Hi Hugh,
My guess is that it would depend very much on the size of the
publisher, and poetry publishers being relatively small outfits
as a rule, I don't think they employ readers as such.
I can only give Bloodaxe as an example from my own past
experience -- as far as I know it was only Neil Astley and one
other assistant editor who read MSS. I submitted one myself
back in 1994, which was read by one of the assistant (joint?)
editors (Andrew somebody . . . ) and returned with a 2-page
crit, picking out the few he genuinely liked, with general comments
on the rest (you're still young, the poems tend too much
towards the abstract, etc).
>From my recent correspondence with Neil, here's a couple of
quotes which may be relevent --
>I receive around 100 submissions a week, virtually all of which I have to
return without comment, <
>I would say that 95% of the submissions I receive are unsuitable for book
publication <
Faber . . . my guess is that it would be a two-person job at the
very least, with perhaps readers sifting out a small number of
MSS which are then passed onto the editor. Whether they're
in the habit of making written reports on these possible MSS
. . . dunno! I think you may be right about the informal avenues . . .
second or third opinions.
I've always associated readers' reports with the big fiction
publishers, for some reason . . . . not so much with poetry.
I'm behind on this particular thread though . . . .
Andy
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