Maleficium Intra Muros

Abstract

Maleficium Intra Muros William W. Savage (bio) Scholarly publishers go to great lengths to instruct each new generation of PhDs in the ethics of how to go about breaking into print. One must promise, the publishers solemnly intone, that the submitted manuscript is one's original work; one must not submit the same manuscript to several houses at the same time; etc., etc., etc. Only the slothful, the stupid (yes, there are some stupid PhDs), and the desperate ignore the prohibitions. The implication from the pontificating presses is that ethical behaviour is reciprocal: You do right, we'll do right, and all of us will be good folks well met. 1 Sometimes – maybe most times – scholarly publishers are telling the truth. In other instances, however, they are lying like Greeks with a big wooden horse available for any sucker who will open the gates and haul it in. Consider the case of the young scholar – not a rookie, to be sure, but new enough to the academic life to be still in the process of establishing his career – who approached a prominent university press with an idea for a new edition of a long-out-of-print volume of considerable merit. He proposed to write an introduction and whatever else might be required, in return, not for money, mind you, but simply for a bit of credit on the title page. Sure, you bet, great idea, quoth the press editor with whom he spoke. Let us mull it over, run it through the system, see what happens. We'll be in touch. A few weeks later, the young scholar received the news: The publisher did not want an introduction, but perhaps the young man would be willing to provide a couple of pages of biographical material about the dead guy who had written the book? And this in return for [End Page 169] one (count 'em, one) paperback copy of the resulting reprint? Huh? Huh? But, said the young scholar, that wasn't my idea. The editor with whom he spoke replied, So what? Your idea isn't worth much. We'd have stumbled upon the book sooner or later, one way or another. It's in the public domain. We can do whatever we want. It was, in effect, the institutional version of 'Up yours and kiss ours.' The young scholar, figuring some recognition was better than none, provided the biographical piece and kept his grumbling to himself. And then the seasonal catalogue appeared. Lo and behold, the catalogue copy revealed that the reprint carried a new introduction after all – one written by an older, established fellow with a big reputation. The young scholar's name was not mentioned. It was as if he had made no contribution at all. Queried about the curious morality of its dealings with the youngster, the press director emulated (a) the cat attempting to cover his house's business on a marble floor and (b) the politician denying sexual indiscretion while attempting to win re-election. It depends, he told me, on who knew what and when they knew it. Or maybe what it is? No, it doesn't. It depends on whether scholarly publishers are going to behave fairly and honestly, or whether they will embrace larceny and theft as policy. The press director admitted that having a big-name introducer might result in increased sales. Ah! That makes it all better, doesn't it? Perhaps publishers whose houses have fallen on hard fiscal times should encourage their staff to use the lunch hour to rob local convenience stores, gas stations, or unsuspecting passers-by, so as to fatten press coffers and pay for all those unreadable dissertations in their slush piles. Meantime, woe still betide the academic tadpole who sends the same manuscript to more than one press, or anything like that. I was made privy to these shady doings by the young scholar, who told me the sordid story. I did not have to check the facts, but I did it anyway. Here is the reason I did not have to check the facts: I'd been victimized by the same publisher in the same way, except that in my...