Have you always worked in publishing?

[GrownUp]

Hey John,
Still curious.
Have you always wanted to work in publishing? Did it seem a natural direction for you to go in from the beginning? Is it a love of books that inspired you, or some flair for media and organisation, or a fascination with the world of books? Like libraries and bookfairs and booksignings and the paper-and-ink and the way people put so much of themselves into it?
I'm a scientist, and I've been fascinated by the questions I'm now researching since I was quite young. Plus I'm good at maths. So the career choice was obvious. But there is something else in it. A sort of immortality ...in the conversations, in the publications. I suppose I'm asking if that is what you feel too?

[John Jarrold]

Originally Posted by GrownUp

Hey John,
Still curious.
Have you always wanted to work in publishing? Did it seem a natural direction for you to go in from the beginning? Is it a love of books that inspired you, or some flair for media and organisation, or a fascination with the world of books? Like libraries and bookfairs and booksignings and the paper-and-ink and the way people put so much of themselves into it?
I'm a scientist, and I've been fascinated by the questions I'm now researching since I was quite young. Plus I'm good at maths. So the career choice was obvious. But there is something else in it. A sort of immortality ...in the conversations, in the publications. I suppose I'm asking if that is what you feel too?

Firstly it was a love of books, which was instilled in me by my parents. I didn't really think about working in publishing until I began to attend SF conventions and got to know a number of authors, like Brian Aldiss, James Blish, Bob Shaw and others, in the early 70s. I also met publishers and agents over the years and after conversations with them, I gradually decided that this was what I wanted to do with my life. Never regretted that decision!

[GrownUp]

Originally Posted by John Jarrold

Firstly it was a love of books, which was instilled in me by my parents.

Parents. Hurrah for them!

Originally Posted by John Jarrold

I didn't really think about working in publishing until I began to attend SF conventions and got to know a number of authors, like Brian Aldiss, James Blish, Bob Shaw and others, in the early 70s. I also met publishers and agents over the years and after conversations with them, I gradually decided that this was what I wanted to do with my life. Never regretted that decision!

Did you do other work before? Is it alright for me to ask?

Thanks for your replies.

[John Jarrold]

Of course! I left school at 16, worked in a bank for three years, then spent fifteen years working in public libraries before coming into publishing, so books have been my professional life for well over thirty years.

[GrownUp]

Libraries are wonderful. Libraries are what souls would look like if people's souls were buildings.

Of course, you may have earned a more mundane view of them!

[John Jarrold]

You could be right! But one thing I loved was the ability to just walk a few yards and pick up a book on any subject. To be able to do that five days a week for fifteen years was wonderful.