And Which Of Jim Paine’s Readers Are Not A Little More Than Mildly Brain-Damaged?
December 17th, 2007
Okay, the only reason I’m bother with this is to illustrate that one can spend one’s entire fucking life catching the Ballerinas in monumentally stupid lies. This one comes from serial liar, Noj, whom I just nailed last week.
See, the Ballerinas have been going apeshit about the release of Joseph Trimbach’s self-published screed American Indian Mafia (which was penned on Mr. Trimbach’s basement walls in his own feces, I hear). I’m a little amused at the fervor generated by a barely literate vanity press offering, but hell, I’ll get around to it somewhere between Sherman and Goebbel’s memoirs. Assuming, of course, that our local library system starts stocking vanity press leavings, which seems unlikely.
Anyway, Noj offered up the following in Ballerina #1’s comments, and it was too good to pass up.
And which of Churchill’s own books were not published with a vanity press? I can only think of one.
Really? Because, though I can’t speak for every book Mr. Churchill has put out, I can’t think of a single one that’s published by a vanity press. Help me out, Noj.
And might I suggest that if you’re so singularly fucking ignorant of the history of twentieth-century American literature as to refer to City Lights as a vanity press, you might be better served restricting your book discussion to those texts which include boy wizards?
Just a thought?
December 17th, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Okay, maybe I contradict myself from time to time. So what?
I’ve never published a book—or anything else aside from blog-slog—so, when you come right down to it, I haven’t got a clue what any of these terms actually mean.
Why should that keep from being the ultimate expert on such things?
After all, it hasn’t stopped Jim Paine.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:56 am
South End Press, AK Press, and City Lights Books, for example, are nowhere near “vanity press.” They are legit publishers each with its own niche. They aren’t traditional “academic” publishers, unlike Routledge, which has published a book or two by Churchill as I recall. The publisher for the book by Trimbach, on the other hand, definitely has “vanity” press written all over it.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:59 am
The difference between City Lights and a vanity press is that City Lights is a non-profit supported by donors and possibly government grants too. Therefore, provided the book supports progressive politics, the foundation may pay all or most of the expenses. In other words, at a vanity press, you pay to be published while at City Lights, other like minded people donate money to pay and support the foundation. There is no quality implied or profit expected due to the quality of the books. City Lights’ mission is to advocate progressive politics. That’s okay, I guess. In general though, I don’t see any more prestige in getting a book published by City Lights over paying one’s own way.
December 18th, 2007 at 11:11 am
No, idiot. The difference between City Lights and a vanity press is that City Lights, like every other non vanity press publisher, has fucking editors. Meaning, they don’t take every asshole stupid project that can be dreamed up by any shitbird with a few hundred bucks in their pocket. (Oh, and they’ve published some of the most important American literature of the last century.)
That’s gotta be the dumbest attempt at obfuscation to come out of your spectacularly dumb camp yet.
December 18th, 2007 at 11:13 am
Oh, and yes, there is quality implied by City Lights. They’re one of the most prestigious independent presses on the planet. Lay off the boy wizard books and try cracking something meant for big folks once in a while.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
” like every other non vanity press publisher, has fucking editors. Meaning, they don’t take every asshole stupid project that can be dreamed up by any shitbird…”
Some would say they do exactly that.
December 18th, 2007 at 1:21 pm
City Lights is a non-profit? That’s bullshit.
Both the publishing operation and the bookstore are, and always have been, profit-making enterprises.
There’s also a City Lights Foundation, which is in fact a non-profit entity, but is in no sense interchangeable with the other two entities. And it was not established not as a forum for “advocacy of progressive politics.” It’s purpose is to provide a venue for avante-gard literary expression—mainly poetry—which is not otherwise commercially viable in this country.
This has nothing to do with the “quality” of the books published with support from the Foundation. Quite the opposite, as Mr. Whitmer has aptly pointed out.
It would really be nice, Laurie, if just once you actually had some vague idea what you were talking about before running off at the mouth.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:34 pm
Oh, bullshit, Laurie. You’re beyond the usual waffling now, and just lying. I refuse to believe you’re so fucking entirely ignorant of the publishing world as to honestly believe what you’re writing. Every publisher, no matter how small and no matter what their politics, has to have a massive financial or aesthetic interest in every book they put out. That interest demands a certain amount of rigor and an editorial process. Vanity presses demand nothing but cash. That’s the reason they’re fucking ignored by the entire industry. Reviewers don’t review them, newspapers/industry magazines don’t mention them, bookstores don’t carry them, and libraries don’t stock them.
Mr. Trimbach’s book is a vanity press offering, suggesting that no publisher of any size would touch it. Which, given the buddies he’s got blurbing the thing and the marketability — at least to a niche — of the content and author, is a pretty damning indictment. That doesn’t mean it sucks, it may not. But before wasting my money and time, I’ll wait to see if there’s any interest generated besides that coming from four bloggers whom I happen to think are fucking idiots.
You’re lying, as usual. Noj is lying, as usual. This is another one of those lies that y’all hang your hat on, so back it up. Name one of Mr. Churchill’s books that was published by a vanity press.
December 18th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
You’re just now noticing that this twit simply makes shit up as she goes along, Mr. Whitmer?
December 18th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
Yeah, I know. But at least they usually try to fake it.
December 18th, 2007 at 3:30 pm
Have you considered the possibility that the reason Noj can “think of only one” of Churchill’s books that wasn’t published by a vanity press is that he (or she) is simply incapable of thinking?
That might explain a lot of what seem to be his (or her) more blatant lies.
December 18th, 2007 at 5:26 pm
publishing basics for noj: http://www.publishingbasics.com/html/askronSubsidy.htm
December 18th, 2007 at 5:37 pm
Why bother, Parker? The ballerinas are quite studious at the craft of lying. As such, they aren’t interested in anything as droll as mere facts.
December 18th, 2007 at 5:49 pm
Oh shit! They’ve seen through me!
December 18th, 2007 at 8:52 pm
“bookstores don’t carry them, and libraries don’t stock them.”
From Amazon.com That’s a bookstore isn’t it?
American Indian Mafia: An FBI Agent’s True Story about Wounded Knee, Leonard Peltier, and the American Indian Movement (AIM) by Joseph H. Trimbach and John M. Trimbach (Paperback - Dec 12, 2007)
Buy new: $28.95 2 Used & new from $28.95
Usually ships in 3 to 5 weeks
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.
December 18th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
Nope, that’s an internet shipping warehouse. Walmart.com will probably carry it also. Meaning, they’ll contact the vanity press and serve as the go-between for a copy — that’s why the order time’s so lengthy. That’s a long ways from actually taking the chance of having stock on hand.
December 18th, 2007 at 9:13 pm
From Arbeiter Ring Publishing website-Publisher of Churchill’s “Pacifism as Pathology”
“Arbeiter Ring (”Worker’s Circle”) borrows its name from the radical Jewish fraternal organization. A century ago, socialist and anarchist locals of the Arbeiter Ring were active on the political and cultural level in Winnipeg, including participating in the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike and organizing Emma Goldman’s visits to the city. ARP is not-for-profit (likely a redundancy in Canadian book publishing these days), and organized as a workers’ collective. Our understanding of workplace democracy is heavily informed by “participatory economics” (parecon), a model developed by Arbeiter Ring author Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel. Parecon is a type of economy proposed as an alternative to contemporary capitalism; its underlying values are equity, solidarity, diversity, and participatory self management. To learn more about Parecon, visit www.parecon.org.”
“Arbeiter Ring Publishing was founded in 1996. We publish books on contemporary politics, culture, and social issues. We are especially interested in works that contribute to the debates that you won’t hear much about from mainstream media or publishers.”
December 18th, 2007 at 9:19 pm
Churchill’s COINTELPRO published by South End Press. From their website:
“About Us
South End Press is a nonprofit, collectively run book publisher with more than 250 titles in print. Since our founding in 1977, we have tried to meet the needs of readers who are exploring, or are already committed to, the politics of radical social change.”
December 18th, 2007 at 9:30 pm
From City Lights Publishing Mission statement:
City Lights Publishers
“In June of 1955, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, co-founder of City Lights Bookstore, launched City Lights Publications with the Pocket Poets Series. The first volume was a collection of his own poems, Pictures of the Gone World, which has since become a classic of beat literature and one of Ferlinghetti’s most popular works. Within a year City Lights had published its fourth, its most famous, and still its bestselling title, Allen Ginsberg’s Howl and Other Poems, the book that revolutionized American poetry and American consciousness.”
“Ferlinghetti writes that the function of the independent press is to discover, to find the new voices and give voice to them. “From the beginning, the aim was to publish across the board, avoiding the provincial and the academic. I had rather an international insurgent ferment in mind, and what has proved most fascinating are the continuing crosscurrents and cross-fertilizations between poets and writers widely separated by language or geography, coalescing in a truly supranational voice.”
“For over fifty years, City Lights has been a champion of progressive thinking, fighting against the forces of conservatism and censorship. We are committed to publishing works of social responsibility, to maintaining a tradition of bringing into English renegade literature from other parts of the world, and in our function of discovery, we will continue to publish cutting-edge contemporary literature and brilliant new fiction”
City Lights Publishing publishes about 12 books per year.
City Lights Foundation is a non-profit. Donors are listed.
December 18th, 2007 at 9:46 pm
About City Lights Foundation:
Welcome to the City Lights Foundation!
For over half a century, City Lights Books has demonstrated a commitment to preserving and promoting the diversity of voices and ideas that are represented in quality books. As the increasingly concentrated mass media and new information technologies change the way people live, work, and think, we believe that nurturing the ability to think critically, to discern truth, and to communicate knowledge is essential to a democratic society.
With this in mind, we have formed the non-profit City Lights Foundation with the goal of advancing deep literacy, which is not only the ability to read and write but fluency in the knowledge and skills that enable us to consciously shape our lives and the life of our community.
Featured books from the City Lights Foundation
Criminal of Poverty
Growing Up Homeless in America
Lisa Gray-Garcia, aka Tiny
A daughter’s struggle to keep her family alive, through poverty, homelessness and incarceration.
The Other Side of the Postcard
devorah major
In conjunction with the San Francisco Public Library, poet laureate devorah major made a public appeal for poems that explored the realities of people’s lives in a city as tough and tragic as it is beautiful and exhilarating. This anthology collects…
The Political Edge
Chris Carlsson
In the wake of the astonishing popular mobilization on behalf of an underdog campaign to elect Green Party candidate Matt Gonzalez mayor of San Francisco, The Political Edge analyzes emergent political energies, where they came from and where they’re…
San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill
David F. Myrick
The City Lights Foundation has collaborated with the Telegraph Hill Dwellers Association to update and reprint David Myrick’s classic Telegraph Hill, a beautiful, lavishly illustrated book that is an invaluable community resource documenting the story…
December 18th, 2007 at 9:55 pm
I think Snapple’s manipulating Laurie’s brain. What the hell is the point of those page of crap you just posted on Churchill’s publishers? That they have politics? How is this at all equivalent to your claim that they don’t heavily review and carefully select submissions?
December 18th, 2007 at 10:00 pm
12 books published each year?
December 18th, 2007 at 10:01 pm
About AK Press
AK Press is a worker-run collective that publishes and distributes radical books, visual and audio media, and other mind-altering material. We’re small: a dozen people who work long hours for short money, because we believe in what we do. We’re anarchists, which is reflected both in the books we provide and in the way we organize our business. Decisions at AK Press are made collectively, from what we publish, to what we distribute and how we structure our labor. All the work, from sweeping floors to answering phones, is shared. When the telemarketers call and ask, “who’s in charge?” the answer is: everyone. Our goal isn’t profit (although we do have to pay the rent). Our goal is supplying radical words and images to as many people as possible. The books and other media we distribute are published by independent presses, not the corporate giants. We make them widely available to help you make positive (or, hell, revolutionary) changes in the world. As you probably know, the stuff we carry is less and less available from the corporate publishers and their chain stores.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:06 pm
Tindale, show me where I said they “don’t heavily review and carefully select submissions”
I said, “There is no quality implied or profit expected due to the quality of the books. City Lights’ mission is to advocate progressive politics. That’s okay, I guess.”
December 18th, 2007 at 10:06 pm
Laurie, you’re proving my point, and you’re a liar. And, more, I have to think you’re smart enough to have Googled the term vanity press by this time. See the next post.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:12 pm
Snapple said: Trimbach’s book is like the Gettysburg Address. It’s an important primary source for American History written by a HERO who was fighting the WAR on TERROR
December 18th, 2007 at 10:20 pm
And finally, a real publisher:
About Routledge
Routledge is a global publisher of academic books, journals and online resources in the humanities and social sciences.
Founded in 1836, we have published many of greatest thinkers and scholars of the last hundred years, including Adorno, Einstein, Russell, Popper, Wittgenstein, Jung, Bohm, Hayek, McLuhan, Marcuse and Sartre.
Today we publish some 600 journals and around 2,000 new books each year, from offices all over the world. Our current publishing program encompasses the liveliest texts, and the best in research. Our books backlist has over 35,000 titles in print. We take pride in the range and strength of the backlist and we use the latest technology to promote it using a wide range of formats, both in print and online.
Churchill’s “Acts of Rebellion” can be purchased for about $135.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:20 pm
http://webcast.berkeley.edu/event_details.php?webcastid=14208
December 18th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
For the record, it was actually LAURIE who posted this under my name:
“Pablo B Says:
December 18th, 2007 at 8:52 pm
“bookstores don’t carry them, and libraries don’t stock them.”
From Amazon.com That’s a bookstore isn’t it?
American Indian Mafia: An FBI Agent’s True Story about Wounded Knee, Leonard Peltier, and the American Indian Movement (AIM) by Joseph H. Trimbach and John M. Trimbach (Paperback - Dec 12, 2007)
Buy new: $28.95 2 Used & new from $28.95
Usually ships in 3 to 5 weeks
Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.
”
Personally, I know better.
December 18th, 2007 at 10:51 pm
Benjamin,
I am not a liar. From time to time I make mistakes, it’s true. But if you read what I wrote instead of what you translated in your own mind, I’m asserting that these publishers are in the business of political and social advocacy. I think they are barely a step up from a vanity press. Of course, you would value them more highly because your personal views are more likely to appear in the works they publish. That’s why you think of them as prestigious. It’s what you like and the better known of their kind.
I still have thousands of books and have donated at least 500 to my local library. One book in my collection was written by my mother-in-law. It’s gawd-awful poetry and published by a vanity press.
My mother (an English instructor at Pierce College) and her friend, Beth Schneiderman, PhD, (a professor of English at UCLA at the time) were collaborating on an English textbook when my mother died. Their publisher was not a vanity press. Their dear friend, Romey Keyes, PhD, (English instructor, UCLA) failed to publish. Many of his colleagues suggested he submit to an advocacy publisher or, failing that, self publish. He refused to do either. He preferred to be untenured over publishing with such entities.
Now you know how I came to my conclusions but don’t forget, I’m an accountant and this isn’t my field.
December 18th, 2007 at 11:00 pm
Hmmm… my brother-in-law owns 6 book stores in California. He orders titles for customers too.
December 18th, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Hmmm… Google “book stores” and up pops Borders, Barnes & Noble and Amazon. Are we trying to split hairs?
December 19th, 2007 at 6:32 am
No, you’re waffling, because, again, you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. Read the next post, or find any source on vanity presses anywhere and you’ll get the same thing.
And, yes, you idiot. Most publishers are engaged in some kind of advocacy: social, political or aesthetic — or in City Lights’ case, all three — that’s the fucking point. There are examples from all sides of the political spectrum, and every publisher has a laundry list of standards and ideological perspectives. (Don’t believe me? Query any publisher with a book proposal; they’ll happily provide it.) You seem to be the only moron on earth who considers having a point of view to be a major flaw.
But you still can’t conflate vanity publishing with advocacy of any kind, which is what you’re trying to do. You’re waffling, and you’re lying.
December 19th, 2007 at 9:33 am
12 books a year! Oh, well. You won me over by calling me a waffling, lying idiot.
December 19th, 2007 at 9:43 am
I don’t try to win liars and idiots over. I just amuse myself at their expense. You’ve more than served that purpose.
December 19th, 2007 at 10:34 am
lots of distros like this exist
http://www.isi.org/books/
December 19th, 2007 at 11:31 am
I guess we should just dismiss all of the Scientific publishers too, since they promote what the right wing fundies call the “religion of Science” that they disagree with.
to quote jwpaine; rofl.
Laurie is just another hack on a long list of hacks who are trying to discredit entire fields of studies because they don’t agree with her positions on “political and social advocacy”.
Hint to Laurie –> Other people’s “political and social advocacy” doesn’t become invalid just because YOU disagree with their viewpoints.
December 19th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
And let’s not forget the business schools, Laurie. After all, peddling the “free market” is a very pronounced form of “political and social advocacy.”
Ask Jim Paine.
December 20th, 2007 at 12:28 pm
As I pointed out earlier, the City Lights Foundation and the City Lights publishing enterprise are not interchangeable entities, and both are separate from the bookstore. “Every tub on its own bottom,” as they say.
The Foundation, which is itself a non-profit, does support literary projects—poetry, fiction, and art books—published by the press at the rate of about a dozen per year.
Over the past few years, the press has also begun to publish political nonfiction (e.g., Churchill, Parenti, and, most recently, Chomsky). That initiative, in which the Foundation plays no role, is distinct from the press’s literary publishing.
January 16th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
Romey Keyes remains a brilliant scholar. His standards are very high and he was prepared to face the consequences of his failure to publish. Life is not about material success. Romey is doing just fine. I admire Romey and any academician who refuses to perform like a circus animal to satisfy the academy.