Jonathan Galassi Interviewed By Haaretz

Want to know more about Jonathan Galassi and the Macmillan/FSG company then read this article published in Haaretz

"It's really about cutting through the miasma of information to grab the reader's attention. And that is getting harder and harder to do."

Galassi bemoans the way nearly all American papers have cut back their coverage of books. This past Sunday, The Washington Post published the last edition of its Book World as a stand-alone section, leaving The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle as two of the few remaining U.S. papers printing separate book-review sections. (In Israel, Haaretz publishes a weekly book review in its Hebrew edition, and the monthly Books supplement in the English edition.)

Galassi suggests that the move is "short-sighted": It may be that book publishers have reduced their newspaper advertising, lowering the profitability of book sections for newspaper publishers, "but you know, a book review is not just about books, it's a forum for discussing ideas, for discussing culture in a different kind of way than you do in other pages." He notes that consumers these days turn to newspapers less for hard news, because they have other sources for immediate news delivery. So newspapers "are much more about context and interpretation." Which is what a good book review section has to offer.