One day, a few years ago, an editor down the hall from me took a nap and never woke up. Not just any editor, but Joe Fox, one of the last of a generation of towering publishing figures who had entered the business in the 1940s and 1950s. Shortly after his death, a story started making the rounds. It went like this:
Joe had first been hired, way back when, as a sales rep. He’d show up at some tiny bookstore, the kind of place that had never sold more than 10 copies of anything, and tell the owner about an upcoming book. It was, he’d claim, the single best thing he’d ever read. And Fox wouldn’t leave until he had talked the owner into placing an absurdly large order.
Some weeks later, Joe would be back with something evenbetter. Once again, he wouldn’t leave until the store had ordered 30, 40, maybe 50 copies. But when those stores sold—as their owners had predicted to Joe—two or three copies and returned several boxes of unsold books, Fox’s employers found themselves facing some serious red ink.
A meeting in New York was called to discuss the problem. Apparently this Joe Fox fellow was simply so thrilled to be involved with books that he couldn’t help but try his hardest. Optimistic, passionate about writers and writing, and a bit innocent, Joe truly felt that each upcoming book was the greatest thing he had ever read. He was like a schoolboy swinging from crush to crush to crush or maybe a missionary, fervent and desperate to enlighten. But, financially, he was killing them, resulting in much higher print runs and much higher returns. So what do to? It seemed wrong to fire someone because they were wildly enthusiastic. Someone had a suggestion: “Make him an editor.” Thus did one of the legends in American publishing history come to New York and begin his career.
I love this story for two reasons. First, because it says something profound regarding what publishing is supposed to be all about. Second, because, as I later found out, none of it ever happened. It was totally made up—by whom, I don’t know. And yet.
Many of the best stories we tell each other, and ourselves, are like this, true but not true. When I was a kid, my father broke his neck falling off a horse. Perhaps my strongest single memory from childhood is finding him sitting at the dining room table, his face covered with caking blood. He was clearly using every ounce of strength to keep from crying out in pain. I asked him what had happened, but he couldn’t say anything without risk of the whole edifice collapsing. Soon the ambulance arrived and he was taken away. It was only a few years ago that I finally realized this could never have happened. A man with a broken neck could not have walked back down the hill, returned to the house, and patiently waited. Nevertheless, a great deal of what I think about my dad’s strength and composure comes out of this memory, this dream, this whatever it was.
We each have our stories.
I lost another book today, outbid by someone else. I wasted a ton of time dealing with a tedious contract negotiation. I skipped lunch. But it was a very good day. It almost always is. You have to keep the war, not the battles, in mind. A good editor is cocky, but only because a good editor—like Joe Fox in that fairy tale—is perpetually hopeful.
Late afternoon, someone called to inquire about getting into the publishing business. At a certain point she asked, as they all do, why I decided to be an editor. I have a generic answer, the same as almost anyone’s. But the real story, which I keep mostly to myself, concerns Santa Fe’s old downtown library, now gone. I can still see every stack, each turnstile, even the faces of the librarians, as clearly as if I was there this morning. It was just a small, hometown library. But it was where I forgot to check my watch, where a whole day could pass while my brother Zack and I sat on the white linoleum floor in the back corner, a 2-foot tall tower of books next to us, books in our lap, nothing in the world more exciting.
With each red penciled mark I make today, I am slowly, I hope, drawing myself a map, a map that will take me back to that library, that orchard of books and friendly locals, where my mom, my brother, and I can sit at a table and read, read, read.
Rosebud.
