“On Saturday, Berkley Books canceled [Herman] Rosenblat’s memoir, Angel at the Fence. Rosenblat acknowledged that he and his wife did not meet, as they had said for years, at a sub-camp of Buchenwald, where she allegedly sneaked him apples and bread.”
Category: publishing
Yet Another Way The Internet Is Killing The Book Business
“In other words, it’s all the fault of people like myself, who increasingly use the Internet both to buy books and later, after their value to us is gone, sell them… [it’s] about the rise of a worldwide network of amateurs who sell books from their homes or, if they’re lazy like me, in partnership with an Internet dealer who does all the work for a chunk of the proceeds.”
Nobel Secretary Who Dissed American Lit To Step Down
Horace Engdahl, who made headlines in the fall for saying that the US “is too isolated, too insular” to compete for the Nobel Prize for literature, will step down as the prize committee’s permanent secretary next June. He says that his decision predates the controversy.
Defending Literary Prizes
“Prizes are an attempt to mould, and to pre-empt, posterity. Their answers rarely satisfy; they seem, sometimes, to possess an astonishing capacity for ignoring talent. Yet they occupy an increasingly crucial, and volatile, position amid those imperfect processes by which writing is turned into literature.”
WashPost, Sun To Share Content
“The Washington Post and The Baltimore Sun – longtime rivals for influence and readers in and outside the Beltway – announced Tuesday they will soon share news and sports stories as well as photos.”
How Fitzgerald Picked His Characters’ Ivy Alma Maters
“There’s a chapter in the life of nearly every major F. Scott Fitzgerald protagonist–after boarding school, before dissipation in New York–when he attends Harvard, Princeton, or Yale. … When Fitzgerald arrived at that crucial choose-an-alma-mater moment, did he just throw a dart at a crimson, orange, and blue board? Or did he have a more rigorous admissions process?”
The Bible: Never Not A Best Seller
“It’s an astonishing fact that year after year, the Bible is the best-selling book in America — even though 90% of households already have at least one copy. The text doesn’t vary, except in translation. The tremendous sales volume, an estimated 25 million copies sold each year, is largely driven by innovations in design, color, style and the ultimate niche marketing.”
After Publishing Chill, A Clever Few Will Come Out Ahead
“Who will survive publishing’s Ice Age? Undoubtedly, the companies that can command developments in the impending digital book revolution.”
E-Book Sales Have Soared At Simon & Schuster
“Simon & Schuster expects to have nearly quadrupled e-book sales by the end of 2008, according to its c.e.o. Carolyn Reidy. In her end-of-year letter to staff, Reidy said that in response to the growing demand the publisher was making an additional 5,000 titles available.”
Where Are The Poets Who Define Our Age?
“Oh sure, there are lots of poets around, writing lots of poems; but none of them seems to encapsulate our times.”