On the intellectual merits of fiction and the debut novel of Redwood Press.
The email arrived with the morning download of author queries, manuscript reviews, and book proposals and recommendations. This one, from a Stanford colleague, subject line, “Greetings and an Inquiry,” opened with discussion of a speaker who had come to campus a few years earlier: Bahiyyih Nakhjavani, brilliant lecturer, previous book published by Bloomsbury, accomplished novelist. And that’s where I stopped short—a novelist. SUP does not publish fiction.
Some editorial instinct urged me to question my immediate “no fiction” response.
When culling book proposal submissions, the first pass is always the easiest: eliminate the “don’ts”—those manuscripts that don’t conform, in form or content, with our publishing agenda. And the line between nonfiction and fiction is often starkly drawn at publishing houses. But within my own acquisition area, Middle East studies, I’ve increasingly noticed works of fiction on syllabi alongside our Press monographs. Some editorial instinct urged me to question my immediate “no fiction” response.
Here was a published author—Nakhjavani’s previous two novels, The Saddlebag and Paper had been widely read and well reviewed. This new book, The Woman Who Read Too Much, had already found critical success in translation. And the recommendation described it as “stunning in the parsimony and poetry of its prose, the pith and power of the plot and the illuminating panorama it offered of parts of the Middle East.” So, interest piqued, I started reading:
When the Shah was shot, he staggered several paces …
And I didn’t stop reading. This was an intriguing story of a woman, and of mothers, daughters, wives, and sisters in nineteenth century Iran. Nakhjavani created a complex world, spun out over alternating perspectives and through stories of women so frequently invisible in the official historical records. With elegant style, she illuminated themes that spoke to contemporary concerns: the equality of women and men, the freedom of expression, the power of literacy and knowledge.
I was drawn into the book, and soon was carrying the manuscript around the SUP office, pressing others to take it home and start reading as well. With conviction equal to my first reaction, “we don’t do fiction,” I now thought, we need to do this book.
As I’ve worked with the novel and we prepare for its publication, I’ve had more opportunity to reflect on the place of fiction within our publishing program at large, and within my own portfolio specifically. These lines between fiction and nonfiction are obviously not as stark as many—as I—assumed. The history and ethnography that I work on most often are ultimately stories of people and societies, of motivations and experiences. I spend considerable time with nonfiction authors discussing the narrative arc of books, “character” development, voice and point of view. While obvious in fiction, these elements are no less essential in crafting a work of nonfiction. There are lessons to learn and similarities that inform good writing and good books, whether fiction or nonfiction.
I’m excited to launch the Redwood Press imprint and have this new outlet to consider publishing more works of fiction. As a university press, our publishing mission is to disseminate new ideas, to encourage knowledge and debate. Fiction can play an important role in the wider public engagement with intellectual work. It can offer a way to imagine and open worlds from a different point of view. As Bahiyyih Nakhjavani herself writes about her aims for The Woman, this book “reconstructs the world of Qajar women and tells the unrecorded stories of … nineteenth-century Iran. In so doing, I hope it also shows the relevance of these lost stories for today."
Interview with Dr. Bahiyyih Nakhjavani from parstimes on Vimeo.
The Woman Who Read Too Much wonderfully illustrates the kind of fiction that complements SUP’s publishing program, and in doing so sets a high bar for what we acquire in the future. I invite you to get a taste of the book now, and then watch for its publication in April. I hope you’ll be as immediately intrigued as I was when this manuscript first landed on my desk.
When the Shah was shot, he staggered several paces in the shrine and fell stone dead in the lap of an old beggar woman. . . Read on at sup.org »
Kate Wahl is editor-in-chief at Stanford University Press. She joined SUP in 2001, launched SUP’s Middle East Studies program in 2004, and became publishing director and editor-in-chief in 2012.
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