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Chapter 2
Books and the Power of Print
CHAPTER OUTLINE
Chapter Opener: The young adult (YA) market makes frequent appearances on the best-seller
lists and continues to be a key element of the publishing mix. Like all mass media, the book-
publishing world is undergoing digital changes and its ability to attract young audiences is a
reminder that books can be as powerful as ever.
I. The Early History of Books: From Papyrus to Paperbacks. Books developed from Egyptian
papyrus scrolls to a print mass medium.
A. Papyrus, Parchment, and Codex: The Development Stage of Books. The Egyptians
began writing on papyrus as early as 2400 BCE. The first protomodern book, the codex,
was developed by the Romans in the fourth century.
B. Writing and Printing Innovations: Books Enter the Entrepreneurial Stage. In this stage,
rules about written language and book design were codified.
1. Manuscript Culture. The Christian clergy in the Middle Ages produced illuminated
manuscripts that featured colorful illustrations.
2. Block Printing. Chinese printers developed early mechanical printing, making mass
II. The Evolution of Modern Publishing. The demand for books led to the growth of the
publishing industry. Early small publishing “houses” were bought by large corporations.
A. Early Publishing Houses. The early prestigious publishing houses produced the works
of respected writers.
B. The Conglomerates. A handful of international conglomerates bought the smaller
houses to take advantage of synergy, and they now dominate the industry.
C. The Structure of Publishing Houses. All publishing houses are structured similarly, with
teams responsible for different facets of the business.
III. Types of Books: Tradition Meets Technology
Books are now published in different formats, including audio books and e-books, and are
highly diverse in subject matter.
A. Print Books. The industry produces books in a wide variety of categories that have been
formally defined by trade organizations.
1. Trade. This category targets general readers and is one of the most lucrative.
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2. Professional. This category targets professionals in occupations like law, business,
medicine, and technology-science.
3. Textbooks. This category is divided into elementary through high school,
vocational, and college textbooks.
B. Electronic and Digital Publishing. Publishers are experimenting with alternatives to
print to remain competitive in the digital age.
1.
Audio Books. These books are indispensable for sightless and older readers and are
also popular with commuters.
IV. The Economics of the Book Industry. Publishers make money by selling books and TV and
movie rights, and spend money on production, distribution, and marketing.
A. Selling Books. Compared with other mass media industries, book publishing has seen
relatively modest increases in revenue.
1. Brick-and-Mortar Stores and Traditional Bookselling. Brick-and-mortar stores
include a variety of bookstores and other stores, but are dominated by one large
chain: Barnes & Noble.
2. Selling Books Online. Since the late 1990s, online booksellers have created an
entirely new book-distribution system.
B. Influences of Television and Film in the Digital Age. TV and film can help sell books,
and books serve as ideas for TV shows and movies.
C. The Cost of Doing Business. To generate sales, publishers must spend money
producing, distributing, and promoting their titles.
1. How Authors Get Paid. Authors get paid based on a percentage of sales, historically
between 5 and 15 percent of the net price of a book.
V. Books in a Democratic Society. Books have played a vital role in our democracy by
disseminating ideas but they face several challenges, including physical deterioration and
censorship.
A. Physical Deterioration. Older books made from acid-based paper continue to
deteriorate over time.
B. Censorship. The tension between free expression and citizens’ desire to suppress
materials they find objectionable has long characterized our democracy.
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LECTURE TOPICS
1. Explain the social and historical transformations caused by the first mass medium—the book.
2. Discuss the book categories (e.g., trade, professional, textbooks) in the publishing industry.
3.
Discuss the various distribution outlets in the publishing industry, including the rise and fall
of book superstores and online distribution outlets.
4.
Clarify the mergers and consolidations in the publishing business and the various patterns of
synergy that have emerged recently (see Lecture Spin-Offs).
LECTURE SPIN-OFFS
The Young Adult Market and Serial Fiction
• After the last Harry Potter installment was published, the book industry happily reported that
the teen book market is thriving, with original voices being published all the time. The
Hunger Games trilogy, the first book of which was turned into a popular movie in 2012,
appears to be taking up the mantle from Harry Potter. Book series seem to work best for kids
• Serial fiction was immensely popular in the mid-1800s, with authors such as Charles
Dickens, George Eliot, and Leo Tolstoy releasing chapters of page-turners in leading
magazines or in chapter-length pamphlets. During this time, readers would wait with
anticipation for each installment. Dickens, especially—the J. K. Rowling of his day—grew
very wealthy writing popular fiction. His book series The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick
The Conglomerates
• Mergers began in earnest in 1960, when Random House bought Knopf (along with Vintage
Paperbacks), Beginner Books, and Pantheon. Six years later, RCA bought Random House,
and in 1980, S. I. Newhouse (with his younger brother, Donald) bought Random House and
put it under Advance Publications. Advance Publications sold Random House to Bertelsmann
in 1998. On July 1, 2013, Bertelsmann and Pearson combined their American trade
publishers to create Penguin Random House, which made it the largest book publisher in the
world (though in 2017, Pearson announced that it planned to sell its stake in the company).
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• Being a media mogul does not protect you from being the target of negative, even sensational
books. Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corp., which owns HarperCollins, has been the
subject of multiple books, including the dramatically titled Dial M for Murdoch, published in
2012. This exposé of a phone-hacking scandal allegedly involving News Corp. journalists
accuses the corporation of corrupting Great Britain.
• On the other hand, some authors of books about media moguls might have difficulty
getting them published. A 1994 biography of S. I. Newhouse by Thomas Maier called
Newhouse was, in the author’s words, “a parable on American power” and a
meticulously researched account of the Newhouse monopoly and his rise to
The Structure of Publishing Houses
• Having a “book imprint” means that an editor has his or her own division within a publishing
house (the division is often named after the editor). This editor not only influences editorial
content but also makes key buying and marketing decisions.
• Judith Regan started the ReganBooks imprint (a subsidiary of HarperCollins) in 1994 and
had stunning success in turning media personalities’ autobiographies into best-sellers.
Howard Stern, Rush Limbaugh, the Fabulous Sports Babe, Denise Brown (Nicole’s
sister), Jenny McCarthy, Christopher Darden, and Drew Carey are just some of the
• Bookjobs.com is a Web site sponsored by the Association of American Publishers (AAP).
Directed at college-aged people, the Web site is part of a campaign to increase diversity
within the book industry and also to entice college-aged students to potential careers in book
publishing. Besides providing great information on the publishing industry, Bookjobs.com
lists available jobs and internships from every major book publisher in the United States.
According to the AAP press release, “AAP will target colleges with diverse student
populations as well as demanding academic standards to increase awareness of book
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Electronic and Digital Publishing
•
The first e-books came out in the mid-1990s (Rocketbook; Softbook) and failed miserably.
People already spending a considerable amount of time with their computers were not
committed to curling up with an e-book before they fell asleep.
Selling Books
•
Coffee shops became popular elements of book superstores starting in 1994, when Borders
and Barnes & Noble began to see their chains as cultural destinations and serene,
nonthreatening environments in contrast to malls and bars. Some of the free, community-
based offerings at superstores have included classes, concerts, food tastings, displays of local
artwork, children’s story hours, and parties (with prizes).
• Powell’s in Portland, Oregon, which first opened its doors in 1971, is both an independent
bookstore and an institution. Taking up an entire block in downtown Portland, the store
• Out of every eight books, one is very profitable, one is very unprofitable, and six either break
even or lose money.
• According to former Random House CEO Peter Olson, the best way to make money in the
bookselling business is to underpay authors. “The most profitable books are highly successful
authors early in their career with a contract that doesn’t reflect their success,” says Olson.
• Here is some information about Oprah’s Book Club, which sent happy shock waves through
the publishing industry from 1996 to 2002, took a short hiatus, and was then revived as
Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 in 2003:
• Publishers call it the “Oprah Effect.” It happens when a certain talk-show host selects a
book for discussion, asks viewers to read it, and hundreds of thousands do. The idea
behind the book club is a grassroots phenomenon: the rise of reading groups.
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weeks of the Oprah mention, the sales of Mitchard’s book jumped from an impressive
100,000 copies to nearly a million.
• A by-product of the Oprah Effect is that, suddenly, talking about books on TV shows is
cool. NBC’s Today and ABC’s Good Morning America started their own clubs when the
Oprah Book Club went on hiatus.
• There is some evidence that the Oprah Book Club decreased book sales in other genres.
One economics study found “no evidence” that the club attracted large numbers of people
to the market but instead found a decrease in sales of adult fiction, perhaps because the
• Booknotes, the popular C-SPAN program devoted to books that was hosted by then-CEO
Brian Lamb, came to an end in December 2004. C-SPAN2 still devotes its entire weekend
coverage to books and book-related events.
• More recently, Harry Potter star Emma Watson, as part of her work with the United Nations
Influences of Television and Film in the Digital Age
• Examples of Hollywood’s encroachment on the publishing industry:
• Studios tend to look more favorably on film ideas based on novels or magazine articles
than on original screenplays because such manuscripts are believed to be more fully
developed and have more believable characters.
The Cost of Doing Business
• For interesting infographics about the life cycle of a book, see “Life Cycle of a Book
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• There has been a trend toward increasing book returns from bookstores to publishers. Unlike
the business practices of almost any other industry, publishers allow bookstores to return
unsold books, a practice that started during the Great Depression to entice booksellers to
accept their wares.
Books in a Democratic Society
• One often thinks of magazines and newspapers as the muckraking platforms of the twentieth
century, but let’s not forget about the impact of muckraking in book form. Here are some
classic muckraking books that have stimulated both debate and social change. Many of these
titles started as magazine or newspaper pieces and then evolved into books.
• History of the Standard Oil Company by Ida M. Tarbell (1904). This 815-page classic of
investigative journalism helped pave the way for the Supreme Court to break up the giant
company.
• The Jungle by Upton Sinclair (1906). Carefully reported yet written as a novel, this book
prompted President Theodore Roosevelt to investigate meatpackers and led Congress to
pass the Pure Food and Drug Act.
• The Hidden Persuaders by Vance Packard (1957). This sensationalistic shot at admen in
the business-friendly Eisenhower era was a cultural milestone, marking a new interest in
questioning authority.
(This list has been adapted from Kenneth Klee, “Modern Muckrakers,” Book Magazine,
September/October 2001, pp. 46–51.)
• According to Amazon, the most well-read cities in the United States as of 2016 were:
1.
Seattle, WA
2. Portland, OR
3. Washington, DC
4.
San Francisco, CA
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MEDIA LITERACY DISCUSSIONS AND EXERCISES
IN BRIEF: BOOKS AND YOU
Pre-Exercise Question: What have been the most important books in your life, and why?
This exercise or assignment is designed to reevaluate the significance of books in people’s
lives, especially in an era of electronic media. It is a variation of the “think-pair-share” discussion
strategy explained in the Teaching Philosophy section of this manual. Divide the class into teams
of two or three and outline the Critical Process exercise below. Give students two to three
minutes to think independently about the questions, five to ten minutes to share their experiences
with their teams, and about fifteen minutes to compare and discuss the issues with the entire class.
1. Description. Consider the books that have made a difference in your life. What kind of books
are they (e.g., novels, nonfiction, reference books, religious books, children’s books, comic
2. Analysis. Does your group or class share certain patterns of experience around your favorite
books? Are these patterns related to your age at the time, your gender, where you live, or the
way you were raised to think about books?
3. Interpretation. Consider your book experiences in relation to the decade in which you started
reading and the other media and activities battling for your attention. Did you generally have
negative or positive experiences connected to books and reading? Do you have certain
coming-of-age experiences connected to books? Why?
4. Evaluation. After considering your book experiences, what do you think is the role of books
IN BRIEF: BOOK READING
Answer each of the following questions in a few sentences or short paragraph(s):
1. Do you read books outside of the school setting? If so, what books do you tend to read, and
why? (Or, if you don’t read books, reflect on why you choose not to.)
2. Think about reading as a practice. When do you read (time of day/time of year)? Where do
you read? (In what types of locations/environments/situations do you pick up a book?) If you
3. What influences (or what would influence) you to read a particular book?
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IN DEPTH: HOW DO YOU FIND OUT ABOUT BOOKS?
(Note: A version of this activity is now available on LaunchPad for Media Essentials. See the
Media Literacy Practice Activity for this chapter.)
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Pre-Exercise Questions: Every year, the book industry publishes more than 100,000 titles in
North America. Some could be life changing, inspiring, or unbelievably fascinating, but you
might never know about them because somehow the book industry failed to reach you. How do
you discover books? And if you knew about more great reading material, would you read more
often?
1. Description. Interview ten of your friends about their relationship with books. First, ask them
whether they read books at all and why or why not. Second, ask them how they choose the
2. Analysis. What important patterns emerge? For example, how many of your participants said
that they choose their books by “word of mouth”? How many browse the shelves of libraries
or bookstores, actively seek out books on the Internet by reading recommended listings
(perhaps on Amazon), participate in a book club or reading group, or never read books at all?
Discuss the most significant patterns.
3. Interpretation. What can you glean from this information? Is it difficult to learn about book
titles you’d be interested in reading? Why do some people read more than others?
4. Evaluation. Do you think that the publishing industry is doing a good job of educating U.S.
citizens about books? How does publicity for books compare to other mass media products
(films, television, recordings)? Is publicizing books a good or bad thing? Discuss.
5. Engagement. One of the best ways to find out about past and present titles is to visit the
Barnes & Noble Review Site (bnreview.barnesandnoble.com). Here you can access titles and
IN DEPTH: THE BIG BOOK BUSINESS
Pre-Exercise Question: What are some recent books that are connected to other media content or
media personalities? Think of all the possibilities across many media, including television, film,
radio, newspapers, comics, and the recording industry.
This Critical Process analyzes the sometimes uncomfortable relationship between book
publishing and the media business, and it begins with the weekly best-seller lists in the New York
Times Book Review. You can also check www.nytimes.com/books.
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2. Analysis. Determine the parent corporation of the book: Is it a multinational media
conglomerate or an independent?
3. Interpretation. Search LexisNexis, the National Newspaper Index, or other sources for news
4.
Evaluation. Evaluate the role of big publishing in the book industry. Is it good to bring book
ideas and stories to a wider audience through the synergy of big companies? Is there a
sufficient variety of genres and ideas in the best-seller lists, or—perhaps owing to business
pressures—is there too much of the same thing?
5. Engagement. Check out the list “The Year’s Best Overlooked Books, According To
CLASSROOM MEDIA RESOURCES
VIDEOS/DVDS/CDS
Book Industry (1997, 29 minutes). This program provides a detailed look at how trade and
educational/reference books are made, sold, and marketed (part of the Film, TV, and Media
The History of Print (1997, 30 minutes). This video illustrates the evolution of print culture and
notes print’s influence on cultural changes in Europe and the United States. The program also
The Machine That Made Us (2008, 59 minutes). A look at the story of Johann Gutenberg and the
WEB SITES
Representing the needs of publishing through advocacy, digital standards, statistical analysis,
and member services.
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Promotes the works of university presses.
The online home of Barnes & Noble.
A literary Web site with more than two thousand texts available for free.
The book industry’s main trade association for research.
Business magazine of the book industry
Promotes children’s books and reading.
A site that has offered the complete works of Shakespeare for free on the Internet since 1993.
Resources for independent book publishers and self-published authors.
Dedicated to the study of comics internationally.
Represents the interests of the international publishing industry.
Not-for-profit representing the campus retailing industry.
54,000 free e-books.
News and opinion about book publishing.
“Bible of the Book Business.”
One of the best-known online resources for new books, new authors, and general information
about the book industry itself.
Publishing resources for scholarly publishing.
Business research on book publishing.
FURTHER READING
Brienza, Casey. Manga in America: Transnational Book Publishing and the Domestication of
Japanese Comics. London/New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.
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Davis, Kenneth. Two-Bit Culture: The Paperbacking of America. Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1984.
Dessauer, John. Book Publishing: The Basic Introduction. New York: Continuum, 1993.
Eisenstein, Elizabeth. The Printing Press as an Agent of Social Change. 2 vols. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1980.
Epstein, Jason. Book Business: Publishing Past, Present and Future. London: W.W. Norton,
2002.
Gilbert, Dale L. Complete Guide to Starting a Used Bookstore. 2nd ed. Dover, NH: Upstart,
1991.
Greco, Albert N. The Economics of the Publishing and Information Industries: The Search for
Yield in a Disintermediated World. New York/London: Routledge, 2015.
Greco, Albert N., Jim Milliot, and Robert Wharton. The Book Publishing Industry. 3rd ed. New
York: Routledge, 2014.
Greco, Albert N, Clara E. Rodriguez, and Robert M. Wharton. The Culture and Commerce of
Publishing in the 21st Century. Stanford, CA: Stanford Business Books, 2007.
