It is no disparagement of the old-established firms to say
that the small publisher is often more interested than the large publisher in "experiments and innovations." The older publishers have upon their lists many successful authors, and it is inevitable that they should prefer the assured income with which these authors provide them than that they should expend time and money on experiments. It is much to their credit indeed that they do not in fact confine themselves to their established authors, and that they should so often give to young authors a most generous chance. Yet the fact remains that it is the small publisher who is the more actively interested in young authors ; on the one hand the small publisher is always hoping to discover a new genius, and in spite of frequent disappointments and betrayals he is optimistic enough to believe that some at least of these discoveries will remain upon his list ; on the other hand many of the junior Partners in these smaller firms have entered the publishing business because of their interest in literature as such, and to them the new and the unusual is more stimulating than the familiar. Under their present quota these ardent explorers are unable to make good their discoveries ; again and again are they obliged to refuse risks ; and it must be galling indeed for them when, having just refused a book which they longed to publish, they see great lorries of newsprint trundling down Fleet Street or observe paper being wasted by some publisher with a quota far higher than their own upon some tin-pot political diatribe.
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