ABPA - Australian Bush Poets Association

I've agreed to edit Award Winning Bush Verse And Stories 2013 (Melbourne Books). Quite a number of ABPA poets and writers were represented in the 2012 edition, which was edited by Max and Jacqui Merckenschlager, so this is a call for submissions from individual winners and/or competition organisers as set out below.

1. Any poem that won a first prize in a bush poetry competition during 2012.

2. Any ‘bush’ short story that won first prize in a competition during 2012. For the purposes of this exercise we’ll borrow the ABPA definition and define a ‘bush story’ as one about Australia, Australians and/or the Australian way of life.

Submissions should be sent to me by March 31 at: camwriter@hotmail.com.

Please check your submission(s) carefully for any errors and then send the poem or short story as an attachment in a Word file (.doc or .docx).

In a separate attachment the following information is requested (as relevant):

full contact details of a responsible person from the awarding organisation;
full contact details for the award recipient;
a 100 word (approx) biography of the award recipient;
a 100 word (approx) description of the competition.

This is a great opportunity for us to get our work ‘out there’ into bookshops, so please give serious thought to submitting.

Cheers
David

This is exciting news, David.

I know Max was quite anxious about how the first 'bush' book would go. Presumably the publishers were happy, given the fact that they are now preparing a second one. Do you have any information on the performance of the first book in the market-place?

No details, Stephen, just the unsurprising news that it's a hard market to crack! As has been discussed elsewhere, poetry in general struggles to sell, and traditional rhyming verse is only a small part of that. I hope our ABPA members supported the first edition, and will also get behind this one.

I don't expect the book will interest the committed free-versers, but it would be good to make some inroads into that vast section of the population that doesn't read any poetry these days. Paterson, Lawson, and Dennis took poetry to the people, and I think our verse still has the ability to strike a chord across a fairly broad spectrum...provided the message can be got out. The book will showcase a terrific range of talent as they'll all be award-winners, so I'd welcome any suggestions re publicity and potential sales avenues. If all goes to plan, and the submissions come in on time, publication will hopefully be somewhere around the middle of the year.

I know a number of us (including me) will simultaneously be trying to sell our own books, but my thinking is that if we can get recognition for a commercially-produced book that goes into bookshops, then that can provide a boost for bush poetry (and stories) in general and hence give some assistance to our sales.

Cheers
David

David where do the proceeds from the sale of the books go?

Heather

Heather, Melbourne Books are a small private publisher. I would assume any profits would go to them. I doubt they would make much money, particularly if you consider the number of hours their staff are likely to commit to the project. David can correct me if I am wrong.

Thanks Stephen.

Stephen's right, Heather. I suspect that any profit in these early stages is minimal, if it exists at all. The hope is that the market will build. The problem with anthologies is the large number of contributors involved, and that makes individual royalties unlikely unless sales go through the roof.

I had a free verse poem selected for Best Australian Poems 2012 (Black Inc.), which would probably sell as well as any poetry book in Australia, and there was a one-off payment, but it was very, very small. I know there can be concern about others possibly profiting from your hard work, but it's a case of balancing that against the importance of gaining recognition through publication. Sort of chicken-and-egg, I guess.

From a different perspective, there's also the fact that successful performers can make more money from my poems than I do from writing them because they can take them to several different competitions and win multiple prizes. But I take the view that it's an honour to have someone consider a poem worth performing (provided they seek permission first, of course). In the poetry world, money is very welcome when it's available, but you can't base your retirement plans on it!

Cheers
David

Ok David I will send you all my winning poems Huh Hang on I don't have any Oops




Bob

Thanks David. I can appreciate the complexities in having your poetry published. It's a brave publisher that takes on the cost of publishing a poetry book. Is there any sort of contract or agreement between the authors and the publishers?

Thanks for the reply.

Heather

Next time, Bob?

Yes, Heather, there'll be a written agreement for all the authors published.

David