Are Historical Monographs Dinosaurs Doomed to Extinction?
As an editor of a series for a university press for the past 20 years, I can report that rumors of the death of historical monographs are no longer premature. Pathbreaking works of history now often sell only a few hundred copies. The source of the problem is not the authors and not the publishers, but the libraries, most of which can no longer afford to acquire many new books. The AHA’s Gutenberg-e Prize program was meant to respond to this problem, but it is not yet clear whether it will make a major impact. It may be that we should address this problem by changing our standards of evaluation for tenure (a step officially advocated by the Modern Language Association) rather than trying to influence the publishing market. The best course of action is far from certain, but the current trend does threaten to increase the sense of hierarchy in the profession; those at the top will continue to publish books, in part because they will have the best access to publishers, and the rest will n
