A Very Long Post Thinking Through Literary Events, Genre, #SelfPubIsHere, and Exchanges of Capital Within The Publishing Industry
TL/DR VERSION: There’s a recurring discussion that occurs year after year about the types of writers who get excluded from literary festivals (the latest iteration being the self-publishers behind #SelfPubIsHere). As a writer, former conference organiser, and current PhD student/cultural theory wonk I put together a bunch of thoughts about the types of publishing capital in play. THE LONG VERSION Every year, when the literary festival season comes around, I see the same iteration of the same argument: why don’t Australian literary festivals feature more fantasy writers/romance writers/things-that-aren’t-lit-fic writers. Every year, people offer up solutions that aren’t really solutions because there’s a fundamental disconnect between the way they think festivals work and the way they’re actually being put together. This year, a bunch of self-published authors have started a campaign to try and rectify the lack of self-published authors on festival programs and award slates. Slightly new take, but I have exactly same doubts about its success. Now, I first self-published
