Publishers reject Jane Austen manuscripts

I don't know what else to say besides "That is just messed up!!" I love Jane Austen!

It would make more sense to try this with a more contemporary writer though. With Jane Austen they can always say the writing was dated, it didn't speak to modern issues, etc.

Makes all of us wonder doesn't it?

An agents job is just to laugh behind our rejected backs. They also host wine and cheese parties. In college, it may have been keg time for them, but after screwing each other up in their reading comprehension, they secretly decided wine and cheese was the way to go.

Just goes to show you that rejections don't mean bad writing (well, not always anyway). Rejections are just someone's opinion on what they believe will (or will not) sell. And as agents and publishers have proven time and again, they are not always right.

Thats is hilarious. Most notably that the editors/agents didn't recognize it. Historical authors today still try to capture her style and wit. And her works most definitely touch on modern issues of today. People are people!

JA fan to the end. :)

That may just be my issue then, I use dialogue, but mine is heavily written in narration with internal monologue dominating the writing throughout. More than emotional, it's mental, and it's difficult to fall into any emotion at moments that are structured with the mental/spiritual construct vs. the physical/emotional. But all of it is present. I just think the narrating is more important than dialogue, because dialogue is less of a challenge for me. I know my characters pretty well after twenty edits.

I once read that a student of Doris Lessing submitted a manuscript Lessing thought was good. It was rejected. Then Lessing submitted it under her own name, and it was, of course, accepted. Do they even READ our stuff??? When I see the millions of copies of celebrity books in the stores, much of it really bad writing, I wonder. "What's in a name?" Turns out, quite a lot!

This has happened many times in the past--even involving pulitzer prize winning novels. The agents and editors never get it right and usually complain that it's an unfair test. Just remember that they are all highly subjective judges and that their opinions only represent THEIR judgment. Keep trying.

Also, regarding Jane Austen, keep in mind that the industry and market conditions have changed a great deal since she got published. Franky, I would be astonished if authors like her and F. Scott Fitzgerald would get published today. They take too long to get to the point and wordiness equals page count equals increased production costs.

Publishing is a business first and foremost and that means that agents and editors are interested in profit. If they don't recognize your name it probably means less profit for them--so they will always go with a proven winner before taking substantial chance on an unknown (thus explaining the Doris Lessing bit mentioned by Christin above). The only way to succeed in this business is to keep trying--ignoring all rejections.

Makes me wonder if I shouldn't resubmit some of my 50+ rejections.

PS: I just bought your book

Steve, did they say which publisher recognized Miss Austen's work?

Sorry, I didn't express myself clearly. Jane Austen clearly "speaks to" modern issues. What I meant is that the setting will immediately be noted as "historical", which may be what hasn't been selling so well lately. If a manuscript is classed at first sight as "we're not doing any more of this kind of book right now", it's not even read after that.

Cheryl,

Only one person recognized a chapter of "Pride and Prejudice." It was Alex Bowler, assistant editor at Jonathan Cape publishers in the UK. He replied: "I suggest you reach for your copy of Pride and Prejudice, which I'd guess lives in close proximity to your typewriter and make sure that your opening pages don't too closely mimic the book's opening. After all, there is such a thing as plagiarism."

I think the point is, this just shows that it's very, very hard (impossible?) to get most publishers to look at the first page of an unsolicited manuscript.

Steve

This faux author should be blacklisted for perpetrating a contrived scam upon the industry. Let me explain why.

First, most publishers do not accept unagented submissions. If he submitted his three chapters to such publishers, he would by default get no response or a rejection.

Second, because we don't know which publishers he submitted to, we don't know if he was submitting to appropriate publishers. For example, I would have rejected the manuscript...not because I don't enjoy that style personally, but because Bards and Sages publishes speculative fiction. The manuscript falls outside of the type of stuff we read and publish, therefore would have been rejected.

Third, getting no response or a rejection does not mean a publisher didn't recognize the work. It may very well mean they DID, and didn't consider it the submission legitimate. I've received submissions that were obvious Harry Potter rip-offs (including one where the teen boy protagonist was named Terry Hopper). Now I have a very, very tiny small press. And I get a half dozen innappropriate submissions each week. Can you imagine what the major houses slush through?

Also, keep in mind that many publishers (like many colleges) are now using software designed to catch plagiarists. This would obviously have been flagged by such software.

The reality is that publishers publish first-time authors all of the time. Everyone is looking for the next big thing, and that means looking at new writers. 50% of the rejection we do at Bards and Sages have nothing to do with the writing per se. It has to do with not following guidelines or submitting work that is outside our specialty. Authors are sometimes their own worst enemies, however, because they pull stunts like this to attract attention and make publishers look like the "bad guys", when in reality perhaps they should be looking at themselves. When in reality, there are hundreds of small and university presses that actively look for new writers. Industry magazines like BookPage, Publisher's Weekly, and others routinely feature first books by new writers.

This author, and authors who pull stunts like this, actually HURT other writers by wasting a publisher's time with a fake submission. Because time spend handling this submission was time not spent looking at a legitimate one.

That is just the saddest thing I've ever heard! I don't know that I would recognize all of Jane Austen's work, but I'm not an editor either! Maybe we need to get some different people in there!

Meaningless as it usually is every year when one of the classic authors is tried.

What would be smarter and more informative to use someone from the mid list or some other current fiction for a test. My contention is that if Robert B. Parker or Nevada Barr were staring today, their stuff would also be rejected. Publsihers aren't interested in growing careers.