The literary world has been rocked by a recent scandal that impacts funding for women and girls.
Blake Bailey, the authorized biographer for prominent American writer Philip Roth, has been accused of multiple sexual assaults against women. As a result, on Tuesday, April 27, 2021, W. W. Norton announced that it would permanently stop publishing Philip Roth: The Biography and would donate the same amount as Mr. Bailey’s advance on the book (described as a mid six figures amount) to “to organizations that support sexual assault survivors and victims of sexual harassment.”
From the New York Times:
W.W. Norton said in a memo to its staff on Tuesday that it will permanently take Blake Bailey’s biography of Philip Roth out of print, following allegations that Mr. Bailey sexually assaulted multiple women and behaved inappropriately toward his students when he was an eighth grade English teacher.
The announcement came after the publisher decided last week that it would stop shipping and promoting the title, which it released earlier in April. It wasn’t immediately clear what would happen with existing copies of the book or the digital and audio versions.
“Norton is permanently putting out of print our editions of ‘Philip Roth: The Biography’ and ‘The Splendid Things We Planned,’ Blake Bailey’s 2014 memoir. Mr. Bailey will be free to seek publication elsewhere if he chooses,” the email said, which was signed by Norton’s president, Julia A. Reidhead. A copy of the email was reviewed by The New York Times.
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