Gatekeepers
There is a vexing preconception among traditionally-published authors, one that I’ve occasionally been guilty of too: the idea that there are leagues in writing, and that some authors belong here or there, not based on the quality of their output but according to how their books reach an audience. Because publishing the traditional way entails overcoming obstacles (agents, acquisition teams, editors, and so on)1, it is often assumed that a book published in this fashion is a priori better than a self-published one. If you look at Amazon KDP — that cesspit of badly-typeset atrocities dressed in covers put together with Microsoft Word — it is tempting to agree: self-publishing does stink of bad literature. But so does traditional publishing, and not always with nicer covers. If you don’t believe me take a look at any bestsellers list and marvel at the stultifying putrefaction of what you’ll find.
What this preconception reveals, more than the state of literature today is our addiction to gatekeepers. Gatekeeping may have sounded convincing when it at least pretended to be about the mythical creature known as Merit, but in 2023 any fool with time to start a literary prize, or with enough family support to work for a couple of years for peanuts at a publishing house, or with enough disposable income to launch a magazine can become a gatekeeper. I speak from experience, having edited a literary journal for ten years, getting to decide many times who gets published or not — I’m both proud and mortified to say I published many writers for the first time, many of whom went on to release books the traditional way. It was a small indie operation, and my power very limited, but how the hell did I end up making those calls? Who appointed me? No one — I just happened to have some spare cash and launched a magazine. In other words, I appointed myself and then some took me seriously and then things took a life of their own... In my defence, gatekeeping is always about self-appointment, whether we’re talking about an e-mag, one of the five big publishers, or a literary prize — gatekeepers see it as only natural to open or close the gate. And at least my moral compass started to work in the end and I escaped from this gatekeeping business hanging my head in shame.
Should it be a free for all then? Is all literary production the same? Not necessarily — this is where criticism has a role to play. Criticism, which unlike gatekeeping, is a collective discourse that is constantly being negotiated and rewritten. Brutally-honest criticism is a creative force that should be put to work more often these days of being nice (online) to all sort of shit. So, what I’m ranting about today isn’t critical red lines, but the snobbish idea that self-published books are necessarily lesser than those traditionally-published. And vice versa. Don’t forget the vice versa.
There’s no natural way to release a book
Swann’s Way, by Marcel Proust; A Christmas Carrol, by Charles Dickens; Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen. Three very different books, three classics, the three of them self-published, for different reasons but self-published nevertheless2. You might like these books or not but you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who doesn’t agree that there are timeless, regardless of how they first reached an audience.