Fresh chapter opens for first-time authors

It is a truth universally acknowledged that any literate person with access to MS Word must be in want of a publisher. While publishers have been aware of this fact of modern life for some time now, it was not until a year or so ago that somebody from that rarefied world chose to act upon it.

That somebody was Michael Bernard, executive director with Pan Macmillan, a British publishing giant with a history dating back to 1843, and an author list that includes Thomas Hardy and Rudyard Kipling. The good news is that, thanks to Bernard, budding writers in India can vie to join their august company; and get published abroad without having to subject themselves to the ego-bruising struggle of finding a guardian agent.

Bernard convinced Macmillan to start a separate imprint for first-time authors, called Macmillan New Writing (MNW). The deal under this imprint, which considers only fiction, is simple: Macmillan will pay no advance to authors; its editors will do no rewriting; authors will get 20 per cent royalty and 50 per cent of the worldwide rights sold; Macmillan makes no promises about the marketing of the book, and will retain the option to publish the author’s second book.

In its first year, by mid-2005, Macmillan had received 4,000 manuscripts, of which “a couple of hundred were from India”. Of the 4,000, they will eventually publish 14, in Bernard’s words, “less than half of one per cent of submissions”. Of the 14, the first six were published in April this year. Across The Mystic Shore (see review) by New Delhi-based Suroopa Mukherjee is the only Indian novel to have made it to the list.

When news about Macmillan’s plans leaked out last year, the British literary establishment erupted, with some calling it “exploitative” and “preying upon the unwary”. All because the writer gets no advance.

Tejeshwar Singh, managing director, Sage Publications, feels it’s not such a bad model. “By giving new writers a chance, Macmillan is doing a good thing, especially when you consider that the entire monetary risk is borne by the publisher, not the writer,” he says.

Thomas Abraham, president of Penguin India, has a different take. “This is a rather pedestrian approach to what is otherwise a passionate business,” he says. “It’s fine that they have a standard no-frills agreement for all writers. But what if they come across a book that really excites them? Will they then pull out all stops when it comes to marketing it? Will they pay the writer a good advance?”

Macmillan, however, knew exactly what they were doing and why. Bernard explains, “Like many mainstream publishers, we stopped reading unsolicited manuscripts some years ago. Agents became the only source of new material and were in a position to negotiate high advances for first novels. The financial consequences for the publisher are uncertain, to say the least. The result is a tendency to reduce risk by publishing fewer first-time authors."

"This in turn would lead to a depleted list of novelists writing for us. So we decided to return to the practice of reading manuscripts received direct from authors and to set up a streamlined system for processing these: electronic manuscripts rather than typescripts, standard author agreements, and so on.”

Mukherjee is quite okay with the ‘no advance’ deal. “With an Indian publisher, you’re not even thinking of an advance and, given the size of our market, even the royalty is ultimately peanuts,” she says. “To compensate for the absence of any advance, Macmillan is offering 20 per cent royalty, against the industry norm of 10 per cent, which seems reasonable enough.”

Macmillan’s critics say a publisher who doesn’t pay an advance will not feel compelled to market a new writer aggressively. But Mukherjee differs. “Macmillan paid for my trip to London, where my novel was launched, and I was invited to panel discussions and shows on BBC as part of the promotional activity. My book is available in all the leading bookshops in the UK, and now in India as well.”

Another issue that raised the hackles of many was the perception that Macmillan will not spend much time editing the manuscripts. “That is not true,” says Bernard. “We did not want to encourage the submission of thousands of badly-written manuscripts. That’s why we said we would not accept submissions which needed rewriting. In fact, some of these books have actually been quite heavily edited.” Mukherjee seconds that. “They didn’t ask me to hire somebody to edit my book. It underwent scrupulous editing by Macmillan’s own editors.” 

Did Macmillan’s editors actually sift through the 4,000 manuscripts? Of course not. Only those that the editors liked were sent out to freelance readers for written reports, with the final decision resting with Bernard. According to Roger Morris, one of the six authors published under MNW in April, 50 per cent of submissions were “self-rejecting”.

Morris, reminiscing about his experience with MNW, says that Bernard once told him, “It’s amazing how many people can write a book-length document without considering the need to make it interesting.”

That’s a sobering thought. However, it should not deter all you closet writers out there toiling away secretly from midnight to dawn in hopes of literary fame and instant celebrity. Just remember, Pamela Anderson has published a novel. And they say she is a blonde.