PUBLISHER: CHAD POST

Chad Post is the publisher of Open Letter Books, a literary translation press at the University of Rochester. In 2018, he was awarded the Ottaway Award for the Promotion of International Literature. 

Recently on the Three Percent website, you began The No Context Project, where publishers send you the electronic file of a future publication to then be uploaded onto your ebook reader with a standardized text and layout design and, after reading, you’ve committed to reviewing the manuscript based on four categories: Style, Translation, Structure, and Cultural Value. Essentially the project is to remove the publisher from the publication. A few books in, what insights into the art and craft of the publisher have you gleaned? Has it offered a better understanding of the average American, who (based on any surveys I’ve seen) is not a regular reader, particularly not of literature?

Oh, man. Well, because of the start of the new semester (I teach Monday through Thursday), and too many other projects, I had to put this on hold for a hot minute, but it was fascinating when I was working on it. My theory—which seemed to bear itself out over the two books I read—was that by not having any of the normal markers in place (preconceived ideas about the quality and merits of a text based on the surrounding metatextual clues—like the cover, the publisher’s reputation, the author’s cultural status, the number of books the translator has translated in the past, priming via jacket copy, etc.) my reading experience would be both more honest, while also be focused on trying to figure out if this is “good” according to the standards of literary society. 

We all have a desire to belong to a group, and whether it’s being lumped in with the haters of a particular art work, or one of its early supporters, we tend to take the otherwise solitary activity of reading and place it within the context of the reactions from a larger group of readers. How frequently does a book get a pass from a bookseller or critic because a powerful author blurbed it? How often are great books overlooked because they’re published by one publisher instead of another? I’ve always been fascinated with behavioral economics and the science of decision making, and I saw this as an extension of that. (Unfortunately, aside from the core fans of Three Percent, I’m not sure who else is interested in these ideas. My long-ass blog posts are not Twitter friendly.)

Having started the Translation Database (now hosted by Publishers Weekly), what are the advantages of seeing publishing numbers separated from the spin? What metrics are helpful to the publishing community and to readers? What numbers not currently available do you think would be helpful to publishers? Is there a value to making readers more aware of the market and other such insider details of publishing?

There’s a lot to unpack here . . . First off, I do think that the numbers—separated from memory more than spin—are incredibly valuable for explaining what our literary situation actually is like. Recency bias and confirmation bias tend to taint most coverage of literature in translation. If you want to write a positive article on international literature, just refer to the Ferrante/Knausgaard explosion—clearly everyone is now interested in international literature! The numbers can expose potential flaws in our thinking, or, to put this in a slightly more nuanced way, they can help tweak the narrative.

Are translations growing in the U.S.? Sort of. The total number of fiction and poetry went down precipitously last year—something that most people wouldn’t expect because of the buzz around a handful of books and the National Book Award for Translation. What would be really interesting is to include sales figures, but that would be nearly impossible, since it would require constant updating, and no one really wants to share this . . . 

I am working on a project that tries to blend some of the data crunching from the database, with sales and public perception, and interviews with translators to look at how readers receive literature in translation, but . . . well, we’ll see if the end product is actually worth anything!

Despite your Twitter bio, “The most insufferable man in publishing,” your work with the Three Percent website and podcast (co-hosted with Tom Roberge of Riffraff), the founding of the Best Translated Book Award, and the Two Month Review (co-hosted with writer Brian Wood), all seem to open publishing to more people and must prompt a collegial atmosphere, to some degree. Do you see avenues for more collaborative efforts between publishers? And between publishers and bookstores? Could such partnerships offset the hyper-consolidation and corporatization of publishing? What is your prognosis of the current state of publishing in the US?

Another long one to unpack! Let’s start with the fun bit: My Twitter bio is basically just a joke. (Although I DO earnestly love 6’7” left-handed relief pitchers . . . one in particular . . . hey, Andrew Miller, give me a call.) That “insufferable” line came in response to my denouncing the Nobel Prize being awarded to Peter Handke. And, well, it’s kind of a cool phrase? 

I would love to be perceived as trying to make publishing more collegial and open—especially in relation to literature in translation. One potential reason our access to books in translation has dipped as of late is because the system behind the industry prefers competition over collaboration and almost enforces a (possibly false) zero-sum game situation. I can name three situations from the past month in which Open Letter was asked to outbid a fellow indie press on a book that that other press was extremely interested in. This happens all the time, and sure, it’s just business, but when your friend steals away a book you’ve been dying to do . . . It doesn’t always feel like we’re in this together. There’s a lack of transparency in this field—with sales, offers, the way books are treated by media and stores—which has started to set presses at odds with one another, competing over a very small slice of pie, instead of working together to increase the appreciation of and readership for valuable works of literature. 

The situation between publishers like Open Letter and bookstores is healthy and a viable way to work around media conglomeration, but overall, I think books like ours will inevitably be a small portion of the sales for most bookstores. They need the hot, hip titles that sell fast and furiously in order to stay afloat. And given the unevenness of the playing field (see the treatment of American Dirt and how much marketing money was invested there vs. the treatment of any number of books by Mexican writers addressing similar themes), it’s unlikely that one of our books will become “hot & hip” on the level that will alter a bookstore’s typical buying patterns. Instead, it’s a long, slow game. Certain booksellers fall in love with one or more of our books, and start to stock them. Then we have a couple “hits” with sales in the 5,000-10,000 range, and the stores are more likely to take a “risk” on a future book we’re excited about and stock 5-10 copies instead of the usual 1-2. But this requires a few things to go right that aren’t entirely under our control . . . So we keep working with our bookselling friends and hoping that as Open Letter’s stature grows, their respect and our sales will follow a similar course. (A rising tide floats all boats?) 

In terms of publishing overall, it clearly has a diversity problem, and I would argue it has a value problem as well. Sales have become the be-all, end-all for agents, editors, and many booksellers. Which makes sense—most of publishing is a business. But it also reduces the richness of a text and reading experience to a single metric—one that only captures popularity and people’s willingness to pay, not the intrinsic value found in a particular book. At the same time, these same people are railing against Amazon for gutting the value of bookstores and books as a whole, which is fair, although Amazon is getting more books into the hands of more people than was possible twenty-five years ago. It’s all muddled and complicated and there’s no right answer, but I hope all my work—with the Database, podcasts, Open Letter titles, Three Percent posts, other writings—can at least offer up another possible way for someone involved in the industry (in one aspect or another) to conceive of the overall value of their work.