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International
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Richard Seaver, one of the true legends of American publishing, has died aged 82. For the past two decades, he and his wife of 55 years, Jeannette, ran Arcade Publishing, whose mission was to publish new voices that "seemingly flout the wisdom of the marketplace" (New York Times). A Fulbright scholar who studied in Paris in the 1950s and wrote his dissertation on James Joyce, Seaver began his career at Grove Press in 1959, where he spent 12 years, becoming Editor-in-Chief. There he challenged taboos and society's mores with books by Henry Miller and William Burroughs and, famously, the pseudonymous Pauline Reage, author of The Story of O, about a woman who gives her body in slavery to a man. The author was later revealed to be French journalist and translator Dominique Aury. From Grove, he joined Viking, where he established his own imprint, and then Holt, Rinehart & Winston, of which he was President and Publisher. For those privileged to be invited, his Frankfurt dinner was the highlight of the Fair. Among the authors Seaver published were Samuel Beckett, D H Lawrence (Lady Chatterley was among the first books he took on at Grove), Octavio Paz and John Berger. A full tribute will follow shortly. |
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International
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McGraw-Hill has announced a restructuring of its business operations and corporate functions in the fourth quarter of 2008, the better to "serve its markets more efficiently in the current economic environment while positioning the company for future growth". In total, the company laid off 1,045 people last year.
"Our diverse portfolio of businesses and ongoing cost containment efforts have helped lessen the impact of challenging economic conditions in 2008," said Harold McGraw III, Chairman, President and CEO. "The actions we are announcing today are a continuation of these efforts and will help us continue to manage the company efficiently through a difficult environment while taking all necessary steps to better serve our customers and shareholders."
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Bookselling
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Independent booksellers struggled over Christmas 2008, although there were pockets of healthy trading, a survey by BookBrunch has found. Some shops were grateful that double-digit falls in sales were not, thanks to a late rush of shoppers, even more drastic. A few shops had supply problems, as Bertrams did its best to maintain normal service while up for sale, and Gardners took on extra business following the collapse of supermarket supplier EUK. For the shops that did not get deliveries on key trading days, there was a good deal of frustration; others noticed no interruptions. Bertrams kept up its next day service for Mr B's, as did (after a hiccup) Gardners. Other shops had less luck. One calculated that it lost up to £7,000 worth of business as a result of breaks in supply from wholesalers, and took to ordering stock from Amazon. |
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Publishing
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Tony Mott, a much-loved publishing figure whose career spanned the golden era of Penguin - with Allen Lane, Tony Godwin and Jim Cochrane - and Transworld, died on Monday following heart complications arising from a hip operation. He would have been 73 on 27 January. It is a bitter irony that his wife Judy, whom he nursed through cancer, was recently given the all-clear. At Penguin, Mott was for many years in charge of marketing before Paul Scherer, CEO of Transworld - not yet a sister company to Random House - lured him to Ealing to set up Bantam, thereby injecting some creative tension into a company where Corgi reined supreme. There he nurtured such authors as Elizabeth George and Sally Beauman and waited seven long years to publish the paperback of Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time (the hardback, acquired by the late Mark Barty-King, was so successful that the decision was taken to postpone the paperback). Observed Patrick Janson-Smith, a long-time-colleague at Transworld who is now Publisher of Blue Door at HarperCollins: "Another publishing character leaves the stage a quieter, duller place." |
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