Literary agents and publishers: Literature Nobel prize winners need not apply
What are the odds for publishers and agents to spot genuine literary talent? Well, if you’re lucky enough to be a literature Nobel prize winner like V S Naipaul they are fairly slim. If not, well… slimmer?
The Sunday Times submitted two Booker prize-winning novels as works by aspiring authors to 20 publishers and literary agencies. Of the 21 replies, all but one were rejections. These aren’t isolated cases: literature Nobel prize winner Doris Lessing was rejected by her own publisher when she submitted one of her novels under a pseudonym. J K Rowling’s Harry Potter? Rejected by several publishers. The list goes on and on: Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park, Patrick Süskind’s Perfume, Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, …
So if you are an aspiring author and your manuscript has been rejected time and time again you are in good company. Over the last couple of months we’ve been working very hard on putting a platform together that supports you as an author in finding your readers and help you attract publishers this way. We’re currently in closed beta so if you don’t mind a couple of bugs here and there apply for your beta account and tell us what you think.
Tags: Author, Publishing
Friday, June 20th, 2008 at 21:42 and is filed under Authors & Publishing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
September 9th, 2008 at 11:46
Please help me. I have a brilliant story well told yet I can’t even get anyone to open it.
September 11th, 2008 at 14:38
Hey Trevor - put it up on quillp; I’m sure there are a lot of people who’d love to read it! And if you get enough people excited about your story the publishers will soon follow suit.