Many of you had lots to say on the subject of writing groups and how to find readers in response to my founding rule number one: every writer needs readers.
This month we’ll focus on rule number two, which many of you have already hinted at: establish the writing group’s goals.
For me in Qatar, when I was setting up the Doha Writers’ Workshop, the aim was fairly simple: create a sustainable community to help me stay motivated toward my writing goals. Over the years I’ve attended many residences and one-day retreats, and in so doing I’ve had a chance to observe a variety of approaches.
The main ingredients are simple and may sound similiar to the conduct at primary school: respect everyone and their work equally.
If this is the founding tenet, then the one number complaint people have about workshops can be avoided: that their group so lambasted their piece, they will never put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) again.
The other basic principles spread outwards like a web from the agreement of mutual respect:
- people will be sure to first mention the strengths of the manuscript under discussion
- submitted material will not necessarily be assumed as autobiographical
- writers will adhere to submission deadlines to give readers enough time
From this base, your group will have to decide what it really wants. Is it focused on a particular genre: fiction, non-fiction, poetry? Will people submit only certain page limits or entire manuscripts?
This can depend on who is starting the group as well. If it is a publishing professional, agent or editor, then he/she may set the rules, ask for applications and charge a fee. If, as in the case of my writers’ workshop, the goals are more community development oriented, then consensus might be appropriate.
The key is to establish the core values and procedures in the first few months of meeting so that as the group's membership rotates, those who stay can help communicate them to joiners.
Best wishes,
(Reading & Writing Development Director)
Madam,
Thank you very much for your kind and prompt clarification and explanation.
Now, I am able to understand the concept of these series of numbers appearing on the copyright page of a book. It is quite clear.
As a humble bibliophile, who subscribes to the motto ' Wear the old coat and buy the new book' ( Austin Phelps) and as someone who has bought quite a reasonable number of books, over the years, within the limited income available, these series of numbers had always intrigued me, and fueled my curiosity.
But I did not know, whom to ask.
Thanks to Writers and Artists website and its wonderful team of bloggers, I have found an answer to a longstanding doubt.
A big thank you once again to all of you bloggers, whom I follow regularly, and with much interest, almost everyday. I have been a regular happy visitor to your website, for the past few years.
To sign off, if it would make you happy madam, as a publisher, I wish to inform you that I have so far bought the 2004 and 2008 editions of the Writers' and Artists' Year Book - which I still posses and preserve carefully - and I have ordered the 2010 edition of the Writers' and Artists' Year Book on the 3rd of March 2010, through the A & C Black Website.
I have found the 2004 and 2008 editions thouroughly enjoyable, a wonderful read and very very useful and educative.
I am eagerly looking forward to receiving the 2010 edition shortly and enjoying a stimulating and educative read.
Many thanks to Mohana Rajakumar and Claire Fogg for their kind and prompt response and help.
With best regards,
G. Venkatesh.
Dear Vengu,
I believe that you could be looking at the printing number of a book. You can identify the printing of a book via the countdown of numbers that appears on the copyright page. The numbers descend from 10, with the number at the end indicating the printing.
For example, this is what you'd find on a first printing of a book: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
However, the following would appear on a fourth printing: 10 9 8 7 6 5 4
The book that you first mention would be a third printing, while the following book that you mention would be a second printing.
Best wishes,
Claire
Madam,
Thank you very much for your kind and prompt response to my query.
What you say about the ISBN number is perfectly correct. The fullform of ISBN is ' International Standard Book Number'. Further details about 'ISBN' is available on the Wikipedia.
However, my query is different from 'ISBN'.
For instance, the ISBN number for the book ' Maximum City - Bombay lost and found' by Suketu Mehta as mentioned on the dust jacket of the book is ' ISBN 0 -67 - 004921 - 2'.
But the number that I mentioned in my query, appearing on the first page of the book is ' 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3'.
Hence, what I have queried about is not the ISBN number of the book ' Maximum City - Bombay lost and found'.
To give another example, the book ' THE WORLD IS WHAT IT IS - THE AUTHORISED BIOGRAPAHY OF V.S. NAIPAUL' by Patrick French, published by Picador India - Hardback - 2008 - has on its first page, a listing of two ISBN numbers - Viz: 'ISBN 978-0-330-43350-1 HB' and 'ISBN 978-0-330-45598-5 TPB'.
I presume in the above ISBN listings the alphabets at the end 'HB' and 'TPB' stand for 'Hard Back' and 'Paper Back'.
However in the same book, on the same first page the below mentioned numbers appear:
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Hence the above listed numbers could not be the ISBN number of the book.
I have a guess that the above listed numbers probably indicate something about the typeface used for printing the copyrighted book, which could probably a way to avoid and detect the printing of pirated editions of the book. But it is only a guess and I am not sure about it and I do not also understand how it would work.
In due course, as a person from the publishing industry, if you could kindly research this printing practice of printing a series of numbers on the first page of the book, and clarify my curiosity and doubt, I would really be very thankful.
With best regards,
G. Venkatesh.