Chapter 3: Penguin
As its title suggests, this chapter of BBPB reviews the history of Penguin. The starting point is the statement by Allen Lane, who created the firm, that few great enterprises survive their founder.
The history of Penguin is at one and the same time a success story and a bizarre chronicle of some curious fumblings. By 1974, for example, when Penguin had been bought by Pearson, the chief executive suddenly found himself with an executive chairman as well. He complained, with good reason. ‘Who runs Penguin?’ he asked. ‘Nobody knows.’ He also complained about Pearson’s ‘alarming incomprehension of publishing in general.’
Here are a few snippets from the rest of the chapter.
Bellaigue’s book as a whole has little to say about authors and their remuneration, but we are told in this chapter that M.M. Kaye’s book The Far Pavilions was made into a bestseller via a large promotional budget; the budget was funded through the author agreeing to take a reduced royalty rate. This, I must say, is a cunning wheeze. It reminds me of modern supermarkets, which demand up-front fees of £1m or so before they will even talk about stocking your yoghurt.
This chapter also provides evidence for a conclusion which can be found in many of Bellaigue’s chapters: it is that trade publishing is, by and large, a thoroughly unprofitable business when compared with (a) less glamorous forms of publishing and (b) other businesses in general. In the five-year period at the end of the 1980s, for example, Penguin’s operating margins were ‘consistently below those of [Pearson’s] other publishing interests and typically below those of other divisions.’ As many other companies have discovered, trade publishing has ‘limited growth prospects’ and ‘obstinately cash-absorbent characteristics.’
Yes, but it's so glamorous isn't it?
Bellaigue's book was published before the current Penguin warehouse problems; and although Allen Lane's suggestion that the firm might not survive his demise was clearly wrong, the warehouse business may yet prove to be a mortal wound.
Oh, and by the way. I had no sooner written the above paragraphs than I read the latest Publishers Lunch newsletter and saw that the Wall Street Journal was quoted as follows in an article headed 'Crunch time for Pearson plc's education strategy':
'The media company has been focused on fixing problems at higher-profile divisions: the Financial Times newspaper and Penguin publishing. But it is the less glitzy business -- education publishing -- that will determine whether Pearson's strategies are working in 2005.'
Chapter 4: Four publishing takeovers
Bellaigue’s fourth chapter examines four situations in UK trade publishing where one well-known firm took over another.
Once again, the case histories provide evidence of two characteristics which, I am sorry to say, seem to me to be entirely typical of UK trade publishing. One is the notable lack of business expertise, and the second is the curiously irrational nature of much of the decision-making.
Paul Hamlyn, for example, made a huge personal fortune out of publishing, but he is here quoted as follows: ‘To say the amount of financial expertise (in UK publishing) is nil is no overstatement.’ And presumably Hamlyn was in a position to know.
And when Anthony Cheetham, widely thought of as one of the smartest people in publishing, took over Weidenfeld and Nicolson, he ‘turned his face against educational and professional publishing – notwithstanding their highly profitable characteristics.’ Who cares about making money when you can have fun and/or make a contribution to culture?
Chapter 5: Associated Book Publishers (ABP)
In 1987, when ownership of ABP changed hands, it was possible, in theory, for an investor who bought shares in the company in May to have sold them in July for three times as much. Chapter 5 investigates the background to this curious phenomenon.
The story is interesting, but there is not much in it to detain us here. It is worth noting, however, that when Philip Sturrock was appointed managing director of Routledge and Kegan Paul in 1983, one of his early decisions was to introduce ‘profitability hurdles for new books.’ This, please note, in a firm which had been founded in 1834. Prior to Sturrock's decision it had presumably been sufficient for an editor to declare 'Our reader says this is a jolly good book,' and publish on the strength of that.
Didn’t I say something earlier about the irrational nature of much decision-making in UK publishing?
More tomorrow.
Friday, December 31, 2004
Thursday, December 30, 2004
British book publishing as a business -- part 1
For the next few days we shall be looking at a selection of essays by Eric de Bellaigue, recently published by the British Library under the title British Book Publishing as a Business since the 1960s – hereinafter to be referred to as BBPB.
In the past, relatively few people have shown any interest in book publishing as a business. Most individuals who have gone into publishing, and certainly most of the writers who have supplied the books, have been lacking in knowledge of, or interest in, the strictly financial side of things. Furthermore, those who have chosen to comment on publishing as a business have been few in number and have found even fewer readers.
The first thing to be said, therefore, is that Eric de Bellaigue’s scholarly and well researched book is much to be welcomed. It should be read by anyone who is contemplating a career in any aspect of publishing, whether as writer, editor, accountant, or salesman; not to mention any venture capitalists and media moguls who are thinking of buying a publishing company.
One thing that can be said with absolute confidence, however, is that few such people will actually bother to take this advice. More fool them. The least you can do, as a partial act of self-preservation, is to read this review.
For better or for worse, BBPB is not a cohesive whole. It is, as I said at the start, a collection of essays, some of them ten years old.
The introduction rightly points out that publishing is an industrial minnow, and a relatively unprofitable one at that; a business which, at first sight, is likely to be of minimal interest to those who are seriously interested in making money. Its one saving grace, perhaps, is the law of copyright. It is that law alone which enables publishers to go on making profits for decades out of those rare books which turn out to capture the public imagination (e.g. Lord of the Rings), or which require a place on every bookshelf (Oxford English Dictionary).
The book consists of ten chapters, and I shall make a few comments on each, with some overall comments at the end. Some of the earlier chapters, in particular, were originally written in the 1990s, and one sometimes needs to remember that while reading them.
Chapter 1: Post-war mergers and acquisitions
It has been a feature of the last few decades that the many independent publishers which once flourished in London (and a few elsewhere) have gradually been absorbed into a much smaller number of large companies. Large, that is, by publishing standards. Much of the book is dedicated to a study of this process and its effects.
I have remarked in the past that sensible discussion of the UK book trade is hampered by a lack of reliable figures; in fact, I have suggested that there are lies, damned lies, and statistics about the UK book trade. And Bellaigue himself admits that ‘debate centres on statistics whose consistency sadly leaves much to be desired.’
However, while Bellaigue does not have absolutely certain knowledge of what is going into the preparation of every company’s accounts, it is reasonable to suppose, I think, that his figures are about as good as we are going to get. So, we might begin, for instance, by noting that the total consumer market for books in the UK was worth about £1.98bn in 2002 (say £2bn in round figures).
If we assume that publishers get around 50% of what goes into the high-street booksellers’ tills, then book publishing in the UK earns about £1bn a year. This is not a large sum (though it sounds large). Bear in mind, please, that the combined income of solicitors’ firms in the UK is about £11bn a year; care homes for the elderly bring in about £10bn. The overall market for books is slightly smaller, in financial terms, than the market for chicken.
Chapter 2: Imprints under conglomeration
Bellaigue proceeds to consider the effects of the apparently unstoppable process of conglomeration. Is it reducing choice, and producing a homogenisation of product? Is it a good thing, or a bad thing?
Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson is quoted on the effects of conglomeration. It has led, he says, to a transfer of power from the publishers to the large bookselling chains. It is the latter who are now calling the shots.
If true, and I have no reason to doubt it, this is hardly good news for either writers or publishers, though it may be good news for readers, if you regard cheap books and 3 for 2 offers as the most important factor in your choice of reading matter.
Bellaigue rightly points out that writers and publishers have been in this relatively subordinate position before. About a hundred years ago, in fact, when Mudie’s circulating library was hugely powerful. Mr Mudie dictated that all novels must be long (‘three-deckers’), and he also influenced the plots, to ensure that nothing available through his library could possible offend a sensitive young woman. Hardly a recipe for success in 2005, one feels.
The author’s overall conclusion to this chapter is that conglomeration has posed, and will pose, an increasing threat to diversity and individuality in publishing.
Bellaigue is certainly right as far as big publishing is concerned, but things have changed somewhat since the essay was originally written. We should not overlook the impact of changes in printing technology and the internet, both of which make it much easier for individuals and small companies to publish new work than was the case in the past.
Bellaigue includes in this chapter a section on authors’ attitudes to conglomeration. He makes the point that, given their publishers' increasing emphasis on economy and profits, authors have begun to turn to their agents for services (such as advice on plotting, and even editing) which might once have been provided by publishers. To cope with the demand, the number of agents offering their services has markedly increased in recent years – from 34 in 1946 to 120 in 1994.
More tomorrow.
In the past, relatively few people have shown any interest in book publishing as a business. Most individuals who have gone into publishing, and certainly most of the writers who have supplied the books, have been lacking in knowledge of, or interest in, the strictly financial side of things. Furthermore, those who have chosen to comment on publishing as a business have been few in number and have found even fewer readers.
The first thing to be said, therefore, is that Eric de Bellaigue’s scholarly and well researched book is much to be welcomed. It should be read by anyone who is contemplating a career in any aspect of publishing, whether as writer, editor, accountant, or salesman; not to mention any venture capitalists and media moguls who are thinking of buying a publishing company.
One thing that can be said with absolute confidence, however, is that few such people will actually bother to take this advice. More fool them. The least you can do, as a partial act of self-preservation, is to read this review.
For better or for worse, BBPB is not a cohesive whole. It is, as I said at the start, a collection of essays, some of them ten years old.
The introduction rightly points out that publishing is an industrial minnow, and a relatively unprofitable one at that; a business which, at first sight, is likely to be of minimal interest to those who are seriously interested in making money. Its one saving grace, perhaps, is the law of copyright. It is that law alone which enables publishers to go on making profits for decades out of those rare books which turn out to capture the public imagination (e.g. Lord of the Rings), or which require a place on every bookshelf (Oxford English Dictionary).
The book consists of ten chapters, and I shall make a few comments on each, with some overall comments at the end. Some of the earlier chapters, in particular, were originally written in the 1990s, and one sometimes needs to remember that while reading them.
Chapter 1: Post-war mergers and acquisitions
It has been a feature of the last few decades that the many independent publishers which once flourished in London (and a few elsewhere) have gradually been absorbed into a much smaller number of large companies. Large, that is, by publishing standards. Much of the book is dedicated to a study of this process and its effects.
I have remarked in the past that sensible discussion of the UK book trade is hampered by a lack of reliable figures; in fact, I have suggested that there are lies, damned lies, and statistics about the UK book trade. And Bellaigue himself admits that ‘debate centres on statistics whose consistency sadly leaves much to be desired.’
However, while Bellaigue does not have absolutely certain knowledge of what is going into the preparation of every company’s accounts, it is reasonable to suppose, I think, that his figures are about as good as we are going to get. So, we might begin, for instance, by noting that the total consumer market for books in the UK was worth about £1.98bn in 2002 (say £2bn in round figures).
If we assume that publishers get around 50% of what goes into the high-street booksellers’ tills, then book publishing in the UK earns about £1bn a year. This is not a large sum (though it sounds large). Bear in mind, please, that the combined income of solicitors’ firms in the UK is about £11bn a year; care homes for the elderly bring in about £10bn. The overall market for books is slightly smaller, in financial terms, than the market for chicken.
Chapter 2: Imprints under conglomeration
Bellaigue proceeds to consider the effects of the apparently unstoppable process of conglomeration. Is it reducing choice, and producing a homogenisation of product? Is it a good thing, or a bad thing?
Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson is quoted on the effects of conglomeration. It has led, he says, to a transfer of power from the publishers to the large bookselling chains. It is the latter who are now calling the shots.
If true, and I have no reason to doubt it, this is hardly good news for either writers or publishers, though it may be good news for readers, if you regard cheap books and 3 for 2 offers as the most important factor in your choice of reading matter.
Bellaigue rightly points out that writers and publishers have been in this relatively subordinate position before. About a hundred years ago, in fact, when Mudie’s circulating library was hugely powerful. Mr Mudie dictated that all novels must be long (‘three-deckers’), and he also influenced the plots, to ensure that nothing available through his library could possible offend a sensitive young woman. Hardly a recipe for success in 2005, one feels.
The author’s overall conclusion to this chapter is that conglomeration has posed, and will pose, an increasing threat to diversity and individuality in publishing.
Bellaigue is certainly right as far as big publishing is concerned, but things have changed somewhat since the essay was originally written. We should not overlook the impact of changes in printing technology and the internet, both of which make it much easier for individuals and small companies to publish new work than was the case in the past.
Bellaigue includes in this chapter a section on authors’ attitudes to conglomeration. He makes the point that, given their publishers' increasing emphasis on economy and profits, authors have begun to turn to their agents for services (such as advice on plotting, and even editing) which might once have been provided by publishers. To cope with the demand, the number of agents offering their services has markedly increased in recent years – from 34 in 1946 to 120 in 1994.
More tomorrow.
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Old Dependables
Professional musicians sometimes find themselves playing a symphony for the 99th time, an experience which may be just the tiniest bit wearisome. However, when a conductor finds his orchestra sounding bored, he may encourage them by pointing out that, although they have played the symphony many times before, someone in the audience is always hearing it for the very first time.
So it is with books. Names which are familiar to you and me, and have been for years, are not necessarily well known to everyone else. So this post will be devoted to a few Old Dependables who have recently published books which are well up to their usual standard. It may be that somebody, somewhere, will be coming across these masters of fiction for the first time.
We will begin with John Mortimer. John has been a successful writer for over forty years, enjoying his earliest successes in the theatre. Nowadays he is perhaps best known as the creator of Rumpole, and this year he has given us Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders.
Rumpole is a barrister, i.e. a British lawyer who appears in court. In Rumpole's case he always appears for the defence, never the prosecution. (In real life John Mortimer had a similar career, though rather more distinguished than Rumpole's.) In this latest book (about the fourteenth in the Rumpole series by my count), we hear about the case in which Rumpole first made his name as a young man.
Rumpole is, I suppose, a comic creation. And for those who have followed the series, either in book form or on television, the latest book contains much that is familiar: the Timson family of small-time criminals; fellow barrister Claude Erskine-Brown, who has an eye for the ladies; and She Who Must Be Obeyed (Rumpole's formidable wife); overall, however, they remain as entertaining as ever. And the book is mercifully short, thus demonstrating, not for the first time, that you don't need to grind on for 150,000 words to make an impression.
Next, Carl Hiaasen, with Skinny Dip. Hiaasen was born and raised in Florida, where he writes a weekly column for the Miami Herald. He first appeared as a novelist some ten years ago, and produces about one book a year. He too writes about crime, with more than a touch of humour.
Skinny Dip centres around Joey Perrone, a young woman whose husband tries to murder her by throwing her off a cruise ship. She survives, and sets out to get her own back on the bastard. There are, of course, complications, mainly arising from the fact that her husband is a corrupt scientist who is disguising the fact that his employer is systematically poisoning the environment in pursuit of the almighty dollar. There is also a romantic element.
As with Rumpole, some of Hiaasen's characters appear in more than one book. Here, for instance, we meet the one-eyed man who lives rough in the Florida Everglades; if memory serves, he is a former State Governor. (You'll have to read the book, or better still, read them all, to find out more.)
Finally, Terry Pratchett, who is well up to par with Going Postal. Well you'd expect that, really, wouldn't you? Older musicians (so to speak) will know, of course, that Mr Pratchett is the creator of the Discworld, a parallel universe or fantasy world which contains not only humans but also trolls, golems, various gods unknown anywhere else (such as Anoia, a minor goddess of Things That Stick in Drawers), and assorted other wonders. The hero of this particular Discworld novel is Moist von Lipwig, a con artist who is given the choice of reviving the postal service or being hanged by the neck until dead. Not much option then.
All the above books are by masters of the novel form. It so happens that all three are men, but that's a coincidence. What is not a coincidence is that they have all written a substantial body of work, over a lengthy period of time. They know how to do the job.
All three are commercial writers, rather than literary, but all have had perfectly respectable reviews from respectable critics. And all of these writers are well aware that the realities of life are unbearable unless you learn to smile at them, at least from time to time.
If you really insist that your novels must deal with Grand Themes and Ideas, rather than just tell a story (which is enough for most of us), then I can promise you that all the above books contain food for thought. John Mortimer's theme is justice, as ever. Carl Hiaasen has much to say on the pollution of the environment in the pursuit of profit, and the corruption of politicians and others which can follow in its wake. And Terry Pratchett is also well aware of the immoral and illegal actions which big businesses undertake in the interests of the bottom line.
Sometimes an Old Dependable can produce a book which is a tad below par, and disappoints; but for these three, not this time.
So it is with books. Names which are familiar to you and me, and have been for years, are not necessarily well known to everyone else. So this post will be devoted to a few Old Dependables who have recently published books which are well up to their usual standard. It may be that somebody, somewhere, will be coming across these masters of fiction for the first time.
We will begin with John Mortimer. John has been a successful writer for over forty years, enjoying his earliest successes in the theatre. Nowadays he is perhaps best known as the creator of Rumpole, and this year he has given us Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders.
Rumpole is a barrister, i.e. a British lawyer who appears in court. In Rumpole's case he always appears for the defence, never the prosecution. (In real life John Mortimer had a similar career, though rather more distinguished than Rumpole's.) In this latest book (about the fourteenth in the Rumpole series by my count), we hear about the case in which Rumpole first made his name as a young man.
Rumpole is, I suppose, a comic creation. And for those who have followed the series, either in book form or on television, the latest book contains much that is familiar: the Timson family of small-time criminals; fellow barrister Claude Erskine-Brown, who has an eye for the ladies; and She Who Must Be Obeyed (Rumpole's formidable wife); overall, however, they remain as entertaining as ever. And the book is mercifully short, thus demonstrating, not for the first time, that you don't need to grind on for 150,000 words to make an impression.
Next, Carl Hiaasen, with Skinny Dip. Hiaasen was born and raised in Florida, where he writes a weekly column for the Miami Herald. He first appeared as a novelist some ten years ago, and produces about one book a year. He too writes about crime, with more than a touch of humour.
Skinny Dip centres around Joey Perrone, a young woman whose husband tries to murder her by throwing her off a cruise ship. She survives, and sets out to get her own back on the bastard. There are, of course, complications, mainly arising from the fact that her husband is a corrupt scientist who is disguising the fact that his employer is systematically poisoning the environment in pursuit of the almighty dollar. There is also a romantic element.
As with Rumpole, some of Hiaasen's characters appear in more than one book. Here, for instance, we meet the one-eyed man who lives rough in the Florida Everglades; if memory serves, he is a former State Governor. (You'll have to read the book, or better still, read them all, to find out more.)
Finally, Terry Pratchett, who is well up to par with Going Postal. Well you'd expect that, really, wouldn't you? Older musicians (so to speak) will know, of course, that Mr Pratchett is the creator of the Discworld, a parallel universe or fantasy world which contains not only humans but also trolls, golems, various gods unknown anywhere else (such as Anoia, a minor goddess of Things That Stick in Drawers), and assorted other wonders. The hero of this particular Discworld novel is Moist von Lipwig, a con artist who is given the choice of reviving the postal service or being hanged by the neck until dead. Not much option then.
All the above books are by masters of the novel form. It so happens that all three are men, but that's a coincidence. What is not a coincidence is that they have all written a substantial body of work, over a lengthy period of time. They know how to do the job.
All three are commercial writers, rather than literary, but all have had perfectly respectable reviews from respectable critics. And all of these writers are well aware that the realities of life are unbearable unless you learn to smile at them, at least from time to time.
If you really insist that your novels must deal with Grand Themes and Ideas, rather than just tell a story (which is enough for most of us), then I can promise you that all the above books contain food for thought. John Mortimer's theme is justice, as ever. Carl Hiaasen has much to say on the pollution of the environment in the pursuit of profit, and the corruption of politicians and others which can follow in its wake. And Terry Pratchett is also well aware of the immoral and illegal actions which big businesses undertake in the interests of the bottom line.
Sometimes an Old Dependable can produce a book which is a tad below par, and disappoints; but for these three, not this time.
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
Christmas break
Mrs GOB and I are taking a brief break, removed from computer terminals, and thus there will be no further posts on this blog until about Wednesday 29 December.
I see that various authorities are complaining about the de-Christianisation of Christmas, but I'm afraid I don't have much sympathy with that. There was a mid-winter festival long before Jesus Christ was born, and the justification for it was the fact that, somewhere around 21 December, the days stop getting shorter and start getting longer.
Back in east Africa, where the human race apparently began, I don't suppose the seasons mattered very much. There was plenty of food all year round -- that's why human beings started to increase in numbers. But once we got into Europe, and started to experience some serious winters, the length of days, and the amount of sunshine, started to have some real significance.
Human beings didn't need to be very smart or observant to find the crucial point in the year when the sun shone for a little bit longer than it had done a week or so earlier. (Technically, this is the winter solstice.) True, winter had not yet finished; but with the sun regaining its strength, so to speak, it was time for a party.
My guess is that this celebration began thousands of years ago, long before the creation of written records. Certainly we do know that, as soon as written records began, there was a mid-winter festival. The Romans called it Saturnalia; the Germanic tribes called it Yule.
When Christianity arrived on the scene, the early Christians were unaware of precisely when Jesus was born, since the Gospels don't give a date. But it wasn't long before the Christian authorities decided that it would be a good plan to latch on to some of the popular pagan festivals, which they promptly proceeded to do. Hence any grumbles from today's Christians that Christmas is being de-Christianised should be countered by a gentle and polite reminder that the mid-winter fun and games were being celebrated long before the Church joined the bandwagon.
I still think it's a good time for feasting and drinking, even in this electrically-lit and centrally heated age.
See you before long.
I see that various authorities are complaining about the de-Christianisation of Christmas, but I'm afraid I don't have much sympathy with that. There was a mid-winter festival long before Jesus Christ was born, and the justification for it was the fact that, somewhere around 21 December, the days stop getting shorter and start getting longer.
Back in east Africa, where the human race apparently began, I don't suppose the seasons mattered very much. There was plenty of food all year round -- that's why human beings started to increase in numbers. But once we got into Europe, and started to experience some serious winters, the length of days, and the amount of sunshine, started to have some real significance.
Human beings didn't need to be very smart or observant to find the crucial point in the year when the sun shone for a little bit longer than it had done a week or so earlier. (Technically, this is the winter solstice.) True, winter had not yet finished; but with the sun regaining its strength, so to speak, it was time for a party.
My guess is that this celebration began thousands of years ago, long before the creation of written records. Certainly we do know that, as soon as written records began, there was a mid-winter festival. The Romans called it Saturnalia; the Germanic tribes called it Yule.
When Christianity arrived on the scene, the early Christians were unaware of precisely when Jesus was born, since the Gospels don't give a date. But it wasn't long before the Christian authorities decided that it would be a good plan to latch on to some of the popular pagan festivals, which they promptly proceeded to do. Hence any grumbles from today's Christians that Christmas is being de-Christianised should be countered by a gentle and polite reminder that the mid-winter fun and games were being celebrated long before the Church joined the bandwagon.
I still think it's a good time for feasting and drinking, even in this electrically-lit and centrally heated age.
See you before long.
The next big thing?
Booktrade.info has provided a couple of links in recent days to a piece on bubblegeneration.com about the future of publishing. Beginning on Thursday last, Umair Haque has been considering whether publishing as we know it has a future. There have been a couple of comments, leading to a further piece by Omar on Friday.
This is all well worth a read, but personally I don't find the diagnosis -- the imminent death of publishing -- at all convincing. Reason: I am quite old enough to remember the invention of video recorders (which are now on the way out as a dead technology). When video recorders first began to appear you could find articles in quite reputable journals predicting the death of the cinema. Similarly, when cable and satellite came along, some otherwise sensible people were telling us that the big TV networks would be dead within five years.
Yes, there have been changes, of course, and there will continue to be. But publishing is not going to die just yet.
The bubblegeneration site also contains a lot of other interesting stuff, for instance on the new economics of music, and particularly on something called human licenses (to use the American spelling). I haven't had time to absorb it all as yet, but if you're at all concerned about copyright in general, and the licensing of rights in particular, it would be worth a look.
This is all well worth a read, but personally I don't find the diagnosis -- the imminent death of publishing -- at all convincing. Reason: I am quite old enough to remember the invention of video recorders (which are now on the way out as a dead technology). When video recorders first began to appear you could find articles in quite reputable journals predicting the death of the cinema. Similarly, when cable and satellite came along, some otherwise sensible people were telling us that the big TV networks would be dead within five years.
Yes, there have been changes, of course, and there will continue to be. But publishing is not going to die just yet.
The bubblegeneration site also contains a lot of other interesting stuff, for instance on the new economics of music, and particularly on something called human licenses (to use the American spelling). I haven't had time to absorb it all as yet, but if you're at all concerned about copyright in general, and the licensing of rights in particular, it would be worth a look.
Monday, December 20, 2004
Credibility problems
I have been reading John Grisham's The Summons. It's a tolerably interesting read: 'classic Grisham', the Times called it. But I found myself wondering, as I went along, how it would fare if it were to turn up in some agent's slush pile, written by an unknown.
Let's see now. It's pretty well written, especially at the start. But before long the agent would scribble in the margin 'too much telling, not enough showing'.
Then there's a big credibility problem. The main character is a professor of law -- a well educated fellow, ultra respectable -- and yet before long we find him doing something not only illegal but pretty damn silly and more or less guaranteed to lead to trouble.
Now, Grisham being Grisham you go along with this and see where he is taking you. But if it was in a slush pile? Nah. The agent would want you to fix it.
And then there's the big surprise that comes at the end. Or it should do. This is where the bad guy is revealed. It's a 341-page book, and I had it figured by page 215, so I'm afraid that isn't too impressive either.
All in all I reckon the agent would call it a good try but not quite up to snuff. Have you got anything else you could show me, John? Please let me have a look at it when you do.
Then there's Agatha Christie. Some enterprising television-production company has decided to remake some of the Miss Marple stories, in two-hour format; very glossy, with lots of top British stars, even in the bit parts. What is more, the producers seem to have decided to update the plots. Or at any rate they did in the first one, The Body in the Library, shown a week ago yesterday.
There's a problem with credibility in this one too. The book was first published in 1941, and the plot turns around the decision of a millionaire to adopt a working-class girl as his daughter.
Now, anyone who knows anything about English life in the 1930s and 1940s would know that such a decision stretches the credulity. And yet somehow, over all these years, Agatha has persuaded us to swallow it. Perhaps it is easier to take in the novel format than in the two-hour TV film. Anyway, it's certainly a big problem. However, Agatha was Agatha, and she got us to believe that black was white so often that it's scarcely surprising that she got away with this one.
Once again, an agent reading a slush-pile submission with a hard-to-believe plot device like this would either want it fixed, or pass on the privilege of offering the book to publishers.
So what am I saying -- that new and as yet unpublished writers have to work to higher standards than established names like Grisham and Christie? Well yes. I'm afraid so. Listen, I never said that this business was fair, OK? Or easy.
By the way, in the latest TV version of The Body in the Library (there have been others), the scriptwriter has changed the plot and given us a new villain. Or rather two new villains: a lesbian couple if you please. This is a smart move, because otherwise the whole thing would be so creaky and old-fashioned that only the most determined Christie fan cum couch potato would watch it. If you want to know who the original murderer was you'll just have to read the book.
Let's see now. It's pretty well written, especially at the start. But before long the agent would scribble in the margin 'too much telling, not enough showing'.
Then there's a big credibility problem. The main character is a professor of law -- a well educated fellow, ultra respectable -- and yet before long we find him doing something not only illegal but pretty damn silly and more or less guaranteed to lead to trouble.
Now, Grisham being Grisham you go along with this and see where he is taking you. But if it was in a slush pile? Nah. The agent would want you to fix it.
And then there's the big surprise that comes at the end. Or it should do. This is where the bad guy is revealed. It's a 341-page book, and I had it figured by page 215, so I'm afraid that isn't too impressive either.
All in all I reckon the agent would call it a good try but not quite up to snuff. Have you got anything else you could show me, John? Please let me have a look at it when you do.
Then there's Agatha Christie. Some enterprising television-production company has decided to remake some of the Miss Marple stories, in two-hour format; very glossy, with lots of top British stars, even in the bit parts. What is more, the producers seem to have decided to update the plots. Or at any rate they did in the first one, The Body in the Library, shown a week ago yesterday.
There's a problem with credibility in this one too. The book was first published in 1941, and the plot turns around the decision of a millionaire to adopt a working-class girl as his daughter.
Now, anyone who knows anything about English life in the 1930s and 1940s would know that such a decision stretches the credulity. And yet somehow, over all these years, Agatha has persuaded us to swallow it. Perhaps it is easier to take in the novel format than in the two-hour TV film. Anyway, it's certainly a big problem. However, Agatha was Agatha, and she got us to believe that black was white so often that it's scarcely surprising that she got away with this one.
Once again, an agent reading a slush-pile submission with a hard-to-believe plot device like this would either want it fixed, or pass on the privilege of offering the book to publishers.
So what am I saying -- that new and as yet unpublished writers have to work to higher standards than established names like Grisham and Christie? Well yes. I'm afraid so. Listen, I never said that this business was fair, OK? Or easy.
By the way, in the latest TV version of The Body in the Library (there have been others), the scriptwriter has changed the plot and given us a new villain. Or rather two new villains: a lesbian couple if you please. This is a smart move, because otherwise the whole thing would be so creaky and old-fashioned that only the most determined Christie fan cum couch potato would watch it. If you want to know who the original murderer was you'll just have to read the book.
Friday, December 17, 2004
A new version of an old story
The Blogger dashboard page has a link to an article in the New York Times, and for once you seem to be able to read it without having to register. Not, I hasten to add, that I would urge you to go read it.
The article is headed 'A New Forum (Blogging) Inspires the Old (Books)'. It is written by one Joshua Kurlantzick, of whom I know not.
The correct technical term for this article is, I think, tired. It includes, in one handy package, every story about bloggers being offered book contracts that you have read over the last few months: Salam Pax, Belle de Jour, wonkette, and a few others. The article even includes, for the Rip Van Winkles, a description of what a blog is. And, yawn, you can also find out what an assistant professor of new media studies thinks about the blog phenomenon.
It is perhaps worth pointing out, once again, that what we have here is another glorious instance of what Dr Taleb calls the drowned worshippers. In other words, Mr Kurlantzick seems to be ignoring all those bloggers who tap away, day after day, week after week, without any publisher showing the slightest interest in them.
According Kurlantzick, there will be 10 million blogs by the end of the year. So, if 7 of those 10 million have been offered book contracts, it means that there are 9,999,993 bloggers, give or take a few, who haven't yet received that phone call. Which means that the idea that the new forum (blogging) is inspiring the old (books) is stretching the facts a bit. Wouldn't you think?
Still, it fills up the space between the adverts, and that's what most newspaper stories are for.
The article is headed 'A New Forum (Blogging) Inspires the Old (Books)'. It is written by one Joshua Kurlantzick, of whom I know not.
The correct technical term for this article is, I think, tired. It includes, in one handy package, every story about bloggers being offered book contracts that you have read over the last few months: Salam Pax, Belle de Jour, wonkette, and a few others. The article even includes, for the Rip Van Winkles, a description of what a blog is. And, yawn, you can also find out what an assistant professor of new media studies thinks about the blog phenomenon.
It is perhaps worth pointing out, once again, that what we have here is another glorious instance of what Dr Taleb calls the drowned worshippers. In other words, Mr Kurlantzick seems to be ignoring all those bloggers who tap away, day after day, week after week, without any publisher showing the slightest interest in them.
According Kurlantzick, there will be 10 million blogs by the end of the year. So, if 7 of those 10 million have been offered book contracts, it means that there are 9,999,993 bloggers, give or take a few, who haven't yet received that phone call. Which means that the idea that the new forum (blogging) is inspiring the old (books) is stretching the facts a bit. Wouldn't you think?
Still, it fills up the space between the adverts, and that's what most newspaper stories are for.
Thursday, December 16, 2004
The problem of length -- part 4
In part 1 of The Problem of Length, I promised that, before concluding this discussion, we would have a look at one writer whose work does at least challenge my general conclusion that 70,000 words or so are sufficient to allow anyone to make their mark as a novelist of note. That writer is Neal Stephenson. (Oh but you’d guessed! Clever you.)
For those who haven’t been paying attention, or even reading this blog regularly, let me say that Neal Stephenson is a novelist who produces seriously long books. In the last two years alone he has published all three volumes of his Baroque Cycle. The first volume, Quicksilver, runs to 927 pages; The Confusion has 815; and The System of the World 887. He has also written several other successful novels, all of them much longer than the average work of fiction.
Occasional references on this blog have also demonstrated beyond doubt, I hope, that I am a Stephenson fan. So what is this, then? I have been arguing so far that it is unwise and unnecessary for a novelist to go over 75,000, tops – so am I inconsistent, am I forgetful, or does Stephenson constitute an exception which proves the rule?
These are very reasonable questions.
Before answering them, let us be clear what ‘proves the rule’ means. It means ‘test the rule’.
Once we have established a general rule, as we have in this case (short novels are better than long ones), and once an apparent exception to that rule appears, we then have to ask ourselves whether this exception is so important that it invalidates the rule which we have so painstakingly developed.
In considering the ‘ideal’ length for a novel, the process of testing the rule comes down to asking this question. If Stephenson, who writes at enormous length, is considered to be such a hotshot (and not only by the GOB) then do we have to admit that the suggested general rule is a load of eyewash?
No, in my opinion, we do not.
The key point in my thesis is that long novels are almost invariably too long for their intended effect: they are overstuffed with material which is unnecessary in order to achieve the desired effect; or they are overwritten on a scene by scene basis; or both.
Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle is a formidable piece of work. When I started to read it, I did consider, at first, that the author might have done better to divide volume I into three separate novels, making up some sort of a saga. But I soon realised that that was not such a good idea; ideally, volume I needs to be read as a whole. And by the time I reached the end of volume III I realised that the entire three volumes do in fact constitute one quite exceptionally long novel. It is a fully unified work; unified, that is, around its intended effect.
This massive chunk of fiction is not, in my view, overlong; and for several reasons. First, every word of it, as far as I can see, is necessary to the final effect. Second, the scenes are not, in my view, over-written; I was never tempted to skip. And third, when you get to the end you realise that everything in it is beautifully planned and hangs together in a most remarkable way.
Stephenson, in short, is a quite unusually talented and hard-working writer, with a formidable grasp of the history of Europe and the history of science, and no doubt a dozen other esoteric subjects as well. As one reviewer remarked, to appreciate Stephenson fully you probably need at least a couple of liberal-arts degrees, plus a good working knowledge of the natural sciences.
Stephenson himself has put his finger on the nature of the problem of length. On his web site he has a short (!) piece about the Cult of Brevity. Here is part of what he has to say: ‘As must be obvious, I am not an adherent of the Cult of Brevity. Personally, I am delighted to read extremely long books, or series of books, as long as they hold my interest.’ And that, of course, is the key. ‘As long as they hold my interest.’
It is self-evidently possible for a writer of Stephenson’s class to produce a long novel which holds his readers’ interest. (Consider his massive fan-base.) But the rest of us find the task impossible, and we would be well advised not to tackle it.
For those who haven’t been paying attention, or even reading this blog regularly, let me say that Neal Stephenson is a novelist who produces seriously long books. In the last two years alone he has published all three volumes of his Baroque Cycle. The first volume, Quicksilver, runs to 927 pages; The Confusion has 815; and The System of the World 887. He has also written several other successful novels, all of them much longer than the average work of fiction.
Occasional references on this blog have also demonstrated beyond doubt, I hope, that I am a Stephenson fan. So what is this, then? I have been arguing so far that it is unwise and unnecessary for a novelist to go over 75,000, tops – so am I inconsistent, am I forgetful, or does Stephenson constitute an exception which proves the rule?
These are very reasonable questions.
Before answering them, let us be clear what ‘proves the rule’ means. It means ‘test the rule’.
Once we have established a general rule, as we have in this case (short novels are better than long ones), and once an apparent exception to that rule appears, we then have to ask ourselves whether this exception is so important that it invalidates the rule which we have so painstakingly developed.
In considering the ‘ideal’ length for a novel, the process of testing the rule comes down to asking this question. If Stephenson, who writes at enormous length, is considered to be such a hotshot (and not only by the GOB) then do we have to admit that the suggested general rule is a load of eyewash?
No, in my opinion, we do not.
The key point in my thesis is that long novels are almost invariably too long for their intended effect: they are overstuffed with material which is unnecessary in order to achieve the desired effect; or they are overwritten on a scene by scene basis; or both.
Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle is a formidable piece of work. When I started to read it, I did consider, at first, that the author might have done better to divide volume I into three separate novels, making up some sort of a saga. But I soon realised that that was not such a good idea; ideally, volume I needs to be read as a whole. And by the time I reached the end of volume III I realised that the entire three volumes do in fact constitute one quite exceptionally long novel. It is a fully unified work; unified, that is, around its intended effect.
This massive chunk of fiction is not, in my view, overlong; and for several reasons. First, every word of it, as far as I can see, is necessary to the final effect. Second, the scenes are not, in my view, over-written; I was never tempted to skip. And third, when you get to the end you realise that everything in it is beautifully planned and hangs together in a most remarkable way.
Stephenson, in short, is a quite unusually talented and hard-working writer, with a formidable grasp of the history of Europe and the history of science, and no doubt a dozen other esoteric subjects as well. As one reviewer remarked, to appreciate Stephenson fully you probably need at least a couple of liberal-arts degrees, plus a good working knowledge of the natural sciences.
Stephenson himself has put his finger on the nature of the problem of length. On his web site he has a short (!) piece about the Cult of Brevity. Here is part of what he has to say: ‘As must be obvious, I am not an adherent of the Cult of Brevity. Personally, I am delighted to read extremely long books, or series of books, as long as they hold my interest.’ And that, of course, is the key. ‘As long as they hold my interest.’
It is self-evidently possible for a writer of Stephenson’s class to produce a long novel which holds his readers’ interest. (Consider his massive fan-base.) But the rest of us find the task impossible, and we would be well advised not to tackle it.
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
The problem of length -- part 3
Conclusions
Today we try to draw some conclusions from the discussion of the ideal length for a novel which has occupied us for the last couple of days.
We began (in part 1) by considering the various demands for books of a certain length which have emanated from publishers in the past, and which continue to have some influence today. And I hope we can agree that what publishers expect of novelists, in terms of length, at any given time, has really had very little to do with any understanding of what makes a novel effective. After all, if publishers really knew how to write an effective novel they would do it themselves, because the rewards can be substantial. Effect is, in any case, not closely linked with length, except perhaps inversely.
No, what has determined publishers’ attitudes to length has been economic considerations (as perceived at any point in time). And there is good reason, in my view, to suppose that publishers’ demands for books of a given length (particularly when they have wanted long ones) have in fact hindered rather than helped the creation of effective fiction.
In part 2, yesterday, I pointed out that there are many examples from the history of this medium (or art form, if you will) to show that a short novel can be every bit as powerful in the emotions that it arouses, and hence in the reputation that it creates, as a long one.
It follows therefore that those who propose to write novels should clear their minds of any idea that they must write a book of a certain length if it is to make any impact. This is true whether the writer’s aims are commercial or literary.
Sol Stein, who is a highly experienced editor and publisher (as well as a writer himself) says in his book Solutions for Novelists that most of the unpublished mss that he sees are too long for what they do – i.e. too long for their stories.
There are two versions of the over-long novel. In the first place, the story may simply include scenes and incidents which are not necessary to the story's ultimate effect on the reader; and in the second place the scenes which are included may simply be over-written, with the writer getting carried away by the sound of his own wonderful voice, and the amazing insights which he is able to generate (the result, of course, of his undeniable genius).
Some of the 'great' novels of the past clearly contain material which is more or less irrelevant to any story they may have to tell. Moby Dick, for example, begins with lengthy portraits of the main characters, a defence of whaling, bits of history, and a zoological taxonomy of all known forms of whales. At this point, Melville realises that he has been rambling on for too long (a good 50,000 words) and writes: 'God keep me from ever completing anything. Oh Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!' Only then does he get on with the real story.
Similarly, Stendhal begins La Chartreuse de Parme with a description of the battle of Waterloo which has no necessary connection with the rest of the story. Balzac declared that it should have been left out.
The implications of all this, for the practising writer of today, are simple. Plan to write a relatively short novel; you are producing one book, not a library. When writing a first draft, by all means let the story rip, so to speak. But at the revision stage, tighten everything up. Go for speed. And if you want an example of speed, taken from another medium, watch the first five minutes of Carol Reed's masterpiece The Third Man; the economy and pace of the scene-setting are breathtaking.
I should perhaps mention, from my own experience, that even an experienced novelist can seriously misjudge the length of a novel. In 1994 I set out to write a new novel, not having written one for some years; I soon realised that what I had thought could be told in 75,000 words or so would require three times that length. A major rethink was involved.
So. If you are looking for a neat conclusion to this series of three posts on the problem of length in the novel, here it is: Most novels today are altogether too damn long.
They are too long in the sense that they include excessive and unnecessary material in order to achieve the effect that the author intends; and this redundant length is to no one's advantage, least of all the writer's.
If you are proposing to write a novel, then for heaven's sake plan it to be of reasonable length. There are innumerable examples from the past to prove that 60,000 or 70,000 words are quite sufficient for you to make your mark.
And, at the risk of stating the obvious, let me add that a writer who restricts himself to, say, 75,000 words as the upper limit, only has to do half the work of a writer who hammers out 150,000. And the two shorter books give twice the chance of royalties, and twice the chance of reputation-building reviews. This is scarcely rocket science, is it?
Today we try to draw some conclusions from the discussion of the ideal length for a novel which has occupied us for the last couple of days.
We began (in part 1) by considering the various demands for books of a certain length which have emanated from publishers in the past, and which continue to have some influence today. And I hope we can agree that what publishers expect of novelists, in terms of length, at any given time, has really had very little to do with any understanding of what makes a novel effective. After all, if publishers really knew how to write an effective novel they would do it themselves, because the rewards can be substantial. Effect is, in any case, not closely linked with length, except perhaps inversely.
No, what has determined publishers’ attitudes to length has been economic considerations (as perceived at any point in time). And there is good reason, in my view, to suppose that publishers’ demands for books of a given length (particularly when they have wanted long ones) have in fact hindered rather than helped the creation of effective fiction.
In part 2, yesterday, I pointed out that there are many examples from the history of this medium (or art form, if you will) to show that a short novel can be every bit as powerful in the emotions that it arouses, and hence in the reputation that it creates, as a long one.
It follows therefore that those who propose to write novels should clear their minds of any idea that they must write a book of a certain length if it is to make any impact. This is true whether the writer’s aims are commercial or literary.
Sol Stein, who is a highly experienced editor and publisher (as well as a writer himself) says in his book Solutions for Novelists that most of the unpublished mss that he sees are too long for what they do – i.e. too long for their stories.
There are two versions of the over-long novel. In the first place, the story may simply include scenes and incidents which are not necessary to the story's ultimate effect on the reader; and in the second place the scenes which are included may simply be over-written, with the writer getting carried away by the sound of his own wonderful voice, and the amazing insights which he is able to generate (the result, of course, of his undeniable genius).
Some of the 'great' novels of the past clearly contain material which is more or less irrelevant to any story they may have to tell. Moby Dick, for example, begins with lengthy portraits of the main characters, a defence of whaling, bits of history, and a zoological taxonomy of all known forms of whales. At this point, Melville realises that he has been rambling on for too long (a good 50,000 words) and writes: 'God keep me from ever completing anything. Oh Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!' Only then does he get on with the real story.
Similarly, Stendhal begins La Chartreuse de Parme with a description of the battle of Waterloo which has no necessary connection with the rest of the story. Balzac declared that it should have been left out.
The implications of all this, for the practising writer of today, are simple. Plan to write a relatively short novel; you are producing one book, not a library. When writing a first draft, by all means let the story rip, so to speak. But at the revision stage, tighten everything up. Go for speed. And if you want an example of speed, taken from another medium, watch the first five minutes of Carol Reed's masterpiece The Third Man; the economy and pace of the scene-setting are breathtaking.
I should perhaps mention, from my own experience, that even an experienced novelist can seriously misjudge the length of a novel. In 1994 I set out to write a new novel, not having written one for some years; I soon realised that what I had thought could be told in 75,000 words or so would require three times that length. A major rethink was involved.
So. If you are looking for a neat conclusion to this series of three posts on the problem of length in the novel, here it is: Most novels today are altogether too damn long.
They are too long in the sense that they include excessive and unnecessary material in order to achieve the effect that the author intends; and this redundant length is to no one's advantage, least of all the writer's.
If you are proposing to write a novel, then for heaven's sake plan it to be of reasonable length. There are innumerable examples from the past to prove that 60,000 or 70,000 words are quite sufficient for you to make your mark.
And, at the risk of stating the obvious, let me add that a writer who restricts himself to, say, 75,000 words as the upper limit, only has to do half the work of a writer who hammers out 150,000. And the two shorter books give twice the chance of royalties, and twice the chance of reputation-building reviews. This is scarcely rocket science, is it?
Tuesday, December 14, 2004
The problem of length -- part 2
The aesthetic imperative
This section of The Problem of Length (which continues from yesterday) represents my attempt to answer the following question: What is the ideal length for a novel, ignoring all demands of the publishing marketplace? In other words, if we consider ‘aesthetics’ alone, what is the best length for a novel?
It will be immediately obvious, of course, that the answer, in any specific instance, will depend at least to some extent on the content and nature of the novel. But in general my answer to this question is that, in all probability, the ideal length for a novel, whatever its subject matter, is probably a good deal less than is usually thought.
Before we consider aesthetics in isolation, let us first empty our minds of literary reputation, because it will prove, on examination, to be irrelevant.
This whole issue of length is clouded by the influence of those well known enemies of clear thinking, the professors of English literature, and their concept (God help us all) of the Great Novel. We have all been brought up, for instance, to believe that War and Peace (all 745,ooo words of it) is a ‘great novel’. Whatever that means, and in my opinion it means damn all.
To enlarge on that point, let us suppose that we put a thousand liberal-arts graduates in a theatre. Hands up, we say, anyone who agrees with the statement that War and Peace is a great novel. Lots of hands will go up, perhaps even three quarters of those present, because they've all been good boys and girls and have listened to their teachers. Then we say, Keep your hand up if you have actually read War and Peace. How many hands will remain? Let us say ten, because I’m feeling generous. And no, dear, seeing the movie doesn’t count. And finally we say, Keep your hand up if you really and truly, cross your heart and swear to die, can say with a clear conscience that you actually enjoyed reading War and Peace more than any other novel you’ve read.
How many hands remain in the air?
I hope my point it clear. It is that the accepted wisdom in literary circles bears no relation whatever to people’s actual reaction to books. Books which are hailed by the literary establishment (choose your own example) remain very largely unread; we could easily make a list of fifty novels which are widely recognised as literary masterpieces but which are read by no one who doesn’t have to study them for a degree (and half of those who are supposed to read them for study purposes don't bother either). Meanwhile, novels which are despised and rejected by that same literary establishment continue to demonstrate their effectiveness and power, either by selling in vast numbers and becoming popular successes, or by becoming cult classics in various genres.
It follows, therefore, that we should ignore literary reputation when we consider the ideal length for a book. The fact that certain novels, mostly big fat long ones such as Moby Dick (220,000 words), have acquired significant literary status gives us no clue whatever as to the ideal length of a work of fiction.
When we come to consider the aesthetics of the novel, what we are talking about is the extent to which fiction communicates emotion to its natural audience. A novel which hits its readers hard, with the emotion which the author intended them to feel, is a successful novel, no matter how large or small its readership is, and no matter how long or short the novel is. And sheer length, as we shall now perceive, has got very little to do with success in that sense: short books have, historically, been at least as successful as long ones; and in my view they are often more so.
It's time for some examples.
Who are the most memorable characters in nineteenth-century fiction? Well, for my money two of the candidates are Ebenezer Scrooge and Sherlock Holmes, neither of whom show any sign of fading from public consciousness.
Scrooge was created in the space of about 43,000 words, by my calculation; somewhere between 40,000 and 45,000 anyway. As for Holmes, he does appear in some novels but he comes to us chiefly through the short stories.
Move to the twentieth century and choose the most memorable character from that era: James Bond, for example. Bond was created by Ian Fleming in 1953, in Casino Royale. The book runs to 159 pages in my paperback copy, which is barely 60,000 words, at a guess. I still have copies of the first Pan paperback editions of most of the Bond books, and few of them creep over 200 pages.
(Incidentally, in the examples which follow I shall give the length in thousands of words if I know it, and in the number of pages if I don’t. Printed pages will, of course, vary in the number of words they contain, but as a crude rule of thumb you might assume that three pages equals a thousand words.)
There are many, many other examples of short books which have embedded themselves in the folk memory of readers. The Time Machine (Wells) runs to about 80 pages in most editions; Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Stevenson) is 70 pages.
Fahrenheit 451 (Bradbury) was written in nine days on a hired typewriter and the first edition contained 158 pages. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald) has 172 pages. Bonjour Tristesse (Sagan) was 30,000 words, and Georges Simenon built a whole career on novels of a similar length. The Bridges of Madison County (Waller) is shown as 180 pages on Amazon, but I believe that too is about 30,000 words. So is Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, if you want a literary example; the book received special recognition in his Nobel Prize citation.
Hemingway, by the way, offered the following advice: ‘Eschew the monumental. Shun the Epic.’
Enough. We have demonstrated that you do not have to grind on for 250,000 words to make a powerful impression on the average reader, or, for that matter, on those who decide on the next Nobel Prize winner.
Perhaps, before we leave the topic of aesthetics, this is the place to point out that the reader’s experience is in my view profoundly influenced, albeit largely subconsciously, by the size and weight of a book, and by the layout of the words on the page.
To begin with, a large, heavy book is an awkward object to carry around. It does not fit easily into a pocket. Your arms get tired holding the damn thing up. Some people find such books intimidating.
As for the typography: well, it seems to me that an art which was once taken seriously is now more or less ignored. In years past, for instance, no respectable printer or publisher would have allowed a right-hand page to end with a word divided by a hyphen. Neither would they have allowed a chapter to end on a page with less than perhaps five lines on it. To prevent these occurrences, minor alterations would be made in the spacing of the lines, or the words, higher up. Nowadays, I am sorry to say, nobody gives a shit. In all probability no one in-house reads the printed book anyway; and in many instances they don't read it in manuscript either. (Geller wants six figures for it so it must be OK.)
As for worrying about the readability of type -- one might as well forget it. No one seems to care (apart from the specialist large-print publishers) about the use of tiny type, lots of lines on the page, narrow margins, and so forth. But all of these things influence the reader’s experience, usually unfavourably; and it is obviously easier to give a text ‘air’, so to speak, if the wordage is short than if it is long.
This is probably also the place to point out that there is a deadly vice which affects writers, once they have reached a certain stage in their development. At first, the task of writing a full-length novel seems impossibly difficult. But then, gradually, writers get into the swing of things; their fluency improves, and after a while they realise that, hey, I can really do this! It isn’t so difficult to sit down and write a novel after all! And you know what, I’m really rather good at it!
This is, of course, drivel. And a writer who begins to enjoy the sound of his own writing voice is a writer who is more than likely to produce drivel.
A corollary of this vice is a reluctance to cut anything. The writer's attitude often boils down to: I wrote it, so it must be marvellous. This is the madness which afflicted Ross Lockridge, for example, in producing his 600,000 word ‘masterpiece’ Raintree County (eventually published at 380,000 words). In his case the disease proved fatal -- see my post of 4 October.
Tomorrow: some conclusions.
This section of The Problem of Length (which continues from yesterday) represents my attempt to answer the following question: What is the ideal length for a novel, ignoring all demands of the publishing marketplace? In other words, if we consider ‘aesthetics’ alone, what is the best length for a novel?
It will be immediately obvious, of course, that the answer, in any specific instance, will depend at least to some extent on the content and nature of the novel. But in general my answer to this question is that, in all probability, the ideal length for a novel, whatever its subject matter, is probably a good deal less than is usually thought.
Before we consider aesthetics in isolation, let us first empty our minds of literary reputation, because it will prove, on examination, to be irrelevant.
This whole issue of length is clouded by the influence of those well known enemies of clear thinking, the professors of English literature, and their concept (God help us all) of the Great Novel. We have all been brought up, for instance, to believe that War and Peace (all 745,ooo words of it) is a ‘great novel’. Whatever that means, and in my opinion it means damn all.
To enlarge on that point, let us suppose that we put a thousand liberal-arts graduates in a theatre. Hands up, we say, anyone who agrees with the statement that War and Peace is a great novel. Lots of hands will go up, perhaps even three quarters of those present, because they've all been good boys and girls and have listened to their teachers. Then we say, Keep your hand up if you have actually read War and Peace. How many hands will remain? Let us say ten, because I’m feeling generous. And no, dear, seeing the movie doesn’t count. And finally we say, Keep your hand up if you really and truly, cross your heart and swear to die, can say with a clear conscience that you actually enjoyed reading War and Peace more than any other novel you’ve read.
How many hands remain in the air?
I hope my point it clear. It is that the accepted wisdom in literary circles bears no relation whatever to people’s actual reaction to books. Books which are hailed by the literary establishment (choose your own example) remain very largely unread; we could easily make a list of fifty novels which are widely recognised as literary masterpieces but which are read by no one who doesn’t have to study them for a degree (and half of those who are supposed to read them for study purposes don't bother either). Meanwhile, novels which are despised and rejected by that same literary establishment continue to demonstrate their effectiveness and power, either by selling in vast numbers and becoming popular successes, or by becoming cult classics in various genres.
It follows, therefore, that we should ignore literary reputation when we consider the ideal length for a book. The fact that certain novels, mostly big fat long ones such as Moby Dick (220,000 words), have acquired significant literary status gives us no clue whatever as to the ideal length of a work of fiction.
When we come to consider the aesthetics of the novel, what we are talking about is the extent to which fiction communicates emotion to its natural audience. A novel which hits its readers hard, with the emotion which the author intended them to feel, is a successful novel, no matter how large or small its readership is, and no matter how long or short the novel is. And sheer length, as we shall now perceive, has got very little to do with success in that sense: short books have, historically, been at least as successful as long ones; and in my view they are often more so.
It's time for some examples.
Who are the most memorable characters in nineteenth-century fiction? Well, for my money two of the candidates are Ebenezer Scrooge and Sherlock Holmes, neither of whom show any sign of fading from public consciousness.
Scrooge was created in the space of about 43,000 words, by my calculation; somewhere between 40,000 and 45,000 anyway. As for Holmes, he does appear in some novels but he comes to us chiefly through the short stories.
Move to the twentieth century and choose the most memorable character from that era: James Bond, for example. Bond was created by Ian Fleming in 1953, in Casino Royale. The book runs to 159 pages in my paperback copy, which is barely 60,000 words, at a guess. I still have copies of the first Pan paperback editions of most of the Bond books, and few of them creep over 200 pages.
(Incidentally, in the examples which follow I shall give the length in thousands of words if I know it, and in the number of pages if I don’t. Printed pages will, of course, vary in the number of words they contain, but as a crude rule of thumb you might assume that three pages equals a thousand words.)
There are many, many other examples of short books which have embedded themselves in the folk memory of readers. The Time Machine (Wells) runs to about 80 pages in most editions; Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Stevenson) is 70 pages.
Fahrenheit 451 (Bradbury) was written in nine days on a hired typewriter and the first edition contained 158 pages. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald) has 172 pages. Bonjour Tristesse (Sagan) was 30,000 words, and Georges Simenon built a whole career on novels of a similar length. The Bridges of Madison County (Waller) is shown as 180 pages on Amazon, but I believe that too is about 30,000 words. So is Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, if you want a literary example; the book received special recognition in his Nobel Prize citation.
Hemingway, by the way, offered the following advice: ‘Eschew the monumental. Shun the Epic.’
Enough. We have demonstrated that you do not have to grind on for 250,000 words to make a powerful impression on the average reader, or, for that matter, on those who decide on the next Nobel Prize winner.
Perhaps, before we leave the topic of aesthetics, this is the place to point out that the reader’s experience is in my view profoundly influenced, albeit largely subconsciously, by the size and weight of a book, and by the layout of the words on the page.
To begin with, a large, heavy book is an awkward object to carry around. It does not fit easily into a pocket. Your arms get tired holding the damn thing up. Some people find such books intimidating.
As for the typography: well, it seems to me that an art which was once taken seriously is now more or less ignored. In years past, for instance, no respectable printer or publisher would have allowed a right-hand page to end with a word divided by a hyphen. Neither would they have allowed a chapter to end on a page with less than perhaps five lines on it. To prevent these occurrences, minor alterations would be made in the spacing of the lines, or the words, higher up. Nowadays, I am sorry to say, nobody gives a shit. In all probability no one in-house reads the printed book anyway; and in many instances they don't read it in manuscript either. (Geller wants six figures for it so it must be OK.)
As for worrying about the readability of type -- one might as well forget it. No one seems to care (apart from the specialist large-print publishers) about the use of tiny type, lots of lines on the page, narrow margins, and so forth. But all of these things influence the reader’s experience, usually unfavourably; and it is obviously easier to give a text ‘air’, so to speak, if the wordage is short than if it is long.
This is probably also the place to point out that there is a deadly vice which affects writers, once they have reached a certain stage in their development. At first, the task of writing a full-length novel seems impossibly difficult. But then, gradually, writers get into the swing of things; their fluency improves, and after a while they realise that, hey, I can really do this! It isn’t so difficult to sit down and write a novel after all! And you know what, I’m really rather good at it!
This is, of course, drivel. And a writer who begins to enjoy the sound of his own writing voice is a writer who is more than likely to produce drivel.
A corollary of this vice is a reluctance to cut anything. The writer's attitude often boils down to: I wrote it, so it must be marvellous. This is the madness which afflicted Ross Lockridge, for example, in producing his 600,000 word ‘masterpiece’ Raintree County (eventually published at 380,000 words). In his case the disease proved fatal -- see my post of 4 October.
Tomorrow: some conclusions.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
