PUBLISHING IN ZAMBIA

If you are a writer of fiction or non-fiction, you will agree that it is really great to get published. Receiving an award and seeing book sales soaring is every writer's dream. However, in Zambia, many manuscripts just end up on shelves, gathering dust and will probably never achieve these milestone. Many potential authors have asked how to get past the ‘publishing hurdle’. Publishing in this country is not easy. The whole process is complicated, worsened by the lack of support structures for writers.

What does it mean to publish? A published writer is one who has written a book, a story, a play, or indeed any work of fiction or  non-fiction and has had such work printed and distributed for public access. It means to make your work public, letting people know that you have written and that your work is ready for reading. 

Photo credit: Kafula Mwila

Where does this whole process begin and what are the hurdles along the way? When a writer is satisfied that a manuscript is complete, they need to get it to a publisher. It is at this point that the woes of most Zambian writers begin.

For a start, there are few publishers in the country. These laregely focus on publishing academic works. So if you have written a text book for school or college, then you might just get lucky, that is if your book is approved by the curriculum development authorities. Otherwise, you join the struggle of the fiction writers. Local publishers have preference for books that they can easily sell in schools and tertiary institutions.  So where does that leave the one who writes for the greater good of humanity? Out in the cold mostly, to fend for themselves. If such a writer succeeds to publish, then they have a challenge of marketing their books to a nation with a poor reading culture. This has also been compounded by low literacy levels with less than 40% of the population being able to read and write. 

A fiction writer has no choice but to seek other publishing routes. What are these alternatives and how accessible are they to the ordinary writer? It is important to recognise that there are Zambian writers who live abroad. For them 

publishing options are plenty. That is one route that local writers can take, get a publisher outside Zambia. The question is, how many can afford to do that? One has to be ready to pay taxes to bring  books into the country, and get back to the marketing difficulties. The major book retailers also have their desires, just like the local publishers. Also, when your book is published abroad how do you keep track of the sales out there? 

The other alternative, something that has been trending in the recent past is self-publishing, but it is not the easier way out either. In the first place, it is totally self-financed. Secondly, the author has to do their own marketing. It is like merging an author and publisher into one.  Then there is need to ensure that the manuscript is edited properly. Finding a good editor is like looking for 'a needle in a haystack'. This has led to the production of sub-standard books. Many writers skip the editing stage to minimise on costs. Then there is the lack of illustrators- an aspect that has made many writers depend on un-established graphics designers. 

If one gets past all these obstacles, they are faced with the colossal cost of printing. Some Zambians have opted for printing services outside the country but pay dearly for importing their own books back into the country. Self-publishing? Well, considering the aforementioned and the fact that generally, self-published work is looked down upon in some circles, it is an option one would wish to consider cautiously. However, we cannot completely discard it, as many self-published books have ended up saving the day.  It has contributed to the development of writing in Zambia. 

What about online publication? The answer to the question is yet another question; how many Zambians have access to a computer, let alone the internet?  Only a small section of of the population has access to a computer (according to ZICTA). That being the case, how many will get to read from this platform? In fact, online publication is the cheapest and the simplest as long as the work is of standard. It is an opportunity to reach a wider audience, beyond the borders of Zambia. But who gets to check what goes and what is completely unpalatable? According to a Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Zambia, ‘State of the Media’ for the quarter January 1 to March 31, 2012, there is no specific regulation for online publication such as a law that must require online publishers to register with any government department the way newspapers do. The current situation allows anyone to set up an online publication and dump whatever stuff they wish to publish without anyone checking. MISA Zambia has since urged the state to come up with a way that will ensure that anyone setting up an online publication registers before launching to publish. The absence of a perfect check system has allowed a situation where anyone, even if they are not well vest in fiction publishing, to go ahead and dilute the good works being done by professionals in this area. 

Photo credit: Kafula Mwila

If we are to head 'Toward a Zambian Genre', a collection of non-fiction works about Zambia, by Zambians, the publishing industry must be developed to accommodate this kind of work. Government should also play a role in making publishing a reality for its citizens. Unless many of the issues raised are addressed,  we are far from realising our dream, yet there is hope because Zambians have started writing.