The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1899-06-11
THE LITERARY OUTLOOK.
TALK WITH A PUBLISHER ON. THE
HAZARDS OF HIS TRADE.

on a New Manner-A New Member
of the New American Literary
schooI-A story of the Volunteer
Fireman-Ian NIncLaren to Follow
<fpIing with stories of SchOOlbOy
Life.
New York June 10 was talking the
other day with a man who was especially
familiar with the mysteries of the pub
fishing business about the relative hazards
70 the publisher in undertaking the vari-
Gus kinds of books "The ordinary novel"
said he, probably presents the smallest
risk Il is usually of only three or four
hundred pages. without illustrations, and
In form nothing more than a fairly good
cloth bound book. To make 1000 copies of
such book costs from 500 to S500-that IS,
for composition, paper, electrotypns.
printing and binding The sale of 1000
copies VIII pay this. and also the cost of
handling, and a moderate royalty 20 the
author, and in most cases even a little
more. And since everybody who reads at
all is more or less of a novel reader, II you
have fair shrewdness and energy in your
business you can manage somehow to sell
at least 1000 copies of almost any novel
that your best judgment as publisher
would prompt you to undertake"
"Stin there are novels" suggested,
published at a loss"
30, plenty of them. And from what I
have already said you can easily gather
why on the basis or 1000 copies every
item In the whole transaction must be
more or less favorable to the publisher or
he gets left. Even novel will not sell
40 the extent of 1000 copies unless it has
some popular qualities and Is well
handled; and to get out whole even on a
sale OF ], 900 copies there must have been
good economy in the manufacture and
handling and the authors royalty must
not be too royal. IT, for instance, you
have TO pay a royalty of % per cent of
the retail price, you would find yourself
involved in a positive loss on a sale of
only 1000 copies. But of course of the
novel of man who can command a
royalty Of % per cent you are pretty sure
20 sell a good many more than 1000 copies.
OF almost any novel, indeed, the publisher
expects to sell more than 1000 copies; and
It is rather the exception, 1 should say,
when the first edition of a novel is not
more than 1000. Usually 1t is about 1000;
but in the case Of popular authors like
Ripping anu kAAltnOny tlOpe II VIII De GUsuuV
or 5000"
IF novels are the publishers Ilghtest
risk, what class of books does he find to
be his greatest?'
wen. books of travel, histories minor
biographies, and, especially, extensively
illustrated books are all a fine gamble.
In any of these lines, the fate of one book
Is not the slightest guide TO the fate of an
other. You see one sell very well; you
f1atter yourself that you know why; and
YOU put out a second that you think. has
the same things, or, at least the same kind
of things, in It's favor, and-ante!-it
doesn't sell at ell. OF any book of 800 or
400 pages you must sell from 400 to 600
copies to come out clear, even If there
are no illustrations and no royalties. Add
either or both, and your proposition be-
comes rapidly hardery and to come out
clear you must sell from 1000 copies up
ward, dependent upon the size of the roy
atty and the extent of the illustration.
In a country of the extent of ours, the
sale of 1000 copies of any book that an
peals to the general reading public looks
Ike a very small matter Regarding it
from the outside. you would say that It
ought TO he effected without any partic-
ular effort. Just the ordinary curiosity
raised by the usual announcements and
reviews ought easily TO suffice TO take IN
that many copies, you would think. There
are not less than 5000 public Libraries in
the United States and as most libraries
so far as they can, buy almost whatever
books are published, IL would seem as IL
they alone would insure sale OF at least
900 copies. But the real fact is that
even of worthy and valuable books-books
that are truly essential 20 the working
completeness Of any general library-so
many as 1000 copies are ordinarily sold
only by being always alert in your BUSH
ness and knowing just how to do It, IN
give you typical instance: A we'll
known author wrote a one-volume biog-
raphy Of popular hero-one of the half
dozen great men of modern times in whom
not only students but people in general
are always interested II contained new
matter, and was a positive addition to the
literature of the subject; and at the same
time was an eminently readable book. An
edition of 1000 or 100 copies was made
costing about as many dollars II was
well advertised and very favorabIy re-
viewed 1t was out in good time for the
holiday trade" which always works In
q books favor. And vet at the end OF
three months there had been only about 500
copies sold and the book showed loss
to the publisher of several hundred dol
lars. Ultimately, on such book, there
could hardly be an actual loss; for the
book would ho.d its interest fora good
long time, until finally the whole edition
was sold out. and perhaps a second called
for. But the instance shows what a
really tough task you have set yourself
when you have undertaken to sell even so
few as 1000 copies of a book even i'm a
country that has az least 1000 public
libraries"
Ian Maclaren has lately finished series
OF stories Of schoolboy life that win an
pear shortly in the Saturday Evening
Post and then in book form They supply
a very interesting contrast to the version
of the same life just completed by Mr..
Kipling in his "Stalky" stories. Natural
~. it Is a Scotch school with which the
author of Beside the Bonnie Brian
Bush" deals, and not an English military
school, and the lads he introduces to us
are of a very different type from Mr.
Kipllngs resourccful three-StallIy Beetle
and McTurk. There is the same abundant
humor and pathos. the same fond portray,
al of Scotch canniness ana cleverness that
marked the first Maclaren stories, and
90 G AfoANv