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| Hearsay: |
This Guardian blogger writes on how we love indy music and film, but can’t seem to accept indy writers. Why is that? My theory is it’s because most of them are gravel-pit ugly. Just kidding. (no he’s not) Really, I am. (uh-uh) Truly, a joke’s a joke. (… … … *cough*ugly!*cough*…) I kid because I love. (no, really, he hates) And love is what makes the world go round. (that and a collision with a passing celestial body early in the planetary development phase of our solar system). You know what I mean.
Doing it yourself is to be much admired in music and cinema. That mainstay of Hollywood, Robert Redford, was so enamoured by the growing movement of indie cinema in the United States that he set up the Sundance Festival to give the film-makers an outlet and an audience.
Without indie music, there would be no Smiths, no Happy Mondays, no Kylie, even (she was on Stock, Aitken and Waterman’s own indie label, PWL). Without indie cinema, there would be no Reservoir Dogs, no Ghost World, no Night of the Living Dead. Without indie publishing there would be no … who? Who are the big indie writers, those who refuse to compromise by not allowing The Man to dictate what and how they should write, and earn massive respect because of it?
The literary world only bestows acceptance, it seems, on those who are published through the traditional avenues. Independent and small presses get short shrift – national newspaper supplements seem loath to review indie books, the big high street sellers won’t stock them, unless the books are about the tough lives of mill girls or histories of public house names, which can be shoved on a shelf marked “local interest”.
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June 25th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Um. Jim Munroe?
June 25th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
The problem is, reading is a solitary act, not that of a group. You can’t put the latest independant novel on speakers while the party rages, who have to give the book to one. person. at. a. time.
And as readers are usually a quiet sort of people, it can be hard to create the mania that a new band can create.
June 25th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
I think I will strive to get a mosh pit together at the next author reading I attend.
June 25th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
I’m going to that reading, Corey. absolutely.
June 26th, 2008 at 3:01 am
George,
Good post. What is needed are more things that generate buzz among indie writers. With indie music (well indie, indie, not fabricated for mass consumption indie) it was also a few listeners at a time to start with. But even with eager fans spreading the word and small clubs booking gigs, it would have been hard for an indie band to make it without contracts, reviews in papers and scouts looking for the next big thing. Slumming pubs and clubs to discover an unknown band had a romantic, cool edge to it. Where publishing trends runs opposite. If you publish small (the thought goes) the big boys don’t want you.
It is a shame there are few reviewers and bookstores stocking small presses and looking for new voices. They seem to be happy enough with the banal, mainstream fiction being churned out by the larger presses. Pity, both for readers and writers alike.
June 26th, 2008 at 7:45 am
I don’t think the truly independent cinema and music gets anymore exposure than independent letters. The Smiths became pretty
mainstream and Tarantino is a brand.
June 26th, 2008 at 9:11 pm
With music and films, most truly indie (what would be called in the book world self-published) creators are huge geeks: geeks about technique & process, why you have to use proper lighting and microphone placement, geeks also about the distibution side of things, willing to jump through all the requisite hoops and able (if the film or record is a flop) to understand that it probably had to do with having produced a ridiculously inferior piece of art and/or promoted it with insufficient zeal. They’re also collaborative artforms (usually).
With writers, it’s all about “self-expression.” I recall a sales conference wherein it was revealed that a prominent Native writer had refused any form of editing on her book, including copyediting and proofreading because it would have quashed her “authentic identity.” There are many, many others who are simply too illiterate to understand that basic editing, design and typographic principles, as well as the conventional forms of book production _must_ be followed. When your unreadable spine in sixteen fonts is printed bottom-to-top, your chances of becoming the indie Dan Brown just fell through the floor. The journey from “writer” to “author” depends on a lot more than simply having enough dough to shell out for a BlitzPrinted version of your typescript.
It’s not just the authors who’re ugly, George; have you seen the books?
(PS – excellently produced indie [i.e. small-press] stuff can have just as much cool cachet as indie [i.e. small-label] music does; it’s just on a smaller scale. Think about outfits like Coach House or the old Anansi or Pulp Press in its heyday [or New Directions or City Lights]; there’s some rock’n'roll sexy there.)
June 28th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
@LS: Your post is just full of generalizations. I’ve seen just as many indie “musicians” uphold their “artistic integrity” as I have indie writers actually care about craft and process. In the interest of full disclosure, I am, right now, the latter; I published my own book via Lulu. I wasn’t interested in expressing myself; I’ve a blog for that. In addition, I was an editor for three years, so I learned lay-out, design, and etc.
Don’t take my word for it though; check it out at Lulu (the e-book is free).
Which pretty much sums up my response to this post overall. Sure, some self-published books are adventures in amateurism at best and–well, worse, at worst. And yes, the best examples of self-published books are few and far between. But then again, the best examples of any books are few and far between, because 90% of everything is crap, and that final 10% differs from person to person.