In Mexico, One Bookstore per 120,000 Inhabitants, by Elena Poniatowska

Cultural Cross Sections Elena Poniatowska In this column that originally appeared in La Jornada, Elena Poniatowska considers the role of editors and talks with Diego Rabasa, founder of publisher Sexto Piso. Already precarious, the pandemic lockdown has made the plight of independent publishers and bookstores in Mexico in light of Covid-19 even more acute. To be an editor is to answer the call of the gods. It’s a vocation, a ministry, an immense privilege, to enter the Olympus of literature. To be an editor is to pick those who have talent and launch them. To be a publisher is to foretell: this one will make it. It’s also to disappoint and reject. I recall the Dutch printer Alexander Stolz in Mexico holding out to me his exquisite edition of Benjamin Constant’s Adolphe, as if it were a diamond, at the Fondo de Cultura Económica, and the paternal care that Arnaldo Orfila Reynal took with the anguished palavering of Fernando del Paso. To be an editor is to be a psychologist and to be bewildered as to how to treat each creature-author. Vicente Rojo was my editor, and we have loved each other deeply since, but I never gave him trouble. What must that genius from Pachuca named Yuri Herrera be like? What’s his soft spot? I have to handle Carlos Montemayor with kid gloves because he’s unpredictable. Federico Alvarez, director of the FCE in Spain, told me that seeing Elena Garro and Helena Paz enter the FCE in Madrid was like falling into... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'

[ World Literature Today | 2020-06-03 21:05:48 UTC ]

Other news stories related to: "In Mexico, One Bookstore per 120,000 Inhabitants, by Elena Poniatowska "

Springboard ready for lift-off, as titles and schedule revealed

Books by Yaa Gyasi, Lisa Taddeo, Amanda Craig, Will Dean, Vaseem Khan, Stanley Tucci, Leone Ross, Kate Mosse, Bryony Gordon, Elle McNicoll, Dapo Adeola, and Rashmi Sirdeshpande will feature during the Springboard Conference, a joint initiative between The Bookseller and the Booksellers... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-25 16:41:12 UTC ]
More news stories like this

What Happens When a Publisher Becomes a Megapublisher?

The merger of Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster has the potential to touch every part of the industry, including how much authors get paid and how bookstores are run. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2021-02-25 10:00:22 UTC ]
More news stories like this

International markets showed mixed response to pandemic in 2020

While the pandemic sent shockwaves across the world’s publishing industry in 2020, some international markets reported strong performances with the US posting record-breaking sales while Australia also saw a major boost. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-25 01:03:16 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Translating Fang Fang’s Wuhan Diary amid the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Conversation with Michael Berry, by King Yu

Interviews Michael Berry is a professor of Asian languages and cultures and director of the Center for Chinese Studies at UCLA. He has published extensive works on addressing the richness and diversity of Chinese art and culture in sinophone... Continue reading at World Literature Today

[ World Literature Today | 2021-02-24 15:28:04 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Farewell to Ferlinghetti

In the middle of the pandemic, City Lights bookstore is still open and it’s thriving. But yesterday it said goodbye to its eternally hip hundred-and-one-year-old cofounder, the poet, publisher, and community activist Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Continue reading at The Paris Review

[ The Paris Review | 2021-02-24 15:21:05 UTC ]
More news stories like this

My Two Favorite Bookish Places in Seoul

Grow your future travel wishlist with a quick tour two bookstores in Seoul: its oldest bookstore as well as an underground bookstore. Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2021-02-24 11:38:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Writing for likes

Wattpad has increasingly become a very popular platform among young writers. Allowing anyone to share their works and providing a route for aspiring authors to be discovered by the publishing industry, it has become a compelling route for those to looking to develop professionally as a writer... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-24 03:00:18 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Lawrence Ferlinghetti obituary

Poet whose outlook spanned anarchism, ecology and small business, as founder of the City Lights Bookstore in San FranciscoLawrence Ferlinghetti, poet, artist, activist and founder of San Francisco’s famous City Lights Bookstore, who has died aged 101 of interstitial lung disease, was the least... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2021-02-23 22:42:13 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Poet Who Nurtured the Beats, Dies at 101

An unapologetic proponent of “poetry as insurgent art,” he was also a publisher and the owner of the celebrated San Francisco bookstore City Lights. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2021-02-23 20:23:41 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Beat poet, publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti dead at 101

Poet, publisher and bookseller Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who helped launch and perpetuate the Beat movement, has died. He was 101. Continue reading at CBC

[ CBC | 2021-02-23 20:10:42 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and titan of the Beat era, dies at 101

Ferlinghetti was the co-founder of the legendary City Lights bookstore and a champion of Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-02-23 18:50:28 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Feast your eyes on this gorgeous Tokyo bookshop-slash-hotel.

While we’re all still in varying levels of lockdown, here’s a new travel destination to dream about: Book and Bed Tokyo. Book and Bed is an “accommodation bookshop”: a bookstore first, hostel second, so avid readers don’t need to pay attention to the time while browsing. At each of Book and... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-23 16:53:41 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Lawrence Ferlinghetti, literary citadel of San Francisco, dies at 101

The acclaimed poet was longtime proprietor of City Lights, the San Francisco bookstore and avant-garde publishing house that catapulted the Beat Generation to fame. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2021-02-23 06:26:33 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Nappy Roots Books, a Bastion and a Haven: A Conversation with Camille Landry, by Alex Crayon

Current Events On a visit to an Oklahoma City bookstore, Alex Crayon finds more than books. When I pulled into the snow-covered parking lot of Nappy Roots Books in northeast Oklahoma City, the first thing I noticed were the posters. Handwritten signs... Continue reading at World Literature Today

[ World Literature Today | 2021-02-22 21:59:22 UTC ]
More news stories like this

Forgive and Remember: A Conversation with Susan Shapiro

WHAT WOULD YOU DO if the person who hurt you most refused to say they were sorry? Could you forgive anyway? Best-selling author Susan Shapiro explores this universal question in her intriguing, insightful, all-too-relatable new book The Forgiveness Tour, out this past January. In her... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2021-02-21 18:00:04 UTC ]
More news stories like this

A new Amor Towles novel is hitting shelves this October.

Literary pivot alert! Yesterday, Entertainment Weekly announced we’re getting a new novel from A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility author Amor Towles, out from Penguin Random House on October 5. Towles told EW that he “likes to mix it up,” and he has; while his previous novels centered... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-18 17:03:11 UTC ]
More news stories like this

What’s Left Unsaid: How Ismail Kadare Escaped Suppression but Embraced the Style It Taught Him, by Peter Constantine

Essay Photo by Tyler Quiring / Unsplash Ismail Kadare has a remarkable quality of saying a great deal and with much clarity, but in an elusive, oblique, and allegorical way. Peter Constantine situates Kadare’s work in the long history of the... Continue reading at World Literature Today

[ World Literature Today | 2021-02-18 14:09:58 UTC ]
More news stories like this

‘I’m afraid of repercussions’: Publishing industry members question Google’s motives in paying off News Corp

Google's News Corp deal may pacify Australian lawmakers, but publishing industry members worry about repercussions for smaller publishers. The post ‘I’m afraid of repercussions’: Publishing industry members question Google’s motives in paying off News Corp appeared first on Digiday. Continue reading at Digiday

[ Digiday | 2021-02-18 05:01:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this

‘I’m afraid of repercussions’: Publishing industry members question Google’s motives in paying off News Corp

[ Digiday | 2021-02-18 05:01:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this

We Need Diverse Books is partnering with Penguin Random House to establish a Black Creatives Fund.

Some good news: today, Publishers Weekly reported that We Need Diverse Books is partnering with Penguin Random House on a series of programs to get more books by Black writers published. The Black Creatives Fund initiative involves a “Revisions Workshop”; a mentoring program; and marketing... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2021-02-17 18:23:38 UTC ]
More news stories like this