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Encyclopedia of British Columbia (Harbour Publishing)
At the 17th annual B.C. Book Prizes, Encyclopedia of British Columbia became only the third book in the history of the event to garner two prizes on the same night.
The Encyclopedia won the Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award and Roderick Haig-Brown Prize for best book about B.C. (In 1990 the Western Canada Wilderness Committee won two B.C. Book Prizes for Carmanah; in 1987 Doris Shadbolt won twice for Bill Reid.).
It was an unprecedented ten-year gamble that paid off.
"When you bet the ranch on one roll of the dice,"; says publisher Howard White, "there can be some terrifying moments, some of which last for months at a time, but if you get away with it, the satisfaction is all the more profound. The reviews have been extravagant and the letters of thanks have been pouring in from all over the province. It's obvious people are not just pleased, many seem to be deeply moved. It's a book that B.C. has wanted for a long time.";
Editor and historian Daniel Francis wrote approximately 80 per cent of the 4,000 entries. At the official launch for the Encyclopedia of British Columbia at the Vancouver
Public Library, White praised Francis, comparing him to Samuel Johnson. At the Book Prizes gala he said Francis had completed a Herculean task.
The text was complemented by 1,500 photos and a CD. "I found out that doing a CD turned out to be roughly the equivalent of doing a full-length feature movie,"; White jokes. "Doing this project, you have to plan for every eventuality, then triple that.";
In October, White told the Globe & Mail's Sandra Martin that the break-even point for the encyclopedia had been passed at sales of 15,000 copies. Three weeks after releasing the first print run on September 30, Harbour had to order a second batch of 15,000 hardcover, full-colour copies for Christmas.
Weyerhauser purchased 3,700 copies of the $99 reference work, one for each of the schools in the areas where the forest company operates. The project also included partnerships with BC Hydro, Telefilm, UBC Special Collections, Telus, CBC Television, B.C. Ministry of Education and ICBC.
ICBC head honcho Bob Williams, a former NDP cabinet minister, has noted that Howard White had a brief political career in 1990. "Thank God for the cultural life of this province that Howie never got elected,"; says Williams.
When he accepted the Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award, White invited a dozen people onto the stage to emphasize that he and writer/editor Daniel Francis had considerable support. He compared the process of creating the 824-page encyclopedia to manufacturing a gigantic mirror.
"It's a privilege to be able to do a book like this,"; he said. "It's sort of like finding yourself in the company of the most beautiful person in the world and realizing that they've never looked at themselves in the mirror before.
"You have the privilege of being the first to hold up a full-length mirror so they can freely see what a magnificent entity they are."; 1-55017-200-X
[BCBW SUMMER 2001]
The Encyclopedia won the Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award and Roderick Haig-Brown Prize for best book about B.C. (In 1990 the Western Canada Wilderness Committee won two B.C. Book Prizes for Carmanah; in 1987 Doris Shadbolt won twice for Bill Reid.).
It was an unprecedented ten-year gamble that paid off.
"When you bet the ranch on one roll of the dice,"; says publisher Howard White, "there can be some terrifying moments, some of which last for months at a time, but if you get away with it, the satisfaction is all the more profound. The reviews have been extravagant and the letters of thanks have been pouring in from all over the province. It's obvious people are not just pleased, many seem to be deeply moved. It's a book that B.C. has wanted for a long time.";
Editor and historian Daniel Francis wrote approximately 80 per cent of the 4,000 entries. At the official launch for the Encyclopedia of British Columbia at the Vancouver
Public Library, White praised Francis, comparing him to Samuel Johnson. At the Book Prizes gala he said Francis had completed a Herculean task.
The text was complemented by 1,500 photos and a CD. "I found out that doing a CD turned out to be roughly the equivalent of doing a full-length feature movie,"; White jokes. "Doing this project, you have to plan for every eventuality, then triple that.";
In October, White told the Globe & Mail's Sandra Martin that the break-even point for the encyclopedia had been passed at sales of 15,000 copies. Three weeks after releasing the first print run on September 30, Harbour had to order a second batch of 15,000 hardcover, full-colour copies for Christmas.
Weyerhauser purchased 3,700 copies of the $99 reference work, one for each of the schools in the areas where the forest company operates. The project also included partnerships with BC Hydro, Telefilm, UBC Special Collections, Telus, CBC Television, B.C. Ministry of Education and ICBC.
ICBC head honcho Bob Williams, a former NDP cabinet minister, has noted that Howard White had a brief political career in 1990. "Thank God for the cultural life of this province that Howie never got elected,"; says Williams.
When he accepted the Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award, White invited a dozen people onto the stage to emphasize that he and writer/editor Daniel Francis had considerable support. He compared the process of creating the 824-page encyclopedia to manufacturing a gigantic mirror.
"It's a privilege to be able to do a book like this,"; he said. "It's sort of like finding yourself in the company of the most beautiful person in the world and realizing that they've never looked at themselves in the mirror before.
"You have the privilege of being the first to hold up a full-length mirror so they can freely see what a magnificent entity they are."; 1-55017-200-X
[BCBW SUMMER 2001]
Submitted on June 25, 2003 in By David.
