Publishing News
The art of bookmaking
Just before Easter a group of MA in Publishing students at Oxford Brookes visited the book printer Biddles in Norfolk.
Chris Boor (MA publishing student) writes:
‘There's something decidedly satisfying about getting one's hands dirty in the line of work. Especially when the result of the labour was a book lovingly crafted by my own fair hands. Making our own books (technically making me a bookmaker?) was just one aspect of the visit to Biddles in Kings Lynn.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02 Apr 2008 around 9am
Filed Under Postgraduate | Publishing
Leipzig Book Fair
The 2008 Leipziger Buchmesse was held from 13 to 16 March 2008. This is an important spring event in Germany for the promotion of books from central and eastern Europe. The Fair had around 2,300 exhibitors and in the previous year attracted over 125,000 visitors. The Leipzig Book Award for European Understanding was given to the Dutch writer Geert Mak, author of In Europa (2004).
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02 Apr 2008 around 9am
Filed Under Oxford Publishing & Digital Media | Postgraduate | Publishing | European Publishing
New publishing company started by Oxford Brookes alumnus
A former student of the MA in Publishing at Oxford Brookes University, Marie Halkjaer, has recently established her own publishing company in Denmark. Halkjaer returned to Denmark following the successful completion of her MA in 2005 and worked with several small publishers as head of marketing. She is now in the process of starting her own publishing company, Clockwise Publishing, which will publish its first book in May. She is also working as a freelance consultant.
Halkjaer recently published an article in the Danish magazine BogMarkedet describing how her experiences at the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies helped to prepare her for the challenges of starting a new publishing company.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 20 Mar 2008 around 11am
Filed Under Postgraduate | Publishing | European Publishing
Writers’ freedoms and the silencing of dissent
The latest Publishing Research Seminar featured a talk from Ophelia Field, Acting Director of the Writers in Prison Programme - English PEN.On March 10, 2008, Ophelia gave a fascinating, chilling and passionate talk to students and staff of the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies about the history and work of English PEN and the Writers in Prison Programme, as well as the writers for whom English PEN is active.
From its apolitical beginnings in London in 1917 as a dining club for writers, International PEN has developed into an organisation with autonomous centres around the world, whose aims include the formation of a community of writers across cultures and the public upholding of human rights. In 1960 the Writers in Prison programme, which campaigns for writers imprisoned because of their work, was born. Since the late 1990s, English PEN has initiated new programmes building relationships between writers and communities and in 2004, the Writers in Translation programme was initiated, which provides grants to publishers to help them promote works in translation that they publish here in the UK.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 17 Mar 2008 around 6pm
Filed Under Publishing | European Publishing
Chinese fiction in English translation
Eva Kneissl, who successfully completed the MA in Publishing at Oxford Brookes University in 2007, has recently had an article published in the trade journal LOGOS. The article, which is adapted from Kneissl's Masters thesis, examines the challenges faced in translating Chinese fiction into English and reaching larger Western audiences.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 14 Mar 2008 around 10am
Filed Under Oxford Publishing & Digital Media | Postgraduate | Publishing | Oxford Centre for Publishing Consultancy and Research
Craig Richardson’s essay in Shotgun Wedding by Tracy Mackenna and Edwin Janssen
This publication from Atopia Projects explores the social, political and cultural background to Tracy Mackenna and Edwin Janssen’s video installation Shotgun Wedding.
Shotgun Wedding engages the various conflicts that run through the history of Scotland and Britain, by re-presenting visual material relevant to the Union of 1707. The exhibition of this work at The Scottish National Portrait Gallery correlated with the tricentennial of the signing of the Treaty of Union that joined Scotland and England, and was the year that the Scottish people elected, for the first time, a Nationalist as their First Minister.
Craig Richardson’s essay discusses the artists’ work in relation to contemporary artistic & curatorial practices at the time of this anniversary of the Union.
Further Details about Atopia Projects and Shotgun Wedding are available online.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 12 Mar 2008 around 10am
Filed Under Research
Working in Publishing Day
The Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies has just held its annual Working in Publishing Day. The day is an opportunity for our current students on the MA and BA in Publishing to talk to our alumni, gain careers advice, meet current employers and recruitment agencies.
Visitors included representatives from Cambridge University Press, Elsevier, HarperCollins, Haymarket, New Internationalist, Oxford University Press, Penguin, Sage, Usborne and Wiley Blackwell.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 05 Mar 2008 around 4pm
Filed Under Oxford Publishing & Digital Media | Publishing | European Publishing | Oxford Centre for Publishing Consultancy and Research
Children’s Publishing Field Trip
This week, students taking the Children's Publishing module on the MA in Publishing at the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies went on a field trip to London.Students first visited Usborne Publishing, where they had sessions with Art Director Mary Cartwright (pictured) and Rights Director Elizabeth Wright. Later, students visited the dedicated children's bookshop Tales on Moon Lane, and talked to the shop manager George Hanratty.
The module on Children's Publishing, which is an option on the MAs in Publishing at Oxford Brookes, is a new course for 2007-8. Students have also heard from others involved in the children's book world, including the publisher David Fickling, the children's book critic of the Sunday Times Nicolette Jones, and OUP editor Liz Cross, who have joined the module as visiting speakers.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02 Mar 2008 around 3pm
Filed Under Publishing
MA Publishing Students in LOGOS
A group of master's students from the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies visited the Frankfurt Book Fair in October 2007 and their impressions of the event have recently been published in LOGOS, the forum of the world book community. The full article can be found here but the following quotes offer a snapshot of the students' experiences.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 19 Feb 2008 around 2pm
Filed Under Oxford Publishing & Digital Media | Publishing | Oxford Centre for Publishing Consultancy and Research
Publishing (OICPS) to be at the London Book Fair again
Following the success of last year's inaugural vist to the London Book Fair, the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies is to have a stand at this year's fair. So come and see us on stand T740, London Book Fair, Earl's Court, 14 - 16 April.Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 18 Feb 2008 around 2pm
Filed Under Oxford Publishing & Digital Media | Publishing