Literary Agents Urged to Redefine Roles - Korea Herald

[김두환]

Literary Agents Urged to Redefine Roles
 
This is the fifth and last in a five-part series of articles on the flood of translated foreign books in the local publication market and top translators. - Ed.

By Yang Sung-jin


"Literary agent" is a misleading term in Korea - at least for now. In other advanced publication markets, agents mean those who manage publishing rights for authors and offer expert-level advice about their future works.

But in Korea, most agents are solely devoted to connecting domestic publishers with other foreign agents in the process of purchasing rights for new books. Agents' major income is a 10 percent fee of the advance when the right for a certain title is purchased by Korean publishers.

Duran Kim, who is a leading one-person literary agency, said the number of agents started to soar in 2001. "You don't need a license to become an agent, so many people are jumping into the business, but to be a professional agent, you need professional expertise," Kim said in an interview with The Korea Herald.

Agents, for instance, should know the complex history of publishers and their preferred sectors. Predicting which titles in what genres will come out from major publishers in overseas markets is one of key abilities agents should learn, he said.

Networking is equally important. Foreign agents do not assign obscure Korean agents to handle the complicated rights-selling and royalty-payment processes. The logic is rather simple. A major U.S. publisher puts out at least 30 new titles, and the company usually receives information requests for a single title from some 30 or 40 countries. If a dozen local publishers or agents join the battle for a single title, the U.S. publisher has to handle more than 300 requests, which require too many resources.

To streamline the process and improve efficiency, American and British publishers tend to give "exclusive" rights-handling deal to a few local agents, most of which have great influences in their respective markets.

The Big Four agents in Korea are KCC, Shinwon, IKA and Eric Yang Agency. But these heavyweights are not entirely controlling the agency market. Individual agencies like Duran Kim are also carving out a significant share in the market.

Kim has exclusive rights deals with five major publishers: Perseus, Random House's subsidiary, Oxford University Press, Little Brown and Norton. Foreign publishers regularly send out information about new titles, which are promptly delivered through Korean agents to publishers.

Once Korean publishers show interest about certain titles, agents deliver more detailed information and, if there's a host of publishers wanting to grab the title, agents launch a bidding process.

The major complaint by Korean publishers, however, is that agents are likely to bid up the prices too much in an attempt to get a bigger fee.

Duran Kim said the complaint sometimes makes sense, but resentment depends on the relative satisfaction. "Publishers express displeasure when the price is too high for its commercial value. But if the price is appropriate, they don't care about the absolute amount," he said.

Another thorny issue is the exclusive rights owned by several Korean agents. Some local publishers openly blame major agencies for jacking up prices excessively by abusing their exclusive rights.

Kim, however, counters the claim, saying that excessive competition and bid-up prices happen when there's no exclusive rights handler.

"When exclusive agents get involved, they can offer a ballpark figure about the bidding price since the channel is streamlined. But if the bidding is open to everybody, nobody knows what's the upper limit," Kim said.

Although agents depend on the 10-percent fee of the advance money for new titles, the industry itself is still small. The advance is usually $2,000 for new literary writers and $3,000 for better-known authors. The advance for economic and business books starts from $10,000.

But agents have to manage rights fee payments for the contract period - five to seven years in most cases - the agency business requires long-term costs, which limits its profitability.

Excluding one-person agencies, there are about 50 agencies in Korea, less than 15 of which have more than five employees, reflecting the smaller market size.

Kim Hee-soon, president of Eric Yang Agency, said the role of agents is slowly changing. "We started the agency business in 1995, and it's only recently that we have Korean writers whose works can be exported to other markets, particularly Asia," Kim said in an interview.

Eric Yang has close business relations with Harper Collins, Doubleday, Crown and U.S. Viking Penguin.

Kim also points to the revival of American and British novels on the domestic publication market. "Just a couple of years ago, American and British novels did not appeal to local readers, but since the introduction of Harry Potter and other blockbuster titles, the portion of novels is on the rise," she said.

Kim said Korea now faces a chance to promote its literary works, but there are many challenges to overcome.

Duran Kim, meanwhile, said local authors and publishers should focus on the commercial market, rather than the pure literary market. "The publishing business is an industry, but we still view it as a sort of cultural sector, not a sector that we can pull off a commercial success."

To embrace a true globalization of Korean literature, Duran Kim suggested local agents, publishers and authors join forces to target foreign markets from the outset, coming up with universal themes and subjects that can appeal to different cultures.

2005.12.09