Nonduality.com Publications
Submissions: Accepting books on nonduality, publishing, and workplace skills. Open to other areas. I publish e-books in .pdf format. Write Jerry Katz at jerry@nonduality.com.
I have published one title so far and a few scheduled to appear this year.
Titles
How to Edit, Create, or Write an
Anthology: A collection of links to articles, with excerpts
Edited by Jerry Katz
Version 08June2009 (all links checked)
$9.95 Downloadable e-book (.pdf file). 13 pages.
Ordering
details and excerpt
$9.95 Downloadable e-book. 13 pages. Pay by PayPal. You will receive a link for an immediate download. The document is in .pdf format. Buy now
The purpose of this publication is to familiarize you with anthology editing and building.
“How do I put together an anthology of writings?” “Should I create an anthology?” “What’s involved in putting together an anthology of writings?”
This will give you valuable insights.
I did not intend to include articles on editing of the text, writing, acquiring permissions, publication, marketing, or sales. These topics, however, are touched upon in some articles.
This paper is about the heart, soul, and work of the anthologist.
It is intended for people who are thinking about, involved in, or about to edit an anthology.
I guarantee the links are fresh and that my work will save you hours of research time. Order now and become a smarter and wiser anthologist.
The cost is $9.95. Pay by PayPal. You will receive a link for an immediate download. The document is in .pdf format.
Read the first couple of pages:
Two big encounters you must face
1. Getting permissions. This can be easy as pie, as when I needed a last-minute permission from an author who got back to me within hours with a positive response. Or it can be frustrating, as when the publisher at a certain press kept accepting my several phone calls and would chat with me, but refused to say yes or no. He simply waffled and waffled and waffled. I contacted the book’s author. She had the same experience. The publisher would not commit.
Getting permission can be expensive. It usually depends on how large your printing is. In my book, One: Essential Writings on Nonduality, which had only 1500 copies in its first printing (it is in its third printing), a publisher wanted $100 to print a few lines of a poem by a fairly well-known author. Many authors/publishers didn’t charge anything. Some charged around $200 for entire chapters, a fair price I thought.
Some publishers tried very hard to get permissions, without
success. One of the largest publishers in the world went out of
their way to locate an author’s family in
I received a very difficult permission upon catching the publisher at just the right time and in just the right mood.
Every experience with gaining permission to reprint is different. That’s why there are houses that specialize in getting permissions. It is a career unto itself that depends on know-how, negotiation skills, legal and publishing background, and industry connections.
Because each experience in getting permissions was unique, I enjoyed it, overall. It was fascinating.
2. The impossibility of including everything and everyone you like, and the edge that can place on friendships and working relationships. Often the decision of what to include in an anthology is not in your hands. The editor or publisher will make those final decisions.
For my book I invited a dozen or so authors to either submit writings or to allow me to reprint from their works. Only one of those people was featured in the book. The people not featured included household names in the spirituality world. However, even if I were spare in selecting contributors, disappointments would occur. It cannot be avoided.
Why were invited authors not included in the anthology? Common reasons include space limitations, failure to receive permission to reprint, contract disagreements, refinement of the vision as the anthology reveals itself, and complication or repetition of a theme.
Part Two
Links with brief comments and excerpts.
[Bold text is mine and not that of the original
author.]
For history, read the Wikipedia article, Anthology.
Excerpt:
“The word derives from the Greek word for garland — or
bouquet of flowers — which was the title of the earliest
surviving anthology, assembled by Meleager of Gadara.
Meleager’s
How to Create a Poetry Anthology gives simple, concise steps applicable to any anthology. A good beginning article.
Excerpt: “Step 3 — Review the submissions carefully. Each entry needs to match the tone and theme of your poetry anthology. If it doesn’t, don’t include it. Send acceptance and rejection letters to the contributors. Include a personal note on each rejection letter if possible. Step4 — Create a master file containing accepted submissions complete with each author’s biography. Back up this file so it is not lost when Murphy’s Law takes over.
Anthology Books and Stories: Getting your personal essay into an anthology compilation, covers rights, payments, expenses, and benefits of appearing in an anthology.
Excerpt: “…with respect to Chicken Soup for the Soul Series…true, they take all rights and only pay $300 while their marketing tactics reap the rewards for years and dollars to come. But when you write an article, on a work-for-hire basis (as a copywriter), you give up all rights for the same $300. At least with Chicken Soup for the Soul, you have your byline, which can often gain you more writing assignments elsewhere—work-for-hire assignments do not allow you a byline.”
Publish an Anthology: How it’s done gives general publishing advice within an excellent website on writing that emphasizes anthologies. This web page asks, “How does a writing group put together an anthology that gets reviewed, sells copies, and even turns a profit?”
Excerpt: “Don’t put together a mishmash of crap
(poetry mixed with fiction and nonfiction and biographies and God
knows what else). Find a theme that works. For instance, we stuck
with the
How to Edit an Anthology, by Gary Bowen, gives 14 short reality shots.
Excerpt: “Fourth: Produce guidelines, outlining everything the potential contributors need to know, including place to send paper submissions and paper queries. Good outlines get the right kind of fiction on time with a minimum of paperwork hassle. Distribute the guidelines–this means getting the guidelines to the people you want to have them; generally speaking workshops do not have a wide enough base of skilled enough participation. Your workshop may be different. Send copies of guidelines to your agent.
“Fifth: Harvest your crop of mail, crosscheck failed addresses, log your submissions, read and answer your submission as promptly as possible. Juggle submissions for length, style, subject, tone, etc., until you have enough words to fulfill your contract while reinforcing and highlighting one another. The sum of the parts should be greater than the whole. Think deeply about the impact your anthology is going to have on the reader, and tailor acceptances and rewrites to enhance that. A synergy develops in a good anthology in which ideas feed off of one another, and writers expand the concept in ways the editor didn’t envision. The editor must prune off distracting tangents, no matter how well written, and strengthen the core ideas. Let your agent review the manuscript.”
This has been a sample of only a few of the links and excerpts in....
How to Edit,
Create, or Write an Anthology: A collection of links to articles,
with excerpts
Edited by Jerry Katz
Version 08June2009 (all links checked)
The cost is $9.95. Pay by PayPal. You will receive a link for an immediate download. The document is in .pdf format. Order now.