There is a wealth of opportunities for small and independent publishers interested in filling other needs in the book trade!
Listen to how the Editor of the Islamic Book Review, published in Cairo, puts it:
“Books are the fertile soil where all nations grow their fruitful ideas and creative innovations in all walks of life.”
Whoa! Because a lot of AstroTurf, it seems, is now being laid in the U.S. on that fertile soil by the owners of the big publishing houses, it is up to all of us in this room to try to meet this noble tradition. YOU AND I HAVE TO DO A BETTER JOB THAN WE HAVE BEEN DOING IN GETTING OUR BOOKS TO THE PUBLIC.
A few more points. Every major publishing house still approaches books in the same black and white way that Johann Gutenberg did. That's amazing when you think that everyone in this room will go home tonight to watch the news on a COLOR television set; will wake up tomorrow to check Email or type a letter on a COLOR computer screen; and will send or receive a cell phone call from a COLOR display?
So why do all of you insist on publishing boring, dull, and less informative black and white books? Why not color? Studies show that:
- 60% of people respond more favorably to material in color; they read color information more carefully and color can link a message to mood. The LA Times just spent another 45 million dollars to be able to add 16 added pages of color. It isn't to make the paper prettier, but to meet advertiser demand.
What is so amazing about all of this is that every book before Gutenberg was in color in the form of illuminated manuscripts. So why aren't you or any of the big publishers doing color? Too expensive? Listen up. We know an Indian printer who can sort and mix color and black and white signatures to present what appears to be color books at reasonable prices. The real reason for your reluctance to get into color may be that you and your larger brethren are sheep, slavish lackeys to conservative convention. You do what you do because it has always been done that way. You do it that way because some of you would rather FAIL being “RIGHT” than suffer the ridicule of conventional thinkers for trying something different.
The International Herald Tribune once categorized the publishing industry as a deeply conservative business . . . trapped in a mind-set shaped by hot type and ink-stained galley proofs. It knows it has to change if it is to survive, but it does not want to change and greets each new proof that it has no choice in the matter with howls of dismay, bewilderment, and outrage.
Take audio books as just another example of this deeply conservative approach. Everyone in radio realizes that people now listen to radio in 10 to 20-minute blocks…the average time between each start and stop on a journey or the beginning and end of a discreet task at home or in the office. Hence talk show hosts, DJs, and news shows repeat segments, telephone numbers, themes about 6 times an hour. Ever heard: “Give us 22 minutes and we'll give you the world?” Why, then, do all audio books drone on and on and on moving relentlessly from beginning to end? Why aren't audio books written and presented for the way its audience will listen-with frequent stops, reviews, repeats-to make sure the listener remembers and understands what is presented?
What about graphic novels? As mangas they are enormously popular in Japan, Europe, but shunned here. Why? I suspect that most teachers and librarians hated Classic Comics as an easy way to absorb Shakespeare or some other slog in high school, and the hatred carries over to any book that combines pictures and words. I have two things to say. Is it better that 57% said they read at least one novel, short story, play or poem in 1987, but now fewer than 47% report reading anything? Guess why? More television choices, video games, concerts. Do you realize that American families earn on average about $49,000 each year, but spend only $150 of that on books-way less than 1%. Realize that they are spending twice as much as that on tobacco and cosmetics and 15 times more on other entertainment. Faced with a shrinking market, I can't understand how some people in the book business would rather remain pure to a form and style that was popular 100 years ago rather than look for new ways and new forms to bring readers back to the joy of any kind of books.
So I see my job tonight as giving you some mental calcium to stiffen your brain functions, to make you no longer afraid to try alternative approaches, to encourage you to change the status quo. If small and independent publishers are not in the forefront of innovation, who will be?
But a note of caution. Call it Harris Axiom Number 1: EVERY BOOK DESERVES TO BE WRITTEN; BUT ONLY A FEW DESERVE TO BE PUBLISHED!