The Art of Literary Publishing: Editors on Their Craft

Long out of print—and an underground favorite of publishers and writers—this gathering celebrates in their own words an endangered species: the literary editor.

First published in 1980, The Art of Literary Publishing is also a how-to manual for literate survival in an age of corporate gigantism; it features legendary voices from the past and present in twenty-four chapters by Cleanth Brooks, Maxwell Perkins, John Farrar, Maurice Girodias, James Laughlin, William Phillips, Saxe Commins, John Galassi, Simon Michael Bessie, Joyce Carol Oates, Raymond Smith, Ishmael Reed, Theodore Solotaroff, and others, plus a new introduction by the editor.