Setting publishing on fire

Alison Lowry

We spoke to the Head of Penguin South Africa, Alison Lowry, and here's what she had to say:

1. How long have you been heading up Penguin SA?
   
   In my current position, Chief Executive Officer, two years. Before that I was Managing Director, and before that Publishing Manager. Altogether about 15 years with Penguin. I joined the company in 1989 with the brief of building a local publishing division and signing up South African writers.
   
   
2. What is your vision for Penguin SA?
   
   I would like to maintain the reputation of the Penguin brand in our market, and to ensure that it continues to be synonymous with quality publishing. I want to see the company grow steadily and gain market share year on year. I would hope to build the local publishing portion of our business, increase the number of titles we produce, and persuade SA writers that to be published originally in their home market is, in fact, first and not second prize.
   
   
3. As Penguin is an international brand, is your main focus on local or international authors?
   
   The bulk of our business comes from the Penguin Group internationally, and we source our stock from Penguin UK, US, Australia, Canada, India and New Zealand - although Penguin UK is our largest supplier. We also represent a number of major UK publishers such as the Time Warner Book Publishing group, Faber & Faber, the Octopus Group, Piatkus, Virgin Books, Egmont Children's books, NelsonThornes' education and tertiary lists, Canongate, Atlantic, etc.
   
   Yes, we focus strongly on our international authors, but our South African publishing is of great importance to us - as indeed indigenous publishing is in each of our Group companies around the world.
   
   
4. What, in your opinion, are the major problems facing publishers in South Africa?
   
   The market for books has not grown perceptibly over the past few years, and to sustain an industry, especially indigenous publishing, becomes just that much more of a challenge each year. VAT on books makes prices high for the man in the street (although book prices have, in fact, come down over the past year or so on account of the stronger rand), and books have to compete for disposable income with a growing range of entertainment options. The prices of paper and printing have gone up considerably - sometimes we have seen a rise in paper costs three times in one year. This puts great pressure on publishers' margins. Publishing a book is costly and a project has to make sense commercially if one wants to stay in business.
   
   
5. What problems have arisen concerning writing and publishing in the indigenous languages of South Africa?
   
   Penguin is essentially an English language trade publisher (as opposed to an education publisher), and to date indigenous language publishing seems to have been largely confined to educational and prescribed books. There is resistance from booksellers to allocate significant shelf space to books in indigenous languages and in the areas where such titles could perhaps have reasonable sales, there are no bookshops at all.
   
   
6. Do you have hope for young writers in South Africa?
   
   Hope? Yes, definitely! I am always on the lookout for young talent and there is plenty of it about. It gladdens the heart of the publisher in me when I read something new and perhaps unformed, something with that tiny, recognisable spark that lifts one manuscript out of the morass of the deeply ordinary and reminds me why I do what I do.
   
   
7. Tell us something about your local authors on the Penguin list. Are they doing well? How are sales? Are their books being sold internationally?
   
   There isn't enough space for me to wax as lyrical as I would like to about our local Penguin authors! We publish across a range of areas of interest, fiction and non-fiction. We have the wonderfully evocative Marguerite Poland, and Booker short-lister Damon Galgut, whose The Good Doctor is just out in paperback, and whose backlist we are reissuing shortly. Jointly with Penguin UK we have just signed Zakes Mda, whose new novel, The Whale Caller, we'll publish next year. Then there is the incredibly talented poet Finuala Dowling's novel called What Poets Need - also a 2005 book.
   
   Fiction is always difficult and the numbers in SA are small, but over the past couple of years I've seen South Africans buying South African novels, and that is very encouraging indeed. So yes, I'd say our authors are doing well.
   
   Sales for local books grow slowly year on year, and with the help of the media, and author events, for example, I am not at all discouraged. We're also strong on the non-fiction side, publishing such diverse books as Sue Grant-Marshall and Graeme Codrington's intriguing dissection of the different generations in Mind the Gap and Kate Turkington's fabulously irreverent memoir Doing it With Doris. In the sports arena, our biggest-selling local title this year was Ali Bacher's biography, which we sold in successfully to the rest of the Penguin group internationally (except America, who don't really know what cricket is). In the stores any day now is Stephen Gray's extremely readable biography of the little-known South African literary figure Beatrice Hastings - who launched Ezra Pound's career and counted among her many lovers both Katherine Mansfield and Modigliani (one of the latter's portraits of Beatrice graces the cover).
   
   We're publishing the official book to tie in with the forthcoming SABC3 series on Great South Africans and we're expecting much interest and big sales from this.
   
   And lots, lots more.
   
   On the international aspect - well, it's always hard to break SA authors internationally and we cannot guarantee an international sale via Penguin in other parts of the world, although we do offer titles around the globe that we believe have a life beyond this market. Competition out there is fierce, though, and the stakes are high.
   
   
8. Would you care to venture an opinion on a comparison between English and Afrikaans writing in South Africa?
   
   I'm not sure that I can offer anything sensible on this question, except to say that the standard of Afrikaans literature in SA has always been mighty high, and that although recognition in the English-speaking publishing world has been there for some, there are other quite brilliant writers in Afrikaans whose work has unfortunately not been appreciated as it deserves to be.
   
   Penguin SA's small involvement in Afrikaans writing has been in the form of English language translations of certain writers: Annelie Botes's Raaiselkind we published as Riddle Child last year; we're about to release Dalene Matthee's Toorbos in English (Dreamforest), and Marita van der Vyver's Travelling Light will be out early in the new year.
   
   
   On your own writing:
   
   
9. What titles of yours have been published?
   
   I wrote two novels a few years ago, both of them published by Heinemann. The first was Natural Rhythm (later made into a miniseries for TV). The second was called Wishing on Trains. Both would fit, I guess, into the mid-range "women's fiction" band. Last year I ghosted the story of drug addict Steve Hamilton - a book called I Want My Life Back - which has gone into two printings and rights were sold to a US publisher. This was an extremely gruelling but ultimately incredibly rewarding experience, and I feel enormously privileged to have been able to do it. Steve's story changes people's lives and the feedback we've had on the book has been mind-blowing.
   
   
10. Tell us a bit about what drives you.
    
    The necessity to feed my children …?
    
    Words are my passion, I guess - the power they have to shape the world, to offer a fresh view on an old subject, to enchant and beguile and make you laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time. Every book project is a new challenge. No two days in this industry are the same; no two books are alike. And of course I like the business side of publishing, the challenge of running a company and working with and meeting likeminded people (and some bloody-minded ones too).
    
    
11. Are you working on something at the moment?
    
    Always. Mostly in my head. I spend a lot of time avoiding writing and then feeling miserable about avoiding writing. My excuse - and it's a good one really! - is that running Penguin is pretty much full-time, and creative writing requires headspace, time, and staying awake. All of which are luxuries for me.
    
    Rubbish! I hear you say. Pathetic excuses! And you'd be right, of course.
    
    
12. Isn't it difficult to marry the work of an editor, publishing manager and novelist?
    
    No, not really. I do very little editing these days, just enough to remind me that I love it and to keep my hand in, and Penguin SA has a publishing team that is extremely creative and capable. I am able to take off one hat and put on another when I do my own writing. I step out of one world and into another - quite different - one, where I am an angst-ridden, insecure, probably untalented writer just like many other people.
    
    And finally, what everyone wants to know ...
    
    
13. How does a young, unpublished author go about getting his or her work read by a publisher?
    
    In this country - easily. Overseas most publishers don't accept unsolicited manuscripts, and will deal only with agents.
    
    Whatever genre you're writing in I'd suggest a bit of research, so that, for example, you don't send science fiction to a publisher who does only wildlife books. Pick up the phone and speak to an editor and ask what their requirements are, eg a synopsis plus sample chapters, a whole manuscript, etc. Then sling the manuscript off and move away from the telephone. Spring-clean the kitchen cupboards or join a tennis club while you're waiting for a response. Silence doesn't mean that your book is a hopeless dud and the publisher can't bring himself to tell you. Nor does it mean that your book is propping up an uneven table leg in the editorial assistant's office. Careful reading takes time. Sometimes an outside reader is used. Sometimes there are numbers being crunched before an offer can be made.
    
    
14. And how do you suggest one should deal with the disappointment of rejection?
    
    Take it on the chin and move on. Rejection does not necessarily mean that your work is bad or unsaleable. It might mean that it doesn't fit in with that publisher's list. It might mean that a publisher is already publishing five debut novels and can't risk another one at that particular time. It might mean that your incredibly insightful book into the tap-dancing marmosets of Mpumalanga is going to compete too closely with a similar book on the tap-dancing ferrets of Fordsburg they're struggling to move off the shelves. Remember that publishers get offered new books every day and are constrained by budgets and the number of books that can produce and sell each year. I'd say that 99 percent of the books that come in to us off the street, as it were, are turned down - some with reluctance when the sums just won't work (ie we're not convinced that for the amount of money, resources etc we'd have to put into the project, our return on the investment would justify publication), and others with great speed, when the book is simply not publishable.
    
    
15. Do you accept submissions from unknown voices? If you do, could you please supply submission details.
    
    Yes, we do. And you'll find the process clearly outlined on our website: www.penguinbooks.co.za.

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