LeafSalon lives! Yes sirree, despite the fact that we’ve moved over the ditch to the big smoke of Sydney your emails have convinced me at the very least to delegate. Our first new contributor is Henry Feltham (pictured, right) who has recently been blogging on NZ Book Month and who also was one of the first winners of The Six Pack. Some of you (or many of you, judging by last years whopping submissions bag) will now be agonising over your Six Pack entry, so take heart from Henry's humbling admission of personal discouragement and its antidote, and forge ahead. I’ll be back on board very soon with a trans-Tasman missive – I'm going to be seeing Paul Auster with Siri Hustvedt next week as well as the marvelous Ian McEwen at the Opera House and I'm sure you'd like to hear about that. Indeed, there are advantages in the Sydney life, although I hear Ian is coming to Wellington too! Wow. But now it's over to Henry. And if anyone else feels they need a literary voice here on LeafSalon, just drop me a line. We'd all love to hear from you.
Nothing bleeds a writer of ambition more than working in a publishing house. I was 22, I think, maybe 23, and had just come back from living in Kenya with my girlfriend. The world looked deeply strange to me, and I needed a job that could accommodate this.
I found it.
The operation was a one-man outfit, run by the father of a friend of mine. He didn't mean to do all the work, it just turned out that way, being orbited as he was by a constellation of bit players who seldom lived up to the tasks required of them. That I did live up to it still astonishes me, and I can only thank the fates that I was granted the needed epiphany at the needed time. I won't name him, but I think many of the people who read this blog will figure it out regardless. He's about six foot, silver haired, with a penchant for hats, and he remains a unique force in New Zealand literature: a perverse mentor to students of the dark art of publishing, variously champion and nemesis to a host of second tier writers, and a past-master of hors d'ouvres subsistence.
I was hired more or less on the spot, possibly because I mentioned Leonard Cohen, or else out of desperation, or simply because his policy was to give all comers an opportunity. It was the worst paid but most valuable job I've ever landed. Certainly it put a few scratches in my literary lens, but it instilled a work ethic that might otherwise have continued to evade me.
The tasks were diffuse, but included refusing manuscripts, copy-editing, inputting other editor's changes, selling excess stock, and anything else that might be required. In hindsight, that last stipulation should have been asterisked, because 'anything else' could have been printed on my business card – which actually said 'Editor'. I arranged book launches, wrote copy, organised printing and financing, placated grizzled authors (whose deranged expectations don't even bear witnessing), and read a lot of astonishingly bad poetry.
At first I was little useless, tending to justify myself when things exploded, books vanished or authors cried, but then came the epiphany I foreshadowed so gently above. It went something like: No-one cares why it didn't work, they just want you to fix it. Which has since become my mantra, insofar as mantras do anything more than annoy the person next to you.
We published everything New Zealand had to offer, hoping there was a dollar in it though often there wasn't. Biographies, poetry, histories, the odd novel, some of it excrable, but often the questionable-though-lucrative elements paid for the more charming, marginal pieces. In 2003, for instance, we put out something like 30 books, my boss-mentor doing the greater part, though no longer single-handedly.
This meant roughly 30 book launches. A passage from my notebook of the time reads:
'I realised I wasn't a writer whilst standing among other writers, at the launch of a book that never made a second printing; a room full of nervous fingers and glasses clutched to chests, conscious that my eyes weren't flickering eidetically, too happy in myself to wring my thoughts onto paper. I saw, beneath speeches, that I was unlikely to find the capacity for internalisation that most of these people cultivated like bonsai. There were too few inner schisms, tracks on my mind's arm, to bear before whatever eyes guarded the door to their clubhouse.'
I cringe a little at these words, not just the syntax, but because they're full of two decade's irony without the honest feeling to accompany them. Though feeling is perhaps what I was writing about (and certainly it bears witness to a certain amount of internalisation), it misses the point pretty widely. The sight of Damien Wilkins and whoeverthehellelse toasting the newest entrant to the Club of the Published had left me feeling blunt and simple, as though I was the only person in the room without an inner monologue, a self-activated recorder from which arose the endless scree of books I found myself celebrating on these straggly Tuesday or Thursday nights.
I seem to remember it was Unity Books this time, and I was trying to say something witty to Harry Rickets, who laughed as though he'd made the joke, and not me. The venom I felt swirling was, I think, the beginnings of my sense that I thrive most as a writer while away from other authors. That I am discouraged by the sight of my competition. That a writing class would have exactly the opposite effect it was intended to. But it took another fifteen or twenty book launches for me to figure this out.
Eventually I abandoned my publisher friend to his shaky empire, and moved to rural New Zealand. I stopped thinking about what everyone else was writing, or how. And just wrote. And I realised what I should have known from the outset, but what I'd needed to disentangle myself from the morass of New Zealand publishing and move about as far away from the Institute of Modern Letters as possible to notice: there is no such thing as a writer.
*I discovered there is a species of poet who writes poetry without ever deigning to read anyone else's, which is the literary equivilent of a crime against humanity**. I am willing to believe in the most obscure quantum theories if it means that somewhere, in a divergent universe, these people are being put through a kind of poetaster's Nuremberg.
** Crime Against Humility?
29 Feb 08 | Filed by Kathy | Add your comment (13 so far)
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Comment by maggie ~ March 1, 2008 2:42 PM
Henry - I recall when you were just a baby - so that dates me. Anyway, I applaud your unflinching honesty about the difficulties of being a writer and negotiating the literary world and its inhabitants. It is at first hugely thrilling and flattering to be in the orbit of successful writers, but in the end, that in itself can be a serious distraction. But, it is of ocurse a fine balance. Because within that orbit lie potential mentors, people who inspire and people to envy. I heard Dame Fiona on Nine to Noon this week speak of her close relationship with Lauris Edmond and then, how, they needed to separate to go on their separate literary paths for a time and then re-united with a renewed and different friendship. How lucky for them.
And...I'm just thrilled that Kathy has decided she can keep this thing alive from across the Tasman. So how about anyone else?
Comment by maggie ~ March 1, 2008 4:25 PM
Oh dear.. one more thing... at the risk of sounding sycophantic (it has been said before). I feel I must add that I cannot imagine Harry Rickets ever being anything other than kind and supportive to young aspiring writers.
Comment by mary mac ~ March 3, 2008 11:13 AM
Great to see you back Kathy -- as effervescent as ever -- and Maggie too! A great post from Henry. I agree that being surrounded by books and the bookish can be a mixed blessing. I get a similar feeling at the bookshop where I work -- seeing the sheer volume of books being produced (some of it so brilliant and inventive) and then the number that don't sell well (however brilliant and inventive). Those volumes of short stories! The poetry! The languising first NZ novel! It saps the confidence somewhat and confidence is what you need to be a writer. So yes, getting ye to a country retreat to recollect in tranquillity sans books, sans authors, can be a solution. Though after a while I know I'd start to yearn for a fix of the very thing I'd eshewed. All power to you, Henry, and good luck with the writing.
Comment by Islander ~ March 4, 2008 8:00 PM
Well, sort of intriguing ( and yes, most of us recognise the publisher - his hazards were also other people's) but - given your nice isolation from Llit stuff (which I practise also, and thoroughly reccommend)- what have you done since?
You see, I am a total sceptic apropos the Six-pack: it most totally is a booksellers' gambit and really nothing to do with writers (or readers much either.) So Henry, how have you found writing life after the 6-pk thingy?
Kathy - W00t! Great your're back, but I think you'll find that lack of feet on the Aotearoan ground will mean the ambience here will - well, at least, change...
marymac & maggie - good people, due to family death, illness, and hardship, I STILL havent read read your estimiable nooks! Gimme some nice illness&accident free months, and I'll respond as the novels deserve -
meanwhile, kia ora tatou katoa-
Comment by Henry Eponymous ~ March 6, 2008 8:27 PM
Um ... Islander ... you are fantastic. I love it. Yes, Six Pack is most TOTALLY a bookseller's gambit. Without a doubt. The only thing I can think of - off the top of my head - which exceeds that brazen attempt to lure audiences away from their televisions is the Booker Prize. Now THERE is a gambit. It's more about the pennies than the prose, to be sure ... And as for what I've written since those meretricious days, well, there's been three screenplays (produced), a mediocre collection of stories, and half a novel (interrupted by aforementioned screenplays but will most certainly be finished by the end of this decade) and ... hang on ... Who asked that question? You're not Keri Hulme, are you? A writer famed for the absence of any second act? That would be a fairly stunning piece of hypocrisy. So I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume you're someone else.
Comment by Kingi ~ March 7, 2008 10:44 AM
Ouch! I felt that and I'm not even the intended recipient. Be gentle with us please, Henry.
I've seen Islander's comments here for quite some time - and really value the input that she has made - here - regardless of what other work she may have written elsewhere or may do in the future.
I didn't read her question quite as harshly as you appear to have felt it. It's fantastic that you've gone on to write more. That's something I wanted to read about also. The thing for me that gets my vote for the Booker Prize for me and for the 6 pack is that they help booksellers sell books. If that helps booksellers and writers make a living I'm all for it.
Cheers,
Kingi - who won a free shirt in a Limerick competition when aged 10yrs (true!) giving me the confidence to go on writing poetry until adulthood.
Comment by maggie ~ March 8, 2008 8:22 PM
Henry - I know your Mum taught you good manners.
You have missed the point.
What happens after the Six-Pack is the same question as what happens after the Booker Prize?
You had empathy, and you snubbed it.
I privately agreed with Islander (coward that I am) about the Six-Pack - I have some misgivings about the funding going into this intiative - but hey, you were a winner - and you sound a little as if you needed that affirmation - so it worked.
I recall saying to a group of writing friends that I was worried about Lloyd if we won the Booker (and they all laughed their heads off... and promised me that I shouldn't concern myself if they won the Booker).
But I have to say, in terms of achievement, it is, lets face it, the top prize more or less. And what do you do after that.
Come out rowing like Rob Waddell...
Hmmm..
Our egos and our craft are inseparable in many ways, but our craft has to survive and outdo the ego.
Enough - I looked back on previous blogs and realised that this tiff has an earlier incarnation.
I think Leafsalon is exciting when we have disagreements, but sad when we fall out.
Comment by Islander ~ March 11, 2008 5:47 PM
Henry Eponymous - I was truly interested in what you had produced- so, the mediocre short stories: where can I read them? The '3 screenplays' - for what? Produced? Actually in film/video land?On your hard disc?
Personally, I dont think any comparison can be made between "The Six-Pack" (entry fees & limited to New Zealand) and the erstwhile Booker-McConnelll award (Commonwealth-wide publishers entering what they think are their best goers with no cost for authors and an INTERNATIONAL platform for ongoing publications (of all kinds.)) If I was feeling mean, I'd say your comparisons are childish, and - in that sense- silly. (Go check a good dictionary.
Comment by tallulahbelle ~ March 12, 2008 5:56 PM
I like this entry. It's not mealy-mouthed and not afraid to say what it really thinks. The NZ writing production line is often too nice and incestuous, because everyone knows each other and is part of the 'club' which locks out all outsiders and dissenters. It's great to finally let off steam and have people saying what they really think instead of all this hidden resentment with a nicey-nice mask on the front. Anyway the bone people was rubbish.
Comment by curtbutnotshort ~ March 13, 2008 10:03 AM
Great. Life at leafsalon again. Also excellent to see that passion has not waned in its hiatus. One small thing on Bookmonth; it was my understanding that the booksellers do not receive any money from the sale of the 6-pack. Surely any propmotional campaign that stalls the decent of the bookshop into a depository of coffe table adornements must be good (its got to be better than throwing turkeys out of a plane for Thanksgiving).
Comment by Chris ~ March 14, 2008 12:53 PM
Four typos in that last comment, Curt. Standards are slipping.
Comment by Henry Eponymous ~ March 16, 2008 9:20 AM
Ms. Islander, I am sorry if I read your comment at a slant. It was the remark about the Six Pack having nothing to do with writers or readers that tripped me. It seemed ... odd. I still fail to see any difference, beyond scale, between the 6 Pack and what has now become the Man Booker (the transformation itself being indicative), but did not actually mean to demean anyone. Money is at the back of all of this; readers (and writers) benefit almost incidentally, though benefit we do, in the way that frypans benefit from space shutles ... As for what I've written prosewise, I'll happily send you some, if you would like. Kathy will give you my email (rather than posting it ... here ... though, now I think about it, anyone who wants it is welcome to it). And therein, if you subject yourself to such a thing, I will delightedly bore you with my current employ, which is a strange creature indeed, and involves writing screenplays for something that's not quite a film, and not quite a computer game ... And once again, apologies for the apparent harshness of my reply. I actually thought I was trying to be funny. I had been deflected. And to Maggie, my dearling, I think YOUR mother raised you better than to bring people's mothers into things ... Ha ha ... (How do you know her, incidentally?)
(I've scanned this one for grevious insults. It doesn't SEEM to contain any. But if I missed something - I am sorry in advance - I didn't mean it/meant it differently/was feeling puerile ...)
Comment by Islander ~ March 16, 2008 5:30 PM
Henry E - as a person who relishes cg'd material (and appreciats the scripting that goes behind it, altho' I am not a gamer in any sense) I'd really enjoy further communication.
OK, fair enough comment about 'benefits neither readers nor writers': let me expand it.
Booker winners
*already have contracts - some contracts may have loopholes but they do provide security for anything the writer - or agent- has sought to protect.
*Do "Six Pack" winners have similar protection? (Audio and dramatisation rights? E-access?) What about continuing royalty payments? (At least one 6pack book has been reprinted.)
*By the time writers win something like a Booker, they generally have a track record. At least 2 people have won the thing with a first novel - but other writings were before the reading public beforehand.
*The one really positive point I thought was going to happen with the "Six Pack" was - window for new writers (I vividly remember how few there were, decades ago.) BUT- with the true sorters and judges being anonymous (always a no-no in a literary competition) - and v. few newcomers turning up so far - one wonders how much readers are gaining? There are a distressing number of "Six Packs" turning up as secondhand or garage sale or simply discard books-
and maggie - really good to read your comments pm'd & otherwise because the blessing & detriment of being a writer in ANZ is - yep, we do get to know each other.
pm us if you feel like further conversation Henry E- Islander, who is neither puerile nor silly but who truly appreciates etymology & changing language & civil responses (except when something snarly is called for!)
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