Diversity in Mainstream Publishing Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun?

I was sad to hear some particularly bleak impressions I’ve formed of the current publishing industry echoed back at me in a recent email exchange with a good friend, who also happens to have been a brilliant and well respected author for over 20 years. They sum up the ethos of this post quite succinctly, so I’ll begin by replicating them here:

“I’m beginning to think that the entire publishing industry is staring down the barrel of a gun, and might actually be on its last legs. It’s all about units now – units shifted – which is a strange way of looking at an art form that is often ahead of its time, and therefore not immediately accessible. I think we’re living in an age that is threatened – even frightened – by originality.”

This is also the sentiment I’ve gathered from talking to a number of agents, who claim it’s harder to break into the industry now as publishers are so much stricter on what they’ll take a chance on.

So how will this ultimately affect us, as readers, and our literary culture? Well, I’m sure a lot of you will be aware of the story of Chuck Palahniuk’s genre transcending debut novel Fight Club. That hardback sales were initially doing so poorly they were due to be pulped, until David Fincher got on board and the movie was released, catapulting Chuck’s career, overnight, into well deserved literary stardom. But if Fight Club were released today, would it even be given a chance? And if not, then how many other ground-breaking novels, that defy cultural constraints and reshape the way we think about the world, are we, as a result, missing out on?

In the past week I’ve been mulling all of this over, and thought back to a few years ago when music fans in the UK, myself included, made their feelings about the plasticated, synthesised music scene, especially around Christmas time, known, by their mass purchasing of Rage Against the Machine’s Killing In The Name Of, to make it the Christmas number one, beating out whatever travesty Simon Cowell and his evil minions happened to be pedalling that year.

Now, I’m not claiming that the publishing industry has a similar horned and trident carrying figurehead, but the effect of their exclusive support for a select number of household name fiction writers, who churn out titles like vending machines, and let’s face it, they do often tend to be fairly formulaic and predictable, is much the same. And then we have non-fiction: Celebrity chefs with another 1001 ways to make cheese on toast; Ghost-written ramblings of yet another glamour model; Middle-aged TV personalities slagging off cars, everything foreign, and anything else they don’t understand; And what about the fourteen-year-old pimply pop-stars with the third instalment of their unmissable auto biographies … and on and on and on.

And I’m not even saying people shouldn’t buy these books. If you really want them then of course you should do so. But first, just to ask yourself the question, do you really want them, or are you just bombarded by their familiarity?

The marketing of these types of books is widespread and undoubtedly very effective, but perhaps we’ve already seen enough of their shiny, airbrushed faces, and don’t really want to read more about them after all.

As an author myself I’m sure this is coming over like a lot of sour grapes, and to be honest, perhaps some of it is, but the sad fact remains that if the current cultural trends stay the same, then the cycle of diminishing returns from the publishing houses will continue to get worse. The big names will get bigger and lesser know authors will continue to be marginalised until they eventually vanish completely, and so much artistry, vision, creativity and passion will be lost.

This is all very depressing, so what am I proposing? Well I’m not about to suggest everyone go out and buy my books or one I’m about to nominate. This isn’t about electing a talismanic title to symbolise our dissatisfaction with the direction the industry is headed in. But rather, as book lovers and book gifters, we delve a little deeper in our selections to see that it can herald a far greater reward, and break the suffocating cycle of the dominance or familiarity.

Just because a title is on the best-seller list, does that automatically make it the best? I’m sure none of us would leap to that conclusion about the music charts, so why do we do it with books? Just because it’s on a big glittery display rack at the front of the store, or prominently placed beside the cash register, does that make it the ideal selection for you or the person you’re buying for? Just because you recognise the big smiley face on the jacket, does that mean the contents are any good?

Take another look. Dig a little deeper. That’s all I’m suggesting. Check out lists voted on by other readers and see what stands out and piques your interest. Take a chance on something that seems curious yet obscure to you. Some of my all time favourite books are titles I’ve discovered in this manner, and had otherwise never heard of. I wonder again if some of our most ground-breaking authors of the past were starting out today, would they be given the necessary chance to shine? To prove what they are all about, cut out a niche fan base and go from strength to strength? If not, and the vast contributions they made to our literary heritage were lost, then what are we currently set to lose out on from this generation of writers and the next?

I’ll close this post with what I feel is a suitably profound quote from Haruki Murakami: “If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.”



R D Ronald.