After Long Delay, Lindqvist’s ‘China’ in Paperback

by Judith Rosen -- Publishers Weekly, 6/20/2008 7:15:00 AM

When Merloyd Lawrence published Cecilia Lindqvist’s China: Empire of Living Symbols on the meaning and evolution of Chinese characters in 1991 under her own imprint at Addison-Wesley, little did she know that it would take close to two decades and a change in the company’s ownership, to the Perseus Books Group, for a paperback edition to be released. After all, the book, which was recommended to her by the late Swedish publisher Ebbe Carlsson, has never been out-of-print in Sweden, and the first printing in the U.S. broke even.

But, says Lawrence, at the time it was too expensive to print a new hardcover edition or to move it into paperback because of the number of illustrations. China might have continued to languish on Lawrence’s bookshelf, had she not kept checking how it was doing at used book dealers online. When she saw that some copies of the English edition were selling for hundreds of dollars, she brought the book to Da Capo, where she now has her own imprint.

Da Capo publisher John Radziewicz agreed that the book is unique and, with interest in all things China increasing, gave the go ahead for a paperback. Unfortunately, there were a few production hurdles, according to Lawrence. For example, there was no longer film from the first edition, so Da Capo had to get files from Sweden for the illustrations and scan Joan Tate’s translation from the earlier edition. Then Lawrence had to re-edit the scan.

“It’s good to feel something is just as valuable or more valuable now,” said Lawrence, who is delighted to finally have the book available in paperback.