Self Publishing: Books, Authors, Companies And Self Publishing Guide

Few can accurately fathom what it must have been like to live and write as John Donne. Academics and lay fans have appreciated the depth and exemplary art shown through Donne's work for centuries, but even a masterful writer as Donne surely faced some tribulations in trying to get his words out to people. Going back even further to the times of the famed Greek and Roman philosophers and orators, millennia before the advent of the printing press, spreading a person's literary genius seemed even more difficult. Since Donne and Plato, though, advances in self-publishing have made publishing a reality even for writers with only a limited interest in the craft.

Not too long after books rose in popularity after the advent of the printing press, companies formed and often hoarded publishing rights. Authors could rarely account for and execute all of the intermediate steps involved with self-publishing and had to rely on agents and companies dedicated to publishing to make printing of a manuscript a tangible reality. Thus, the publishing industry grew into at $24 billion enterprise. Still, considering the vast number of rejection notices mailed out each year, self-publishing stands as a logical alternative to the traditional publishing industry.

When most consider self-publishing, the real image inspired involves assisted self-publishing. Authors need not try to operate printing presses and other positions ancillary to the actual writing portion of the publishing process. Instead, many self-publishing organizations offer guides about how writers should develop manuscripts for books they intend to submit to assisted self-publishing groups. Often, guides about how to work through the self-publishing industry come at a reduced cost or none at all. Without agents and advertisers absorbing capital from the organization, self-publishing groups can help writers make a reasonable print run for as little as $5,000. Publishers may suggest ways of marketing the book to the writer, but the bulk of the responsibility for getting the work into the hands of eager readers remains with the writer. Writers weary of relinquishing control of a work to a faceless executive can control the marketing, the font and even the binding of a book when straying away from mainstream publishers. It may require more capital at the outset, but self-publishing can garner an incredible freedom and make for a lucrative venture if done successfully.

Acquiring a manuscript of a text centuries ago might have required something as extraordinary as a monk to write out each copy out by hand. Now, with computer monitors displaying so much of the world's reading, a good, tangible book may appear obsolete. However, rising internet usage has not yet destroyed the publishing industry, though it likely made publishing professionally that much more difficult. To exert stronger control over the creative process as almost any writer would like, paying the fees of self-publishing may seem a perfect venture for a book. The next Donne may be awaiting discovery, just waiting for a published work to reach the masses. Having so many options before them, people deserve to give independent publishing a shot before the world wonders where all of the literary geniuses of the epoch went.


Sources:
"Education." Self Publishing. 2005. Selfpublishing.Com. 2 Nov. 2007 http://www.selfpublishing.com/step1.php5.

Harris, Tom. "How Self-Publishing Works." How Stuff Works. 2007. HowStuffWorks, Inc. 2 Nov. 2007 http://money.howstuffworks.com/self-publishing.htm .

"Supported Self-Publishing." IUniverse. 2007. Barnes & Noble. 2 Nov. 2007 http://www.iuniverse.com/why-iuniverse/supported-s elf-publishing.htm.