Elke and Tim Inkster have made an important and enduring contribution to Canadian literature. In 1974 they founded The Porcupine’s Quill (PQL), a publishing house based in Erin, Ontario. Renowned for excellence in design and production, and for taking risks with new, unpublished authors, the firm has helped kick-start the careers of many of Canada’s best known writers . PQL publications have won numerous awards and serve as an example to the world of Canadian publishing excellence.

Its first title came off the press in 1975: Brian Johnson’s only book of poems, Marzipan Lies. Brian Johnson is currently the film critic for Maclean’s and "claims to have met Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones, twice!" (almost certainly an in-joke here that I’m not privy to).  Many of the early titles were slim volumes written by poets Tim Inkster had met as a student at the University of Toronto — amongst them Ed Carson who until recently was President of Penguin Canada, and Brian Henderson who is currently the publisher at Wilfrid Laurier University Press.

I met the Inksters recently in the garden behind their Press House. It butts up against the West Credit River, where this little critter

spent most of the morning chopping and hauling lumber from one

 bank to the

other.

While he was doing this Tim and I made our way back into the press room to talk about the history of The Porcupine’s Quill and how to go about collecting its books. During this discussion we hit on how market forces often influence appearance: namely glossy versus matte finished covers. It was here that Tim got into describing the difficulties he’s encountered dealing with Chapters, Canada’s one and only big box bookstore. Please listen here to our conversation:

Subscribe to the Biblio File Podcast here

Copyright © 2010 by Nigel Beale. www.nigelbeale.com

This interview is part of our  Book Publisher Series which focuses on the histories of important British, American and Canadian publishing houses, and how to go about collecting their works.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Be Sociable, Share!

• 

Related posts:

1. Audio Interview with Marie Korey, Librarian at The Robertson Davies Library, Massey College: On Collecting the History of the Book
2. Audio Interview with Mark Samuels Lasner: on collecting The Bodley Head
3. Audio Interview with David R. Godine: On Collecting his Imprint
4. Audio Interview with Eric Lorberer, Editor, Rain Taxi by Nigel Beale: On the Book Reviewing Business
5. Audio Interview with Karl Siegler, Publisher, Talonbooks, by Nigel Beale

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 21st, 2010 at 9:13 AM and is filed under AUDIO Publishers' Histories Series. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.