1616: The World in Motion is a brilliant creative examination and interpretation of the developed world’s recent history: east, middle, and west. In the seventeenth century, a sailing trip from London to Asia meant a year or more out of touch. Religion was about getting into a program that guaranteed you for eternity—one’s permanent status in the universe was at stake—and world population was one tenth of what it is now. Life was rich and intense. Christensen argues that there was already a global economy and a kind of Eastern Enlightenment in the works, as well as Occidental early science. He documents the affluence of the main civilizations of East Asia, South Asia, the Near East, and Western Europe and the significant colonial civilization in Central and South America. It is a treasure of plates of art and maps alone. The human future might hope to be a world like 1666 but with electricity. Back to that 90% lower population would leave room for solar panels, whales, Siberian tigers, cranes, dragons, and saints.

— Gary Snyder

This will probably be all the blurb work I’ll be doing until I get the ms. cleaned up and into galleys, when I’ll do another round.

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Third blurb in

In 1616: The World in Motion, Christensen conducts a horizontal survey of the world—the entire globe—at a single point in time. With a masterful command of facts and data, he ties together events in a brisk narrative, revealing a world “in motion,” vibrant with remarkable solutions, activities, and individuals. He shows how separate threads affected one another, transformed discourse, and contributed to the development of a truly global culture fully four centuries ago.

– Emily Sano, director emeritus, Asian Art Museum, San Francisco

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Second blurb in

You might have seen Peter on the Daily Show:

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First blurb in

I thought it would be good to have some blurbs for the sales catalogue, but I haven’t finished writing the book yet. Given that, how could I get blurbs within just two weeks? (Later on it should be a little easier to get some.)

I ended up asking three people who I thought might be generous enough to look at the almost-complete manuscript and offer a comment on an accelerated timeline. Stay tuned to see if blurbs come in over the next couple of weeks.

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Blurb watch

This ad, which to me sounds more like some kind of stunt than a typical scam, has been removed from Craigslist. Certainly it’s not a “new and better way” of getting blurbs. Blurbing is already largely corrupt, and it’s not at all difficult to get jacket blurbs without going to all this trouble.

Book Reviewer: $150 – $1500 (Telecommute)
Prepublication book reviews needed for literary novel.

I am an Author and Professor of English in Austin, Texas. I also own a small publishing company. I am currently seeking prepublication reviews for a novel set for publication at the end of next month (February 2011). If your review is favorable, I would like to include a blurb from it on the back cover of the novel.

I am an advocate of finding new and better ways to accomplish common tasks. The old way of seeking prepublication reviews is to send galley proofs (Advance Reading Copies – ARC) out into the abyss of the mainstream media to compete in the mailboxes of those organizations with the one thousand other books they received that day. To me, that sounds like the definition of insanity.

If you are a book critic, an author, a university professor, a member of the media, a blogger, a review writer, a representative of an independent bookstore, or anyone with high literary credentials, I will pay you between $150 and $1500 for your review. Those with higher credentials will receive a higher stipend.

Of course, your review should be honest. Just because this is a paid review does not mean that you have to review the novel favorably; however, I certainly hope that you like the book. If your review is negative, I will not be using any portion of it on the back cover of my novel, on my website, or anywhere else.

Although I will not reveal the name of the novel or the synopsis in this ad, I will tell you that it is literary fiction in the vein of Lolita, Blood Meridian, and Steppenwolf. The novel challenges organized religion and is left-leaning, but the overall message of the novel is one of peace, tolerance, and unity. The novel has been described as Less Than Zero meets Dead Poet’s Society.

I would expect you to read the novel and write a thoughtful evaluative review that is somewhere between 500 and 1500 words long. The review should not be merely summative. It should evaluate the novel, pointing out its strengths in the areas of style, theme, narrative, characterization, etc. It should also compare the novel and writing to other major writers and novels. Remember, this is a pre-publication review, so I am looking for blurbs to include on the back cover of the novel accompanied by your name and organization. Keep in mind that you must be authorized to use your organization’s name. I will also use your review and organization name on my website, in promotional materials, and I will ask you to post your review on Amazon.com.

If you feel you are a qualified reviewer and you are favorable to the type of novel outlined above, please respond to this ad with a list of your credentials. If I feel your credentials are adequate, I will contact you with the full details of the novel, and we can negotiate a stipend amount and a timetable for completion.

Although I will have to verify your credentials, the entire process will be confidential. No one will know that you were paid for your freelance review.

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“I am an advocate of finding new and better ways to accomplish common tasks”

“You must be here for the rebranding project.”

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(Submit your own here.)

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Caption

Now consider the second image, the logo of the Art Fund, which offered £80,000 toward the purchase of the Bassetti. Maybe not quite as gallery worthy. Unless you ask the Art Fund, as they insisted that in order for the museum to receive the funding their logo had to appear alongside the artwork. To his credit,Timothy Potts, the museum’s director, declined the gift, saying:

Logos are the currency of marketing and commerce and this introduces a promotional element into the galleries that we regard as an unnecessary and unacceptable distraction – no matter how worthy the object of promotion.

Here we see an unintended consequence of branding run amok — logos are proliferating like tribbles. These days there will be several of them on every copyright page I work on. Praise be to Mr. Potts for drawing the line at letting them into gallery labels!

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via David the Designer

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(He)art and commerce

In a distant kingdom long ago a prince was born. He grew up quickly, as children do, and soon the king and queen assembled the most talented people from throughout the realm to tutor the boy in all the arts and sciences. In time he became a man who was not just tall and handsome but also learned and cultured.

His father, the king, was a stern but forward-thinking ruler who encouraged the development of new technologies, and it resulted that his metal workers developed a new method of tempering steel blades that gave him a military advantage over neighboring kingdoms. Unfortunately for those kingdoms, the king was also a ruthless and fearsome man, who launched a campaign of conquest that saw him defeat his every opponent. His empire spread throughout the known world, and so he called himself no longer simply the king but the first emperor of what would become a great and powerful dynasty.

When the emperor would conquer a city he would instruct his generals to emblazon his mark on its walls and ramparts and all its important buildings. Because his empire had been built by the sword, his mark depicted a black boot holding down a howling head while a bloody blade sliced its neck. The emperor’s cruelty was legendary, and whenever the people saw his mark they recalled his terrors, and they trembled in fear.

The people endured decades of the emperor’s harsh rule, but in time he grew old and passed away, and the prince ascended the throne as the dynasty’s second emperor. To mark his ascension he toured his realm in a fine carriage marked with the empire’s fearsome logo. As before, when the people saw that frightening symbol and knew that the emperor was approaching they would flee and cower.

This disturbed the young emperor, who knew that he was handsome and cultured above all others, and who longed not just to be feared but also to be loved and admired. He assembled his ministers and asked them to propose a solution. They recommended that the emperor remove his father’s mark everywhere it appeared throughout the empire and replace it with a new one that would better express the new emperor’s vision.

A few dissented that such a program would be extremely expensive, and some questioned its effectiveness. But the emperor’s magicians assured him that if his artisans and ministers could get the new mark exactly right, all of the empire’s problems would be solved and the emperor and his subjects would surely live happily ever after.

Artists and philosophers from every corner of the land gathered in the capital and submitted their proposals. One of these appealed to the young emperor above all the rest. It depicted a pair of throbbing hearts, representing the love of the emperor for his subjects and their love for him.

“This is the mark, I choose,” he enthused, but before making a final decision he asked his inner circle of ministers their opinions. “It looks like a pair of twisted radishes,” some of them thought. “If we changed our policies,” thought others, “it would do more good than changing our symbol.” But everyone was afraid to contradict the emperor, and the decision was finalized to replace the old mark with this new one.

Throughout the empire the former mark was removed and the new one installed. The side panel of the emperor’s carriage was replaced with one bearing the new symbol, and the beaming young royal began a new tour of his realm. But when the people saw the carriage and knew that the emperor was approaching they would flee and cower, just as before. This disturbed the young emperor, but his ministers, disguising their worries, assured him that new brands simply take time to be effective.

Now, it so happened that in a country hovel another boy had been born on the very same day as the prince. What’s more, this boy resembled the prince strongly. The boy’s mother had been a great beauty, and some of their neighbors recalled how charmingly she had curtsied to the emperor when he had visited the area on a hunting excursion the same year his son was born.

That boy too grew tall and handsome. But he was anything but learned and cultured; in fact, he was illiterate and naive. But he a good lad, and even, in his own little part of the world, a famous one, for he was known for always telling the truth — in his entire life he had never even hinted at the slightest prevarication. As a result, people called him The Fool.

In time the emperor’s tour brought him to the fool’s hut, where he and his mother and his seventeen siblings eked out a hardscrabble existence raising radishes and other root crops. As the emperor’s carriage drew near, the fool pointed at the logo on its side panel and cried out, “Look! The emperor’s carriage is marked with a couple of twisted radishes, just like the ones we grow!”

At this the emperor flew into a rage. “It is not a picture of radishes!” he exclaimed. “It depicts entwined hearts, representing my love for my subjects and their love for me!” In his fury he ordered the farm to be burnt to the ground and the fool and his entire family to be buried up to their chins to slowly and painfully expire beneath the same blazing sun that had stunted their crops and kept them empoverished for so many years.

Then the emperor continued on his tour, his carriage still proudly bearing his new double heart symbol. And whenever the people saw his mark they recalled his terrors, and they trembled in fear.

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Image: the prince from “Sleeping Beauty,” by Walter Crane

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The Emperor’s New Brand

Today even whole countries get brands. Consider these national tourism logos. Start with Colombia. Is it trying to establish itself as the world radish center?

Okay, it says “Colombia is passion!” so I guess that’s a heart. A heart attack? A heart on fire? Open heart surgery? Well it’s scarlet, so it’s passionate.

In any case, the logo seems to have worked, because it appears the design firm tweaked it and resold it to Dubai.

If Colombia says passion, and Dubai says . . . something about hearts, what does Chile say? Excitement? Fireworks? A mugging?

Hey, Colombia, watch out! This branding business is cutthroat! I think Turkey wants to cut into the radish trade.

And Hungary also has designs on the heart market.

Well, that’s enough of this. it could go on forever — just ask the Dominican Republic.

I don’t know what that thing is. Do you?

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Some of the national brands are better than others. But one thing they all have in common — they didn’t come cheap. That’s because brands are the new snake oil — the suckers lap it up, and the branders rake it in.

Which of the national tourism logos do you think work best? What do you think of them as a whole? You can see the full set here.

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Nation brands

Hello, I think you are someone I met years ago, and you had a big (negative) impact on my life. I’m writing today to say hi, and to offer you a chance at karmic balancing.

On the other hand, you may not be the person I met years ago, in which case I sincerely apologize for sending you this email.

This is how I remember it: I was in my early twenties, a former Peace Corps Volunteer from [foreign country], and living in [U.S. city]. I had published in small ways, school and work newsletters, that sort of thing.

I met you at a reading or some other event, maybe at a bookstore. You were an editor for North Point Press. I had just written a book that I thought was going to help the Third World. You looked at it and said the writing was no good.

I was devastated and stopped showing my writing to others for ten years. I continued to write, of course — that’s what writers do, in spite of everything. I just felt really uncomfortable about writing and so I did it late at night, and accorded it no honor.

A key event in “getting over Tom Christensen telling me my writing sucks” were the letters I wrote home when I lived in [another foreign country]. I was there for [big news event], of course, and wrote feverish letters to a large audience back in the states.

People photocopied my letters and passed them around to friends and family. [Later], I got a letter from a woman I’d never met (still haven’t), a young [woman] in [U.S. state].  She had received a photocopy of one of my letters and said it had changed her life. I’m not sure why or how.

Still, it took the hand of God to get me to publish. [Later], I  [experienced a personal tragedy]. My time had suddenly become meaningless — of what use is the time of a [person in my situation]? So, I used my time to write for real, to invest myself in my writing. To my great surprise, that piece was almost immediately published and it become something of a cause celebre.

I guess I slowly came to realize that you, or the message I heard you deliver — “Your writing sucks / you have no talent / go bury yourself somewhere” — Perhaps you did not say exactly that but that is what I heard — was incorrect. People liked my writing, found it worthy. I should keep writing.

And, so, I did.

I have no hard feelings against you. You may not even be the person I met, although what I’ve turned up on the web seems to indicate that you were that person.

I’m writing now because I’ve written a book I’m trying to get published, and, from your webpage, you seem very knowledgeable. Please look at my query letter, below, and if you have any advice to offer, please do offer it. If not, have a nice day.

I am writing to this person, but I fear the gesture will do little to balance my karma, as the cover letter seems mostly fine as is.

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A ruined life?

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Should publishing be open?

Today’s guest post at ForeWord Magazine is about how book publishers can increase traffic to their websites.

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Driving traffic

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Internet book marketing

Getty Images has come up with an odd, inventive, and intriguing take on the streaming music service (pandora, last fm, etc.). Getty’s Moodstream combines audio with shifting still and video images. The user dials up a “mood” by adjusting sliders for such qualities as “happy” vs. “sad,” “calm” vs. “lively,” and so on. (Or you can choose from presets.)

Moodstream is intended as a promotional tool. Getty hopes that creative people will use it as a brainstorming tool and end up licensing some of the images. Certainly Getty is rich in excellent stock images. Unfortunately, the music is the weak link, and I suspect after the site’s novelty has faded the comparatively insipid music will not be good enough to attract a sizable audience.

Still, it’s an interesting concept, and one worth checking out.

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Never the same stream twice

• Read at Work : amusing
• The all-important author photo : lessons from Capote
• It’s difficult to talk coherently about typefaces without some sense of the history of typography
• Nipplephobia : watch out, they’re coming to get you
• Books flying off the shelves in Spain
• PhotoShop line art trick : should work
• Second guessing Google : what makes a good favicon?
• The saddest post I have read in a long time

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Friday Roundup

Want to bribe the New York Times Book Review into reviewing your book? If so, you’ll have to come up with something better than these examples of book review swag.

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Publishing payola

Book publishing has always been a little backward in some aspects of marketing. For example, while a graphic designer might produce several covers for a book, these are usually reviewed only by a select group of decision makers involved with its production and marketing. I’m not aware of many focus group tests, even for titles that will be receiving massive resources.

Now Bantam Dell is running an online poll to help choose among three different covers for the paperback edition of Ian Ayres’ Super Crunchers (which “explores how detail-rich data and our increasing ability to ‘crunch’ information is changing the way we live”). I suppose it’s a positive step, although I’m not sure that online votes correspond directly to potential sales.

In an extravagant gesture, Bantam Dell will give a free trade paperback copy of the book to twenty lucky winners (a value to the publisher of perhaps a dollar per book in direct production costs, so they are committing some $20 to prizes an an inducement for people to vote) — this is announced by a huge red checkmark together with the words (all caps) ENTER TO WIN, followed by a screamer. I can’t imagine this kind of overselling is effective.

Is one of these covers better than the others?

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via Buzz, Balls, and Hype

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Market testing book covers

Italy produced some of the boldest op art ads, such as these ads for a film festival, left, and a design company, Alfieri & Lacroix, right.

Examples from the U.S. include ads for Fresh Start (whatever that is), left, and Ford Fairlane, right.

Some of the quirkiest examples come from Japan, such as this (completely inappropriate) Yukio Mishima ad, left, and a book or movie called A La Maison de Civecawa, right.

These examples are drawn from Pink Ponk’s 1950s-1970s advertising set on Flickr.

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Op ads

But focusing on branding can deflect attention from the products the brands are supposed to support. Branding has become so much a part of the contemporary ethos that its metaphorical origin as a stamp to identify cattle headed to the slaughterhouse has been forgotten. As brands become more important than products, we are more and more selling the idea of things rather than things themselves. (Naomi Klein has written about this in No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies.)

What I most hate about “branding” is the magical thinking it represents. Marketers and their clients believe that if they can get the brand just right, all their problems will miraculously disappear. NeurocyberSeo puts it well: “Branding is the corporate equivalent of sex, drugs and rock-’n'-roll — a shortcut to all that seems good. Companies look at the rewards from branding sneakers, fizzy sugar water and coffee and say, “me too!” Advertising and PR agencies no longer promote or increase visibility — they ‘brand.’”

Recently I heard the head of marketing at a cultural institution complain about surveys that showed a lack of general awareness of his institution in its local community — it just wasn’t on enough folks’ radar. His proposed solution? A $500,000 “brand study.” In other words, he was proposed spending half a million dollars before actually doing anything to actually address his problem. I say that for $500,000 he could give $10 to 50,000 people in his community on the condition that they visit his institution and mention it to two or three friends. Not only would the word-of-mouth do its thing, but the giveaway itself would raise attention. I’ll bet his institution would be on a lot of tongues in no time.

But no. The magic power of “branding” will cause that money to be spent on a study, which will then be analyzed for action points, and then more money will be spent to implement them, with the result that awareness of the institution will increase by 10 percent or whatever a reasonable return on that kind of initiative is. The whole project will be a net loss. But the institution will point with pride to its refined brand.

And then it a few years it can begin the next phase: “rebranding.”

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Against branding

And he is beginning to see opportunities in new media to address this problem — “hope,” he says “lies in the new technology-spawned networks and print technologies that give oxygen to diversity, resulting in demand that allows online and range-holding booksellers to thrive.”

It’s nice to see the battleship of big book publishing sloooowly turning to align with the direction everyone else has been headed for some time. If only it were clearly exactly what Mr. Page is calling for. It sounds a bit like setting the publicity department loose on the internet rather than embracing new media in their essence. (Looming large on Mr. Page’s map of the future is the e-book. I will continue to regard this as a minor technological curiosity until someone shows that it’s really worth paying attention to.)

While Mr. Page’s comments are rather vague, they have nonetheless provoked a lively discussion in the comments section, which is worth checking out.

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Stephen Page on book publishing today