Editor's Fence

Editor's Fence ACADEMIC JOURNALS will encounter new as well as old challenges in the 1990s. By the middle of the decade those who would like to make scholarship a so-called "on-line" affair will have a more powerful voice. Which is to say the insurgents who promote this fashionable argument would like to dethrone ink and paper; they would install the modern-day barons—computers, animated by those robotic chatter-boxes called modems. The promise is simple: we may conveniently "telephone" a "data bank" that, for example, includes ELT articles. We may read the scholarship as soon as it has been accepted for "publication." Happy days. Similar "modem services" are already available. In many places you can "dial" your university library and access the equivalent of the card catalog. Certainly the usefulness of personal computers is undeniable; they are levers, so to speak, that help move and thus share information. Why push if you can use a lever to ease the wearisome part of the effort? Nevertheless, the prospect of computer technology superseding those palpable and visual enjoyments unique to the printed page does not have much appeal. And factors other than aesthetics come to mind. I don't want to take one to bed, a computer that is. Nor can I imagine lounging on the couch with a monitor propped on my chest, no matter how colorful. The things of modernity have a way of wheedling their way into our Uves. Perhaps the publishing gods may intervene and spare us one—-just one—smart twentieth-century innovation. Those same gods will be cynical when it comes to offering relief from the all-too-familiar challenges. The pleasures in preparing a volume for publication have been troubled by increased printing costs in recent years. The most persistent menace, however, remains postal rates. Given the severe financial pressures on the American government, the talk of abolishing the Library Rate is now quite real. An increase in February (precious enough) is certain. If those champions of all but education and the future, the Washington politicians, also rescind the Library Rate (admittedly a subsidy), the expense of delivering even a modest publication like ELT will escalate. Obviously I anticipate changes in subscription rates for 1992, a few dollars added to each subscriber category. Our last increase was 1987. However, subscription agents estimate that library subscriptions on average rise by 15% each year (foreign journals as much as 38%). ELT will remain sensibly priced, and I hope you and your friendly librarians will continue your subscriptions. Despite these and other challenges, I remain sanguine about the future of ELT. We should pause to appreciate the community of effort it enjoys: those who write the good articles, those who take the time to review the books, those who attend to the mundane but all-important chores of publishing the journal. For many years ELT has also been blessed by knowledgeable scholars, the members of the Advisory Board who generously share their expertise and time. I'm pleased to say the masthead now includes the names of other distinguished scholars who have agreed to join us: G. A. Cevasco (St. John's University); Elliott L. Gilbert (University of California, Davis); Avrom Fleishman (The Johns Hopkins University); Simon Gatrell (University of Georgia); Judith Scherer Herz (Concordia University); Billie Andrew Inman (University of Arizona); Ira B. Nadel (University of British Columbia). A sincere welcome to them all. New in the ELT Special Series: Lloyd Siemens, "The Critical Reception of H. Rider Haggard: With an Annotated Secondary Bibliography ," Special Series Number 5 (August 1991). U.S $13.00 / Elsewhere $15.00. See the ad in 34:2, opposite page 197. New from ELT Press: Pater in the 1990s. May 1991 $30.00 300 pp. ISBN 0-944318-05-3. See the ad in this issue, opposite page 71. ^ Gissing Centre Opens ^ On 5 May 1990 ceremonies were held at the opening of a George Gissing Centre in Wakefield, located in the house where Gissing was born and brought up. The Centre occupies one floor of the house, and exhibits photos, books and wall captions with information about Gissing and other Wakefield writers. The Gissing Trust will now...