#uk publishing

[shieldcrestpublishing]

The Evolution of Children’s Publishing in the UK

Pick up almost any children’s book published in Britain before the 1700s and you’ll find it an uncomfortable read — not because of anything…

okay so I've been reading about the history of children's publishing in the UK and genuinely — it's wild how dark the starting point was.

before the 1700s, books written for children were basically just pamphlets telling them to be good or they'd die. not metaphorically. literally. there were popular books about pious children who died young as a lesson.

and then one guy in 1744 — John Newbery, a bookseller in London — went "what if kids had a book that was just... fun" and published A Little Pretty Pocket-Book and suddenly everything was different.

fast forward a bit and you get Alice in Wonderland (no moral, just vibes and a talking rabbit), Beatrix Potter letting Peter eat someone's garden and get away with it, Roald Dahl essentially writing revenge fantasies for children, and then Harry Potter making publishers realise kids would read 700-page books if the story was good enough.

there's also a whole section about independent publishing and how it's opened things up for writers who'd never survive the traditional submission process — including a sweet spider called Freddie who has his own adventure series now and I think about that a lot.

anyway if you're interested in book history or publishing or just want to feel good about how far storytelling for kids has come:

[finnlongman]

“As the key sample for comparing developments over time, the study defines a sub-group of writers who spend at least half of their time writing. These ‘Primary occupation writers’ are people who clearly aim to make a living from writing and engage in sustained and professional effort to achieve this. For this group, the survey shows a drop in real terms (accounting for inflation) of 42 percent in median earnings from an equivalent of £18,013 in 2006 to £10,497 in 2018, continuing a downward trend seen already in the 2014 survey.”

Found this set of statistics eye-opening and extremely depressing, especially as I often see people online justifying book piracy because “authors are rich”. Authors, generally speaking, are not rich -- 10k/yr is slightly over half of minimum wage, assuming full-time work -- and increasingly it seems like the only people who can afford to write for a living are those who have other household income (e.g. a highly paid partner). As a single person whose health limits other career options and who hopes to write for a living, it’s pretty discouraging, I have to say.

[smallpressdistribution]

A Q&A with Sandeep Parmar: Supporting Emerging Critics of Color

In the following Q&A, the Academy of American Poets speaks with Sandeep Parmar about her work supporting emerging poetry critics of color, why a range of voices in poetry criticism is so important, and how she and Kaminsky plan to bring this project to the United States.

“I can think of many, too many, examples of (unconscious or conscious) framing of work by poets of color as unliterary, ‘light verse,’ ‘performance poetry,’ or whatever dog whistle might be on the go at any time. As someone who cut their teeth on revising critical histories of neglected modernist women’s poetry, I am deeply conscious of the ways in which identity is invoked to undercut the seriousness of craft, to collapse the distance between the author and the literary value of their text as though they were one and the same. As I’ve also written elsewhere, in the long-term, a real and meaningful shift in cultural value must come with critics whose first loyalty is to the work at hand, to reading it knowledgeably and with an awareness of the structural power within which works of literature are produced and received. It is my strong sense that critics of color bring with them a complex awareness of this structural power that is so desperately needed.”

via @poetsorg

[bameinpublishing-blog]

February 2017 BAME In Publishing meet up

All photos © Dan Vo

Last Thursday we were generously hosted by HarperCollins UK at the News Building for BAME In Publishing’s February 2017 meet up - as you can see we had fantastic views and swankier equipment than we often do! It was a brilliant night, and we’d like to thank to Lisa Milton, Assallah Tahir and Sarah McPhee for helping us organise it. We’d also like to thank Charlie Redmayne and other HarperCollins staff for dropping by to chat, it was lovely having you there!

Final thanks go to Dan Vo for being photographer as usual, brilliant pictures as always! Due to book fairs in March, our next meet up will be in April. Until then, everyone!

[bameinpublishing-blog]

November 2016 BAME In Publishing meet up

All photos © Dan Vo

A very overdue collection of photos from November 2016′s BAME In Publishing meet up, which was held in the Penguin Random House Vauxhall offices. Thanks to Yasmin Mahmoudi and Siena Parker for their help with organisation and contribution to the event, and thanks once again to Dan Vo for his photos!

[bameinpublishing-blog]

January 2017′s BAME In Publishing meet up

All photos © Dan Vo

We started off 2017 with a bang at the V & A - this January’s BAME In Publishing meet up was generously accommodated by the museum, and Sarah and I would like to thank Dan Vo, Janet Browne, Kim Sheldon and Tania Rodrigues for making it such an amazing evening.

We started with an African Heritage Tour of Europe from 1600 - 1815, then watched Tania Rodrigues perform a section of Invisible, her in-progress play about Princess Sophia Duleep Singh. We finished off with over an hour of socialising in a seminar space, which was great fun as always! Thanks everyone for coming along, see you next time!

[kerryweaverlesbian]

figured it was worth sharing this scholarship I came across for a scholarship for low-income LGBTQIA+ horror writers to write their first novel. I assume it is UK only as Curtis Brown is a UK publisher and there's a course attached, but have a look yourself if you're interested. Also if you are a marginalized creator looking for roles in the Arts (theater, publishing, art, television, ect.) Creative Access, which I found this through, is a great site for finding them :)

Here is the link

[horror-n-m3tal]

Games Master Magazine August 2000.