On publishing...

[zalena]

sachie asked for advice to pass on to a colleague about publishing & NYC. I thought about reposting here, but decided I'd just direct you to my comments in her post:

http://sachie.livejournal.com/186818.html

The ultimate question: If I knew then what I know now would I have gone into publishing?

Good question. I think I learned what I needed to from the experience. I got into publishing primarily becaues I wanted to better understand how the process worked, how people made decisions, how books are made. I learned all those things. I also learned a lot of things I wish I hadn't about how awful people can be. I'm not sure that's publishing's fault, but I have to tell you that it is not always a pleasant industry and I feel that it is more abusive than some in its treatment of the over-educated and idealistic young people that are its entry-level workers.

The larger community of 'book people' I have always found to be extremely warm and welcoming, but it's smaller subsets can be mean, petty, and vindictive, particularly as there are many little fiefdoms ruled by selfish personalities. (This extends beyond publshing, btw.) My experience with publishing kind of made me feel like we were a bunch of rats squabbling over scraps while missing the bigger picture.

I definitely think that the most interesting aspect of publishing is how it will deal with technology. I think there is a lot of room for creative, technologically savvy, young people to be able to outpace the current, groaning, dinosaurs. I guess, overall, my advice about a career in publishing would be "get what you need out of it, don't expect it to give back."

What my relationship to publishing will be in the future remains unknown. I'm not looking, specifically, for another job at publishing at this point; but I'm guessing how my experience in the industry will play out in the long term will be one of life's great and wonderful mysteries.

My teacher is always telling me, "Nothing is wasted," and increasingly I'm finding that to be the case. Things have a way of coming back around in completely unexpected ways; and for some reason I'm NOT equating this with the no bridge-burning rule. The two are not always the same, and not always engaged in a causal relationship. Life needs destruction of outmoded, useless, or even dangerous structures, just as much as it needs the building of new ones.

Comments

[cawriter.livejournal.com]

This is interesting. Thanks. Definitely some parallels to the teaching world, too.