GUYANA has always had a body of souls who have, beyond all odds, kept the business of publishing alive.

No, we do not have a publishing industry, but rather we have the potential through our pool of talents for a vibrant publishing industry with its lucrative spinoffs. Though I am part of that group, it has always intrigued me that we persist.
In fact, we are driven to write our narratives; to implore and negotiate sponsorship, and endure the rejection and deceptions and labour with the footwork to bring our fiction or nonfiction piece of literature alive, then to sell by wrenching sales from most of our public associates.
We who write, illustrate and publish locally are indeed a peculiar group. Guyana has just past the first 50 years of nationhood. Guyana faces a changed world, where what we understood to be the norm has morphed into something different, not necessarily positive to the GDP.
New platforms have to be built, as old economic monoliths disintegrate and command restructure to endure and keep working families fed. It is in this context that we must look at the options.
The book industry is not what we local self- publishers exist in. The book industry revolves around ‘distribution’, with ‘agents’ in some categories that are en vogue, with institutions which, when motivated, can, like a track relay race, take the ideas of a book to another level, on the negotiation of a talented ‘agent’.
We have none of the latter. Why is that so? Simple. The reality is that it has not become a public discourse that involves our decision makers. Neither does the framework of a publishing industry exist, to the best of my knowledge, on any Caribbean territory.
Why? Again, because we have not shaken off the colonial cloak to contemplate and respond to the idea that there needs to be changes that include new frontiers for reference.
We wait, like Guyana, which stubbornly played politics with the sugar industry, and implement no reforms; now the EU Protocol is over, and business rather than politics, is on the table. Well, you know that story.

NEW KID ON THE BLOCK
The newest kid on the published block is Mike Jordan’s ‘KAMARANG’. And it lures you into the realms of Amerindian lore, expanding into Georgetown. This is an exciting story, from the excerpts published in Kaieteur News. A supernatural thriller that envelopes, ever so subtly, the lives of characters, then unfolds, gripping the interest of the reader. This is good reading. And when I conclude it, I will expand on the concept with more authority.
It was commendable when the Jagdeo Government had designated funds, under the name Caribbean Press, to republish old publications and embrace new publishing. This opportunity was squandered in the most vulgar way, and became the personal adventure of a few, resulting in a national embarrassment.
Local publishing had a place in the national framework when I came on the scene as a teenager with a manuscript in the late 70s. There was Curriculum Development, an independent Department of Culture, the National Service Publishing Centre. They all indulged and meaningfully encouraged local writers and self publishers. And the Chronicle that published local short stories and illustrated work all had staff that understood the genre.
Even the National Library would request a free copy for the file, and then buy about a dozen books. The GNTC bought a substantial amount. With this kind of atmosphere, creative souls endeavoured.
Today, we live in a different world. However, the local creative world is the first matter of Cultural Industries. Though the Cultural Industry is vibrant, with commendable precedents in nations all around Guyana, it is challenged at home. Those people of the 70s are long gone, and no serious thought has been given to developing structures peopled by artistic kindred to directly help create of our creative souls and their restless muses, evolved forms, from hunter gatherers to progressive city State environments.

NO BLUFFING CULTURE
It is very frustrating that Kulture is still perceived as an area that can be bluffed. And it is not. One has ‘to know’ to construct deeper from the national ideas we dabble with; to capture space and audience on the critical stage of the Cultural Industries market to be able to attract licensed adaptations.
The prototypes of those local creative ideas exist within the characters and conflicts shaped in books like Mike Jordan’s KAMARANG. With reference to ‘bluff’, we have witnessed where this has taken us with dabblers, in the ancient art of masonry [civil construction] across Guyana.
The proponents of ideas in every field must have its visible and compatible source people existing in the State apparatus. Let me take time out to remind our legion of reading critics as to why I mentioned ‘The State’.
The idea can be explored. Every cultural edifice [building or idea] we reflect on with awe was State-sponsored. In other words, sponsored by ‘the people’ across the continents for millennia. That Guyana’s self publishers persist within the knowledge that, from concept to published product to meaningful sales, all depend 75% on their own efforts, whether we link with Amazon, Austin’s or sales from friends.
We have done this over the past 50 years almost on our own; it does merit a national shift. Just reflect on royalties received, and taxes extracted from book publishing in other countries of the Americas and ponder, perhaps regrettably, why not before?