At first,
as people sought to record transactions, their history or laws, everything was
written by hand. It took time to record small bits of information. Any book was
a labor of love, and only available to the ruling class or members of the
religion of the time. And so it was for hundreds of years.
As the
Black Plague in Europe wiped out hundreds of people, the
landed lords or royals had to actually hire help. Farmers moved to the villages
and towns that sprang up and the newly hired residents had to learn the
rudiments of ciphering and reading to do business. Information about what was
happening locally was important and that news became available. It was
handwritten and pinned to the tavern door, or read aloud at the local inn by
someone who could read. But if you
didn't live in the town or village, you got news second, third, or fourth hand,
not the most desirable method. You went to the local church or synagogue to
learn about your religion. The handwritten works, now available, remained in the churches,
synagogues or the homes of the nobles.
Along come
Guttenberg. (I did say a very short and condensed history). He developed a way
to print a hundred pages of the same thing in less time than it took to write a
single page, so the growing middle class could buy their own bibles. It was an
easy jump to also print the news of the day. Imagine! You could now buy your
own news sheet for a bit of local currency, and take it home to read at your
leisure.
If the news
could be printed and sold - why not a book? It took more time to print, and
cost more than the news sheets but people who could now read wanted more than
just the bible or news sheets. Fictional accounts and fables, which had always
been delivered orally and passed down from generation to generation, could now
be printed.
Enter the
publisher along with the fiction writer. The publisher had the expense of printing
and distributing the book, so it was only fair for the author to give him a
percentage of the author's labor. However, that brought with it another
problem. The publisher could only guess what a book might produce by way of
income. The publisher had to sell the books outright or contract with a
bookseller which meant more expense. And what if he printed more books than
were sold? With thought and planning a system was developed. An author would
received royalties for books sold. Unsold books, if contracted by a bookseller
would have to be returned and the publisher would lose his profits. Easy
solution. Wait to pay the author his royalties but give him a small advance to
write the book. And it worked for years. It still works today.
As more and
more people learned to read, the demand for reading material grew. A new chapter of a popular author was
inexpensively printed in a new daily or weekly addition with the hope of
developing anticipation so more copies could be printed and sold. Obviously there
was a market for inexpensive fiction. So we have the first real paperback book
becoming available. A lonely cowboy, shop girl or lady's maid could live
vicariously in the adventures or romance of a hero or heroine in the 'Penny
Dreadfuls', which were not only inexpensive, but easy to carry fiction.
Paperback
books, or pocket books as they were originally called, were hugely popular. Series
books and various imprints were developed but with anything mass marketed, as
those books were, came a problem. As each new imprint or series was released
the bookseller was stuck with unwanted books from previous imprints or series.
Returning a large shipment of unsold books, even paperbacks, cost too much for
the seller to enjoy a profit. The industry answered the problem by allowing a
bookseller to tear the cover from the paperback, return it for credit and then
throw the rest of the book away. That seems to be the model we use today.
Hardbacks, of course, stayed on the shelves for a much longer time, and weren't
returned as often.
With the
advent of the home computer reading took a new direction. By this time we had
spread all over the globe and family and friends had moved to cities and towns
around the world. With the internet came the ability to communicate with them
even though they were miles away. You could even read news about places you had
lived with the touch of a button, in the comfort of your home and at your
leisure. Local news was released via the internet, then national and world
news.
So, just as
with original mass printing of the news made available to the population, now
books began to make their way in digital format. Printing had developed from
handwritten works to print to digital works.
Today we
have digital readers, the computer, the ipad, cellular telephones with apps
enabling you to read news or books on the phone. We have more and more people availing themselves of the digital market. Once
again the history of the printed word had taken a new direction. I can only ask
- what new device will once again change the way fiction is delivered to us?
And what will it mean for the fiction writer?
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