Newsflash! Publishers and agents don't read all of their submissions! Sometimes they send form rejection letters! David Lassman, director of the Jane Austen Festival in Bath, must be rubbing his hands together in glee, having exposed the failings of the British publishing industry through his canny submission of plagiarised Austen to a range of agents and publishers, all of whom rejected it. How clever.
Or maybe not. Trying to shame publishers by sending out faintly disguised published books is not a particularly unusual trick. The Sunday Times did it last year on a slow news day with books by VS Naipaul and Stanley Middleton; Doris Lessing did it way back in 1984, submitting her own work with a pseudonym. All that it proves is that getting published is tough and that publishers aren't perfect, which was already clear.
When I worked in publishing, on occasion I kept copies of the most bizarre cover letters and submissions that I received, as a useful fillip when I needed cheering up. Had I received a plagiarised copy of a canonical classic, I have no doubt that I would have laughed heartily, dispatched a form rejection letter, and filed it under "Hilarious Submissions from Weirdos".
I would not have written an impassioned letter to the "author" admonishing him for his crime against literature, because I would have assumed that he was an incurable crank. I had too much work to do for viable writers, and I also didn't relish the prospect of fanning the flames of incurable crankage and encouraging further correspondence, which is why I often signed those form rejection letters with an illegible scrawl. I suspect that most of the people who received Mr. Lassman's faux-submission took this approach.
Furthermore, I do not think it is too outrageous to suggest that if Jane Austen were writing today, her books would not be published. They are decidedly old-fashioned, after all: compared with great contemporary fiction, they are stuffy, anachronistic, and stilted.
Two centuries ago, Jane Austen was plugged into the times, which is why it is valuable and pleasurable to read her work today. Presented as fresh 21st century writing, Austen's work doesn't tick the right boxes: it's really kind of derivative of all sorts of trashy stuff, from Bridget Jones to movies like Clueless.
Yes, trade publishing is pretty closed shop, and it can be frustrating, but so are most creative industries. In my opinion, I am an outstanding actress - as I am sure anyone who witnessed my performance in last spring's Publishers' Pantomime would agree. The film industry's tragic failure to recognise my talent while Keira Knightley makes millions of pounds in her film roles is a clear case of discrimination. Alert the media!
Or maybe I'm just being an incorrigible moaner. Sometimes some of us get the breaks and some of us do not. The only thing worth doing is carrying on with your art because you love it, not because you require the public and the publishers' approval. Anything more is a bonus, not a right.
