American Authors and the Literary Marketplace Since 1900 - Hardcover

West III, James L. W.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0812281144 ISBN 13: 9780812281149

Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988

Synopsis

This book examines literary authorship in the twentieth century and covers such topics as publishing, book distribution, the trade editor, the literary agent, the magazine market, subsidiary rights, and the blockbuster mentality.

About this title

About the Author

Biographer, book historian, and scholarly editor, James L. W. West III is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of English at Pennsylvania State University.

Reviews

To understand literature qua "literature" we must be knowledgeable about the commercialism that directs publishing, lectures the author, who teaches at Pennsylvania State University, and in this overview, which proves to be insufficiently specific for students and too academic for general readers, he attempts to address and ultimately fails both audiences. West views authorship as a cottage industry that produces literary piecework for publishers to turn into saleable goods and writers themselves as economically classless and thus unprotected by professionalization or unionization in the free-enterprise economy. Noting a paucity of post-1950 archival materialthe information covering our own day, however, proves to be the most interesting in the studyhe concentrates on late 19th and early 20th century authors and publishers, tracking the evolving book industry as transportation systems and book clubs expanded distribution, bookstore chains made their impact, literary agents emerged as a force. West is savvy about ancillary rightstranslation, reprints, etc. "recycling" that reaps continuing income from even less-than-blockbuster books.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
• Publication date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0812281144
• ISBN 13: 9780812281149
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 188