WCP5056

Letter (cc) (WCP5056.5530)

[1]1

25th Jan[uary] [1]900

D[octo]r. A Russel Wallace

Dear Sir,

We are much obliged by your letter, & glad to see that you are not disinclined to the "Reader".2 We have contacted Mr Williams3 who has a very exact knowledge of the School Board4 requirements and the tendencies of the teachers; and the result is as follows:—

The book should contain 256 pp., [pages] crown 8vo [octavo],5 & be well printed on a really good paper to do justice to the many cuts.6 It must be strongly bound in cloth. The selling price, to enter into competition on equal terms as regards cheapness with its competitors, should be 1s. 8d.; [1 shilling & 8 pence] but the author’s name, being so very much better than the School Boards are accustomed to, would well warrant 1s. 10d. It is the very outside[?] price, to ensure equal competition, taking the teacher’s point of view. We are inclined to the safer course, fixing the price at 1s. 10d., if you approve. The Schoolboards [sic] do not favour "nett" [MS damaged], & to issue at a "nett" price would be [MS damaged] unwise.

The cost of the book will <be> [MS damaged] about as below: —

[2]7

Capital Expend[iture][?]

To Mr. Williams 25 68
" Illustrations 50
" Compositor's[?] checked through 35
" Author’s corrections 5
" Advertisements 100
" Distribution of 250 free
copies by post @10½ 11
£22 6

Costs per copy: 256 pp. = 8 Double sheets

{80 reams paper @ 15/- £60
{"printing @ 6/- 24
5000 {Bringing up cuts 10
{Binding 5000 @ 30/- per 100 75
£169.
or 8d. per copy
Realization: If 1s.8d. 1s.nett
1s. 10d. 1s. 1 1/5"
2s.0d. 1s. 2 2/5"

______________________________________________________________

We should propose (making the book 1s. 10d.) to pay you a royalty of 3d. per copy on the English ed[itio]n. As regards copies sold to America & the Colonies;9 we should certainly not get orders for quantities at more than 10d. per copy if so much. Such orders, if any (& there should be many) would be very large. Mr. Williams has recently had an order for 20,000 copies of his[?] Readers from one of the Western States of America[.] Would you think it fair if we were to pay your royalty on such sales at two thirds of the actual profit they realized? It is absolutely necessary to "break" prices for large export orders, partly because there is a 25% import duty to America, as well as the freights. On all sales abroad at the regular price, you would of course receive the regular royalty of 3d.

Yours very truly | [no signature]

1
The letter bears no heading but is signed in the name of ARW’s London publisher Swan Sonnenschein & Co., founded in 1878 by William Swan Sonnenschein (1855-1931).
2
Wallace A. R. (1901). The Wonderful Century Reader London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., published in November 1901. This was an abridged version of the 4th Edition (February 1901) of The Wonderful Century; Its Successes and Its Failures, first published in 1898.
3
Not positively identified. He is probably Francis Williams (full name given in WCP5058), the Board School editor, referred to in WCP5054 (31 October 1899), in which Swan Sonnenschein & Co. first broach the possibility to ARW of producing the Supplementary Board School Reader from The Wonderful Century, part I.
4
Victorian Board Schools were the first state-run schools, intended to make education available for all children. Local Boards could raise funds from a rate, build and run non-denominational schools where existing voluntary provision was inadequate, pay the fees of the poorest children and create a by-law making attendance compulsory between ages 5-13.
5
An octavo is a book or pamphlet made up of one or more full sheets of paper on which 16 pages of text were printed, which were then folded three times to produce eight leaves. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, technology permitted the manufacture of large sheets or rolls of paper on which books were printed, many text pages at a time. The term "octavo" as applied to such books may refer simply to the size of the book. Crown octavo is 7½" by 5" (190 mm x 126 mm).
6
The engraved boxwood block or woodcut dominated early Victorian book illustration. Electrotyping replaced the various kinds of woodcuts for the production of fine artwork in books. In the second half of the century, most woodblock engravings were actually printed from electrotypes.
7
The page is stamped "261".
8
Costs are expressed in shillings here, making a total of £22 6d.
9
The colonies were British overseas territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom in the 19th and early 20th centuries, principally Canada, parts of Africa, the Indian subcontinent, Australia, New Zealand and parts of the Far East. Colonial editions of books were cheaper versions to be sold overseas.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (cc) (WCP5056.5530)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by O'Dell, Sandra [2018-08-15]

Please cite as “WCP5056,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP5056