Though most of this week was spent on the art biography, I wasn't completely satisfied with my findings in the Melbourne University Press archives, so I had another look, this time at the minutes of the board over a few years. It took two trips because the new restricted hours of the service mean slower deliveries. In other words, what I wanted hadn't arrived. When they did arrive, the old minutes were a testament to a past age; pasted into a minute book were typed minutes and roneoed financial statements, but, alas, not what I wanted. The board spent endless time discussing pilfering in the University Bookroom, but none at all on sales and printruns.
The publications sub-committee was interesting though. Very snooty attitude to authors like Michael Cannon, whose work received reports saying that it was solid history, but the committee preferred it to go to a commercial publisher, as it was 'not suitable for the Press'. How they justified publishing poetry but not fiction was never explained.
As well, two night in a row, I attended launches of books I had edited. Ouyang Yu's On the Smell of an Oily Rag, subtitled Speaking English, thinking Chinese and living Australian, was very well launched by Rodney Hall at Collected Works, the Hemensley eccentric and valuable bookshop in Swanston Street. The next night, Barry Hill did the honours for George Papaellinas' novel, The Trip, at the Brunswick Street Bookstore. George was very emotional. Unfortunately, the world will probably not take much notice of either book, in spite of their excellence, because they do not have a major publicity machine behind them. Fingers crossed.
A quite productive meeting today with the art biography author. We are making quite good progress and just might make our deadline.
