Reviews

Abstract

This is a most important study of an essentially modern situation. The first part, “Getting in Print”, introduces the way short‐run publications can be produced without sacrificing quality or being priced out of the market. There has been considerable polarisation in the publishing trade as huge multinational combines have continued to take over smaller units and now dominate the publishing, marketing and distribution of English language titles worldwide. This could well have made it difficult indeed for authors of low‐volume, less profitably saleable works to find a publisher. Paradoxically, however, helped by computer technology it has opened up the field for enterprising new small‐scale publishers, with an eye for scholarly specialist subjects and new authors, to issue short‐run editions and even to achieve a better return on capital and higher profit ratios than do the major publishers. The total number of titles produced has actually grown, causing bibliographical problems for librarians who need to keep track of publication, and greatly increasing the number of works going out of print before they can be acquired. The reprint trade is similarly in confusion because the economics of reprinting have become more chancy for some works and potentially easier for others.

Citation

Ashworth, W. and Pettman, I. (1990), "Reviews", New Library World, Vol. 91 No. 10. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055638