Rights & Licensing
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PUBLISHINGPERSPECTIVES London Book Fair Edition / April 2014 Kerstin Schlosser, rights manager at Gabal Verlag, takes a meeting at the London Book Fair Rights & Licensing • How copyright affects global economies • International licensing and market trends • Interviews with agents and rights experts LETTER FROM THE EDITOR On Telling—and Selling— Your Story to the World ast September, I took advantage of a Ful- Furs. The statue proved surprisingly popular Lbright Grant offered by the United States with female tourists, considering he is the - writer who blessed us with the term “mas- national Book Forum, the country’s largest ochism.” Perhaps it was the unique feature andto fly most to the popular Ukraine book to attend festival, the where Lviv IInter gave that allows you to put a hand into his pocket a series of talks about international publish- and grasp his bronze manhood? ing and e-books. That Olha and the Ukrainian publishers Edward Nawotka When my minder Olha, a translator from I met throughout that week were sensitive Editor-in-Chief the United States embassy in Kiev, picked me about being mistaken for Russians is entirely Publishing Perspectives up at the airport, I knew things were going understandable. The country has struggled to be a bit, well, different: sitting in the back to forge a unique identity in its many years of of her car was her octogenarian mother, a independence, particularly in the eyes of the real—as my own mother would say—pink- west. The Ukraine’s best known writer, An- skinned, white-haired “babushka.” drei Kurkov, writes in Russian, and its pub- “Mama,” as I came to refer to her, sat lishing industry continues to be subsumed in smiling at me, wrapped in a headscarf and a tide of Russian book imports. a heavy black wool cardigan. A former pub- Alexander Afonin, CEO of the Ukrainian lisher and academic, she, too, was attending Association of Publishers and Booksellers, the fair and, as it turned out, traveled with us noted, “The market is swamped by imports, everywhere—to the fair, to the hotel, to an and mainly from Russia, which supplies 90% impromptu reading of American Beat poetry of books to Ukraine.” Lamenting that “Russia I was asked to give alongside the Ukrainian mostly specializes in the supply of entertain- poet Yuri Andrukhovych. ing books of poor quality,” Alexandr Kraso- “Mama is wise, she has experienced vitsky of Folio Publishing House, concurred, many things. Germans. Communists. Many noting that “the market is saturated with hard things,” Olha noted. Olha then admon- Russian literature.” ished me to remember her own name was, But it’s not as if the Ukraine doesn’t have indeed, Olha, not Olga, as I persisted in call- its own indigenous publishing industry. Ac- ing her in our email exchanges prior to my cording to Aleksey Kononenko, director of arrival. “We are Ukrainian, not Russian. publishing and the press of the Goskomtele- Please.” she said. “Now get in Lada and look radio—the Ukrainian state television and ra- out for bear . ” dio company and the country’s largest media It was to become her refrain to me - throughout my visit, both the warnings istered publishers, manufacturers, and dis- about her name and nationality and the tributorsholding—there of books are in some Ukraine. 5,400 The officially problem reg is warnings about the bears, which apparently that just 400 of those companies are active, have begun wandering onto the roads creat- making for an “extremely complex” situation, ing hazards for drivers. So, when I went to according to Kononenko. buy souvenirs in Lviv’s old town and tried to That said, despite the Russian domi- purchase a matryoshka doll for my daughter, nance, there are several points of hope and PUBLISHING PERSPECTIVES I wasn’t surprised when she briskly yanked it some publishers who are looking forward to out of my hand and promptly returned it to the future. One of the publishers I was intro- 72 Spring Street, 11th Floor the vendor. “Doll is Russian. You no buy doll. duced to during my time in Lviv was A-BA- New York, NY 10012 Maybe you buy Ukrainian socks instead?” BA-HA-LA-MA-HA. The house, founded by Lviv is a university town in the west of poet and children’s book author Ivan Mal- USA the Ukraine, close to the Polish border, that kovich, is the oldest independent publishing was once an outpost of the Habsburg Empire. house in the independent Ukraine. Malkovich Read international publishing It maintains close ties to Austria and has a produces some 20 new books a year, many of news & opinion daily at: coffee culture that mirrors Vienna’s. It looks which are bestsellers—and some, such as his publishingperspectives.com west to Europe for its cultural cues, rather edition of The Snow Queen, have been best- than east. It’s also a town that values litera- sellers in Russia as well. ture: the central square features towering The book, originally published in 2000, Facebook.com/pubperspectives statues of not one, but two poets, and nearby has sold more than 100,000 copies in the Twitter @pubperspectives is another statue of the Austrian writer Leo- Ukraine alone and has proved so popular pold von Sacher-Masoch, author of Venus in continued on page 30 » 2 • April 2014 • Publishing Perspectives TABLE OF CONTENTS / April 2014 PUBLISHING PERSPECTIVES INSIDE THIS ISSUE: Rights & Licensing London Book Fair Edition “Rights & Licensing” April 2014 NEWS & UPDATES Q&A: SCOUTS AND AGENTS Editor-in-chief Edward Nawotka British Council Honors Digital Lucy Abrahams 4 Publishing Entrepreneurs 18 Literary Scout Deputy Publisher by Publishing Perspectives United Kingdom Hannah Johnson Russian Gov’t Considers Silke Weniger Business Development 4 Support for Bookselling 19 Literary Agent Erin L. Cox by Eugene Gerden Germany Contributors David Lopez-Del Amo Liz Bury 20 Literary Agent Carlo Carrenho AUTHOR INTERVIEWS China Tom Chalmers Andrés Delgado Darnalt Hwang Sok-Yong on Korea’s Norbert Uzseka Eugene Gerden 6 Tumultuous Past 21 Literary Agent Ramy Habeeb by Olivia Snaije Hungary Rob Johnson Donald Katz Anthony Horowitz on Lena Stjernström Andrew Lownie 7 Bookstores and Libraries 22 Literary Agent Rosie Milne by Roger Tagholm Sweden Olivia Snaije Riky Stock, German Book Office Roger Tagholm Jane Tappuni RIGHTS & LICENSING AGENT PROFILES Contact Publishing Perspectives Rights and Licensing Growth Agenting in the Philippines, 8 Across the Globe 23 Asia’s Forgotten Giant Advertising and Media Parterships: by Tom Chalmers by Rosie Milne [email protected] Rights Sales as “Soft Power” The Vikings of Brazil: Editorial Inquiries: 10 in Global Economies 25 Interview with Pasi Loman [email protected] by Andrés Delgado Darnalt by Carlo Carrenho All other inquiries or questions: From Page to Stage: the UK’s +1-212-794-2851 or 12 Theatrical Licensing Boom [email protected] by Liz Bury BUSINESS MODELS Why Arabic E-Publishing The Battle to Remain 14 Could Work Now 26 Relevant and Profitable Read Publishing Perspectives by Ramy Habeeb by Jane Tappuni Read our daily coverage of the Chinese Licensing More Open Access: international publishing industry, 15 Children’s Books from UK 27 The Journey So Far media trends, and tech updates: by Liz Bury by Rob Johnson publishingpespectives.com Inside Guide: How One UK Subscribe to our daily email 16 Agency Places Its Writers editions, digital monthly magazine by Andrew Lownie AUDIOBOOKS and event updates for FREE at: publishingperspectives.com/ 31 The Audio Self-Publishing subscribe Revolution Beckons by Donald Katz Publishing Perspectives • April 2014 • 3 NEWS & UPDATES / International British Council Honors Digital Publishing Entrepreneurs his year at the London Book Fair, seven creative himself (he says he can’t draw to Ricardo Almeida Tinternational entrepreneurs have been save his life!), he is passionate about the selected by the British Council to be hon- problem-solving and solution process be- ored to compete for the “International Book hind creative thinking. His plans for 10and5 Industry Excellence Awards.” The honorees stretch beyond just a publishing business highlight the wide range of talent, focus, and and aims to grow into a single point of refer- vision that is being applied to digital pub- ence for all creative output in South Africa. lishing across the globe—from China to the www.10and5.com Middle East, Africa to South America. The entrepreneurs shortlisted for the Irina Sheveleva | Russia award (though all of them are winners in our Irina is the Product and Content Lead of book) are: Bookmate, the largest distributor of Russian e-books, with more than 300 Russian pub- Dai Qin | China lishers on board. www.bookmate.com In 2012 Dai Qin and her team started Uno DeWaal the digital publishing and reading service, Iman Ben Chaibah | United Arab Emirates Douban Read. The platform encourages Iman Ben Chaibah is Owner and Editor- non-professional writers to publish their only independent Emirati online monthly been downloaded by more than four million magazinein-Chief of written SailEMagazine.com, in English and the created first and by peoplenon-fiction across work. the Theworld Douban with 400,000 Read app active has UAE nationals. www.SailEMagazine.com monthly users. www.read.douban.com Johanna Pinzon Rodriguez | Columbia Ricardo Almeida | Brazil Johanna is the Founder and CEO of Po- Ricardo Almeida is President at Clube liedro, which started in 2012 in Bogotá. The - company has two branches: the Poliedro lishing company. With no previous experi- Foundation, working on design and con- encede Autores, in publishing, Brazil’s firstAlmeida and largestlaunched self-pub Clube tent development projects for the arts with Irina Sheveleva de Autores in 2009, sensing an opportunity a focus on innovation and tech culture; and to develop an open platform so that writers Poliedro Digital SAS, an agency offering cre- could publish, sell, and earn money through ative digital solutions for brands, including their own books.