Cartels in the Book Industry ?
The relationships between authors and their publishers—r od certainly between authors of repute and publishers of repute" are traditionally personal and even intimate. It attracts attention when a group of eminent authors appear, phalanr like, in The Times, making gestures of defiance in the direct i0 of another phalanx of publishers. What lies behind dliS phenomenon ? The qUestion is one of 'subsidiary rights. all those rights to the profits in, for example, translatioa• serialisation, films, radio, television, and condensation which a book may earn. The publishers argue that they, by send 118 out catalogues, by advertising and by personal contacts, helP to create the market for these rights, and consequently that they should have a) share in its profits: They claim, even, that the costs of publishing have risen in such a manner—wf ii° its customary kind of profits have not—that they imperative need the new kinds of profits. To this end the Publishas Association has recommended to its members that in mak ng contracts with 'new' authors they should insist upon certain shares in these subsidiary rights (for example 10 per cent translation rights) and in all contracts they should press for other shares (for example 25 per cent, of television righte)' The eminent authors who, under the aegis of the Society 01 Authors, wrote to The Times, argue that the publishers are setting up a cartel whose activities will "end the independei ce not only of British authors but of British publishers." It would appear from the dispute, first, that the publishers are ingenuous in believing that there is anything very special in the imperat vo need they feel for making more money. Secondly, and mor° important, it appears, if only from the use by the Publishers Association of the revealing phrase that with establist ed authors they will "press for" certain rights, that every bo011' sale is different and individual. Cartels and phalanxes are unsuitable bodies in this field, and those who have notions a forming them should—and almost certainly will—think ag'
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