Overseas bid by publishers

Press, 6 October 1980, Page 4

Overseas bid by publishers

NZPA Correspondent ’| London: New Zealand publishers! are making a bid for a! bigger share of the inter-' national market at thei annual London Book Fair; which opened yesterday. ■ “We hope for overseas sales worth $3 million in! 1980-81,” Mr Murray Hum-j phries, chairman of the New Zealand book publisher? export committee, told NZPA. “This year we have more books that are inter-; nationally directed, and it is: a trend you're going to see; more. .' j “We are trying to get, away from parochial books; that’have a market only ini our particular part of the world.” | Nineteen New Zealand; publishers are represented at j the three-day London fair:

’(which has attracted 300 ex-|! i hibitors from more than 12; , countries. : It will be followed by thei I Frankfurt International Book: (Fair, which will open on! (Wednesday. I The New Zealand Publi-j ishers will all be represented: jin Frankfurt. Displays at both fairs are financially supported by the 1 Department of Trade and Industry. . New Zealand books which; the publishers hope to sell; [overseas include Alister.i Taylor’s “Notable Tho-; iroughbred” series, ranging in; price from 5330 a copy for; ’the book on New Zealand [thoroughbreds to about $6OO, I for the one on English and; [lrish thoroughbreds to bep (published next year. Also on display is the limited 750-copies edition of the? (“Zoology of the Voyage ofu

IH.M.S. Beagle,” edited by ■ Charles Darwin, and pub- : lished by Nova Pacifica Pubi lishing ’ Company, Ltd, of i Wellington, which costs ; $750. I “Virtually the whole edi(tion has been sold already,” (Mr Humphries said. World rights for “Shakes- ■ peare’s Plays.” edited by Professor G. B. Harrison, of Palmerston North. recognised as an authority on the (English playwright, are ; being offered by Mr Hum- : phries at the fairs on behalf of A. H. and A. W. Reed, for which he is overseas execu-i ; tive director. : “It is a superbly good edi-j ition for basic reading and: ; we have got interest in sel-i ■ ling rights from round the; ■ world,” he said. I ( Other Reed books for, which overseas rights are being offered include Bob; Charles's “Left-hander's Golf:

Book” to be published towards the end of next year, and part three of “Muldoon,” by R. D. Muldoon, to be published in mid-1981.

Reed’s has already sold 11,000 copies of “Creative Knitting” by Sherry Wilson, of Auckland, to a British publisher. “From our point of view the London Book Fair is a good place to meet smaller British publishers who do not go to the world fair at; Frankfurt,” Mr Humphries! said. !

; New Zealand publishers: (were trying to encourage the [Department of Trade and Inidustry to include books in : overseas trade fairs whereiver possible, he said. j “If you are selling New (Zealand food, for instance, ; you should have New Zealand recipe books alongside.”