, 1884-03-16
CHEAP EDITIONS.
The Generous Profits OF the Cheap
Reprint Business
why the Pocket Forms Arc Not SO
Popular ns They were---How n
New Translation
Was Made.


New York SUM-
u am one OF the much-nbused pirates who
have been cribbing English literature and
publishing it in books sold for a few cents
each" said a New York publisher yesterday,
~but I am ready to vote for an international
cop right law to-day"
This remark and the conversation that fol-
lowed arose from the announcement that a
famous cheap publisher had failed. There
proved to have been no solid foundation for
the rumor, but tho publisher who uttered the
rather startling statement quoted above said
he would not be surprised II the other pub
Usher Ind failed, because he published 10
cent novels in pocket form"
AS long as an American publisher could
get a famous English book for nothing and
reproduce it in n broad, thin pamphlet for 10
cents, or a thick pamphlet for 70 cents, there
was a generous margin for profit, though
even those publication, ara now turned out
by so many houses that where the profit
originally went to one house it is now divided
among half a dozen. There was nothing to
pay to the author, and the composition and
paper were simply ordinary in quality, while
the Sales were large II common business judg-
ment was exercised in the selection OF the
works TO be republished.
WRONG love.
at was in an evil hour for cheap literature
that one publishing house began to repro
duce foreign works in cheap books to fit the
pocket. These were much more expensive.
There were nearly three times as many cleo
trotype plates to the volume, and the binding
and covers cost money. 1 figured 1t out that
this publisher and those that followed him
did not average more than half a cent profit
in every 5 cents Of the selling price. Other
publishers went into it because the new style
OF books was very attractive. One man in
particular who was reaping a great fortune
from a weekly paper put a great deal of his
super-abundant money into these pocket
form books and then all the rest went into 1t.
They killed the goose that laid the golden
eggs" the publisher continued. "The other
day The Sun contained an account OF an in
terview with a Third avenue stationer, who
announced that he wanted to get rid of his
stock OF cheap pamphl ct reprint novels at
about what he paid for them. We, In the
publishing business all knew what that
meant. That man complained Of the amount
OF capital no was obliged to invest in these
pamphlets, and he may have been sincere,
but he would never have complained IL it
had not been for these pocket volumes. He
think. it wiser TO stick to the new form ex-
clusively. A great many hundreds of other
uowsdealers and stationers nave come to the
same conclusion.
POCKET EDITIONS.
STho pocket volumes took the town by
, storm. People no longer had to spread out u
thing as big as u newspaper, but could OBJ
tnin u novel that they could carry in their
pockets and could ufterward put on their
library shelves. They would not even look ut
tho old unhandy pamphlets which continued
to be turned out at the rate of one new novel
u day, and remained dead on the shelves of
the dealers, while the reading public either
went without them or waited until some
house got out the came work In handy size.
The consequence was that a trade journal
published in our interest announced the other
day that one publisher was to DO congratu-
lated upon having had MI immense stock of
these pamphlets destroyed by a fire, while
another was To be commiserated because he
has about 400, 600 such volumes lying dead in
his basement. The publisher last referred to
has, by the way, hit upon a device for clear
ing out his cellar.
HAPPY HIT.
"By means of a slight alteration, and at
small expense, he puts several OF these
novels together, and issues them in a thick
book with u colored cover. salable at d good
figure in the railroad cars. You can find no
trace OF the former library in the new books,
the title pages having been newly printed,
with the oil headings left off and new ones
substituted"
Arc the pocket volumes to be with
drawnf'
"They will have to DO. There Is no money
in them. Hundreds OF thousands of dollars
lie buried in the plates and printed pamphlets
that came out before them. Tits capital wii!
be lost unless the more attractive volumes are
kept out of the public view. That Is why l
was willing to believe that ono firm had al
ready succumbei. Il had been known to the
trade a month ago that the printing Of handy
pocket volumes was a mistake, and leading
houses were discussing the ndvisability OF
disseminating them. Unless l am misin-
formed. soma firms had already discontinued
them"
But why would you vote for an internn-
tiuIlnl copyright lawF
"Oi, | believe nearly all the publishers
would do so. The profits in the present style
OF doing business are both slender and uncer-
tuin. With our capital and the enterprise
we nave shown the field of legitimate COM
petition for the right IN produce a good book
here under an international copyright law
would be much moro lucrative. Take any
example of how the thing works. Look ut
that Sarah Buri.um' book, for instance. A
BeclInan street printer, by the exercise of
really wonderful shrowdness and hard and
quick work, gets ont "A 5O-cent translation Of
tue book. In less than thrOs days the streets
are flooded with the saIne thing at 10 cents
anu 20 cents, and a deep hole Is cut through
the profits that the Beeknlan street man de-
served TO have all to himself"
But the Beekman street house copyrighted
its translation"
"Oh, that made no difference. Such n
thing as slightly altering the phraseology Of
a copyrighted translation Is not unheard Of
in the cheap book trade"
IN TwENTY-FouR HOURS.
"You can take a book and by altering con
spicuous words here aud there eau defy the
world to prove that it Is not a new transla-
ton. Idou't say that anybody did this with
Sarah Barnum,' because l don't know any
thing about it, but they get out the cheap
editions very quickly, and such tricks are not
unknown to the trade, That is why an inter
national copyright law now seems to me a
desirable thing. | get out "A taking English
book bind 1t nicely, and put it out for a dollar.
The Others get onto it, us the boys say. in
about a day. and in another twenty-four
hours you can get 1t anywhere for 10 cents.
1t would be just the same IL you
paid an English author handsomely for
Alliance sheets, You would enjly the pro
cssds no longer than forty eight hours be-
fore all the Others would have 1t out in 10.
rent form. Now, look at this. novel by
Bertha NJ. Clay, an English authoress much
admired by u certain class Of novel readers
Suppose | put that out for 75 cents or $ll
You won't buy it because you can get 1t for