Because of the number of items that we had published, we were very happy when we received an invitation to attend a Christian Publisher’s Conference at Potchefstroom University. We were printing in about eighteen languages at that time, and were regarded to be a major publisher simply because of the number of different languages, titles, and how many ISBN numbers we had used as we filed the required copies with the State Libraries. None of the individual items was a large book.
This happened at the height of the isolation of South Africa during the apartheid years, so it was surprising that such a meeting for delegates from all over Africa could be successful. It was, after all, not technically possible for delegates from Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Malawi and other Northern Africa countries to obtain permits to go to South Africa. Where there is a will, there is a way, so that technicality was overcome by simply stamping their passports on a removable slip of paper once they had reached a country friendly to South Africa. Those slips were taken out when they returned home after the meetings.
This conference, sponsored by the Dutch Reformed Church, had as its primary purpose, to find out from writers and booksellers from those countries just what the churches wanted published for their use. Did they want major textbooks, commentaries, and concordances by well-known authors, or did they want booklets and inexpensive literature? As invited delegates, we were housed in the university guesthouse on campus and our meals were served in the dining room. As I remember it lasted about three or four days. At first, I planned to sleep in the bunk of our Bible van at the campus campsite. It turned out however that I had to ask to move to the guesthouse when the seam between the bunk and the body of the van leaked badly in a driving rainstorm. This was my first time to use it for sleeping in bad weather after I had added the sleeping compartment. We were given a tour of their library, and entertained at a special picnic on the lawn under the trees of the campus, and also attended a special evening presentation by the campus drama group. Our days were largely spent in available lecture rooms and classrooms where representatives from the various countries told of what they really needed where they lived and worked. After these times, we broke up into smaller round table units and in those groups discussed what they had told us. On the final day, the results of those discussions and answers to the questions, were tabulated, and discussed again back in the lecture room. The University later published the conclusions in a book to guide Christian Publishers to have a better, more meaningful, ministry..
Ghana had booksellers who carried "shoebox libraries" of small booklets dealing with the various problems and answers for the people in their country. They did not want commentaries, concordances, or other expensive volumes and added that they would buy those from existing book wholesalers in English. They all came from British colonies so could all speak English. Those were already available. The representatives from each country had come to the final agreement, that what they really needed were inexpensive booklets and tracts in their own languages.
This was precisely what we had been doing from the very beginning. We had specialized in printing translated paperback booklets that were staple bound and single sheet, tracts. The booklets ranged from a few pages to up to about fifty pages, and the first printing was usually for 500 or 1000 copies depending on the demand we expected. This allowed for us to make corrections in later editions and printings, and even to discard the entire printing if the translator proved to be too inaccurate. That actually happened only one time. That time it was a Xhosa translation that was just compltely unacceptable. Of course we did not realize that until readers started to lodge complaints. It was immediately withdrawn, and in that particular case, we did not have another translation made. One learns from his mistakes!
What did they need? And, What did they want? That is not necessarily the same answer. What they needed had a lot to do with what we published.
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