Cookbook publishing, it’s very difficult
April 18th, 2010 by IonaCookbook misprint costs Australian publishers dear.
So, a publisher in Australia managed to publish a cookbook with a recipe that called for “salt and freshly ground black people”.
Oops.
I’m sure I would have had much more sympathy for said publisher, though, had he not been quoted as saying, “[W]hy anyone would be offended, we don’t know”, and “proofreading a cook-book is an extremely difficult task”.
I don’t know, I might not buy books from a publisher that finds it very difficult not to accidentally advocate grinding up black people.
April 20th, 2010 at 9:00 pm
I’d not have been surprised by a “We apologise for any offence caused, but we’re not sorry enough to do anything to make sure it doesn’t happen again” response, but that’s a few levels more dismissive still.
I’m also not sure about what’s so impossible about a recall of previously distributed stock. Every other industry seems to manage, and I’d expect at least some bookshops would be keen to send the copies back.
April 20th, 2010 at 11:13 pm
Yes – and you don’t even have to go as far as that. I worked in a bookshop for a long time, and on one occasion went round taking copies of a racist book off the shelves – not because we could send it back to the publishers, but because we didn’t want to be seen selling it.