Authors and the Book Ttade
IF the late Sir Walter Resent, that tireless champion of the sanctity of literary property, had lived to read this brisk, witty and revealing little volume, he might well have felt that his life's work on behalf of authors' rights had realized a legacy far beyond his own anticipation& For the story here told of the relationship between authors and the book trade during the last fifty years is a record of the steady triumph of authorship all along the line. When Sir Walter Besant started his campaign, the position of the author was isolated and precarious ; the publisher held the cheque book, and dictated the terms ; except in the case of dominant popular favourites like Dickens, Trollope and Tennyson, the rewards of the literary life were very inadequate, and' the drudgery was acute. To-day, as Mr. Swinnerton, himself uu successful novelist, is at every turn ready to admit, the author, through the medium of his agent, is the party who calls the tune ; the publisher pays the, piper through the nose ; and, if he feels the pinch intolerably, there is a rival at his elbow, only too eager to open his purse-strings. The multiplication of home and foreign rights, of serial and second serial markets, and of all sorts of by-ways of com- mercialism has increased the opportunities of authorship II hundredfold ; and yet, it would appear, nobody is really contented, and the entire book trade seethes with argument and recrimination. No doubt much of the grumbling is after the fashion of Mrs. Gummidge, and 'must not be taken too seriously. But when Mr. 'Swinnerton asks Who" Would
be a Writer ? " and " Why are Books Published ? " he cannot resist the temptation to be a little " depressive " to start with. After all, he has been a novelist, publisher's reader and reviewer ; so lie has seen most that there is to be seen of the difficulties of launching literature to success.
Let it be said at once that this is an invaluable record for everyone concerned with the writing and marketing of books. It would be no bad policy for the publisher to keep a few copies perpetually " on tap " in his desk, and to slip one into the hand of each new author at the close of their :first interview. For the wisdom, judgement and good humour which bubble up in these pages should benefit author, pub- Usher and bookseller alike, and help them all to a better understanding of one another's troubles and adversities. Who does not know the familiar complaints that seem as though they would never be laid to rest ? The author com- plains that the publishers will not advertise ; the publisher knows that advertising hardly ever pays ; . the bookseller complains that there arc too many books ; the author insists that his own book at least should be found on every bookstall in the kingdom. The literary agent listens to both sides, –and carries the author oft to another firm. The new Arm has paid in advance far more than the author will ever earn in royalties ; it did so willingly to net a big name, but it begins to have qualms when the. year's accounts are 'cast up. So still there is nobody quite contented.
On the borders of the market, at either gate, sit: the :publisher's reader and the reviewer, presiding the one over the birth, the other (occasionally) over the death, of every book. Mr. Swinnerton has any amount of interesting things to tell about them both ; he is very tender to the publisher's reader, who indeed has a desperately responsible and often :thankless job ; but he says some rather hard things about reviewers' coteries, although his humour always mellows his criticism. " The coterie system," he says, " is propagandist, partial, and mean. It is full of little jealousies, little favouritism, little snobberies, and little retaliations for past
affronts.. It may be so, but it is doubtful if such sub- terranean methods ever did a worthy author harm. For sooner or later the good thing is always " discovered " by somebody ; even if the discovery come too late, as it did in the case of Mary Webb. And, when all is said and done, it is not advertising that sells a book, nor reviewing, nor the presence upon booksellers' shelves of copies for which nobody asks. The only thing that sells a book is "the sense that it is in the air," and how that sense is stimulated neither author, nor publisher, nor bookseller has yet
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