It’s been posted on Facebook and
other social media sites the remarks by one of America’s most admired and
treasured writers of science fiction and fantasy. It’s all very public, sides are being chosen, as well as getting going political (GO HERE).
We humans tend to blame things on
others when they don’t go our way. It’s always this group or that, which is
preventing or perverting our goals—whatever they are. In this case, according
to Ms. Le Guin, it’s the mass of unjuried books that are flooding the
marketplace aided and abetted by Amazon. Books that are likened to food
produced by agribusiness and food packagers full of sugar and fat. And because
of this plethora of books our freedoms are in jeopardy? I my humble opinion, no
one, at least in the more civilized parts of the world, can tell you what to
eat or what to read.
Blaming Amazon for the collapse of
the high quality of writing (as if there ever was a nostalgic past of “high
quality writing”) is like blaming Safeway/Kroger for the increase in obesity.
If there is one undeniable truth
it’s that more books are being written and published than at any time in the
history of the world—period. Some are truly great and many are truly crap,
that’s the way it is. Humans are capable of great things, but remember that
even smart people produce things like the AMC Gremlin, any movie by Adam
Sandler, and the “New Coke.”
Every writer I’ve met at
conferences and conventions—everyone—has their books on Amazon. Most have self-published
because the traditional publishers don’t have the room, the time, the interest, or
the dollars to publish everything. Trads will continue to do what they do, but
I assure you if they played for their beloved Yankees with their batting
averages of published successful hits, they’d be optioned to the Single-A
Charleston RiverDogs, tomorrow.
There are two ancient accomplices for
human traditions, they are the storyteller and the listener. And today, it’s
the writer and the reader. The publisher and the distributor act as middlemen
and, of course, take the largest piece of the pie (not sure exactly why—but
there it is). Amazon has now completely turned upside down this business model
that’s just less than a century old. Amazon—acting as the distributor—deals
directly with the author/self-piblisher, cut their deal (take it or leave it),
and post the book with no censorship or jury (within their editorial/ethical limits
of course). They wouldn’t post the first cover of my novel Toulouse For Death because there was a swastika on the cover. Since
they sell in Germany, and the image is forbidden in that country, they asked me
to remove/change the cover. That was my decision within the norms they
established. But that’s as far as it’s gone.
What is really underlying Ms. Le
Guin’s rant is what she herself said: “The profit motive often is in conflict
with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable.” She
has become concerned that books have become a commodity and that by inference;
the capitalist greed of Amazon is to blame for the collapse of civil discord
and freedom. As the great Nero Wolf said, “Phooey.”
Every writer, who wishes to write
(and eat) for a living, hopes and prays that their works are treated as more
that expressions of freedom—they hope and pray that they become a commercial
success. That means selling thousand of books, ten’s of thousands of books, maybe
millions. That means by being with Amazon they are paid regularly (not
semi-annually as with some trads), it means adjusting covers as needed, it
allows fixing typos if found, and it means helping to develop online marketing
strategies in a new world of ebooks that wasn’t even a consideration in those
science fiction and fantasy books so popular fifty years ago.
In Le Guin’s original blog (GO HERE), she excoriates
the Best Seller list (BS), and then, using the initials BS, proceeds to delve
into the whole world of fast book marketing and throw away books – one can’t help
but say the term bull shit every time she writes BS (my guess it’s wholly
intentional). Her points are interesting yet steeped in a cultural rant that
has been the progressive’s and conservative’s complaint for fifty years. “(fill in the blank) is leading to the end
of civilization.” Now it’s Amazon.
Capitalism is Amazon’s greatest
enemy; the works of Adam Smith prove this. If Amazon is successful, others will
follow and improve the model. Even today, as Amazon’s stock price climbs and
maybe a thousand new books are listed, it is in mortal danger of failing and some
day being replaced with something bigger, better, more responsive. How’s that
for an interesting fantasy notion.
More Later . . . . . . .
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