difficulties in publishing plays

[Don Rubin]

what angela says about free ISBN is also true in china.  there is no 
isbn cost. 

what happens there is that publishing houses routinely charge authors 
and editors to publish their books.  they simply make up reasons for the 
costs -- ISBN is the latest made up reason.  what do scholars there know 
about what such things really cost.  sure, for foreign publishers to get 
an isbn  there may be a modest cost but it is modest.  nowehere near the 
numbers publishers there charge writers.

nevertheless,  the costs to the author/translator is real. so what does 
one do?

if one really wants a book published there and one finds a willing 
translator, they also need help in finding financial support from a 
canadian source to cover the required payments to the publishing house. 
a few thousand dollars is the norm.  would the embassy and/or the canada 
council cover that?  they should.  that's the only way non-commercial 
stuff (plays alas) get published in china.

best

don

Angela Rebeiro wrote:
> In Canada the ISBN is free, as is Cataloguing in Publication. The only 
> cost, if one wants to consider it a cost, because most countries to my 
> knowledge demand
> that copies of books are deposited at the national library or some 
> such institution. In Canada it's the National Library and Archives. in 
> fact, I'd be surprised if this is not
> true of most or all countries in the West.
> Angela Rebeiro
> Playwrights Canada Press
> 215 Spadina Avenue
> Suite 230
> Toronto, Ontario
> M5T 2C7
> (416) 703-0013
> (416) 408-3402 FAX
>
> On Jan 16, 2008, at 4:26 PM, Louise . Forsyth wrote:
>
>
>     Dear colleague,
>      
>     The cost of publishing plays in China is shocking!! Are there
>     similar costs in staging foreign plays? Am I not right in thinking
>     that the cost of obtaining an ISBN number in North America is
>     minimal?
>      
>     Louise Forsyth
>      
>
>     *From:* Canadian Theatre Reserach
>     [mailto:CANDRAMA at LISTSERV.UNB.CA] *On Behalf Of *??
>     *Sent:* January 14, 2008 18:19
>     *To:* CANDRAMA at LISTSERV.UNB.CA
>     *Subject:* difficulties in publishing plays
>      
>      
>      
>     Yes, it's quite important to publish plays. I think this is also
>     true in China. But perhaps you don't know how difficult to publish
>     a play in China. The most difficult part is the cost barrier.As
>     you know, every book must have an ISBN,right? But publishers will
>     usually charge the author about 2000 US$ for that number (it's not
>     cheap in China). Together with some other charges like 'editing
>     fee(700 us$)', printing fee(starting from mim of 2000 copies in
>     general so of 2700-3000 us$), the total publishing fee for a play
>     of 200,000 words will reach up to 5400-6000 us$). Probably the
>     publisher will say 'This kind of stuff will not sell well in the
>     market and so you will almost publish yourself--, that is, you pay
>     all the fee. I feel sad about this.
>      
>     You may ask "Why could not you get support from the government?
>     from the university?
>     Well, that seems to be a good idea. But not in China. If you know
>     how many routines you have to go through and how many people you
>     have to beg for a drop of water, you will mostly just give up trying!
>      
>     And I am not adding royalties here.!!
>      
>     How much does it cost to publish a play in Canada?
>      
>     If I can solve this problem, I will be more willing to translate
>     and introduce Canadian plays to China....
>      
>      
>      
>     Dachuan Lu
>     School of Foreign Languages
>     Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics
>     100083, Beijing
>     dclu at yeah.net
>      
>