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The question in the title was answered by Index, a well-known Hungarian writer, rather than an answer when we asked her how much she thought was the fair amount, fee, and salary she should receive for a novel she wrote and published. As a percentage.
Because in our background conversations with the writers, this amount, as a percentage, is said to be unfairly small.
Translated, if we consider that the price of a book is one hundred florins, the distributor will keep 50-60 percent, while the writer will see only 6-7 percent. The rest belongs to the publisher, of which the editor, the printer, the graphic designer, the editor, the proofreader, the reading editor must be paid.
We thought we were going to find out what the players in the book market think about this, and we found that what counts as evidence in a private conversation, that is, a complaint, is everything that when faced with a face and a name, writers often prefer
- “Let’s go”
- the “isn’t it really a more important issue?”
- “I’ll tell you what I think about this, but I don’t want my name to appear”
formulas and hiding behind similar apologetic phrases.
One of the most sincere outbursts continues to be the credit of the renowned and famous writer, “Why do they dig into our pockets so that we get the least!” That is why we thought of putting together a specific questionnaire for writers, and in which, among others, we asked them what
- Are you aware of what a writer from another country earns for his novel?
- Are they satisfied with the current percentage allocation practice?
- If you could change the proportions, how would you do it?
The questionnaire was sent to dozens of Hungarian writers. We asked them if the answer was uncomfortable for them to complete it anonymously.
Few respondents answered that statistics could not be compiled,
on the other hand, they all answered no to the question of whether one can live in Hungary just by writing books.
Among those who responded to the questionnaire, Balázs Szálinger took his name. He thinks it would be good practice for a writer to get 6 to 10 percent of the price of a book. You have no bad experiences with editors, you receive a weight loss report regularly. According to him, the publisher and the author should participate in promoting a book with the same attitude, and no more than 2-3 thousand florins should be ordered per book.
Editors say they fare worse
This was already said by Katalin Gál, President of the Hungarian Publishers and Distributors Association. According to him, not only are the fees of writers low, but those of editorial workers are even lower and, if possible, even those of the latter. If 50-55 percent of the price of a book is taken away from the distribution, that is, the merchant, and 10 percent from the publisher’s overhead (rent, electricity bill, transportation, storage, etc.), then 35 percent remains for all other publishing costs: designer, proofreader, compiler, typographer, translator, and printing costs.
And then we don’t even talk about public relations and marketing, which is behind very few books, although it should be, because a normal number of copies can only be achieved with the right publicity. It is not worth publishing a book in less than a thousand copies.
According to their calculations, royalties range from 7 to 15 percent, and contracts are often banded based on the number of copies sold. Even if there is an illustrator, the two share this percentage, which makes things worse. Legal images, works of art, various authors continue to bear the costs.
The level of royalties is similar around the world, and the writer receives the least of the price of the book sold. A bestseller can negotiate a higher royalty than usual.
Dealers say they fare worse
Péter Kovács, chief executive of Libri, on the question of whether the 50-55 percent share of distributors in the price of a book is not unrealistically high, says that this rate is not only high, but rather low.
Publishers make much higher profits. We work with a profit margin of five percent, publishers are two or three times more, so they have a minimum of ten percent of the price of a book. I can’t comment on the writers’ fees, I don’t even know them. Much of our 50-55 percent goes to maintaining the store network. It is not true that the number of copies cannot be tracked or kept secret, we report the number of copies to publishers accurately every month and also pay 45 days after that. The biggest crisis was in the book market, so we published it in 2008 and luckily the market has since recovered and is stagnant. By the time the two-month store closed, we posted a five to ten percent loss.
It’s not good for anyone to have a book market
In fact, the coronavirus epidemic did no one any good. Without knowing what will be the fate of quality layer publishers and small family businesses. When the printing house is closed, no works or translations are commissioned due to lack of resources. According to Katalin Gál, this is a great shame, because in many cases these publishers publish international literature that would maintain the Hungarian technical language through the translation of works, which is lacking in many scientific fields or so out of date that no one uses it today.
Overall book sales fell 20 to 30 percent this year due to the epidemic, although the number of online orders increased during the quarantine period, but overall book purchases declined.
According to the president of the Hungarian Book Publishers and Distributors Association, creators and publishers could gain significant support by introducing the Scandinavian or Dutch model.
In this case, the state would purchase 2,000 to 2,500 copies of the book for libraries each year.
This would have a positive effect if the selection of works – these are thousands of titles a year – by objective and value-based boards of directors. It is a question of whether the cultural government is capable of achieving this in this politicized environment.
According to Gál, the NKA works very weak, a few hundred thousand guilders do not help much with the publication of a book. The composition of the boards of directors and the selection mechanism would require a radical and outdated revision. The EU-supported digitization program could also be a source for creators and publishers, but sadly few have access to this opportunity, and the selection mechanism also raises questions.
The subject of writers’ fees is just confusing
This has already been said by Endre Szkárossy, president of the Society of Fine Writers.
I can practically say that it is gone as such. Where magazines pay, where they don’t – depending on your application and other sources – online magazines are almost never, possibly once a year, behind schedule. Everyone struggles to survive.
He’s not talking about select forums at the moment, but as he says, the big publishers are sure to pay, obviously depending on the parity between writer and buyer. The smallest or the smallest or not, the smallest are helped by the author, if he knows.
Therefore, in general, we cannot even talk about the royalties of the writers, only of the publishers, their royalties, which range from the negative range to the apparently fair pay of the market leading authors, magazines and portals in print and in online and forums of the literary market in general. In this rather impossible situation, writers’ organizations try to help their members, with book honors and literary events, with some honors as much as they can.
The writer and poet Endre Kukorelly, in search of the Index, said that in his opinion this question would sound different if we are not talking about a literary market as large as the Hungarian one. According to his calculations, if a writer received 8 to 10 percent of the price of his book, it would already be fair, but in a country of 10 million, contemporary art would have to be strongly supported. That this is not the case cannot be done by the editors, but by the established structure. According to him, this must be taken into account by the current cultural government.
Only known authors of the screen will receive a normal royalty
In 2019, Róbert Kovács, science journalist and author of the educational book Climate Change – Between Panic and Denial, published his work, which fills a gap on the subject. You have visited various publishers and everywhere you have received the response that your work is published for a first volume author if he creates the costs himself. He ended up with a smaller but professionally recognized publisher of educational books. He worked on the material for about a year and a half, and not only did he not earn a penny from the best-performing publisher’s book, he also paid for the professional reviewer out of his own pocket, even winning a sponsor.
“Unfortunately, it should be noted that this is the case, in this profession the author cannot make money unless he is a well-known celebrity on the screen. I did it because I was interested in the subject, I meddled and well, of course, it’s not bad if one person has a well-written and well-managed book. If there will be a second edition, there may be other negotiation bases, I can also take it to another publisher. ” – He says.
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