John Thompson talking about his new book on trade publishing, ‘Merchants of Culture’

Summary: John Thompson is Professor of Sociology at Cambridge University and Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge. Recent publications include Books in the Digital Age (2005) andMerchants of Culture (2010).  He was awarded the European Amalfi Prize for Sociology and the Social Sciences in 2001 for his work on political scandal. In his book Merchants of Culture he provides a fascinating account of the high-risk culture in consumer publishing on both sides of the Atlantic. Revealed is the world of agents and scouts, of auctions and deals, often with large sums of money paid out to authors, as publishers gamble in the hope of signing the next Harry Potter or Dan Brown.