From: Annette Goldsmith <ayg>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2008 22:16:08 -0400

Thank you, Norma Jean, for sharing your experience. How and why current U.S. children's editors decide (or decide not) to publish translations is the subject of my dissertation, so I find the history quite fascinating.
  Annette

-----Original Message----- From: ccbc-net-bounces at ccbc.education.wisc.edu
[mailto:ccbc-net-bounces at ccbc.education.wisc.edu] On Behalf Of Norma Jean Sawicki Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2008 6:10 PM To: ccbc-net at lists.education.wisc.edu Subject: [CCBC-Net] Internationalism

I certainly do not speak for Leonard or for children's book editors at work today but as a long time publisher of children's book who was interested in, and published novels from other countries, "foreign" novels, no matter how well translated, or reviewed, sat in the warehouse...ignored/avoided by most librarians, teachers, and parents. A couple of decades later, I lost interest in acquiring/ publishing translations....from the chair in which I sat, one could afford to take only so many risks...meaning, books that may not sell well...and I preferred to take risks, and nurture/develop new American writers, and illustrators. When, industry wide, a certain genre of book does not sell...and is therefore not read....there is no point..there is no audience. And too, in my experience, winning the Mildred Batchelder Award did not increase sales. Others may agree to disagree but that was my experience. Norma Jean


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Received on Thu 17 Jul 2008 09:16:08 PM CDT