Event Information

The Author and the Agent

Date: 17 April 2002   Drinks: 18:30   Talk Starts: 19:30 OPuS Event

Description

A Working Relationship in the World of Consumer Publishing.

Sir John Harvey Jones told a London Book Fair Bloomsbury Business seminar that advances paid to authors were excessive. He said they had become 'a sign of virility', and that paying huge advances was 'yesterday's game': better instead to pay a higher royalty. Others have criticised the spate of 'literary' prizes - 'a millstone round the trade's neck, rather than a stimulus to business'.

Do these dissenting voices herald a sea change in the world of consumer publishing?

Or is this just another sign of evolution, marking the same kinds of rapid change that are affecting other sectors of the publishing industry?

We've asked Douglas Kennedy, well-known book author, most recently of The Pursuit of Happiness, to join Catherine Clarke, a literary agent with Felicity Bryan (and former trade publishing director at OUP), and present some views on the consumer publishing world in 2002.

Simon Littlewood, International Director of Random House, will join them in a panel discussion afterwards.

Richard Balkwill of Oxford Brookes University will chair the meeting.

Speakers

Douglas Kennedy — Most recent publication was, The Pursuit of Happiness.

Catherine Clarke — Catherine was formerly trade publishing director at OUP.

Simon Littlewood — International Director of Random House