Big Fiction: How Conglomeration Changed the Publishing Industry and American Literature

"In the late 1950s, Random House editor Jason Epstein would talk jazz with authors like Ralph Ellison while pouring drinks in his office. By the late 1960s, he was poring over profit-and-loss statements. What happened? Beginning in 1965 after RCA bought Random House and then with subsequent purchases of publishing companies by multinational conglomerates, the business of publishing started to change. With more of an emphasis on rationalization, many publishers began to focus on genre and brand name authors. However, amidst a changing marketplace, other publishers found new avenues and possibilities to publish literary and experimental fiction. In Big Fiction, Dan Sinykin examines how changes in the publishing industry affected fiction and literary form. Beginning with RCA's purchase of Random House in 1965 to the invention of the Amazon Kindle in 2007, Sinkyin reveals how power situated in multinational media conglomerates and disseminated through the book publishing industry has influenced what kind of fiction and authors get published. In considering how publishers pursued profits and prestige, Sinykin examines four different sectors of the industry: mass market books and the rise of superstar authors such as Danielle Steel; the changing focus of Random House as a trade publisher; the rise of nonprofits such as Graywolf; and the employee-owned Norton. He also considers how women and writers of color navigated shifts in the publishing industry and allegorized their experiences in their fiction"--
In the late 1950s, Random House editor Jason Epstein would talk jazz with Ralph Ellison or chat with Andy Warhol while pouring drinks in his office. By the 1970s, editors were poring over profit-and-loss statements. The electronics company RCA bought Random House in 1965, and then other large corporations purchased other formerly independent publishers. As multinational conglomerates consolidated the industry, the business of literature—and literature itself—transformed.Dan Sinykin explores how changes in the publishing industry have affected fiction, literary form, and what it means to be an author. Giving an inside look at the industry’s daily routines, personal dramas, and institutional crises, he reveals how conglomeration has shaped what kinds of books and writers are published. Sinykin examines four different sectors of the publishing industry: mass-market books by brand-name authors like Danielle Steel; trade publishers that encouraged genre elements in literary fiction; nonprofits such as Graywolf that aspired to protect literature from market pressures; and the distinctive niche of employee-owned W. W. Norton. He emphasizes how women and people of color navigated shifts in publishing, arguing that writers such as Toni Morrison allegorized their experiences in their fiction.Big Fiction features dazzling readings of a vast range of novelists—including E. L. Doctorow, Judith Krantz, Renata Adler, Stephen King, Joan Didion, Cormac McCarthy, Chuck Palahniuk, Patrick O’Brian, and Walter Mosley—as well as vivid portraits of industry figures. Written in gripping and lively prose, this deeply original book recasts the past six decades of American fiction.
Dan Sinykin explores how changes in the publishing industry have affected fiction, literary form, and what it means to be an author.