Skip to main content
Read page text
page 2
FROM THE PULPIT J EREMY L EWIS HOPPINGTHEFENCE another, the agent had become the one fixed point in an author’s life; and the agent of today is as much a manager as a quasi-accountant, involving himself in editorial labours, W HEN I STARTED out in publishing, nearly forty years ago, the book trade was more elderly than it is today. ‘Billy’ Collins and ‘Jamie’ Hamilton were in their late sixties; ‘Fred’ Warburg and Victor Gollancz were even older, and Sir Stanley Unwin, with his white goatee beard, looked as old as the hills. Longevity has become less prized in the intervening years. George Weidenfeld is still active in his eighties, and Ernest Hecht of the Souvenir Press is as effervescent as ever: but very few of my contemporaries have survived the course. Red-faced men in chalk-striped suits have been elbowed aside by high-powered lady publishers; long, boozy lunches at the Garrick are tolerated, just, for the few survivors of the ancien régime. Literary agents, on the other hand, seem exempt from the cult of youth. Many of the top agents of today – Michael Sissons, Pat Kavanagh, Deborah Rogers, Gillon Aitken, Bruce Hunter – were the top agents of my youth, and show no signs of slowing down or jumping ship. Nor is there any good reason for them ever to retire. Successful agents are said to earn more than all but a few bestselling authors, far outstripping publishers and booksellers; and because they embody their businesses, they are the masters of their fates to a far greater extent than most publishers can ever hope to be. Whereas publishing houses consist of warehouses full of books, workin-progress and contracts as well as the people who work there, agencies are, in essence, no more and no less than the accumulated experience, shrewdness and rapacity of the agents themselves. Back in the Seventies and Eighties many independent publishers sold out to the conglomerates, and found themselves, often to their surprise, being shown the door by their new owners; but agents who sell out will be begged to stay on, since without them and their authors agencies dissolve into thin air. Publishers come and go, it seems, but agents go on for ever. Not surprisingly, many people who, in earlier times, might have become editors now aspire to be agents instead – so much so that every time I open The Bookseller I expect to read how yet another eminent publisher has hopped over the fence. Back in the Seventies, Ed Victor and Gillon Aitken set the pattern, and were followed in due course by David Godwin; recent apostates include Peter Straus, late of Picador, Caroline Michel from HarperCollins, Clare Alexander from Macmillan and the ebullient Patrick Janson-Smith of Transworld – whose father, Peter, represented Ian Fleming, Eric Ambler and Gavin Maxwell back in the Fifties, and has recently set up shop once more. Publishing, they tell us, has become intolerably corporate and bureaucratic, too dominated by salesmen and accountants. In the Nineties we were told that, with editors always on the move from one firm to advising on publicity and jackets, and advancing his clients’ careers in film and television as well as the printed word. But since agents are essentially businessfolk, all this reflects realpolitik as well as the desire to be more closely involved with their authors’ work. In the old days, publishers ruled the literary roost, for good or for bad, but towards the end of the Eighties they ceded power to the new bookselling chains and to the literary agents: with the result that the great publishing conglomerates tend to combine massivity with powerlessness. Agents seem, by comparison, enviably free spirits; and whereas a publisher’s mistakes are invariably expensive, with money tied up in unearned advances and unsold stock, an agent’s dead duck represents little more than time wasted and a blow to the morale. Setting up and running a publishing house is a hugely expensive business; working on a commission basis, agents are recipients rather than investors, and the fact that starting up an agency is relatively cheap makes it an attractive option for editors who have recently been sacked or want to cast corporate shackles aside. This Gadarene rush into literary agency has come at a curious time. As the publishing conglomerates become ever larger, swallowing up one firm after another (the few remaining independents include Bloomsbury, Faber, Granta, Profile, Duckworth and Constable), the number of outlets to whom agents can sell their wares is bound to diminish. This coincides with a widening gulf between the haves and the have-nots of the literary world, with publishers concentrating their firepower – in the form of advances and publicity budgets – on a few hoped-for bestsellers, often ghostwritten for celebrities and sportsmen. The ‘midlist’ – those worthy books which get large reviews, sell in modest quantities, are more productive of réclame than profit, and are of no great interest to chains and supermarkets – has been under siege for as long as I can remember, with doomsters predicting its imminent demise; judging by the threadbare look of some publishers’ autumn catalogues, the moment of truth may be upon us. There is always a great gulf set between what an author needs to write a book and what a publisher should sensibly pay for it, and whereas agents both prompted and profited from the inflated advances paid over the last twenty years even for modest-selling books, there are signs that, for midlist titles at least, advances are tumbling down. Bestsellers are, by definition, few and far between; the rewards of the midlist are not what they were; what, one wonders, will all these agents be up to in five or ten years’ time? A job in publishing, perhaps? 1 LITERARY REVIEW July 2006
page 3
CONTENTS T HIS MONTH ’ S P ULPIT is written by Jeremy Lewis. His most recent book, Penguin Special: The Life and Times of Allen Lane, is now available in paperback from Penguin. He is currently working on a book about the Greene family for Jonathan Cape. C HRISTOPHER R OSS is a writer living in Paris. He spent five years in Japan in the 1990s, returning in 2002 to research his latest book, Mishima’s Sword, on the spectacular suicide of Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima. J ASON G OODWIN is the author of The Janissary Tree, an Ottoman thriller (Faber & Faber). C HRISTOPHER H ART ’s first volume of his blockbuster Attila trilogy, written under the pseudonym William Napier, is now available in paperback. U RSULA B UCHAN has written the Gardens column inThe Spectator for more than 20 years. Her latest book, The English Garden, will be published by Frances Lincoln in October. P ETER J ONES is the Founder of Friends of Classics. C HRIS B RAY , whose mother says he will never be happy, is film critic of the First Post. His book on Michael Caine and post-war Britain is out from Faber & Faber. A LICE P ITMAN is The Oldie’s shopping correspondent. C HANDAK S ENGOOPTA is Reader in History at Birkbeck College, University of London. He is writing The City of Dreadful Myths, a history of Western images of his hometown Calcutta. M ARTYN B EDFORD ’s fifth novel, The Island of Lost Souls, was published in May by Bloomsbury. PULPIT HISTORY MUSIC VEGETABLE MATTERS BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIRS TROUBLE SPOTS 11 J EREMY L EWIS 44 66 77 99 1100 1122 1144 1155 R ICHARD O VERY The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy Adam Tooze D ONALD R AYFIELD I Want to Live: The Diary of a Young Girl in Stalin’s RussiaNina Lugovskaya P ETER J ONES An Imperial Possession: Britain in the Roman Empire, 54 BC – AD 409 David Mattingly J ASON G OODWIN Victory of the West: The Story of the Battle of Lepanto Niccolò Capponi F RANK F AIRFIELD The Breaking Point: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and the Murder of José Robles Stephen Koch Guerra! Living in the Shadows of the Spanish Civil War Jason Webster N IGEL J ONESONTHE S OMME G ILES M AC D ONOGH Berlin Games: How Hitler Stole the Olympic Dream Guy Walters C HANDAK S ENGOOPTA The Black Hole: Money, Myth and Empire Jan Dalley 1177 1199 2211 S IMON H EFFER Stravinsky: The Second Exile, France and America, 1934–1971, Vol 2 Stephen Walsh P ATRICK O’C ONNOR Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Adventures of Mozart’s Librettist in the Old and New Worlds Rodney Bolt The Man Who Wrote Mozart Anthony Holden W ILLIAM P ALMER And They All Sang: The Great Musicians of the 20th Century Talk About Their Music Studs Terkel 2222 2244 J ULIA K EAY The Bloodless Revolution: Radical Vegetarians and the Discovery of India Tristram Stuart C HARLES E LLIOTT Seed to Seed Nicholas Harberd 2255 2266 2288 2299 R ICHARD H OLMES Captain Professor: The Memoirs of Sir Michael Howard Michael Howard F RANK M C L YNN Bette Davis: The Girl Who Walked Home Alone Charlotte Chandler U RSULA B UCHAN My Darling Herriott: Henrietta Luxborough, Poetic Gardener and Irrepressible Exile Jane Brown D OMINIC S ANDBROOK The Man Who Saved Britain Simon Winder 3300 3322 H AZHIR T EIMOURIAN On the Road to Kandahar: Travels through Conflict in the Islamic World Jason Burke J OHN S WEENEY City of Oranges: Arabs and Jews in Jaffa Adam LeBor LITERARY REVIEW July 2006 Editor:N ANCY S LADEK Deputy Editor: T OM F LEMING Editor-at-Large: J EREMY L EWIS Editorial Assistants: P HILIP W OMACK Contributing Editors: A LAN R AFFERTY , S EBASTIAN S HAKESPEARE Business Manager: R OBERT P OSNER Advertising Manager: T ERRY F INNEGAN Advertising Assistant: M ATTHEW E DMONDS Founding Editor:D R A NNE S MITH Founding Father: A UBERON W AUGH Cover illustration by Chris Riddell Issue no. 334 2

Page Text

View plaintext

CONTENTS

T HIS MONTH ’ S P ULPIT is written by Jeremy Lewis. His most recent book, Penguin Special: The Life and Times of Allen Lane, is now available in paperback from Penguin. He is currently working on a book about the Greene family for Jonathan Cape.

C HRISTOPHER R OSS is a writer living in Paris. He spent five years in Japan in the 1990s, returning in 2002 to research his latest book, Mishima’s Sword, on the spectacular suicide of Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima.

J ASON G OODWIN is the author of The Janissary Tree, an Ottoman thriller (Faber & Faber).

C HRISTOPHER H ART ’s first volume of his blockbuster Attila trilogy, written under the pseudonym William Napier, is now available in paperback.

U RSULA B UCHAN has written the Gardens column inThe Spectator for more than 20 years. Her latest book, The English Garden, will be published by Frances Lincoln in October.

P ETER J ONES is the Founder of Friends of Classics.

C HRIS B RAY , whose mother says he will never be happy, is film critic of the First Post. His book on Michael Caine and post-war Britain is out from Faber & Faber.

A LICE P ITMAN is The Oldie’s shopping correspondent.

C HANDAK S ENGOOPTA is Reader in History at Birkbeck College, University of London. He is writing The City of Dreadful Myths, a history of Western images of his hometown Calcutta.

M ARTYN B EDFORD ’s fifth novel, The Island of Lost Souls, was published in May by Bloomsbury.

PULPIT

HISTORY

MUSIC

VEGETABLE MATTERS

BIOGRAPHY &

MEMOIRS

TROUBLE SPOTS

11

J EREMY L EWIS

44

66

77

99

1100

1122 1144

1155

R ICHARD O VERY The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy Adam Tooze D ONALD R AYFIELD I Want to Live: The Diary of a Young Girl in Stalin’s RussiaNina Lugovskaya P ETER J ONES An Imperial Possession: Britain in the Roman Empire, 54 BC – AD 409 David Mattingly J ASON G OODWIN Victory of the West: The Story of the Battle of Lepanto Niccolò Capponi F RANK F AIRFIELD The Breaking Point: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and the Murder of José Robles Stephen Koch Guerra! Living in the Shadows of the Spanish Civil War Jason Webster N IGEL J ONESONTHE S OMME G ILES M AC D ONOGH Berlin Games: How Hitler Stole the Olympic Dream Guy Walters C HANDAK S ENGOOPTA The Black Hole: Money, Myth and Empire Jan Dalley

1177

1199

2211

S IMON H EFFER Stravinsky: The Second Exile, France and America, 1934–1971, Vol 2 Stephen Walsh P ATRICK O’C ONNOR Lorenzo Da Ponte: The Adventures of Mozart’s Librettist in the Old and New Worlds Rodney Bolt The Man Who Wrote Mozart Anthony Holden W ILLIAM P ALMER And They All Sang: The Great Musicians of the 20th Century Talk About Their Music Studs Terkel

2222

2244

J ULIA K EAY The Bloodless Revolution: Radical Vegetarians and the Discovery of India Tristram Stuart C HARLES E LLIOTT Seed to Seed Nicholas Harberd

2255

2266

2288

2299

R ICHARD H OLMES Captain Professor: The Memoirs of Sir Michael Howard Michael Howard F RANK M C L YNN Bette Davis: The Girl Who Walked Home Alone Charlotte Chandler U RSULA B UCHAN My Darling Herriott: Henrietta Luxborough, Poetic Gardener and Irrepressible Exile Jane Brown D OMINIC S ANDBROOK The Man Who Saved Britain Simon Winder

3300

3322

H AZHIR T EIMOURIAN On the Road to Kandahar: Travels through Conflict in the Islamic World Jason Burke J OHN S WEENEY City of Oranges: Arabs and Jews in Jaffa Adam LeBor

LITERARY REVIEW July 2006

Editor:N ANCY S LADEK Deputy Editor: T OM F LEMING Editor-at-Large: J EREMY L EWIS Editorial Assistants: P HILIP W OMACK

Contributing Editors: A LAN R AFFERTY , S EBASTIAN S HAKESPEARE Business Manager: R OBERT P OSNER Advertising Manager: T ERRY F INNEGAN Advertising Assistant: M ATTHEW E DMONDS Founding Editor:D R A NNE S MITH Founding Father: A UBERON W AUGH Cover illustration by Chris Riddell Issue no. 334

2

read next page

My Bookmarks

Buy this Book
Skip to main content