Our next guest’s company recently celebrated 50 years in business and an accolade as the recipient of the Governor’s Award in the Humanities. Mike Switzer interviews Richard Layman, president of Layman Publishing Partners in Columbia, SC.
TRANSCRIPT:
Switzer: Hello and welcome to another edition of the South Carolina Business Review. This is Mike Switzer. Our next guest's company recently celebrated 50 years in business and an accolade as the recipient of the Governor's Award in the Humanities. Richard Layman is president of Layman Publishing Partners. He joins us by phone now from his office in Columbia. Rick, welcome to the program.
Layman: Thank you. Happy to be here.
Switzer: Congratulations on 50 years and this award.
Layman: Well, it's been, a, long 50 years and a short 50 years at the same time. Very pleased.
Switzer: Well, now tell us more about this Governor's Award for the Humanities.
Layman: Well, the Governor's Award is for career achievement, I suppose. Has to do a lot with the achievement of the various iterations of my company, which has gone on, since February 1976. But in addition to that, I've had the liberty to, do my own work. And I have done a good bit of scholarship on Dashiell Hammett, John Dos Passos, in particular. And I'm, a trustee of the Literary Property Trust of Dashiell Hammett. Have done 10 books on him and working on a couple more right now.
Switzer: All right, well, tell us how you got into the publishing business and what it is your company does.
Layman: Well, I had the good fortune of having my dissertation directed at the University of South Carolina by Matthew J. Brookley. Came here in 1972 to work on PhD. I was a long haired, undisciplined kid, who came under the tutelage of the equivalent of a Parris island drill master. Berkeley was a genius. He took me under his wings, taught me, how to act as a scholar, and as a professional, a business professional. When I got my degree in 1975, taught at the university for a couple of years and then met his friends, CE Frazer Clark, who a Detroit businessman, started a small publishing company called Bruccoli Clark. Matt and Frazer needed an employee. That was me. And that's how the company started. I was the only employee. A couple years in, Frazer Clark went to a Detroit publisher, Frederick Ruffner, who owned what became the largest reference publishing company in the United States. Gill Research made friends with him and Fred asked phrase to do a book about authors. That's all one book about authors. Bruccoli got hold of that idea, so he went back with a series of books about authors. That was the Dictionary of Literary Biography. The first volume of DLB was published in 1978. it is now over 400 volumes. It's 100 million words. Library Journal called it the most important literary reference book ever published. We're working on it now. Just finished a volume on Ukrainian writers, first of two volumes. And we're working on a series of essential writers in the DLB that is the most 100 or so most important writers in the world. And those will be evergreen entries that are kept continuously up to date so they never grow stale.
Switzer: Is your specialty then literary publishing? Do you do other types of publishing?
Layman: Our background is literary publishing, certainly, but we, have done good bit of work in the humanities in general. We have done, for example a series called American Decades, which is a social history of the United States from 1900 into the 21st century, decade by decade, one volume per decade. Each volume is divided into 10 chapters and the chapters are on such things as religion and sports, lifestyles and medicine. We did a series called History and Dispute, which had senior scholars debating issues in American history. We've done a two volume set on disability studies. Gail came to us two, three years ago and asked for a volume on the emerging field of disability studies. Within a year we came up with two volumes called Disability Experiences, Autobiographical essays by people who had experienced challenges of disabilities. that volume was submitted to the Dartmouth committee. Came in as runner up for the Dartmouth Prize, which is regarded as the highest award in the industry.
Switzer: Well, Rick, congratulations again. Thank you so much for spending time with us today.
Layman: Happy to do so.
Switzer: Rick Layman is president of Layman Publishing Partners. He joined us by phone from his office in Columbia, South Carolina. And we will have a link to the company posted at our webpage so you can learn more SouthCarolinaPublicRadio.org where you can hear this show again, and you can find us wherever you find podcasts. With the South Carolina Business Review, this is Mike Switzer.
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