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    The McMaster Department of Philosophy has now put together the following notice commemorating Barry: Barry Allen: A Philosophical Life Barry…

Philosophy Presses: Which Ones are Responsible, Which Not?

Brian Leiter

Tad Brennan (Philosophy, Northwestern) writes:

Last week’s thread on philosophy journals was right in line with the
mission of the PGR:  making widely available to philosophers and
philosophy grad students some important facts about how the
profession works.  There was some healthy venting, some
not-so-healthy (in my opinion) piling-on, and now everyone  has a
better sense of which journals are well-run and which are not (with
perhaps some reporting-bias from the deeply aggrieved).

Following on some thoughts that Chris Gauker and I have been emailing
to each other, how about a thread soliciting comparable plaudits and
plaints about book-publishers and the philosophical book world?

A good idea, so comments are open; no anonymous postings, of course.  My own nominees for excellent presses would be Oxford University Press and Routledge, though in both cases, this has much to do with their being led by creative and highly knowledgeable editors, Peter Momtchiloff and Tony Bruce, respectively.  Indeed, working with them has been so constructive and rewarding, that I’ve really had little occasion to work substantially with other no doubt good presses.

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3 responses to “Philosophy Presses: Which Ones are Responsible, Which Not?”

  1. C.E. Petit

    I encourage philosophers (and others) to consider their experience with the various presses' copyright policies when evaluating publishers (of both periodicals and books). The kind of "respect" that authors get–or, too often, don't get–from the "business" end of the publisher has far more to do with the overall publishing experience than I think some authors consider at contracting time.

    A substantial part of my practice involves representing and advising authors of serious nonfiction works. Usually, this means stepping in after something has already blown up. However, sometimes I do get involved at the contracting stage; and publisher attitude toward copyright varies tremendously. For example, one extraordinarily prominent university press absolutely refuses to negotiate its copyright grab under any circumstances–even for books consisting largely of reprints of previously published material. This publisher is downright hostile to even politely worded requests to consider allowing the author(s) to retain copyright. On the other hand, some university presses are much more accomodating, including a couple that default to leaving copyright with the author.

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  2. Tim O'Keefe

    I've been very pleased with Cambridge University Press (UK office) thus far. All my dealings with them have been smooth, professional, and timely, and the reviewers' reports helped me substantially improve my ms. I'm about to prepare the index and still have to look over final page proofs, so there may still be some train wreck looming, but I very much doubt it.

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  3. J.S. Taylor

    I've also been very pleased with Cambridge, who made my first foray into book publishing (with an edited collection of new papers) a delight. The referees' comments were timely and helpful, and all the editorial staff I dealt with were both charming and professional. They also made indexing as straightforward as possible, for which I'm still very grateful!

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