Editors on Editing: What Writers Need to Know About What Editors Do (42 page)

In an ideal world, we work to integrate our own balance sheet into our company’s by publishing books that we find both attractive and stimulating intellectually and that,
on the whole
, allow us to function profitably. Remember that italicized phrase. Thomas Boswell,
Washington Post
sports columnist, says that you can’t tell anything about a baseball player’s abilities from a single week, much less a single game—performance quality shows up only over time. The same is true for an editor or author, and even for a publisher’s list. Not every player is expected to get on base at each at bat, and the way I see it, nor should every book be judged solely on the basis of its potential financial profile or its immediate popularity estimation. First of all, our predictive capabilities are just too crude to rely on for long. We know about those durable war-horses of the best-seller lists, but if we publish only in the existing categories and genres, we risk missing out not just on the most interesting new books, but on the greatest profits. Ask me, an early (and doubting) reader, about an Italian manuscript, a dense and difficult historical mystery by a semiologist, of all things. Who was to know what could come of
The Name of the Rose
in the right and able hands? The same pertains in the entertainment industry; ask the A&R guy who first heard Elvis.

Second, books have, since the beginning, served a critical function in the discourse of ideas as well as in the marketplace of goods. We run grave risks when the two parts of books’ identities are severed, and we get carried away with our own perceptions of the demands of the marketplace. Even when I’m calculating a small readership for a book, I’m making an implicit
assumption about a book’s potential readership—what readers it might reach, whom it should reach. As I try to imagine a book’s readership, I have to ask how important it is that people agree with said book’s content, for giving the public what we think it wants, now as well as in the past, doesn’t necessarily mean publishing garbage. But it involves a precise definition of “audience,” which all too often conforms for us to the demographics of the suburban mall.

Even an editor who claims to make a judgment entirely in market or money terms has to, at some point, account for his or her failures. We all spend far too little time in postmortems, reviewing our miscalculations and misreadings of the marketplace, but if we did, I suspect we’d find that while there may have been different justifications voiced for a signing decision (I took this on because it’s good/it’s important/it will sell), in fact all decisions are a mix of value judgments and more or less accurate ideas about potential sales. And in this context, it’s not that editors are more or less interested in markets, but that those in pursuit of the mass market probably hold it in more contempt than those who target the various niche audiences. We have to consider the so-called rights of the niche audience to gain access to the mainstream outlets for books, and our complicity in keeping them out by bending to the status quo in
bookselling
, an issue I’ll elaborate on further.

Part of the challenge of being an editor at a time when many of the old assumptions about history, historiography, and language itself are under fire is to stay honest about the person I imagine as a reader or book buyer. Writers from the disenfranchised minorities claim we discriminate against their potential audience because they aren’t “traditional” (white, well-educated, well-heeled book club types). I think we do, in large part because our bookselling outlets service those “other” audiences so poorly. It sounds like a vicious circle of blame, and it is incumbent upon all the participants to take responsibility for breaking the cycle, but as we press toward greater representation of
all
voices through the books we publish, we should be trying not just to expand the rolls of writers, but of readers as well. Opening up the book-buying world, supporting libraries, attending to literacy on a mass level—these are tasks as crucial as finding the new Terry McMillan or Toni Morrison.

…

The large majority of the books we all deal with raise little controversy—other than disagreement over sales potential and whether blue or red on the jacket makes the most sense. What happens, then, when I am presented with what we delicately refer to as one of “those difficult projects”—nonfiction books that propose unpopular ideas, that challenge conventionally held
and often widely beloved notions, that upset and are upsetting, that sometimes seem designed to cause trouble and nothing else?

It’s simple. I know I have a choice. I have to figure out why I want to publish this particular work and ally my name with it—what it’s going to do for (or to) the universe, the discourse, the author, my company, and myself—and go on from there. It’s no more than taking responsibility for your own decisions, and then standing by them. I know that the decision I make to pursue one project will affect what happens on several others on my desk at the same time, and that a book that appeals to me one year will sound like old hat another. No standard formula works for long because the individual variables in that formula change not just from editor to editor but from book to book, and change over time, as the demands of keeping a list functioning create certain other demands. But I personally don’t subscribe to the belief that the money quotient always comes first and last. Anyway, there just isn’t that much money to make. If maximizing profits at any cost is your interest, go into the shoe business. At least you can wear the remainders.

Now here’s the part that’s not quite so simple. What if, in said book, the argument being presented not only flies in the face of world opinion or taste, but speaks against your own sensibilities or values. The author presents a fascinating account of working at the pioneering frontiers of brain biology and research, but amasses his evidence to prove that there is not only racial differentiation but limitation in capability or content; you find the lab work riveting and the conclusions revolting. Or a discredited refugee from-a notorious political scandal comes to you promising that he will name names (perhaps or perhaps not clearing his own); you know his name will attract attention—and revenues—but believe the man to be in fact guilty of the crimes accused. The offense can be launched from anywhere on the political spectrum—Right attacking the Left; black attacking Jew; female attacking male; a proponent of “family values” alleging a gay conspiracy; and so on. The pairs of possible opponents and available controversies are infinite, and for this argument, the particulars are irrelevant. But what happens when I’m both attracted to and disturbed by the contents of the proposal or manuscript at the same time?

One of two other awful considerations usually arises here, too. Either the book is almost certain to lose money or—sometimes a worse prospect, I think—we might actually sell large quantities of something readily deemed hateful; after all, it’s what the public wants/believes/is believed to believe. What do I do?

There is no convincing argument for avoiding controversy or conflict, for suppressing a minority opinion, for controlling language, for rounding sharp edges, for censorship. Period. Even if applied under the supposed
“best of humane intentions” in a particular situation, any censoring effort creates a precedent of suppression. But if I don’t censor
them
, they won’t have that excuse to censor
me
. However—and I think this is crucial in the debate over the tyranny of the marketplace and censorship through commercial choices—this is
not
the same as saying an editor or a house is under
obligation
to publish anything and everything they are presented with, nor does the simple fact of controversial content merit selection and promotion as a trade book. Recognizing that I chose to be in this position not only gives me a responsibility—it gives me protection as well.

Much ink is spilled these days over what is now commonly called “the new McCarthyism of the Left”—the tyrannical rule of “political correctness,” which in its extreme form is said to demand that any attempt to write history or to describe the past or future of our society pass through stringent screens designed to filter out discriminatory language, hegemonic cultural assumptions, or any intended or unintended slur against the traditionally disenfranchised special-interest or “ethnic” (read non-Caucasian, usually non-European) people in American society. Writers across the cultural and political spectrum, from Robert Hughes to C. Vann Woodward, have argued in venues from the
New York Review of Books
to the
Village Voice
about the breadth and depth of the P.C. Reign of Terror on campuses today, and I would not presume to venture unarmed into
that
debate. I can only speak about the supposed tyranny of P.C. as witnessed from the acquiring editor’s chair, and I merely point to recent best-seller lists as evidence of who’s on top, who’s selling, and who’s getting big bucks. The fury over P.C. may in fact be yet another index of the well-organized, well-connected, highly visible, and voluble Right effectively articulating its paranoia. Chew over the sales figures for Allan Bloom, Camille Paglia, Dinesh D’Souza, E. D. Hirsch. Notice that there’s nary a defender of the misbegotten rights of otherly abled Trotskyite Basques of Puerto Rican descent among them. Defending the old regime still seems to be a pretty marketable commodity.

From where I sit, being an O. A. T. B. of P. R. D. neither qualifies nor disqualifies you from publication. On the other hand, neither does being a tenured professor at Yale. It’s the same boring story—I gotta like, or at least respect, what you’re trying to say, or find a value in it on my own terms. Needless to say, a
balance
of voices from niches large and small should be the ideal.

Books have also become an extension of the celebrity tee shirt-rock video-breakfast cereal-endorsement merchandise package. It’s innocuous when it’s merely football players and soap opera stars to whom this publishing prerogative is extended. Their books may not save Western civilization or advance the cause of freedom, but they usually don’t harm anyone either,
and can generate revenues that can be put to good use elsewhere. But consider this more troubling scenario.

What if David Duke were to approach me with a proposal? The celebrity component is certainly there, as is the public recognition, the proven publicity machinery, and the arguably legitimate interest in hearing his arguments, seeing them played out, testing their validity. There’s also the point to be considered that such a book could conceivably produce revenues and profits. After all, so they would say, many people agree with him and would want to hear what he has to say. But to take him on, I would have to find my own answers to a series of pointed questions. How would I be serving any community’s interest or enlarging the debate about race, the social welfare structure, and the role of government? Would I in fact be contributing to the legitimizing of what I consider a wholly unacceptable position by permitting him this platform to sound off from? Now, an assemblage of Duke documents as evidence could be a usefully frightening object. But my answer, on the packaged offering of Duke
himself
, would be a clear no. I might question the judgment of another publisher who did take him on, but that would be that publisher’s prerogative. Yes, that’s a personal political and moral decision on my part, but so would be the decision
to
publish him. There is no such thing as an impersonal decision in this realm. This touches on an area I’ll elaborate on later, in specific issues of language and terminology. Certain books arrive in more or less fixed shape, due to the odd insistence by the author to have it his way, come hell, high water, or editor armed with sharp pencils. In assessing a book’s “worth” and its hazards to me, my house, and the world at large, I try, not always successfully, to stay aware of the distinctions between what I would like a book to be or become, and what its real features and limitations are.

As editors, we more often are presented with less extreme cases of crises of conscience—a well-grounded argument that takes a few uncomfortable turns, throws a few dangerous curves. I don’t have a hard-and-fast rule for myself, and I attempt, not always with success, to stop short of the doctrinaire, to keep my own mind open to new persuasions. “It’s a mixed bag,” I often say, describing a complicated project. But there are usually few surprises; it’s rare that, if you take the time to investigate even the skimpiest three-page proposal, you can’t suss out where the dark corners are going to be. I know that I have to make a choice whether to throw myself into it, but once I do commit, then my absolute obligation is to help the author get it right.

If only there were a computer program to work this one out—but you’re stuck with your own cost-benefit ratio analysis; of course, the definitions of what constitutes a cost—or a benefit—follow no rigid formula. The decision to take on only profitable books is not automatically or a priori more
or less defensible than a choice based on “political” principles. It’s not a given but a deliberate choice in and of itself, and one with grave ramifications as editors perform the necessary ritual of trying to come to terms with why they do what they do. Unfortunately, we spend little time assessing or accounting for the times we miscalculated the size of the audience, the nature of the book’s appeal.

…

So I’ve got this daring work of dissident scholarship on my desk. Now what do I do with it?

There are, to my mind, three stages of influence or intervention for an editor, each with distinct opportunities and requisites. Stage One is the period in which I’m considering signing up a project. Once there might have been a significant portion of a manuscript and a clear profile of the author to back it up. These days I’m lucky if I get three irrelevant magazine articles and a ten-page outline. Still, I’ve got investigative tools at my disposal to help me determine just what I’m getting into—where this argument might lead, for better or worse, what skeletonic secondary characters might be dancing in the author’s closet, what portions of his or her work I know I’ll have issues with.