Guest Post: Alison Miles on ‘What Can We Hope For?’ from the edge of the epicentre

John Polkinghorne lives near us and we have known him for many years. In 2015 the Church Times published an interview in which he answered questions about science and religion put to him by my husband, Patrick. It celebrated John’s 85th birthday.

Patrick is neither a mathematical physicist nor a theologian so to prepare for interviewing John, he read many of John’s books as well as doing additional research on topics relevant to John’s lifetime’s work. Patrick and John recorded their discussions and our son, Jim, transcribed them. Jim had transcribed recordings during his Year 10 work experience, using a transcription kit with pedal. This time he wrote some software to enable him to manage and pace the recording while typing the text. Patrick edited the typed version ready for John to give feedback, then they completed the final stages ready for submission to the Church Times.

A short while later, John invited Patrick to read his recent books about ‘eschatology’ and discuss them. So the new topic was ‘the future’ of us and the universe. At the time, Patrick was also working on his biography of George Calderon, which was coming up for publication under the Sam&Sam banner. Patrick managed that project and Jim was the technical supremo, including typesetting the book ready for printing by Clays of Bungay. So they were both occupied with the first book when the second began, but ‘If you want something done, ask a busy person’!

The new series of discussions between Patrick and John started; they usually took place on Thursday mornings lasting about an hour. Patrick’s questions were submitted to John a week in advance. Over thirteen months they covered a huge range of aspects of our human and cosmic ‘future’. Again, it was all recorded on our small dictaphone which Jim downloaded after each session. He transcribed the interviews word for word including hesitations, interjections, duplications etc.

Once the transcription was complete it was time to review what was there and decide on the next steps. Seven years ago John said he had ‘written his last book’ but here was a different text that could become a short book. He agreed with Patrick that it was worth going ahead with this as a real viva voce script rather than a ‘set piece’ philosophical dialogue. So together they edited down the transcript of 60,000 words into one of 31,000 words in five chapters. John proposed the title What Can We Hope For? and Patrick the sub-title ‘Dialogues about the Future’. The result was a ‘manuscript’ that they both liked, so the next step was publication.

Many publishers were approached. John and Patrick agreed that the book needed to be reasonably priced and there was a feeling that it should be produced relatively quickly, ideally for John’s 89th birthday (16 October 2019). Commercial publishers could not match these requirements so Jim and Patrick investigated Amazon ‘print on demand’ and agreed that, for a book of this size, it was a definite possibility. As before, Patrick was the project manager and Jim the typesetter (to find out more about what he did go to ‘How to typeset a second book’). The book went through seven sets of proofs including being read by me (someone has to be ‘keeper of the comma’ – but all I found was one inconsistent indentation!).

At the point when the project moved to Amazon print on demand, Patrick moved straight out of his comfort zone and Jim moved quickly into his. Patrick is very familiar with the traditional ‘Gutenberg’ publication process (manuscript/typescript/proofs/print) while Jim understands how online processes work. They both looked into Amazon’s terms and conditions and the procedures for print on demand. As a result they decided to go ahead. This included finishing off the book (cover, spine, back page author blurbs and photos, ISBN etc) before submitting the pdf to Amazon.

In his blog post ‘A Tale of Two Front Covers’ Patrick describes what happened as he and John discussed and chose the cover(s). I remember him arriving home with a print of Naum Gabo’s Opus 9 from Kettle’s Yard. At the time (as with so many art, poetry and drama references) I hadn’t a clue who Naum Gabo was and promptly forgot his name! That aside, from 1 December we have had two editions available to accommodate the two authors’ cover preferences.

Celebrating the publication of the ‘second’ (Gabo) edition

Then there were the ins and outs of the Amazon printing process. The overall impression that I have, as the spectator on the edge of the epicentre, is that Amazon has set up an interactive process that (for the IT savvy, i.e. Jim) makes it relatively easy to submit a book, to make amendments after submission if required, to set a price (£5 as opposed to one publisher’s suggestion of £12.50) and to check the product, all before (and, amazingly, also after) going live. Jim regularly comes round to our house with author’s copies that he has ordered on Patrick’s behalf from Amazon. Initially the proofs had ‘not for resale’ printed on them, and Patrick and Jim went through them with a fine-tooth comb for any errors etc. A few changes had to be made because one or two layout issues turned up and also Amazon requested 100 pages if there is text on the spine. This led to production of about twenty copies of the first edition with additional blank pages headed ‘For Notes’. These copies are now rarities as those ‘extra’ pages have become an appendix containing the full initial texts of the Church Times interview. Various interesting facts have emerged. Printing seems to happen anywhere, for example some copies have come from Poland. Author copies can take at least a week to arrive but normal copies, printed by Amazon UK, arrive very quickly, particularly for Amazon Prime users. For me insight into this automated and hugely efficient production process has been fascinating. Whatever we all think about Amazon’s monopolistic, exploitative qualities it is clear that they have nailed almost every aspect of print on demand for paperbacks, at least for a relatively straightforward one like this.

The book is now well and truly published, so all that remains for me is to make the celebration cake for the tea party we are having with John, in a week or so.

The left cover can be found on amazon by clicking here and the right cover can be found on amazon by clicking here.