the war over books heats up

update: Welcome, BuzzMachine readers! Take a look here to see who I am and what this blog is about. Sorta. Thanks for the link, Jeff!

In a frontal assault on the literary establishment (and sounding just as enthusiastic about the digital future of books as Jeff Jarvis), longtime book publishing maven Joni Evans tells “large elite fish in a small pond” John Updike*** to get a grip and think of authors other than himself.

Here’s the text of her letter to the New York Times Book Review (July 16):

Whose Revolution?

To the Editor:

John Updike’s eloquent essay about digital publishing, ”The End of Authorship” (June 25), misses one fundamental point. Updike does not have to join the revolution. Digitization is optional. The Internet operates in the world of Also, Either/Or, Not One Way. Updike’s intentions of privacy and intimacy are safe; his copyright thoroughly protects his choice to remain nonenhanced, nondigitized, nonhyperlinked and nonsearchable.

But what is good for John Updike is not necessarily good for the millions of authors the current system has locked out. Creativity does not flourish when books can’t find publishers or when audiences cannot be sustained. Those authors whose works remain unpublished, out of print, out of stock or out of date will be the ones to march in the digital revolution. Updike is a large, elite fish in a small pond. The digital pond is primarily for other species — smaller, less recognized, exotic fish that need the oxygen this new world provides.
JONI EVANS
New York
The writer has worked for many years as an editor, publisher and literary agent.

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*** I grumbled about John Updike’s reactionary fears here and here. Search the “books” and “publishing” categories to see more of what I’ve written about this subject.