The Return of Print? ─ Contemporary Australian Publishing

This collection of essays by established and emerging scholars of Australian publishing examines the industry in the wake of both the Global Financial Crisis of 2008 and the various shocks and upheavals associated with the rise of ebooks. The authors here look beyond the digital, so prominent in many considerations of contemporary publishing, to questions of the book as a material artefact. As consumer trends increasingly suggest print will remain the central medium for the global publishing industry, it is asked if the messy state of affairs existing now, 'after' the digital revolution, can be described as 'post-digital'. With reference to a range of cultural, economic and technological issues, these essays examine how publishers are leveraging the possibilities afforded by multiple modes of dissemination. Contributors include David Carter, Sarah Couper, Mark Davis, Beth Driscoll, Ben Etheringtson, Lisa Fletcher, Sybil Nolan, Tracy O'Shaughnessy, Anne Richards, Emmett Stinson, and Kim Wilkins. About the editors: Aaron Mannion is associate publisher at Vignette Press, fiction editor at Antic, deputy chair of the Small Press Network and co-convener of the Australian Independent Publishing Conference's academic day. Aaron read English Literature at the University of Cambridge and is currently completing a PhD at the University of Melbourne. He has been shortlisted for the Wet Ink Short Story Prize and for the Penguin Manuscript Award twice. Emmett Stinson is a Lecturer in English at the University of Newcastle and was previously a Lecturer in Publishing and Communications at the University of Melbourne. He researches contemporary Australian publishing, focusing on small publishers and literary publishing. He also researches Modernist literature with a focus on aesthetic autonomy and satire. His collection of short stories, Known Unknowns (Affirm Press, 2010), was shortlisted for the Steele Rudd Award in the Queensland Literary Awards.