the aisle, the city editor. The worst of them is the occasional and
inevitable error in giving out the assignment. All his reporters
are good book reporters, but like the people on the city editor’s
staff they have usually their limitations, whether temperamental or
knowledgeable. Every once in a while the city editor sends to cover a
fire a reporter who does speechified dinners beautifully but who has no
sympathy with fires, who can’t get through the fire lines, who writes
that the fire “broke out” and burns up more words misdescribing the
facts than the copyreader can extinguish with blue air and blue pencil.
Just so it will happen in the best regulated literary editor’s sanctum
that, now and then, the editor will give the wrong book to the right
man. Then he learns how unreasonable an author can be, if he doesn’t
know already from the confidences of publishers.
The literary editor’s point of view, we believe, must be that so
well expressed by Robert Cortes Holliday in the essay on _That
Reviewer “Cuss”_ in the book _Walking-Stick Papers_. Few books that
get published by established publishing houses are so poor or so
circumscribed as not to appeal to a body of readers somewhere, however
small or scattered. The function of the book reporter is transcendently
to find a book’s waiting audience. If he can incidentally warn off
those who don’t belong to that audience, so much the better. That’s a
harder thing to do, of course.
2
The first requisite in a good book section is that it shall be
interesting. As regards the news of new books, this is not difficult
where book reporters, with the reporter’s attitude, are on the job.
Reporter’s stories are sometimes badly written, but they are seldom
dull. New books described by persons who have it firmly lodged in
their noodles that they are “reviewing” the books, fare badly. The
reviewer-obsession manifests itself in different ways. Sometimes the
new book is made to march past the reviewer in column of squads,
deploying at page 247 into skirmish formation and coming at page 431
into company front. Very fine, but the reader wants to see them in the
trenches, or, headed by the author uttering inspiriting yells, going
over the top. On other occasions the reviewer assumes the so-called
judicial attitude, the true inwardness of which William Schwenk Gilbert
was perhaps the first to appreciate, with the possible exception of
Lewis Carroll. Then doth our reviewer tell us what will be famous a
century hence. Much we care what will be famous a century hence. What
bothers us is what we shall read to-morrow. Of course it may happen to
be one and the same book. Very well then, why not say so?
The main interest of the book section is served by getting crackajack
book reporters. They will suffice for the people who read the section
because they are interested in books. If the literary editor stops
there, however, he might as well never have started. These people would
read the book section anyway, unless it were filled throughout with
absolutely unreadable matter, as has been known to happen. Even then
they would doubtless scan the advertisements. At least, that is the
theory on which publishers hopefully proceed. There are book sections
where the contributors always specify that their articles shall have a
position next to advertising matter.
No, the literary editor must interest people who do not especially
care about books as such. He can do it only by convincing them that
books are just as full of life and just as much a part of a normal
scheme of life as movies, or magazine cut-outs, or buying things on the
instalment plan. Many a plain person has been led to read books by the
fact that books are sometimes sold for instalment payments. Anything
so sold, the ordinary person at once realizes, must be something which
will fit into his scheme of existence. Acting on an instinct so old
that its origin is shrouded in the mists of antiquity, the ordinary
person pays the instalments. As a result, books are delivered at his
residence. At first he is frightened. But he who looks and runs away
may live to read another day. And from living to read it is but a step
to reading to live.
Now one way to interest people who don’t care about books for books’
sake is to get up attractive pages, with pleasant or enticing
headlines, with pictures, with jokes in the corners of ’em, with some
new and original and not-hitherto-published matter in them, with poetry
(all kinds), with large type, with signed articles so that the reader
can know who wrote it and like or hate him with the necessary personal
tag. But these things aren’t literary, at all. They are just plain
human and fall in the field of action of every editor alive--though of
course editors who are dead are exempt from dealing with them. That
is why a literary editor has no need to be literary and, indeed, had
better not be if it is going to prevent his being human.
We have been talking about the literary editor of a book section.
There are not many book sections in this country. There are hundreds
of book pages--half-pages and whole pages and double pages. The word
“technique” is a loathsome thing and really without any significance
in this connection, inasmuch as there is no particular way of doing
the news of books well, and certainly no one way of doing it that is
invariably better than any other. But for convenience we may permit
ourselves to use the word “technique” for a moment; and, permission
granted, we will merely say that the technique of a book page or pages
is entirely different from the technique of a book section--if you know
what we mean.
Clarified (we hope) it comes down to this, that things which a fellow
would attempt in a book section he would not essay in a book page or
double page. Conversely, things that will make a page successful may
be out of place in a section. It is by no means wholly a matter of
newspaper makeup, though there is that to it, too. But a man with a
book section, though not necessarily more ambitious, is otherwisely so.
For one thing, he expects to turn his reporters loose on more books
than his colleague who has only a page or so to turn around in. For
another, he will probably want to print a careful list of all books
he receives, of whatever sort, with a description of each as adequate
as he can contrive in from twenty to fifty words, plus title, author,
place of publication, publisher and price. Such lists are scanned by
publishers, booksellers, librarians, readers in search of books on
special subjects--by pretty nearly everybody who reads the section at
all. Even the rather prosaic quality of such a list has its value.
A woman down in Texas writes to the literary editor that there is
too much conscious cleverness in lots of the stuff he prints, “but
the lists of books are delightful”! There you are. In editing a book
section you must be all things to all women.
The fellow with a page or two has quite other preoccupations. Where’s
a photo, or a cartoon? Must have a headline to break the solidity of
this close-packed column of print. How about a funny column? That
gifted person, Heywood Broun, taking charge of the book pages of the
New York _Tribune_, announces that he is in favor of anything that
will make book reviewing exciting. Nothing can make book reviewing
exciting except book reporting and the books themselves; but if Broun
is looking for excitement he will find it while filling the rôle of
a literary editor. Before long he will learn that everybody in the
world who is not the author of a book wants to review books--and
some who are authors are willing to double in both parts. Also, a
considerable number of books are published annually in these still
United States and a considerable percentage of those published find
their way to the literary editor. It is no joke to receive, list with
descriptions and sort out for assignment or non-assignment an average
of 1,500 volumes a year, nor to assign to your book reporters, with as
much infallibility in choosing the reporter as possible, perhaps half
of the 1,500. Likewise there are assignments which several reporters
want, a single book bespoken by four persons, maybe; and there are
book assignments that are received with horror or sometimes with
unflinching bravery by the good soldier. To hand a man, for instance,
the extremely thick two-volume _History of Labour in the United States_
by Professor Commons and his associates is like pinning a decoration on
him for limitless valor under fire--only the decoration bears a strong
resemblance to the Iron Cross.
3
Advertising?
Newspapers depend upon advertising for their existence, let alone their
profits, in most instances. Of course, if there were no such things as
advertisements we should still have newspapers. The news must be had.
Presumably people would simply pay more for it, or pay as much in a
more direct way.
What is true of newspapers is true of parts of newspapers. The fact
that a new book is news, and, as such, a thing that must more or less
widely but indispensably be reported, is attested by the maintenance
of book columns and pages in many newspapers where book advertising
there is none. The people who read the Boston _Evening Transcript_, for
example, would hardly endure the abolition of its book pages whether
publishers used them to advertise in or not.
At the same time the publisher finds, and can find, no better medium
than a good live book page or book section; nor can he find any other
medium, nor can any other medium be created, in which his advertising
will reach his full audience. “The trade” reads the excellent
_Publishers’ Weekly_, librarians have the journal of the American
Library Association, readers have the newspapers and magazines of
general circulation on which they rely for the news of new books.
But the good book page or book section reaches all these groups.
Publishers, authors, booksellers, librarians, book buyers--all read
it. And if it is really good it spreads the book-reading habit. Even a
bookshop seldom does that--we have one exception in mind, pretty well
known. People do not, ordinarily, read in a bookshop.
Of course a literary editor who has any regard for the vitality of his
page or section is interested in book advertising. There’s something
wrong with him if he isn’t. If he isn’t he doesn’t measure up to his
job, which is to get people to read books and find their way about
among them. A book page or a book section without advertising is no
more satisfactory than a man or a woman without a sense of the value
of money. It looks lopsided and it is lopsided. Readers resent it, and
rightly. It’s a beautiful façade, but the side view is disappointing.
The interest the literary editor takes in book advertising need no more
be limited than the interest he takes in the growth or improvement
of any other feature of his page or section. It has and can have no
relation to his editorial or news policy. The moment such a thing is
true his usefulness is ended. An alliance between the pen and the
pocketbook is known the moment it is made and is transparent the moment
it takes effect in print. A literary editor may resent, and keenly,
as an editor, the fact that Bing, Bang & Company do not advertise
their books in his domain. He is quite right to feel strongly about
it. It has nothing to do with his handling of the Bing Bang books.
That is determined by their news value alone. He may give the Bing
Bang best seller a front page review and at the same time decline to
meet Mr. Bing or lunch with Mr. Bang. And he will be entirely honest
and justified in his course, both ways. Puff & Boom advertise like
thunder. The literary editor likes them both immensely, or, at least,
he appreciates their good judgment (necessarily it seems good to him in
his rôle as editor of the pages they use). But Puff & Boom’s books are
one-stick stories. Well, it’s up to Puff & Boom, isn’t it?
Oh, well, first and last there’s a lot to being a literary editor, new
style. But first and last there’s a lot to being a human. Any one who
can be human successfully can do the far lesser thing much better than
any literary editor has yet done it.
WHAT EVERY PUBLISHER KNOWS
VI
WHAT EVERY PUBLISHER KNOWS
A big subject? Not necessarily. Discussed by an authority? No, indeed.
On the contrary, about to be written upon by an amateur recording
impressions extending a little over a year but formed in several
relationships--as a “literary editor,” as an author and, involuntarily,
as an author’s agent--but all friendly. Also, perhaps, as a pretty
regular reader of publishers’ products. What will first appear as
vastness in the subject will shrink on a moment’s examination. For our
title is concerned only with what _every_ publisher knows. A common
piece of knowledge; or if not, after all, very “common,” at least
commonly held--by book publishers.
To state the main conclusion first: The one thing that every publisher
knows, so far as a humble experience can deduce, is that what is called
“general” publishing--meaning fiction and other books of general
appeal--is a highly speculative enterprise and hardly a business at
all. The clearest analogy seems to be with the theatrical business.
Producing books and producing plays is terrifyingly alike. Full of
risks. Requiring, unless genius is manifested, considerable money
capital. Likely to make, and far more likely to lose, small fortunes
overnight.... Fatally fascinating. More an art than an organization
but usually requiring an organization for the exhibition of the
most brilliant art--like opera. A habit comparable with hasheesh.
Heart-lifting--and headachy. ’Twas the night before publication and all
through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a stenographer.
The day dawned bright and clear and a re-order for fifty more copies
came in the afternoon mail.... Absentmindedly, the publisher-bridegroom
pulled a contract instead of the wedding ring from his pocket. “With
this royalty I thee wed,” he murmured. And so she was published and
they lived happily ever after until she left him because he did not
clothe the children suitably, using green cloth with purple stamping.
2
A fine old publishing house once went back over the record of about
1,200 published books. This was a rather conservative firm, as little
of a gambler as possible; its books had placed it, in every respect, in
the first rank of publishing houses.
Of the 1,200 books just one in ten had made any sizable amount of
money. The remaining 1,080 had either lost money, broken even, or made
sums smaller than the interest on the money tied up in them. Most
of the 120 profitable books had been highly profitable; it will not
surprise you to learn this when you reflect that these lucrative books
had each to foot the bill, more or less, for nine others. So much for
the analysis of figures. But what lay behind the figures? In some cases
it was possible to tell why a particular book had sold. More often it
wasn’t.... Is this a business?
3
Thorwald Alembert Jenkinson has a book published. It’s not a bad book,
either; very good novel, as a matter of fact. Sales rather poor. Mr.
Jenkinson’s publisher takes his next book with a natural reluctance,
buoyed up by the certitude that this is a better story and has in it
elements that promise popularity. The publisher’s salesman goes on the
road. In Dodge City, Iowa, let us say, he enters a bookseller’s and
begins to talk the new Jenkinson novel. At the sound of his voice and
the sight of the dummy the bookseller lifts repelling hands and backs
away in horror.
“Stock that?” asks the bookseller rhetorically. “Not on your life!
Why,” with a gesture toward one shelf, “there’s his first book. Twenty
copies and only two sold!”
The new Jenkinson novel has a wretched advance sale. Readers, not
seeing it in the bookshops, may yet call for it when they read a
review--not necessarily a favorable account--or when they see it
advertised. If Mr. Jenkinson wrote histories or biographies the
bookseller’s wholly human attitude would not much matter. But a novel
is different. The customer wanting Jenkinson’s _History of France_
would order it or go elsewhere, most likely. The customer wanting
Jenkinson’s new novel is quite often content with Tarkington’s instead.
When you go to the ticket agency to get seats at a Broadway show and
find they have none left for _Whoop ’Er Up_ you grumble, and then buy
seats at _Let’s All Go_. Not that you really care. Not that any one
really cares. The man who produced _Whoop ’Er Up_ is also the producer
of _Let’s All Go_, both theatres are owned by a single group, the
librettists are one and the same and the music of both is equally
bad, proceeding from an identical source. Even the stagehands work
interchangeably on a strict union scale. But Mr. Jenkinson did not
write Tarkington’s novel, the two books are published by firms that
have not a dollar in common, and only the bookseller can preserve an
evatanguayan indifference over your choice.
4
The publisher’s salesman comes to the bookseller’s lair equipped with
dummies. These show the book’s exterior, its size, thickness, paper,
binding and (very important) its jacket. Within the dummy are blank
pages, or perhaps the first twenty pages of the book printed over and
over to give the volume requisite thickness. The bookseller may read
these twenty pages. If the author has got plenty of action into them
the bookseller is favorably impressed. Mainly he depends for his idea
of the book upon what the salesman and the publisher’s catalogue tells
him. He has to. He can’t read ’em all.
Sometimes the salesman can illustrate his remarks. Henry Leverage wrote
an ingenious story called _Whispering Wires_ in which the explanation
of a mysterious murder depended upon the telephone, converted by a
too-gifted electrician into a single-shot pistol. Offering the story
to the booksellers, Harry Apeler carried parts of a telephone receiver
about the country with him, unscrewing and screwing on again the
delicate disc that you put against your ear and showing how the deed
was done.
5
The bookseller, like every one else, goes by experience. It is, or
has been, his experience that collections of short stories do not
sell well. And this is true despite O. Henry, Fannie Hurst and Edna
Ferber. It is so true that publishers shy at short story volumes.
Where there is a name that will command attention--Alice Brown,
Theodore Dreiser--or where a special appeal is possible, as in Edward
J. O’Brien’s _The Best Short Stories of 191-_, books made up of short
tales may sell. But there are depressing precedents.
In his interesting article on _The Publishing Business_, appearing in
1916 in the _Publishers’ Weekly_ and since reprinted as a booklet,
Temple Scott cites Henri Bergson’s _Creative Evolution_ as a modern
instance of a special sort of book finding its own very special, but
surprisingly large, public. “Nine booksellers out of ten ‘passed’ it
when the traveller brought it round,” observes Mr. Scott. “Fortunately,
for the publisher, the press acted the part of the expert, and public
attention was secured.” Was the bookseller to blame? Most decidedly
not. _Creative Evolution_ is nothing to tie up your money in on a dim
chance that somewhere an enthusiastic audience waits for the Bergsonian
gospel.
Mr. Scott’s article, which is inconclusive, in our opinion, points
out clearly that as no two books are like each other no two books are
really the same article. Much fiction, to be sure, is of a single
stamp; many books, and here we are by no means limited to fiction,
have whatever unity comes from the authorship of a single hand. This
unity may exist, elusively, as in the stories of Joseph Conrad, or
may be confined almost wholly to the presence of the same name on two
titlepages, as in the fact that _The Virginian_ and _The Pentecost of
Calamity_ are both the work of Owen Wister.
No! Two books are most often and emphatically _not_ the same article.
Mr. Scott is wholly right when he points out every book should have
advertising, or other attention, peculiar to itself. A method of
reporting one book will not do for another, any more than a publisher’s
circular describing one book will do to describe a second. The art of
reporting books or other news, like the art of advertising books or
other commodities, is one of endless differentiation. In the absence of
real originality, freshness and ideas, both objects go unachieved or
else are achieved by speciousness, not to say guile. You, for example,
do not really believe that by reading Hannibal Halcombe’s _How to Heap
Up Happiness_ you will be able to acquire the equivalent of a college
education in 52 weeks. But somewhere in _How to Heap Up Happiness_ Mr.
Halcombe tells how he made money or how he learned to enjoy pictures
on magazine covers or a happy solution of his unoriginal domestic
troubles--any one of which you may crave to know and honest information
of which will probably send you after the book.
6
At this point in the discussion of our subject we have had the
incredible folly to look back at our outline. Yes, there is an
outline--or a thing of shreds and patches which once went by that
description. What, you will say, wrecked so soon, after a mere
introduction of 1,500 words or so? Certainly. Outlines are to writers
what architects’ plans are to builders, or what red rags are supposed
to be to bulls. Or, as the proverbial (our favorite adjective) chaff
before the wind. Our outline says that the subject of selling books
should be subdivision (c) under division 1 of the three partitions of
our subject. All Gaul and Poland are not the only objects divided in
three parts. Every serious subject is, likewise.
Never mind. We shall have to struggle along as best we can. We have
been talking about selling books, or what every publisher knows in
regard to it. Well, then, every publisher knows that selling books as
it has mainly to be conducted under present conditions, is just as much
a matter of merchandising as selling bonnets, bathrobes and birdseed.
But this is one of the things that people outside the publishing and
bookselling businesses seldom grasp. A cultural air, for them, invests
the book business. The curse of the genteel hangs about it. It is
almost professional, like medicine and baseball. It has an odor, like
sanctity.... All wrong.
Bonnets, bathrobes, birdseed, books. All are saleable if you go about
it right. And how is that? you ask.
The best way to sell bonnets is to lay a great foundational demand for
headgear. The best way to sell bathrobes is to encourage bathing. The
best way to sell birdseed is to put a canary in every home. It might
be supposed that the best way to sell books would be to get people to
read. Yes, it might be far more valuable in the end to stimulate and
spread the reading habit than to try to sell 100,000 copies of any
particular book.
Of course every publisher knows this and of course all the publishers,
associating themselves for the promotion of a common cause not
inconceivably allied to the general welfare, spend time and money in
the effort to make readers--not of Mrs. Halcyon Hunter’s _Love Has
Wings_ or Mr. Caspar Cartouche’s _Martin the Magnificent_, but of
books, just good books of any sort soever. Yes, of course....
This would be--beg pardon, is--the thing that actually and immediately
as well as ultimately counts: Let us get people to read, to like to
read, to _enjoy_ reading, and they will, sooner or later, read books.
Sooner or later they’ll become book readers and book buyers. Sooner or
later books will sell as well as automobiles....
On the merely technical side of bookselling, on the immediate
problem of selling particular new novels, collections of short
stories, histories, books of verse, and all the rest, the publishers
have, collectively at least, not much to learn from their fellow
merchants with the bonnets, bathrobes and birdseed. The mechanism
of merchandising is so highly developed in America that many of the
methods resemble the interchangeable parts of standardized manufactures
everywhere. Suppose we have a look at these methods.
7