Diary
Jeanette Winterson
Travelling to New York City, after so long, was a complicated experience. I was glad to see my publishers again. Grove Press is the largest independent publisher in the US, and I have been with them for many years. Henry Miller, Kathy Acker, Helen Macdonald, Bernardine Evaristo… they have a long and distinguished line of writers and, just as importantly, are a model of difference in the corporate world.
Grove did fine during Covid. Folks read a lot, and serious readers read much more than usual. Now though, paper shortages, pallet shortages, printing and logistical nightmares are making it harder for Grove to use their legendary fleetfootedness to capitalise on what’s selling well. Rapid reprints are a thing of the past. Consequence? Either a publisher overprints or under-prints. For an independent, this manifests as cost per book, potential profit and, most of all, satisfying the market—which is what capitalism is supposed to be about. That old basic of supply and demand.