Peter Robb is
obviously having a serious case of selective amnesia.
I read with
interest and a touch of sadness his blinkered view of the current state of
bookselling and publishing in his article in the Good Weekend March 30, 2013.
As an
independent bookseller in business for 35 years I am staggered at his blurred
view of bookshops of yesteryear. Also, if I were a publisher, I would be similarly
saddened by his view of the current state of publishing.
Why were books
published 50 years ago? Is it any different
to why books are published today? What keeps a bookshop in business above all
else it is to ensure all areas of the community are catered for with respect to
their literary needs and desires? Basically to drive sales. I know it doesn’t
sound altruistic but it is true. Every bookseller I know loves what he or she
does and loves books but we have to make a dollar to survive.
A bookshop, whether
established 100, 50, 30 or 2 years ago has to provide an income to survive. How
did they do this? Well I can tell Peter that they probably sold many books that
he would not read or even glance at. In fact, the vast majority of the
population would not be remotely interested in the books Peter wants to read.
So according to him that makes them “crap” and “doomed losers”. If we and the
publishers catered only for the minority, like Peter, we would not be in
business for long. Each to his own. That allows us to continue with the art of
“choice, guidance and seduction”.
I find Peter
Robb hypocritical in the extreme. I suspect that he would be happy for his books
to be in the top 10, but then they would probably be classified as crap and we
would be selling lots of them.
Publishers are
also working very hard in difficult times to make a dollar. Publishers now, as
in the past make choices to publish a book based on many factors. Sometimes it
works and sometimes not. New authors emerge and shine, others fade away.
Publishers can invest in new authors only because they have other authors that
sell a lot of books (books that Peter probably doesn’t read) .These books make
money for the publishers so that ultimately they can print Peters’ books.
He claims that “at some point I stopped visiting
shops. You can say it’s the internet, and it partly is” ...”I was buying obscure books, out of print
books… and foreign language books”
Well Peter, are
you suggesting that your local general bookshop should stock obscure, out of
print or foreign language books? How many books do you want us to sell in a
day? Perhaps none.
You are also
using the internet to purchase books. Have you tried to go into your local
bookshop and asked them to source a book from overseas for you? If you do you
may be pleasantly surprised that we are friendly, informative and can usually
source your book, fast, reasonably priced, undamaged and you don’t have to pay
for it until you pick it up. Not bad eh!
Peter,
Melbourne is still a great place for bookshops. You may even find one or two of
your books in them.
Luke Macartney
Thesaurus
Booksellers
Church St, Brighton,
Vic
