sites like Byliner and The
Atavist are publishing original, digital-only pieces of long-form
journalism and fiction, and having considerable success doing so.
There's an opportunity to publish work on the web that falls into the
grey area between the short story and the novel that authors are
embracing.
In an international context, growth in
the ebook marketing may be slowing in North America and the UK, but
there's still a lot of room for growth in other parts of the world.
Distributing print books internationally can be difficult, but as
smart phones become more common in Asia, South America and Africa,
there's a potential to reach new readers through the internet that
wasn't possible with print.
There's also a whole generation of
children growing up right now who are being raised on screens, and
who may not have with the same sense of cultural attachment and
nostalgia related to print books that previous generations have.
Those digital natives may be more willing to publish and read digital
texts, and to view them as equal to printed works.
3 It is arguable the Internet isn't
effective as a medium for publishing long works of fiction because
very few people can stand looking at regular screens for the
necessary length of time. But e-ink provides a solution to this. It
eliminates eye strain.
E-books are now accepted in the
industry. However, how much potential do you think e-ink and e-book
technologies have? Will they ever replace print? Or will the two
co-exist from this point on?
I believe that the two formats will
continue to co-exist for some time. I think we're at a point where
it's clear that digital books, and publishing of literature online,
aren't going to completely overtake printed literature (in the next
few decades, anyway), but they're also not going away. Digital sales
still remain a fairly small piece of the pie for most publishers, but
the number of people reading in digital format is growing.
On the other hand, it's clear that
there is still a desire for print books in the current market, and
many studies I've seen recently indicate that digital adoption rates
among adolescents are not as high as was anticipated, so it seems
that the demand for print will persist.
Aside from transmitting stories and
information, printed books are also cultural artifacts that hold
special meaning to people as objects, and that aspect of the printed
book is hard to reproduce with digital. I personally do most of my
fiction reading in digital format, but I still buy printed books
occasionally, if it's something that I know I would like to have on
my shelf, and be able to lend to friends, and re-read.
There's room for both formats in my
consumption of literature, and I think a lot of people feel the same
way.
4 In the past few years, articles
and blog posts have appeared criticizing the pricing of books. Are
books (particularly in Canada) too expensive? Has this been a factor
in reducing the size of the book-buying audience over the last twenty
or so years?
Book prices in Canada are higher than
in the U.S. or the UK, and that's becoming more apparent as the
market becomes more international through digital sales.
In the digital realm, self-published
authors with low overhead costs are driving prices down, and
traditional publishers are in some cases being forced to lower their
prices to compete.
There's certainly more demand for
inexpensive books, but the cost of producing and disseminating them
has not reduced significantly for publishers, so the reality is that
lowering prices leads to lower margins for publishers, in what is
already a pretty low margin industry.
5 Staying with the same theme.
Literary novels were once publishing in hardcover and then, several
months later (and a spot on the best-seller lists willing), they were
available as affordable pocket-sized paperbacks. However, in the
1980s this practice ceased and literary paperbacks started being
published in North America as pricier trade paperbacks. Only genre
fiction retained the pocket-book form. In retrospect, was this a
prudent decision by publishers of literary fiction? Or should the
literary pocket-book make a return?
In some ways, I think that digital is
replacing the pocket-book. If people aren't concerned with acquiring
the hardcover or literary paperback as an object, digital is a good
alternative to the pocket-book or mass market paperback. I'm not sure
there's a need for the return of the literary pocket-book.
6 What is your view of
print-on-demand? Do you think it will ultimately be adopted by the
industry to the degree e-books have?
There are a lot of exciting
opportunities afforded by print-on-demand. Publishers can resuscitate
backlist titles on smaller scale, or produce new texts in smaller
print runs. It also enables international sales more easily.
The technology involved in POD is still
prohibitively expensive for most publishers to own and operate their
own machines, but more presses are taking advantage of the POD
services supplied by digital asset managers like Lightning Source. I
do think that we will see an increase in the number of books created
through POD machines in the next decade.
7 When we met, you mentioned that
right now there is a struggle for primacy between task specific
e-readers and more general usage tablets. Is e-ink technology more in
the "interest" of the publishing industry since e-ink
allows for sustained reading? Or is this factor something the
marketplace alone should decide?
This will likely be something that the
marketplace determines. Right now, there are more opportunities to
create illustrated, complex and enhanced texts for viewing on a
tablet than on an e-ink device, and those texts are viewed by some as
a way for books to compete with other digital media, so I wouldn't
necessarily say that e-ink is more in the interest of the publishing
industry.
8 Are e-titles perceived as a threat
to print? Or is it a question of snobbery, with publishers
instinctively viewing e-titles as artistically 'lesser”?
Digital is still perceived as a threat
to print by some publishers, but most of the ones that have
incorporated digital texts into their catalogue have found that it's
just another piece of the puzzle, rather than the overtaking force it
was originally anticipated to be. Digital texts are still most often
created and treated by publishers as a secondary, lesser product, but
in part that's because they still only account for a small fraction
of sales.
9 Or is it a question of arts
council funding, with arts monies allowing Canadian publishers to
keep producing primarily in print, whereas in the (for better or
worse) more capitalistic and competitive U.S., small presses do not
have the same degree of luxury?
Grant funding does make it easier for
Canadian publishers to continue to produce in print, but it also
enables them to participate in the digital marketplace through
initiatives like eBOUND. Their American counterparts have less
funding for both print and digital.
10 Or -- in a twist on this theme --
is the arts council funding that is available to Canadian publishers
earmarked for print production, so that Canadian houses do not have
enough monies left over to build an e-book base?
Federal and provincial governmental
bodies have begun earmarking funds for digital production and
distribution over the past few years, which has helped a lot of
smaller Canadian publishers to digitize their catalogues. I can't
speak to the exact breakdown of funding that publishers receive for
print vs. digital, though.
Friday, January 22, 2016
Thursday, January 21, 2016
Heather Birrell - Novelist
Heather
Birrell, interviewed on August 11. 2012:
1
V. S. Naipaul has declared there are not any important writers
anymore, Philip Roth has predicted the novel will become a cult
activity, Peter Stothard has asked if fiction writing simply used to
be better, Cullen Murphy, David Shields, Lee Seigel, and Geoff Dyer
have all stated that non-fiction is superior to fiction. The list of
people of letters who apparently have lost faith in literary fiction
goes on an on; it is clear that an elementary questioning of the
novel is not a passing cultural phase. Furthermore, the short story
seems to be under siege as well: many agents and multinational
publishers do not handle/publish story collections, small magazines
seem perpetually underfunded, and a YouTube-ification of text and
image seems to be taking short narrative in new directions.
What
is your opinion? Do the novel and short story have a future? If so,
what kind? And will e-technology alter the very forms of them? If so,
how?
I
don’t want to sound like someone who refuses to leave her garret,
but as a writer, I try not to think about this too much. I’ve
chosen to write fiction, or it’s chosen me, and it’s part of the
way I tussle with and honour the world. I also have a young family
and a full-time teaching job, so often there is not a lot of room
left in my brain to consider these questions -- and when I have a
pocket of time, I usually want to spend it reading authors who excite
me, or contemplating my own writing projects.
I
do have a certain amount of faith that my work will find readers and
have come to understand that the quantity of those readers is much
less important than the quality of the connection to the reader --
i.e. -- that the readers who end up with my books in their hands are
those who are yearning for the kind of stories and prose I can
deliver. Also: my writing is never going to make me the big bucks.
Having a day job, while often all-consuming and time-sucking, can be
freeing in that respect; I am not dependent on my writing or
writing-related gigs for my livelihood and that, to me, really gives
me permission as a creator.
In
2006, I had the opportunity to e-interview Deborah Eisenberg (a
fantastic and accomplished American short story writer) for the
on-line (and sadly no more) bookninja. She said:
If
most fiction is made according to a general idea of what fiction
ought to be, then most fiction is going to be fairly predictable. And
people who want, and are accustomed to, predictable fiction are
unlikely to be good at engaging in the very active process of reading
– they merely want their expectations met, and are perplexed when
their expectations aren't met. So it's a self-perpetuating, actually
a self-generating, situation, and I think it's a fine thing to meet
it head on with a simple refusal.
I
love that: a simple refusal.
As
for the short story! I adore the form, to read and to write. As a
short story practitioner I have definitely been well-served by small
magazines. I think it’s tragic that they have to struggle the way
they do; small press workers are the unsung heroes of our age. They
work so hard for very little recompense or glory and serve an
invaluable role in fostering new writers and bolstering more
experienced writers. They are a vital part of the literary eco-system
and deserve our protection.
2
Are the very significant structural changes taking place in the
publishing industry having an effect on novel or short story writing?
If so, how?
I
don’t think they’re having an effect on the writing -- people who
want to write will find a way to write. Anybody who writes with a
notion of what will sell as his or her prevailing impetus -- well, I
don’t think that’s exactly artful, authentic writing, is it?
These
are easy things to say, I realize, while you are in the throes of
creation; it is more difficult have this same conviction when you are
trolling for a publisher. Of the eleven stories in my second
collection, seven had been previously published in respected literary
journals, one had won the Journey Prize. I had some short story
street cred going into the submission process. And now that it’s
seen the light of day as a book, Mad
Hope has
been well-received by readers and critics alike. I am thrilled with
my publisher -- both the editorial and publicity/marketing support
I’ve received have been stellar.
But
the book’s road to publication was rocky. Before Coach House
welcomed me back, I got a lot of ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ from
editors who professed to admiring the manuscript but not knowing how
to sell short stories or finding the prose too ‘writerly’.
It
can chip away at your soul, this pitching/pining, watching/waiting
process, and hold you in its unhealthy thrall for protracted periods.
To my mind, it is, quite simply, anti-art. Having said that, it seems
to be a new fact of life as publishers are less willing these days to
take leaps of faith and commit to authors (especially if they are
being stylistically or thematically adventurous) for the long haul.
- Is the cutting back of mid-lists and a general cautiousness about taking risks on new or relatively unknown writers affecting the caliber of writing that does manage to get into print?
Yes,
I think so. But the small presses are filling the breach in amazing
and nimble ways. This is reflected in critical response (the amount
of space/air time dedicated to books from smaller publishers) and
prize lists (which used to be dominated by the larger more moneyed
publishing companies, but are increasingly populated by books from
independent presses).
4
Do you have an author's website? Does it help you sell books?
I
do have an author’s website. I have no idea if it helps me sell
books -- I’m not sure how I would or could measure that and I
honestly don’t want to.
5
How do you feel about running an author's website? Do you feel its a
labour of love – or an annoying imposition? Or something else
altogether?
I
have mixed feelings about it. I recently had the website re-designed
and built so that I could update it on my own and incorporate a blog
element. On the one hand I like that I can control my presence -- to
a certain extent -- on the web, and I also like the freedom a blog
affords, the opportunity to describe, riff of, and link to things
that pique and hold my interest as a writer and as a mother and
teacher and human being engaged in the world around me. I think a
blog can be a really wonderful way to form relationships with other
readers and writers, and a lovely complement to a writer’s body of
work. On the other hand, I am still grappling with what it means to
present and shape a presence on-line. I hate
the
notion of personal branding
(that
thing people do to cattle and used to do to slaves) with a passion
and sometimes trying to figure out my boundaries around ‘sharing’
just makes me want to unplug completely and take a nap. And yes --
updating the site can feel like an annoying imposition at times,
especially since my life is pretty hectic at the moment. But I do
feel a responsibility to, at the very least, let readers know about
upcoming publications and readings and provide a portal to my
writer-self.
6
Is the selection system for novel and short story manuscripts fair?
Should it be made blind?
I’m
going to do that thing people do when they’re stalling, taking time
to think about the question, which is to repeat the question: Is the
selection system fair? I think it depends on the publisher and editor
in question. I’m not sure making the judging blind would help -- if
you’re suggesting some people get published because of who they are
or more importantly, who they know, I’m sure you’re right. But I
think more often, big publishers are looking for the all important
‘hook‘ that will make them money, more than anything else -- so
the hook might be the very fact of the author -- his/her history,
looks, job, but it might also be the book’s subject matter or
political relevance, or the headlong pace of the plot. It’s not
often stellar prose, acute psychological insight or brilliant
experimentation are seen as hooks that will make a publisher
money.... because they’re looking to appeal to a broad swath of
people and their wallets. Is this ‘hook‘ business more true
lately? It seems to me it is, simply because big publishers’
decisions are more dependent on marketing strategies and revenue
potential.
7
According to media reports, e-book sales now represent a significant
percentage of overall sales. But small bookstores see them as more a
threat to their survival than anything else, and a lot of book people
remain print people. Are you enthusiastic about e-books? Do they hold
the potential for a renaissance in literary publishing? Or are they
over-rated and too susceptible to piracy?
I
don’t own an e-reader, and have no plans to, but this is not
because I have any strong feelings against them. I do have an i-phone
and do a lot of reading of periodicals on there while commuting or
lying next to a napping baby. It saved me from total annihilating
boredom during some marathon breastfeeding sessions in dim light. I
have read some short stories on my phone through an app called
Storyville that delivers a new story every week, and that was nice.
But I still love a good old fashioned book and Coach House did such a
good job making my old fashioned book look like a very current and
beautiful object. For the most part, I think the more avenues that
lead to the written word, the better.
Oh,
and piracy. I’ve had my work available on-line, and have given away
an e-version of one of my stories for free. Before I agreed to the
latter, I did have some reservations, but decided (after polling some
readers I trusted) that it was a pretty fantastic opportunity for
potential readers to get a taste of who I am as a writer, and, to use
a hackneyed metaphor, be lured into buying the cow after having had a
taste of the oh-so-delicious-and-nutritious milk.
8
What do you think of literary prizes? As Jason Cowley has commented,
they reduce our culture's ability to think in a critically complex
fashion? Do they suggest, “this book is worth reading and all these
others aren't?”
I’m
not sure they reduce
our
culture’s ability to think in a critically complex fashion although
I do think they have an effect on how we think about what’s out
there... The problem, I suppose, is that I live in pretty cloistered
world, full of people who like to talk and argue books all the time
-- so the creation of lists and the naming of winners is always cause
for a broader discussion and disagreement re: who belongs, who was
omitted, whether a winner is deserving, what machinations might have
prompted a shortlist or a win. The readers I know who are not so sunk
in this literary world do care about prize winners, I suppose, but
they also go to their friends and to favourite blogs (and I think the
proliferation of book blogs is a great boon for literary conversation
and critique) for help in curating their reading lists.
I
have benefitted directly from two literary prizes: the Journey Prize
and the Edna Staebler Award. The Journey Prize (co-sponsored by
McClelland & Stewart and the Writer’s Trust of Canada) is
awarded to the best story published in literary journals in the
previous year (nominated by said journals’ editors). The nominated
stories are then winnowed down by a jury, who chooses a longlist
(that becomes the anthology), a shortlist, and a winner. The winner
receives $10,000 and the nominating journal $2000. To me, this seems
a wonderfully healthy type of literary award. It draws attention to a
broad swath of accomplished stories and (often emerging) writers, and
supports both the writer and the journal/editor that helped brought
the writer’s work to light. The ‘Edna
Award’ is an in-house honour administered by
The
New Quarterly. You
can’t apply for it or enter to win. It originates in a
wonderful and whimsical tradition that Edna
Staebler (a southern Ontarian journalist, cookbook author, and
well-loved free spirit) herself initiated — a
writer/philanthropist, she would send cheques of a thousand dollars
to students and individual writers she admired, with the simple note
reading “Enjoy! Edna.” attached. TNQ
has
used a generous gift of $25,000 that Edna Staebler gave the magazine
in 2006, the year of her death at age 100, to recognize outstanding
essays published in the magazine in the previous year with their
version of Edna’s flash-generosity. The recipient is chosen by a
judge selected from past winners. Both of these awards, it seems to
me, reflect the type of solidarity and spirit that contribute to a
thriving literary culture and community.
9
What are you working on now that you're excited about?
I’ve
just finished an essay for an anthology-in-the-making edited by Kerry
Clare (of www.picklemethis.com),
(M)Other
Stories: Dispatches from the Limits of Maternity.
I’m excited to see what other women have to say about this
seemingly inexhaustible topic.
And,
like every other person in the coffee shop, I’m working on a novel.
I have been alternately excited and excoriated by this project for
more years than I’d like to admit. I’m in an excited phase right
now, and hoping it will feel like a workable draft soon. It’s set
in the eighties in Toronto, and it’s also about Cuba, a draft
dodger, how families are made and unmade, a tire plant shut-down,
young love and idealism, and the fumbling techniques and tactics we
use to rescue each other and ourselves.
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
큰 영화/ Film du longue-mettrage/ Feature-length movie
Take 14 of my nature, urban/nature feature documentary
Alanna Wilcox - novelist, publisher
Alanna Wilcox - novelist, publisher
Fall, 2012
1. Literature is in trouble -- that is,
more trouble than usual. Why do you think this is? The increasing
prevalence of TV? The distractions of increasingly narcotic
subcultures such as video games? Sept. 11? The Crash of 2008? Or is
talk of the "death of literature" simple exaggeration?
Well, I don’t believe in the ‘death
of literature’ by any means. Look how many people are eager to
commit to reading long, long books like Twilight. I am more concerned
with the homogenization of what it is that people are reading, and
the fact that while we may spend more hours per day reading, that
reading is not in the form of books but of blogs, etc., which don’t
do much to further prolonged and substantive thought or good writing.
2. Reports of declines in book sales
have become widespread. How bad are the delcines? And do you think
they are only a cyclical phenomenon, or do they represent a
permanent, negative change for print book sales?
That’s not strictly true, I don’t
think. Last year saw our biggest sales ever, for instance. The ‘long
tail’ theory of book retailing is exactly right: sales are down in
the mid-list, the majority of titles that get published. But they’re
up for those few bestsellers, and for the niche titles at the other
end of the graph.
But it is true that our culture
values books less and less, or is at least less willing to pay for
them, in the same way that we’re less willing to pay for any
culture, which we have come to expect for free. I’m not sure what
we can do to fix this.
3. What area of book publishing is
suffering most? More specifically, are novel sales suffering more
than other kinds of books?
I don’t know — I only know our
little corner of publishing. Poetry has never been huge, so no
palpable difference. We notice declines in fiction mainly when we try
to sell foreign rights to our novels and everyone else says fiction
is not selling.
4. Are the declines linked to woes in
the bricks-and-mortar retail sector, for example,
bankrupt/near-bankrupt independents and teetering chains like
America's Borders, or are troubles in the retail trade the result,
not the cause, of declining book sales?
For us, yes, the loss of bookstores is
a huge problem. Pages in Toronto accounted for a very substantial
portion of our sales, so its loss is tragic — and tragic for me as
a reader, too, as browsing a well-curated bookstore is the best way
of amassing a fine library.
As a publisher, it means we have to
work extra-hard to find other avenues of sales: more events,
readings, web sales, etc. Which takes up an enormous amount of extra
time.
5. Are online retailers like Amazon taking over so much market share that they are driving books-and-mortar bookstores out of business? Or does Amazon, with its discounts, simply create more book sales for itself, and are the books-and-mortar stores suffering from their own structural deficiencies?
I can’t really imagine how to begin
answering this one. There’s no baseline, and everything is in flux,
so there’s really no way of knowing.
6. The publishing industry suffers
from retailers' ability to return unsold books. In the current
environment, is reversing this policy possible?
No bookstore would ever agree to return
to a world without returns. The risks would be too big. And as much
as we hate returns, it’d be worse without them, because odd books
like ours would simply never get ordered in the first place. Returns
used to be handled really responsibly: smart ordering, frequent
reordering and careful attention meant that they were reasonable. But
the big chains changed that by using returns as a way of forestalling
payment and then reordering, or ordering ridiculous quantities, or
ordering carelessly across their outlets. There’s maybe no
understanding there what impact giant returns have on publishers,
whose margins are so close to zero anyway.
We all joke that the only people
making money in publishing are the shipping companies.
7. In your opinion, do e-books -- with their lack of printing costs and ease of distribution -- represent a golden opportunity for publishers to reverse the trend of declining sales?
Right now, no. It’s simply an
additional cost and administration burden for publishers, with no
discernable sales at this point. If they catch on, sure, it could be
fantastic for publishers — if they end up adding to the number of
books sold. But if they simply take over some of the print sales, it
won’t make much difference, as the money saved on printing is
offset by the expenses of making the e-book. But if the total numbers
can grow, that’d be great.
8. Or are e-books -- with their
vulnerability to piracy and untested popularity with the bulk of the
reading public -- over-rated?
Well, I don’t know any ‘book
people’ who actually LIKE reading e-books. I use a Sony Reader to
read manuscripts, and it’s not exactly enjoyable. I’ve not yet
read a ‘real’ book on it.
As for piracy? For us, that’s not
an undesirable outcome. It happens with print books all the time:
people lend them to friends or take them out of the library. So, if a
few e-files get passed around, it’s not a bad thing — it all
serves to get the book READ, which is the most important thing.
9. Does the Google settlement, allowing
Google to scan books as it wishes, represent a form of piracy? Or, as
Google argues, will its planned scanning of the world's books
strengthen book sales and reading culture?
It’d be great if we could all work
together to make this something good, which it well could be. How
amazing to have an archive of the world’s literature, great for
scholars and readers and authors, and anything that reifies the
importance of books is not something we can afford to reject. But
yes, permission from all involved is essential.
10. Is the Kindle model of fixed prices
for e-books but a relatively piracy-free sales/distribution system
(and, sometimes, sound profits for publishers) one that you are happy
with? Or does it lend Amazon too much control over pricing?
I’m not sure how I feel about this
yet.
11. Is the "agency model" of,
for example, Apple's iBooks better?
Ditto.
12. How much potential do e-book sales
directly from a publisher's own site have?
Who knows? But sales of print books
from publishers’ websites seem to cap out around 5 percent, so it
might be the same. Still, it’s an important service to offer, I
think.
13. Do you think the e-book, being a
digital form, will eventually evolve into a new form of narrative,
incorporating audio and visual elements?
I hope so.
14. Will a movement toward e-books
drive a separate-but-linked movement toward audio-books more than
exists now?
I don’t know. But maybe the interest
in podcasts that the iPod has inspired will help.
15. Are book trailers a valuable
marketing tool or a waste of money and time?
I don’t know. The ones we make are
free, other than costing a couple of hours of Evan’s time. And they
seem to attract attention. Whether that translates into sales, I have
no idea.
16. In South Korea, books incorporating
pictures and text are massively popular. In North America, graphic
novel sales remain comparatively healthy. Will the print book move
more and more in the direction of an objet d'art, appealing to book
buyers as much with images as text?
Probably. The more the book is an
object, the more it distinguishes itself from online ‘content.’
17. Prizes and awards are playing an
increasing role in determining an author's career-trajectory. In
short, winning a major literary prize can win a writer a large
audience overnight (not to mention, considerable fame and financial
remuneration). But, as British critic Jason Cowley has observed, what
is lost is the the ability for readers to think in a critically
complex fashion.
Are literary prizes dangerous in this
regard? Do they convey to the public the message that "this book
is worth reading and all these others aren't"?
There are two sides to it: prizes bring
attention to books and reading, which is a good thing, but they also
draw all that attention to a few titles. I guess the optimist would
hope that prize-winning books can be a ‘gateway drug’ to more
reading, though the pessimist might say that it encourages a kind of
laziness (‘I’ll just read whatever they tell me to read’). On
balance, I’d say they do more good than harm.
18. Literary publishing has always been
a marriage of art and commerce. But in recent years, the Cult of the
Deal has become more influential, with agents demanding larger
advances and marketing people paying especially close attention to
sales figures. Is the "art" side of the business being
pushed out?
In the larger houses, maybe. But we
still work hard to try and balance the two: making good art while
still staying in business. Of course, if the Canadian government
didn’t help us out by awarding grants, that wouldn’t be possible.
I mean, we still have no money, and so we scrimp and save at every
turn — which means no giant advances, which means we miss out on
those big books. But we’re more interested in books that are a
little more unusual, in any case.
19. Many major publishers now refuse to
accept "unsolicited" work; that is, they will not even
consider work unless it is agented. Is this a sound policy from point
of view of finding the best new literary voices? Isn't there a chance
good writing will be squeezed out?
As a smaller publisher, it’s often
very frustrating to have no money and to not have access to ‘bigger’
books, and it’s especially frustrating that when a book by an
unknown author does well, we lose them to bigger houses, just when
they’re in a position to start earning back all that we invested
(intense editing, big promo) in the first book. On the other hand, it
means that I get to be, for lack of a better word, a talent scout. I
love finding something great in the slush pile. So, no. As long as
smaller literary houses exist, I’m not worried about good writing
vanishing. And, to be fair, the big houses publish some really good
stuff!
20. Alternatively, for small presses
that do accept unsolicited work, is the problem that the majors are
squeezing the small houses at the distribution/retail marketing end?
In other words, even when good writers get published by small houses,
do they have a fair chance of winning an audience? Or are the major
houses introducing an overly corporate, overly aggressive mentality
to the book trade?
Our culture thinks bigger is better, so
of course people assume that a Random House book is better than a
Coach House book. And I don’t think Random House is deliberately
squeezing us out or thwarting us — everyone’s just fighting to
get space for their own titles. How to fight such a pervasive
cultural perception? No idea! We’ll just keep making great books
and trying to elbow out a little space for them.
21. Are agents too powerful? If so, in
what ways? Or are they a largely beneficial and necessary element of
contemporary publishing?
Agents are important for authors with a
lot of business stuff to manage. It does make me sad, however, when
authors working at our scale end up giving a chunk of the small
amount of money they make to an agent when they don’t really need
one. Many authors benefit from having an agent, but Canada is a
pretty small pond, and I worry that there are a lot of authors who
don’t really need one...
As an editor, I do sometimes bemoan
the fact that the agent is now involved in what used to be such a
tight, intimate relationship between author and editor.
22. Does Canada have too many
publishers? Or too few?
I’m not much of a capitalist, but
here I’d say the market can decide that. I do find it troubling
that this question comes up so often. Every book that has readers can
justify its place, and one could argue that if we place so much
emphasis on diversity and democracy the same should be true for our
reading list.
23. And what role can traditional,
venerable institutions such as libraries and English Departments play
in reversing the decline in sales of literary fiction?
Libraries need to balance being
reactive (blowing the budget on Twilights because that’s what
people want) and proactive (considering themselves taste-makers and
lining the shelves with books they think should be read). But a
little further in the direction of the latter would be okay with me.
Ditto English departments. Academics could also afford to take a
broader view of what ‘literature’ is — we’re on the campus of
the University of Toronto, with its hundreds of English classes, and
we rarely have requests for tours of our printing presses or
discussions of how publishing works or even visits from authors. It’d
be nice if they thought of literature as living, kinetic being
instead of simply autopsying it.
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Monday, January 18, 2016
Sunday, January 17, 2016
Saturday, January 16, 2016
Friday, January 15, 2016
Thursday, January 14, 2016
Wednesday, January 13, 2016
Kevin Connolly - poet
Kevin Connolly - poet, editor, critic
Sept., 2012
1 V. S. Naipaul has declared there are
not any important writers anymore, Philip Roth has
predicted the novel will become a cult activity, Peter Stothard has
asked if fiction writing simply used to be better, Cullen Murphy,
David Shields, Lee Seigel, and Geoff Dyer have all stated that
non-fiction is superior to fiction. The list of people of letters who
apparently have lost faith in literary fiction goes on and on; it is
clear that an elementary questioning of the novel is not a passing
cultural phase. Furthermore, the short story seems to be under siege
as well: many agents and multinational publishers do not
handle/publish story collections, small magazines seem perpetually
underfunded, and a YouTube-ification of text and image seems to be
taking short narrative in new directions.
What is your opinion? Do the novel and
short story have a future? If so, what kind? And will e-technology
alter the very forms of them? If so, how?
I feel sad that people are not onboard
with the short story at the moment, but that has not always been the
case and will change eventually. I’ve met Geoff Dyer and can more
or less confidently tell you he was being cheeky. I don’t know how
cocky a human has to be to believe that your work will have a lasting
impact, but seriously, if Roth and Naipaul are worried, maybe it’s
a dumb thing to worry about. Lady Gaga is a passing phase, the novel
will be here as long as people write. As will poems and plays and
short stories.
2 Are the very significant structural
changes taking place in the publishing industry having an effect on
novel or short story writing? If so, how? And is poetry -- the "odd
kid who's adapted", being affected? Or has it got used to
evolving according to its own set of rules?
Poetry is more or less exempt from this
kind of discussion. Which is its strength and its problem. The good
side of technology is that people can find things they normally
wouldn’t otherwise. My feeling is that this helps poetry more than
it hurts it, because sales of poetry books more or less mean nothing.
3 One occasionally hears calls for
"less and better", including at presses specializing in
poetry. Two questions here: first, do you agree there is too much
poetry being published in Canada? Could we do with less?
Maybe. My real worry is that there are
more very good Canadian poets publishing than ever before, and that
the lousy stuff outshouts the good.
4. Second: Since publishing poetry in
either English or French Canada is ipso facto not a way to make a
living, should poetry presses be held to the same standards as
presses which strive to be commercially successful (e.g., the Toronto
based larger independents as well as the multi-nationals?)
I’m more or less sure no press in
North America makes money on publishing poetry, period. Maybe in
French Canada, but it would be a small amount. The idea that Anansi
or M & S or Coach House are making money on their poets is
nonsensical. They may make enough to support still doing it for all
the right reasons, but that’s a different answer to a different
question.
5. Is the cutting back of mid-lists and
a general cautiousness about taking risks on new or relatively
unknown writers affecting the caliber of writing that does manage to
get into print?
It’s interesting you didn’t ask me
if there was too much literary fiction being published in Canada, to
which my answer would also be yes. Not to be bitchy, but I sort of
despise terms like “mid-list,” which is a label that seems to
attach itself to good writers who don’t sell. Most challenging
writers don’t sell. And when they do, no one really knows why. Of
course most crappy writers don’t sell either. You can see the
problem.
6 Do you have an author's website? Does
it help you sell books?
No. And I doubt it would, at least in
my case.
7 How do you feel about running an
author's website? Do you feel its a labour of love – or an annoying
imposition? Or something else altogether?
It’s something else altogether. Have
a look them. Narcissism at worst. Desperation, in many cases. There
are exceptions, but if it’s a labour of love it’s usually one of
self love. I find most of them as nauseating as Facebook and twitter.
8 Is the selection system for literary
manuscripts fair? Should it be made blind?
I can’t speak for all presses, but
Coach House bends over backward to find good writers and good
manuscripts. Some writers do not understand where their work belongs,
or that there’s a fairly stiff level of competition when each press
publishes a very finite list every season. I declined several
top-notch manuscripts a year because they did not fit the press, or
would be held up longer than they should be by other commitments,
etc. But good work always gets published; that much I know.
9 According to media reports, e-book
sales now represent a significant percentage of overall sales. But
small bookstores see them as more a threat to their survival than
anything else, and a lot of book people remain print people. Are you
enthusiastic about e-books? Do they hold the potential for a
renaissance in literary publishing? Or are they over-rated and too
susceptible to piracy?
I think we’re all in a wait and see
model with this. I have no idea where it will go, but there are ways
to protect electronic delivery from piracy. See steam and video
games.
10 What do you think of literary
prizes? As Jason Cowley has commented, they reduce our culture's
ability to think in a critically complex fashion? Do they suggest,
“this book is worth reading and all these others aren't?”
There will always be readers who are
told what to read and others who read what they happen on or what
interests them, the latter being the vast majority in my experience.
I’m just happy people continue to read at all at this point, but
I’m also not particularly worried it’s going to change all that
much. It’s a pleasure to read a book, just like it is fun to go to
the movies, or a ballgame or eat a good sandwich, for that matter.
Literature should aspire to be a pleasurable part of everyday life,
no more and no less. We’re not splitting atoms or exploring the
surface of Mars after all.
11 What are you working on now that
you're excited about?
I’m (slowly) working on a new bunch
of poems. They’re not good enough to be excited about yet, but I’m
trying. I like writing when it’s going well, and it’s getting
there. Thanks for asking.
Tuesday, January 12, 2016
From Baram XC - video clip
Pour voir le vidéo entière, va ici:
See see the whole vid, go here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ShWm9DXLdkg
Monday, January 11, 2016
Bernard Anton - poet, professeur
Bernard Anton - poet, professeur
automne, 2012
automne, 2012
1.
On entend souvent que la littérature est dan un état de crise.
Premièrement, êtes-vous d'accord avec ça? Si oui, quelles sont les
facteurs qui ont crée cette crise? Est-ce la récession contemporaine?
L'onzieme Septembre? Ou est-ce qu'il y a d'autres facteurs plus loins du
nouveau millenaire qui a aussi fait la crise?
Oui
et non. La culture (la grande culture) est en crise parce que le volet
artistique on dirait intéresse moins les gens qui sont portés vers les
choses plus faciles à consommer et à comprendre. Cependant, la culture
prend d'autres formes, telles la photographie, le vidéoclip... l'art pop
sur le web est extrêmement vivant et populaire. Peut-être qu'il faut
vulgariser et démocratiser la grande culture...
2. Et la littérature, c'est quoi, exactement? Et est-ce que le roman traditionel le meilleur representatif de ça?
La
littérature est très vaste. Le roman traditionnel n'en est qu'une
partie. De nouveaux genres littéraires ont émergé et l'emportent
aujourd'hui, comme le slam, le spoken words...
3. Pensez-vous que l'internet devrai être le premier moyen pour distribuer les livres? Oui,
pour rendre les livres visibles, accessibles. Internet aujourd'hui est
le moyen # 1 de communication mondiale. Il est incontournable et
tellement facile d'accès. Il dépasse les frontières. En 2-3 secondes,
nous avons les réponses à presque toutes nos recheches... C'est beaucoup
plus efficace qu'aller à la bibliothèque et fouiller durant des heures.
4 Pensez-vous que les e-livres remplaceront les livres de papier?
Oui
et non. Le livre papier est un format qui restera toujours, du moins
pour moi. Nous avons besoin du contact avec la matière. On ne peut pas
se limiter aux moyens virtuels.
5. Pensez-vous
qu'il y a un mur entre la littérature anglophone Canadienne et
francophone Québecoise? Si oui, qu'est qu'on puet faire?
Ce
n'est pas un mur, c'est différent. Ce sont deux cultures différentes
qui évoluent dans deux contextes socioculturels qui ne se ressemblent
pas du tout. On dirait deux pays distincts. Rien à faire. C'est normal.
6. Pensez-vous que les prix pour la littérature sont dangereux parce qu'ils suggerent qu “ce livre on doit le lire et tous les autres on ne doit pas”?
Les
prix récompensent une oeuvre ou un auteur. Cependant, ils tendent à
minimiser le beau travail des autres auteurs, des autres oeuvres... Dans
un concours, on donne un seul prix, on le choisit parmi les 5
finalistes. Mais les 4 autres qui n'ont pas remporté le prix sont aussi
bons. Un prix est subjectif, relatif. C'est parfois un choix politisé,
organisé... Tout dépend du jury. Un autre jury peut donner le même prix à
un autre livre et ne même pas retenir celui qui a gagné le prix....
7. Avez-vous un site d'ecrivain? Si oui, pensez-vous qu'il est efficace pour promouvoir vos livres?
Oui,
j'ai un site d'écrivain. c'est très important d'être visible et
accessible à mes lecteurs. C'est par respect pour eux. C'est mon outils
de communication. Moi aussi, je dois faire ma part pour promouvoir mes
livres... pas seulement mon attaché de presse et mon éditeur...
8. Les "slams" (par example, "slams polygames"), c'est quoi exactement?
C'est
un recueil de textes poétiques qui sont rythmés et rimés qui traitent
de la vie de tous les jours. Le choix de « polygame » est bien songé.
C'est dans le sens large, polyvalent. Je ne parle pas de polygamie au
sens propre ou sexuel du terme, mais au sens figuré. Pour moi, le slam
flirt avec toutes les langues, toutes les cultures, tous les continents,
tous les âges, tous les genres, tous les pays.
9. Selon votre biographie dans Wikipedia, "En 2005,
il a eu un grave accident de voiture, ce qui ralentit ses activités. Il
est impliqué dans plusieurs mouvements verts." S'il vous plait, disez
nous plus des details comment l'accident a change votre vie.
Depuis
mon accident, je ne suis plus le même. Je fonctionne au ralenti, je
prends mon temps. Je m'occupe plus de mon corps. Je suis plus vigilant.
Mes limites m'obligent de choisir mes activités et d'être plus patient.
C'est physique.
10. Au meme theme, dans "Plaidoyer
pour la Terre et les vivants" [Living Earth], vous exprimez un passion
pour l'ecologie. Est-ce que c'est possible pour la littérature d'aider l'environment?
Tout
peut contribuer à aider l'environnement : l'art, la politique,
l'économie, l'industrie et la littérature aussi... Il y a plusieurs
films qui essaient d'éveiller les consciences... plusieurs artistes,
plusieurs écrivains. Le devoir de la littérature est de refléter et de
dialoguer avec l'époque et les problèmes de son époque. C'est, il me
semble, inséparable. Nous sommes tous des produits de notre époque. La
littérature n'y échappe pas.
11. A ces jours, quel projets de le votre etes vous en train de faire?
Je
prépare un troisième recueil de salms et j'essaie de retravailler ma
thèse de doctorat qui porte sur le pardon. Je voudrais en faire une
version plus accessible qui rejoindrait le grand public et non seulement
quelques spécialistes.
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