Literary Types Only

And The Book Show Is Not Literary Enough!

I just wanted to share this lovely little open letter with you from David Musgrave to the ABC:

Dear Producer

I'm writing in my capacity as board member of Australian Poetry Limited (a not-for-profit national arts organisation), as Publisher at Puncher & Wattmann Pty Ltd (the foremost independent publisher of poetry in Australia) and as one of this country's leading poets to request that you change the name of your program to the "Non-Poetry Multinational Publisher Product Show" to accurately reflect the content of your program. I am sure that the several thousand like-minded people in Australia who are my colleagues, peers or customers would agree that the rigorous exclusion of poetry from your program, as well as the extreme difficulty an independent publisher has in having their books discussed on your program, means that the current program title "The Book Show" is misleading, implying as it does that all books are given equal consideration.

Poetry is a vital part of our literary culture, yet your program, as with most of the mainstream media, does not even pay lip-service to this important literary art-form. If changing the name of your program is more difficult than merely changing the content to include poetry, I'd be happy to talk to you about how you might go about this.

Yours sincerely,

David Musgrave

Publisher

Puncher & Wattmann

P.S. You may want to read my blog about this subject.

And if that wasn't tart enough, here's his Blog entry. The middle bit reads thusly:

Poetry is an important part of the press, but not the only part - we're publishing more literary fiction than ever, and in early 2014 we will be releasing the novels Out of Print by Julian Croft and Slush-Pile by Ian Shadwell. A small but growing press like Puncher & Wattmann has to be prepared for the long haul, and to build its readership slowly but steadily. I'm always amazed at how popular poetry readings at the Sydney Writers festival are: every one that I have been involved in has been full to capacity, and I am sure that this is not because I happen to be part of it. The thing about poetry, and interesting writing in general, is that if you present it to a captive audience, they will find it very interesting and engage with it. It's just that in this day and age it is very difficult for the average reader to seek out new and interesting work apart from the small number of titles which are pushed through the mainstream press, largely by multinational publishers. Even people with a lot of time on their hands, retirees who are interested in reading literature, often don't know what is worth reading because reviews don't necessarily help them (even if they do appear in the newspapers) when there might be, say ten books of poetry or literary fiction to choose from in any given month, and they might only really want to read one or two. That's why small presses, those that hang around for decades, are extremely important for literary culture in this country.

So, take that, boring old establishment!

On another note, it's interesting that after years of sneering at this blog for being a blog ("what the hells is a blog anyway?") David has taken to writing his own. :) So, I've added a link to it on the right.

Now. If only I could get him to return my calls...

Sprung!

Les 'Raging Bully' Murray - Part 2

This news is now on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald.
A man would say anything -*ANYTHING* to cover up for bad judgment calls. Here's the latest on Les Murray's "publish my wife's novel and I'll give you your blurb" deal offer to publishers Puncher and Wattmann.

Contacted by the Herald yesterday, Murray dismissed the letter as "a joke" and said his intention was to say no to the publisher, "but I said it in a baroque way". Told it did not read like a joke, he replied, "It reads like, 'Piss off', actually."

For 40 years, he said, "people have been preying on me for free services and this is only a desire to stir trouble. People are forever asking me for blurbs. I've been

pestered unmercifully." Anyway, he said, "blurbs are nonsense - they're all hyperbole and hype, a publishers' bad habit. Read the contents of the damned book."

In his letter, he writes, "My endorsement does carry some clout, and I try never to cheapen it … "

Murray told the Herald "various other publishers" had seen his wife's book, Flight From The Brothers Grimm, an account of her family's postwar journey from Budapest to Switzerland and Melbourne.

David Musgrave, the publisher at Puncher & Wattman, said Moving Along: Selected Verse by J. K. Murphy, an 81-year-old Melbourne poet, would be out soon. He thought it appropriate to ask Murray for a comment for the book cover because Murray had published poems by Murphy in Quadrant magazine, where he is literary editor. "If he'd said no, we would have said, 'Fine, thanks,' but he's gone out of his way to offend us," Musgrave said. "He has been very unpleasant and he does seem to court hatred. We refuse to be bullied."

Uh, yeah Mr. Murray. Blurbs are hyperbole, but yours "does carry some clout", right? What kind of excuse is it that others have been pestering him for 40 years so he can write what he wrote to the publishers? Where's the logical consistency in that argument? Mr. Murray needs some mental health assistance if he thinks that makes any sense in light of what he wrote.

It's hardly the case that Mr. Murray was pestered by anybody. He was asked for one blurb. In the time it took to write his alleged "Piss-Off" note, he could have written the blurb; but no, he wanted to write what he wrote instead. You feel sorry for his wife, regardless of the quality of her manuscript.
Pretty laughable that a man would part with his good reputation so easily.

You Must Be Joking Les Murray

How & Why Australian Poetry Is Made Small By The Likes Of Les Murray

All this is hearsay and rumour in the wonderful wee world of Australian Literature but the evidence doing the rounds is pretty damning.

The story goes like this: Poet J.K. Murphy is 81. Puncher and Wattmann are going to publish the selected works. Mr. Murphy has been around for a long while and has been published in such notable publications as 'Quadrant'. He is in his own way, an important enough contributor to Australian poetry, as any other name.

So the editors of Puncher and Wattmann sent a letter to Les Murray to see if he might be interested in writing a blurb for Mr. Murphy's book. Apparently, the response they got from Les Murray is as below:

Where do you start with a letter like this?

The first assertion that his proposal is 'eminently fair' is eminently false. In what kind of world, does a few hundred words on a blurb carry as much economic value as necessitating the risk to publish a book, sight unseen? How long has Mr. Murray been in print? Does he think all and any publisher would just roll over to idiotic demands like this? I cannot imagine a single other professional author on the planet that would suggest that this was a fair transaction, let alone decent. Worse still, he goes on to argue a case for his idiotic and indecent proposal.

Indeed, the indecency of the proposal is pungent. Instead of addressing anything to do with Mr. Murphy's career or upcoming book, Les Murray expends a whole 300 or so words pitching his wife's manuscript. Then he has the gall to assert that if and when the said book comes out in print, then he will write the blurb. In other words, he has no concern for the fact that Mr. Murphy is 81 - no screw that, Mr. Murray seems to say, - print my wife's book first and then I'll write you your blurb.

As a side note, we should argue, if his wife's manuscript is so damn good, why hasn't anybody else published it? And why should it fall to Puncher and Wattmann to take on the costs and effort of marketing this book that clearly has not made the grade for other publishers, sight-unseen? It begs the question, "Just who the hell does he think he is?"
Clearly, he's thinking "I'm Les Murray, and I'm IMPORTANT," which is all abundantly clear from his claim that his endorsement carries clout. I have news for you Mr. Murray, your endorsement couldn't sell me Shakespeare.

He's serious, because he says "let me know quickly if you wish to enter into this arrangement, and Valerie's ms will be swiftly on its way to you."
He's not kidding; Not only is his style completely lacking in professional respect, he's trying to browbeat the publishers into hurrying up. The utter lack of formality and professionalism is astounding. The bullying tone is ridiculous and filled with self-importance with scant regard for Mr. Murphy's career's worth of work. He seems utterly oblivious to just how insulting he is being.
What planet is he on?

It's difficult to believe this is the caliber of the man who was once tapped to help John Howard write a draft of the preamble to our constitution (when one word: "Mate," would have sufficed). One wonders why the cultural cringe persists in Australian poetry, but when one comes across this altogether ungracious man's handiwork, one comes to realise that it's because people like Les Murray are held up as being so damned important. The fact of the matter is, we don't cringe enough, and it applies doubly to Les Murray: he really should cringe in shame a whole lot more.