Diana Gvozden recently left her job as publisher of Dutch house Unieboek/Agathon to take on the role of acquiring editor at the new venture, Hollands Diep. We spoke to Govozden about the new company--a joint venture with the entrepreneur Cees Wessels (who owns Dutch Media Books)--which will be publishing a mix of international literary fiction and nonfiction.
In September, you and Robbert Ammerlaan (a publishing veteran who previously worked for the Dutch publisher De Bezige Bij) announced your new venture, Hollands Diep. Can you give us some background on how the company was formed?
I consider myself very lucky that Robbert reached out to me when he was in talks about his new venture. Honestly, there is nothing more fun than starting a new list, being part of the team that gives it structure, identity. Robbert was looking for an editor to be his right hand man (or woman, in this case), and I was recommended to him by some mutual international publishing friends. When we met we found that we shared similar views on publishing and similar taste in books--unsurprising really, as we have both, at some point in our careers, run the same imprint, Agathon. The fact that I had worked at Dutch Media Books in the past was a plus; I know a lot of the people, and I understand their views on marketing and sales, which is tremendously helpful.
Tell us about your vision for Hollands Diep, and what you hope the imprint will become known for publishing.
The imprint is founded on the firm belief that, despite a difficult market and despite all the things that threaten the publishing world, people will always have a need for quality fiction and nonfiction. Hollands Diep aims to provide just that: the very best in international literary fiction and nonfiction, a good mix of established literary authors and exciting new voices, and every single book will be published with the utmost care and attention. My hope for the imprint is that it will one day be seen as a sign of quality, that readers will recognize the logo and associate it with great books. I know it’s ambitious but a girl can dream, can’t she?
What are some of the books you've acquired, so far, at the imprint?
As I mentioned before, the start of a new imprint is one of the most exhilarating times you can have in publishing. As you’re building the list you get to acquire a bit more than usual and every author you add to your list gives it just that little bit more of an identity. You can see the original idea that you had taking shape through your acquisitions.
Some of the acquisitions I am very excited about are Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies, Leslie Jamison’s The Empathy Exams, Beau Lotto’s Seeing Differently, Lily King’s Euphoria and Imbolo Mbue’s The Longings of Jende Jonga. I could go on for a while, to be honest.
What, precisely, do you look for in a book? Is there any type of submission you'd like to see more of?
Distinctive voices, beautiful writing, surprising stories… Sometimes it can be so hard to pin down exactly what you’re looking for. When you see it, you just know. You can see how it fits in with the rest of your list, how it works with your authors. What I’d love to see more of is surprising projects and collaborations like Women in Clothes by Sheila Heti, Heidi Julavits & Leanne Shapton. [That book is] so very now, while also having the potential of becoming a classic. [It's] the kind of book that you can give any woman, young or old, fashionable or not, because it’s about so much more than clothes; it’s about how we choose to express ourselves.
