Quotes from Jonathan Galassi

I've always loved the poetry in 'Pale Fire.' I think it's wonderful.

I deal with the authors I work with, agents, and other departments of the company, talking about both the books that I'm working on and everyone else's. Then there's dealing with foreign publishers: foreigners visit all the time. People want to bounce things off the publisher, and a lot of it is encouragement.

What the beautiful-writing writers are most attached to is almost always superfluous.

I love poetry; it's my primary literary interest, and I suppose the kind of reading you do when you are reading poems - close reading - can carry over into how you read other things.

My poems are always about my life in one way or another.

Claiming your life for yourself feels like a huge deal until you do it.

There's been a fragmentation of how the market functions, but I believe printed books are here to stay. People like the tactile experience, the smell of them; there's a great romance to them.

I think poetry was always where I went to deal with my deepest feelings.

There are courses you can take to learn the mechanics of the business, like the Radcliffe course, but I don't think they teach you how to edit.

I think poetry should be read very much like prose, except that the line breaks should be acknowledged somehow.

I've always used poetry to explain myself to myself. These things just sat in my psyche and then came out.

A lot of great authors are published before their time. That's not wrong; it's just the way it works.

John Updike's first published book was a collection of poems.

I think that a really good agent should be able to get the right publisher, which the agent has already figured out, get as much money as she can from that publisher, and make a deal, rather than have the amount of money determine the sale. That's what the best agents do.

An e-book distributor is not a publisher, but rather a purveyor of work that has already been created.

I think that the continuity of what I do as an editor with what I did when I started out 40 years ago is very direct. The delivery system is changing and will continue to, but the actual interaction between publisher and author is exactly the same.

A publisher - and I write as one - does far more than print and sell a book. It selects, nurtures, positions and promotes the writer's work.

My biggest concern about the market is the force that acts to drive down price, because I think that's destructive to authors as well as publishers. Our biggest battle is to underline the value of intellectual property.

I wanted to be involved with literature. I certainly wasn't going to be able to write for a living, and I didn't have enough confidence in my talent to think that I should be just doing that. Publishing seemed like fun to me - to be involved with writers. And it did turn out to be.

Everything is different - except for publishing itself: getting hold of an amazing author, working to make his or her book the best and best-looking it can be, telling the world.

When you're in the throes of writing, I find, the lessons you've casually imparted to others are not in the forefront of your mind. Which may be good or bad. Probably both.

Editing is more by-the-hip. You look at a text and ask yourself how it can be improved.

The only thing you can really say in a poem is what you really, really deeply believe.

Elizabeth Bishop in particular had a big impact on me personally as well as artistically. Her insistence on clarity is something I rate very highly.