Planning Your Academic Publishing

Journey: Publish Or Perish? 1st Edition

Jacqui Ewart
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Jacqui Ewart

Planning your
Academic
Publishing
Journey
Publish or Perish?
Planning your Academic Publishing Journey
Jacqui Ewart

Planning your Academic

Publishing Journey
Publish or Perish?
Jacqui Ewart
Griffith University
Nathan, QLD, Australia

ISBN 978-981-99-5901-3 ISBN 978-981-99-5902-0 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-5902-0

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature
Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023

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To Dean my warrior poet for sustaining our
magic while you dealt with your dilemmas
and the people who have made your journey
beyond challenging. Sometimes there is a
little light in the darkness—let’s move
towards it.
Preface

Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey: Publish or Perish? is for those new to
academia and those who might want to shift the focus of their research and publishing.
It is also a resource for academics wanting to develop or expand their mentoring of
early career academics. It is not intended to be a deep dive into the literature about
academic publishing—you are equipped to find that material yourself. Rather, it
has been informed by personal experience and many conversations with academic
friends, colleagues, and others over an academic career of more than two decades—
they have often been accompanied by laughter and occasionally by tears. This book
is designed to help readers avoid the perils and pitfalls of academic publishing.
You can dip into this book when a question arises about a particular type of
publication or a specific issue associated with academic publishing. If your academic
journey is just beginning you may want to read it from the beginning to the end to
gain a comprehensive introduction to what is involved in the publishing aspect of
academic work.
Planning your Academic Publishing Journey: Publish or Perish? arose from
what was initially a casual conversation with my friend and colleague Dr Chris-
tine Feldman-Barrett. Our conversation meandered around the academic publishing
landscape and wound up with some questions about specific aspects of publishing.
My friend commented that she wished she had known the answers to those ques-
tions before she wrote her books. I thought that it would be great if early career
researchers and first-time book authors had a ready reference manual that would
assist them through the labyrinth of the academic publishing world. Thus, the seed
for this book was planted.
Planning your Academic Publishing Journey: Publish or Perish? is a natural
progression from a book I conceptualised and then lead authored called Managing
Your Academic Research Project, published in 2020 by Springer. The book you
are now reading and its forerunner, were driven by a desire to help those entering
academia to navigate the sometimes-choppy waters of academic research and
publishing. It can be difficult to find good mentors in academia, and this book is
about helping early career researchers and those who find themselves stuck in a rut
with the need to reboot their publishing careers.

vii
viii Preface

Over the course of your career as an academic you will probably work for more
than one university and therefore approaching your academic working life as a career
requires that your mindset is about working for you will be important. This will
include building your research and publishing trajectory to mirror what you want to
see not what others want you to do. As academics we should always be learning,
but we may not recognise some of the most important lessons when they occur. In
any academic publishing career, there will be many of the latter movements. There
will also be difficult conversations, bad behaviour, colleagues who fail to live up to
their promises, but there will also be the ah ha moments, the colleague who delivers
on time every time, the joy of brining a publication to fruition—these experiences
equip you to better handle the adversity and the privilege that comes with working
as an academic. Some of the matters raised in this book are mentioned more than
once because they are crucial to a smooth academic journey.
I hope this book will help in those moments in your publishing trajectory where
you might find yourself saying “I never thought this would happen”. Expecting the
unexpected is crucial in publishing and having a backup plan for when things go
wrong is important. Importantly, you should determine the journey you take when
it comes to the research and publishing elements of your academic work. Run your
own race. Stay in your lane. Find your people. Follow your passions.

Nathan, QLD, Australia Jacqui Ewart

Acknowledgements

The time to write this book was in part facilitated by a period of research leave
provided by Griffith University’s School of Humanities, Languages, and Social
Sciences in 2022. I extend my appreciation to the Griffith Criminology Institute
for its ongoing support. A special thanks to Dr Christine Feldman-Barrett—one of
our conversations led to this book.
Early in the writing of this book, I decided to anonymise the people who shared
the stories included in it. Not everyone who contributed had negative experiences
in relation to publishing or co-authoring, but some did, and it was important to
treat everyone the same way for consistency. I was keenly aware that those who
shared sometimes funny, dire, and terrible stories may have faced repercussions if
their names were attached to their full and very frank accounts of academic life. It
was important to ensure their safety and my heartfelt thanks to those who gave so
generously of their time to be interviewed. Your kindness is a precious thing in the
world of academia. You know who you are and how much I value your help.
Thanks to the tools and the fools whose bad behaviour inspired me to help others.
They do not deserve the ink that has been wasted on them, but I find it hard to resist
temptation. Nemo me impune lacessit (no one attacks me with impunity).
I extend my appreciation to the anonymous reviewers for their comments on the
proposal and full manuscript which strengthened the book. A note to reviewer 2—no
you were not that reviewer!
To my warrior poet who interrupted me when I needed to be interrupted, who left
me to write in peace when I needed to do so and whose love is as awe-inspiring as
a Scottish battle. Thank you, D, for the ring of Scottish thistles that you have grown
around us. Your love is inspiring every moment of every day.

ix
x Acknowledgements

Note

The interviews undertaken for this project had ethics approval from Griffith Univer-
sity (GU Ref No: 2021/728). They add a variety of voices and experiences to this
book to demonstrate the wide and varied nature of academic publishing journeys.
Contents

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Preparing for Your Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Challenges of Academia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Complexities of Publishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Fighting for Funding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Managing Competing Demands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2 Foundations Matter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Publishing Imperatives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Knowing Your Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Publishing Ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Planning to Find Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Finding a Mentor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3 Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
What Is Your Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Telling Your Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Formulating a Research and Publishing Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
The One-Year Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
The Three-to-Five-Year Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Juggling Publishing and Grant Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Outputs and Outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

xi
xii Contents

4 Choosing a Publisher or Publication Outlet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Choosing a Publication Outlet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Choosing a Publisher . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Journal Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Open Access Publishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Predatory Publishers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Metrics and Impact Factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
New Models of Publishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
5 Authorship, Co-Authoring and Collaborating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
Setting up for Co-Authoring . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Co-Authoring as a Student . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
Pitfalls and Perils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
6 Shorter Publications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Making the Most of Your Research Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
Journal Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Book Chapters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
The ‘In-Crowd’ and Book Chapters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Conference Papers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Publishing From Your Teaching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Non-Academic Publications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
7 Books Matter: Lengthy Publication Projects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Edited Collections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Special Themed Editions of Journals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Contents xiii

8 The Hidden Workload of Publishing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
What Is in a Title? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Seeking Help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Responding to Reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Reviewer 2 and Problematic Reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
Dealing with Rejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Copyright, Images, Sound and Other Matters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Publishing Contracts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
Reviewing Publications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
Acknowledging the Labour . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
9 Establishing and Maintaining Your Author Platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Author Platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
Social Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Key Considerations for Using Social Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
Channels and Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Content and Growing Audiences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
To Social or Not to Social . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Personal Websites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Case Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
10 Putting It All Together . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Introduction: Looking Forward, Looking Back . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
Reconfiguring and Reorienting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
Learning From the Past . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Why Money Matters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Dealing with Disruption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
Conclusion: Final Advice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
About the Author

Jacqui Ewart is a professor at Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia. She is a

former journalist and communication professional. Her research focuses on public
communication in the various phases of disasters and extreme climate change events,
community emergence during crises and disasters, news media coverage of Muslims
and Islam and public attitudes towards Muslims. She has authored, co-authored, and
edited seven other books. She has led major research projects and has won awards
for her journalism and her academic work. Her approach to academic life is to assist
others through books such as this one and others she has written.

xv
Abbreviations

ECA Early Career Academic

ECR Early Career Researcher
ERA Excellence in Research Australia
MCR Mid-Career Researcher
REF Research Excellence Framework

Terminology

Global South is used in this book to replace terms such as developing countries and
non-Western Countries. Global North is used to replace terms such as developed
countries and Western countries.

xvii
Chapter 1
Introduction

Abstract This chapter provides an overview of the book, how it is structured, how
to use it, some of the key motivations for writing it. It sets the stage and context for
the book by offering an overview of the fraught publishing terrain that academics
face. It explains why publishing is important for academics, no matter the stage of
their career. Readers are reminded that there are some key principles of publishing
that remain the same regardless of the changing environments and contexts that
characterise current publishing and academic settings. It raises some of the challenges
academics face, whether they be new to academia or experienced researchers and
authors. This chapter explains why planning publications is crucial for academics.
There is a detailed description of the contents of each chapter so that readers can
see how each chapter logically flows from that which goes before it. It is a roadmap
for readers. It highlights that readers need to be conversant with the requirements of
their own fields because not all disciplines and fields have the same expectations in
respect to publication outputs.

Preparing for Your Journey

Every journey should begin with a plan, however well, loosely, or ill conceived.
When I go on a road trip, I plan my route and I pack water and my favourite sweet
Dinosaurs treats. I make sure I have a USB or the CD stacker full of my favourite
road tripping tunes. These elements are essential for a successful journey, but before
I gather these favourites, I ensure my car has been serviced, the tyres are at the correct
pressure and the car is fully fuelled. I do this every time I take a new road excursion
and so too should you with your academic publishing plan. Devoting some time to
planning what you will write and submit for publication every year will set a clear
pathway for you. Reviewing how each of the publications you plan to write fit with
your overall plan is essential.
This is not a self-help book for academics. Neither is it a book about how to write
academic publications as there are libraries and book shops full of those sorts of
books. It is a book about how to plan and approach publishing across your academic

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 1
J. Ewart, Planning your Academic Publishing Journey,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-5902-0_1
2 1 Introduction

career. It is designed to help you craft a publishing plan, while also considering, and
catering for the issues that might arise in the course of your academic journey.
Let us begin by addressing the elephant in the title, specifically the subtitle of
this book Publish or Perish? The publish or perish maxim or perhaps more fittingly,
dictum characterises much of academic publishing. The addition of the question
mark after the sub-title of this book is there to remind the reader that the publish or
perish mantra that has pervaded academia for decades need not be a case of success
or failure. The pressure to publish, or to reconsider whether an academic career is for
you, has ramped up over the past decade or so as neoliberalism has pervaded univer-
sities. As two of the reviewers of the proposal for this book pointed out, universities
now operate within a context of rampant managerialism. This widespread manageri-
alism pervades almost every corner of academic life if we let it. Bottrell and Keating
(2019) highlight in their chapter titled Academic Wellbeing under Rampant Manage-
rialism: From Neoliberal to Critical Resilience published in the edited collection
Resisting Neoliberalism in Higher Education (Volume 1), that there is a form of
cognitive dissonance in universities. They explain that this cognitive dissonance
revolves around university discourses that on the one hand emphasise staff well-
being, with every second academic referred to counselling and well-being services
that have been outsourced to external providers, while on the other hand focusing
on compliance, academic productivity, and institutional performance. Productivity
for many academics in universities in the Global North centres on how much grant
funding individuals gain within a set period and to a lesser degree how many journal
articles or books they have been able to produce. For those in universities in coun-
tries in the Global South, the pressures can be remarkably different, with little or no
workload allocated for publishing or research related activities, leaving academics
who wish to pursue such scholarly activities with little choice but to use their own
time to do so. Of course, many academics located in institutions in the Global North
also find research and publishing eating into their leisure or family time, as rampant
managerialism demands staff be available 24 h a day seven days a week to answer to
students and administrators. Colleagues around the world have shared stories about
how this has manifested, with administrators calling them on weekends and while
they are on annual or sick leave to insist that they complete administrative tasks or
respond to student queries. Our time is increasingly at risk of not being our own.
If you have made it this far into this book you may be nodding in agreement
or hunting through job advertisements to find where your calling is outside of the
academy. Despite the tendency amongst university management to want to count
everything—the number of books and journal articles academics publish annually
and as some colleagues have disturbingly reported time taken for toilet breaks—
you can ostensibly play the numbers game while running your own race. When I
first joined academia, a colleague said two things to me that have been helpful in
dealing with the managerialism that has increasingly pervaded universities. The first
piece of advice was that you do not work for university X, you work for yourself.
These words have resonated over the years for me and my colleagues, as the pressure
to meet university goals have at times threatened to over-ride our own professional
aspirations and interrupted our academic journey. The second piece of sage advice my
Challenges of Academia 3

colleague provided was that you should always see yourself as part of an international
community of academics, not as an academic working in what for me was at the
time a small, regional Australian university. Despite the rampant managerialism
pervading neo-liberal universities, many academics have managed not only to survive
but to thrive. Somehow, they have kept their vision of research that matters and
makes a difference intact and alive. They have managed to walk the precarious line
between what Bottrell and Keating (2019) describe as the need for academics to
maintain a commitment to emancipatory projects and their institution’s obsession
with employee productivity and institutional performance. While a lot of academic
research is based on socially responsible principles, it is increasingly difficult to enact
social responsibility in the post-modern university with the challenges academics face
including managerialism and the neo-liberal context of higher education. Despite this,
the imperative remains to make a difference by getting your research out to the world,
whether it is to an audience of academics, industry, government, or non-government
bodies.

Challenges of Academia

The world of academic publishing can initially appear to be difficult terrain for those
new to it and the rapidly changing landscape of publishing presents new challenges for
those who are old hands at publishing journal articles, books, and edited collections.
This book is not meant to be an exhaustive review of literature and research about
academic publishing. You are well equipped to locate that material yourself. Rather,
much of the information, advice, and hints contained in this book are drawn from
me and my colleagues’ involvement with academic publishing. In writing this book I
have drawn on the many weird, wonderful, funny, and sometimes horrendous stories
my colleagues (de-identified for their safety) have shared with me during the two
decades that I have worked as an academic. Their stories about theirs and others
experiences with academic publishing illuminate a world with which some readers
will be unfamiliar but will want to know about. I acknowledge that I have only
worked in universities in Australia and recognise the context here is quite different
than for example in a university in Nigeria or in many other academic institutions in
the world. I have included perspectives on key issues that colleagues at universities
face in the Global South through interviews with some of them. I also note that the
disciplines in which I work, humanities and social sciences, are very different than
those of science, education, medicine, and technology. In writing this book I have
tried to cater for the diversity in academic disciplines and experiences. To that end I
have occasionally drawn on the literature and my colleagues’ advice and experiences.
Despite the rampant managerialism, the neo-liberal context, and the flow on effects,
there is enormous privilege in working in universities. Many academics employed
in the higher education sector are ostensibly allocated time to research and prepare
journal articles or books for publication, while others are not. Despite the pressures
this entails, there can be much joy in this work for academics. It is important to
4 1 Introduction

acknowledge that the academic publishing industry is just that—an industry. Parts of
that industry make millions from the often-unpaid labour of academics. Many aspects
of the academic publishing industry are designed primarily to suit academics working
in Global North universities. The proliferation of journals published in English puts
those whose first, second or third language is not English at significant disadvantage.
Another problem for many scholars is the political environment in which they work
because that can have negative ramifications for their work as public intellectuals.
For example, it can restrict their ability to speak publicly about their research or
the social, economic, and cultural conditions of the country in which they work for
fear of sometimes brutal repercussions such as the loss of their job, jailing, torture,
or being ‘disappeared’. Many women face a range of issues in addition to those
experienced by their male colleagues including family and caring responsibilities,
pregnancy and birth, work conditions and expectations that are not conducive to
them, marginalisation in some disciplines and difficulties in gaining positions on
significant, influential university level committees. They often start their careers
later in life due to raising children and shortly after beginning their careers find they
have to care for elderly relatives. While their personal situations are often difficult
many women are expected to serve on the lower-level departmental committees and
take on entry level management roles that men are unwilling to do because it would
hamper their ability to research and publish. Female academics often deprioritised
their careers so that their husbands or partners can pursue their own calling.

Complexities of Publishing

For some academics, particularly those in the very early stages of their careers, the
complexities of academic publishing may seem overwhelming. Not all the informa-
tion in this book will be pertinent to every reader, but if you are starting out on your
academic journey, some sections may become relevant as you progress through your
career. Academic publishing can be a jungle and you might feel like a bug about to
be swallowed by the immensity of the beast. This book is presented so that you can
dip into it when and as you need to, or you can read the entire text.
If you are at the start of your academic career looking for guidance about how
to plan your publishing career, this book will hopefully provide a path to follow.
Sound advice can be difficult to find when you are first starting out on your academic
journey. More than a decade ago I instigated a regular get together for Early Career
Researchers at my university to provide attendees with support for various aspects of
their research careers. Those sessions involved panels of senior researchers discussing
a set topic. At the time I was aware that just like my own publishing career, those
of many senior academics had not been planned, rather it had ‘just happened’ for
them. Many academics have progressed through their careers by taking advantage
of research and publishing opportunities as they have arisen and have not neces-
sarily been guided by a carefully considered plan. However, by the beginning of
the second decade of this century it had become obvious to me, some 14 years into
Fighting for Funding 5

my career as a full-time academic work, that the demands of universities, funding

bodies and industry partners meant that it would no longer be possible to muddle
through without a plan. Paradoxically, many of my senior colleagues who have
somehow made it through the publishing and research maze, have stellar publishing
careers and have risen to lofty heights within the academy. However, if you are
entering academia now, it is vital to have a carefully crafted plan that covers your
research focus, the planning and management of your publishing trajectory and, most
importantly, a well-crafted research and publishing story for tenure, promotion, and
research funding applications. Many universities now ask academic staff or those
who have a dedicated research workload to prepare a three-to-five-year research
and publishing plan. To further complicate your publishing journey many institu-
tions have introduced a series of guidelines, expectations or benchmarks related to
publishing outputs. These determine whether you are research active or whether
your workload will shift to intensive teaching. They prescribe how many grants,
publications and higher degree research student completions staff must have in a set
time frame to be deemed research active. Woe betide those who fall below those
benchmarks or what might be deemed acceptable output and achievement levels for
a particular discipline.

Fighting for Funding

Along with the aforementioned expectations, we are now in an environment where

competition for funding has increased exponentially, meaning that many research
active academics are driven by the institution’s need to attract external and nationally
competitive funding. However, it is a Catch 22 situation—funding will be difficult to
secure without a strong, competitive publication record; and you will not be able to
develop a strong, competitive publication record unless you have had grants to collect
data from which to publish. Seemingly more bizarre is the need to have held compet-
itive grants to gain competitive grants. Those who enter academia through traditional
pathways such as completing a Ph.D. and gaining a full-time tenure track position,
which is increasingly rare, will have published during their doctoral candidature and
so will be in a slightly better position than those whose entry into the academy is not
so traditional. For example, professionals who transition to academia may be bewil-
dered by the demands they face when it comes to publishing. Nobody is exempt. Early
Career Academics will have to learn how to navigate the complex and sometimes
opposing discourses within academic institutions. These include competing perspec-
tives about what is important at any given time. Some may feel that academics should
prioritise teaching, while others will put the emphasis on research, grant applications
and publications. There are also those academics who will shift into administrative
roles which often means leaving behind their own research and publishing or finding
time on weekends to continue that work.
Although more established, senior academics who are research active, may appear
to have more wiggle room in these processes, they also face pressures to bring teams
6 1 Introduction

together to apply for and obtain competitive grant funding. It may appear to the
lesser experienced academic that the spotlight shines on the glory of the professors
who bring in the big bucks, but it is only a momentary gleam. In the grant game
it used to be that you were only good as your last successful funding application,
but now you are only as good as your next successful funding bid. This goes to the
heightened expectations for continued success in attracting external, nationally, or
internationally competitive research funding. In other words, one big grant is not
enough across a career. The expectation is multiple grants over the lifespan of an
academic’s career. The research active academic is always looking to the next grant,
the next funding application, and the next project.

Managing Competing Demands

By now readers, especially those in the early stages of their academic careers, might
be wondering whether it is worthwhile continuing in this profession or whether to
chuck it all in and try to find where their skills set fits in the ‘real world’. Some may
be tempted to consider moving to a deserted island and using their limited life skills
to opt out while leading a sustainable lifestyle. While the situation may appear dire,
I hope this book will help readers to come to terms with and manage the various and
often-competing demands of the part of academic life that is publishing, whether
it be journal articles, books, or book chapters. It may also be useful when you are
trying to corral a group of unruly scholars to provide a chapter or a journal article
for an edited collection or special edition of a journal.
Many of us know from bitter experience, that the best laid plans can go awry.
That is why building contingencies into your academic publishing plan is crucial.
You may not get that grant that you applied for and while you might decide to rework
it, you will need to think about the other steps that you are going to take to ensure
your publication outputs continue and that they build up your case for the awarding
of funding. That is why it is best to have a plan A, B, C and D, just in case.

Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey

This book is not about how to write academic articles, books, conference papers,
although it does touch on those matters tangentially. It is not about planning your
research although those matters are raised in the context of planning your publica-
tions. It is not about how to write a journal article because there are plenty of books
that take you through that process. This book assumes that the reader knows how
to write academically and for an academic audience. While some might think that
is a huge assumption, given some of the articles they have refereed over time, there
are plenty of resources available including vlogs, blogs, journal articles and books
about how to write academic articles and there is no intention to replicate that work
Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey 7

here. Rather, this book is about how to plan your publishing trajectory and how to
execute that plan. Each chapter starts with a series of short tips condensed from the
content of the chapter, so that readers can easily locate the relevant chapter if they
do not have time to read the whole book. This book is structured so that readers can
dip into it to find a quick answer to their question, or they can read it at length if they
are new to academia and wanting to wise themselves up about the pitfalls and perils
of publishing while also planning their publication journey.
Academic publishing has gone through several revolutions, and it will continue to
change. This does not change the good practices that underpin academic publishing,
such as rigour and the need for ethical approaches to authoring and co-authoring
publications. Formats and styles change, the way findings are presented also vary,
but each scholar must continue to find their own reason for publishing whether that
is to drive their career forward, to maintain their current paid employment or to bring
about change in the world.
Chapter 2 explores a range of foundational issues that should underpin your
approach to academic publishing and your journey through it. Some readers may
be tempted to skip this chapter, but it includes some pointed questions that you
need to consider answering before you launch into, or reconfigure, your academic
publishing pathway. Key amongst these is the issue of ethics, and that doesn’t refer
to ethics clearances granted by universities and research partners. Rather, it is about
your own ethics in publishing, working with others, dealing with publishers, and
navigating the fraught and complex academic publishing world. It asks some diffi-
cult questions about who you are as a person and as a scholar. In other words, it
prompts you to think about your story. Knowing what your story is and being able
to vocalise it, will help to underpin your approach to research and publishing. This
goes to the concept of your story. This is about not only knowing what your story
is as an academic but the importance of being able to effectively communicate it. It
is essential that you can effectively communicate your story to other scholars within
and outside of your discipline and to non-academic audiences.
Chapter 2 explores how academics communicate their stories within and across
disciplines, and publicly. Publicly communicating your story and your research is
critical. Brian Cox, a former musician who is now a professor of particle physics at the
University of Manchester and presenter of popular science programs on television,
provides a strong example and role model for public communication. Knowing what
your story is and being able to convey it in a way that is appropriate for the target
audience, will help keep you on your academic publishing pathway. Ask yourself
how the publication you are planning to write today will contribute to your story.
Some people might approach their story by thinking of the key messages that inform
it, or for others it might be t-shirt slogans that form the basis of their story. Professor
Tara Brabazon (2018a), whose vlogs and scholarship provide support and inspiration
for postgraduate students and those in the early stages of their academic careers puts
it this way “What are the t-shirt slogans of your life?”. This chapter discusses some
of the broader issues that inform academic publishing including questions about why
we research and publish, which also go to the matter of the t-shirt slogans of your life.
Planning your publishing journey will help you to address the often heard lament
8 1 Introduction

that it is difficult if not impossible to find time to write. Additionally, this chapter
explores the competing tensions between publishing to satisfy the managerialists
and producing knowledge that matters, that makes a difference and contributes to
society. The focus here is not just on being a public intellectual, which is important,
but making a real-world difference with your research. It explores how academics
can position their research by focussing on the important problems and issues at the
heart of that research. This chapter will draw on some examples of academic work
that has made a difference to illustrate the aforementioned concepts.
Academics in different disciplines and national contexts experience varying condi-
tions when it comes to workloads, research, and publishing. The challenges experi-
enced by those working in the Global South will be discussed. There is a discussion
of the Anglophile nature of publishing, metrics and the issues and difficulties that
raises for academics publishing in their second, third or fourth language and how this
can lead to some academics seeking alternative platforms through which to publish
and disseminate their research to those who matter, for example government, policy
makers and practitioners. The expectation of publishing in English will be dealt with
as will the challenges faced by those whose first, second or third language is not
English and the consequences for those facing the Anglophile academic publishing
world.
Chapter 3 deals with the big picture; planning your academic publishing journey.
It provides a roadmap to keep you on track. It reflects on the current state of academic
publishing and how academics at different stages of their careers can negotiate this
sometimes-precarious landscape. It encourages researchers to think about their story
and ensure that story underpins and informs their publishing plan. Critically, this
chapter focuses on your story, the one that you want to tell with your research and
in doing so it builds on the concept of your story as introduced in Chapter 2. The
word your is emphasised for several reasons because it is not anyone else’s story or
management’s ideas or wacky notions about what you should be publishing. Across
the scope of academic life, I have heard some strange stories about ECRs who were
told what they should or should not research and publish by those determined to
advance their own careers and interests at the expense of the new academic. Many
of the benefits of being an academic have been worn away over the past decades as
economic imperatives have influenced universities, but one of the few benefits left
that we should protect is being able to pursue your passions when it comes to research.
I have also seen academics turn their hobbies, such as collecting antique jewellery or
mountain climbing, into the focus of their research and publishing endeavours. Being
strategic as to how you talk about and discuss your research is crucial. If your research
is about one of your hobbies, being able to make the connection between researching
aspects of your favourite pastime of mountain climbing, such as the history of the
local mountains you climb, and the value of those mountains to cultural tourism is
now more crucial than ever before.
As your career progresses your research publishing pathway will become more
complicated, and it will probably involve juggling multiple projects and publication
outputs simultaneously. This is where it will be useful to have a multi-storey car
park in your mind, with a soft (digital) or a hard copy format (something as simple
Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey 9

as a whiteboard or tabbed sectioned large format notebook) to keep track of these

publications. These formats can take you from conceptualisation to completion of
a proposed publication. The format you keep this in will depend on how you like
to work and manage your publications. These matters and more are covered in this
chapter including mining your research for multiple publications, understanding the
university environment and your own pathway, and navigating between the two and
considering policies that influence your publishing plan. It explores the competing
tensions between the race to secure grant funding and the desire of academics to
publish and provides tips on how to manage those demands. Finally, the differences
between outputs and outcomes are covered because this goes to the impact of your
research and publications.
Chapter 4 moves into more pragmatic territory—that of choosing a publisher
and a publication outlet. In the past decade or so the publishing landscape has
changed dramatically, with an increase in open access publishing options and an
intensification in the number and voracity of predatory publishers. Coupled with this,
some academics feel that some aspects of academic publishing models are broken.
Academic publication is largely funded by employers i.e., universities, or is funded
by academics working extra hours outside of paid employment. Many publishers
have ceased paying royalties preferring to offer small gratuities with part payment on
completion and submission of book manuscripts and another payment on publication.
While open access publishing can subvert some of the brokenness that characterises
much of the academic publishing industry, it is also fraught with problems including
journals and publishers that masquerade as open access but have hidden fees for
publication. However, there are publishers who approach academic publishing as a
way of supporting and enabling the careers of those new to academia and those still
establishing their careers. The choice of publisher will differ throughout the various
stages of your career. It will depend on the audience you want to reach and what you
want to achieve with the publication. This chapter looks at an issue closely tied to
publishing, that is metrics and impact factors. There are different kinds of metrics
and different types of impacts, with industry connections and social and economic
impacts now foremost amongst academics’ concerns. This is discussed in the context
of thinking about your plan for publishing and who you will publish with, but it is
also part of the bigger picture for you because metrics and impact measures will no
doubt continue to change and evolve over time. Other types of impact are considered
including that created by working with industry and government and publishing in
industry and trade publications.
The next series of issues covered in this book including authorship, co-authoring,
and sharing data, are amongst the most rewarding, but also the most fraught and the
most difficult with which to deal. The benefits, pitfalls and perils of collaborating
are explored in Chapter 5. It discusses how to handle that moment when a colleague
you like says “hey why don’t we write a book together” or “I’ve got a great idea
for a themed edition of Journal X that we could co-edit”. Every academic will have
a different approach to dealing with moments such as these. Deciding early on in
your career how you are going to manage these types of requests will help you
avoid some of the perils, while capitalising on the enormous benefits of working
10 1 Introduction

with someone you respect and trust to meet deadlines and obligations. The rules of
authorship are explored, including protocols that help you avoid being ‘ripped off’,
mistreated and having the wool pulled over your eyes by someone who has more
power than you or who mounts a seemingly convincing argument as to why their
name should go first on a co-authored article when you did all the hard intellectual
slog associated with it. There are ‘rules’ around these matters that may be discipline
specific, but the general principles of fairness, recognition of intellectual input and
being ethical when co-authoring should apply regardless of discipline. These ‘rules’
should also apply whether you are an ECR, a more established academic, or a Ph.D.,
student traversing the rough terrain of publishing. It is also useful to be aware of and
familiarise yourself with your institution’s policies and procedures when it comes to
co-authoring. Nothing stops a predatory colleague looking to score a co-authorship or
lead authorship of a publication faster than a junior colleague who casually responds
to intimidation subtle or otherwise by citing the relevant policies and procedures. It
can be immensely useful to know the relevant policies ‘inside out’ if you find yourself
in the unenviable position of having to deal with fall outs with collaborators, minor
or otherwise. This might involve a colleague who decides they would like to take all
that amazing data you collected and analysed to publish a book without involving
you. It is important to remember that if you have done nothing wrong, have acted
ethically and followed policy and procedures and any written agreements you have
made with collaborators, that you will be able to fight underhanded attempts to claim
your data and cut you out of co-publication opportunities. This chapter concludes
with a discussion of written co-authoring agreements.
After dealing with many of the big picture issues when it comes to your academic
publishing career, this book turns to the matter of shorter publications. Chapter 6
deals with journal articles, and book chapters including those produced for special
collections, as well as turning conference and symposia papers into publications. It
discusses how to make the most out of your research data. When I was some years
into my academic career, a colleague asked me how I managed to publish so much. I
somewhat jokingly responded that I was the Queen of the themes. What I meant by
this was that when I first start thinking about a research project, I consider the types
of themes that might arise given the research questions. That approach allows me to
starting thinking about how these themes might become the focus of a journal article,
book chapter, or book. This chapter explores the crucial question of which journal
to target, that is which journal will be the right fit for your article. The process of
choosing a journal will change depending on the stage of your career. In the early
stages of your career publication is an important aspect of risk management. You need
to be aware of the risks associated with publishing in journals of different quality and
that there are potentially long lead times for top ranked journals, which is important
when mapping and developing your career path. It will take you through some of
the key factors that should inform your decision about the choice of journal for your
article and considers various types of publications and how they are prioritised and
de-prioritised across disciplines.
This chapter also looks at how to make your teaching count when it comes to
publishing. There are some academics who focus solely on producing publications
Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey 11

about innovations in their teaching, or about their activities and fantastic projects
based around Work Integrated Learning (WIL). One of my colleagues, Dr Faith
Valencia-Forrester, has dedicated much of her academic career to Work Integrated
Learning and I explore how she has embedded research in learning and teaching
which has led to publications (see for example Valencia-Forrester & Backhaus, 2021;
Valencia-Forrester, 2020).
From short articles to lengthy publications, Chapter 7 turns to the publication of
books as part of the process of managing your academic publishing career. Books
matter, despite what some people might tell you. They are a magnificent showcase
for original knowledge and in that respect can make a wonderful contribution to your
field. This chapter deals with the question of why you would choose to write a book
rather than a series of journal articles from your research project. It then delves into
the rewarding and sometimes fraught territory of editing books, that is collections
whose chapters are based around a common theme. I use the word fraught because
of the many considerations and difficulties that editors can encounter. However,
bringing a group of top international scholars together can have many benefits and it
can be an enjoyable experience. From edited collections, the book moves to exam-
ining the ins and outs of proposing and bringing together special themed editions of
journals. While there is a significant workload attached to such projects and often
little recognition of this within many universities, these activities are opportunities
to facilitate connections with, grow and create new networks amongst high profile
international scholars. This chapter also discusses the meaning and importance or
otherwise of books in different disciplines.
Chapter 8 deals with a range of matters involved in publishing some of which could
be referred to as the ‘hidden workload of publishing’. This chapter explores the extras
that are involving in publishing. This includes choosing titles for your publications
and why titles matter. It delves into the dreaded peer review process, discusses how
to deal with Reviewer 2 and how to respond to problematic reviews. This chapter
also discusses how you can be constructive when you are invited to review a journal
article, book chapter or book. It tackles how to deal with that article—the one that
has been rejected several times and what approaches you can take towards getting
it published. It covers managing activities such as editing, allocating and managing
time to review page proofs and corrections, and how to fix things when they go wrong.
Issues around artwork, photos and graphics negotiating copyright and approvals are
explored. This chapter concludes with a brief discussion of mentoring, how to get
support and provide support in return in the context of an academic publishing career.
Chapter 9 moves away from the minutiae of your academic publishing career and
it returns to the big picture of how to manage your publishing profile. In other words,
how do you brand and sell yourself effectively in an over-crowded market. This
relates closely to the earlier discussion in this book about your story because how
you tell your story will be intimately tied up to how you talk about and promote your
publications. If you can clarify the benefits and impacts of your research findings,
as detailed in your publications that will help enormously when promoting them.
This chapter discusses what you can do to assist in publicising your publications
including the types of support publishers offer. It also examines the other types of
12 1 Introduction

writing and activities that can be used to disseminate your research and publications,
such as opinion pieces for news and other specialist publication sites. This chapter
looks at how to pitch an idea for an opinion piece and how to tie your piece to current
events to increase the likelihood of publication. It examines what Brabazon (2018b)
calls the “author platform” and describes as “the capacity for an author to be known
so that their name sells books”. Brabazon explains that the author platform shows
who you are and how you connect to specific audiences. It is “your connection, your
authentic relationship with a readership” (Brabazon, 2018b). In investigating what
the author platform is and how you can develop yours, this chapter also examines how
you can use social media to promote your publications. It delves into creating your
personal brand, networking, using social media as part of your academic publishing
career. It will look at other means of disseminating research findings including blogs
and vlogs, which can be useful for academics including those in the Global South.
The chapter discusses the benefits and pitfalls of academic self-publishing including
reports for industry, position papers and rapid responses such as research briefs.
It also highlights the variations in approaches to this type of publishing between
disciplines, regions, and countries.
Chapter 10 ‘Putting it all together’ completes the jigsaw puzzle that is managing
your academic publishing career. While it acknowledges the variations in approach
to academic publishing across disciplines and countries, this chapter provides some
final advice including publishing in a pandemic. This is because in the early stages
of planning this book the world was in the first few years of COVID-19 with asso-
ciated lock downs, travel restrictions and bans on in-person gatherings. This had
significant effects on some researcher’s careers including their ability to gather data
and ultimately for some, to publish. It then turns to where this book has taken you
and where you still have to go in a looking back to look forward approach. This
chapter talks about reconfiguring, re-orienting, and recalibrating your publishing
career pathway along with learning from past mistakes and most importantly cele-
brating your successes. Finally, I discuss why money matters. This might seem like
an odd note on which to finish this book, but many of the precariat rely on royalties
to top up their sessional casual teaching and research assistant work. While true open
access publishing is important, many who are at the earlier stages of their careers will
need to publish with top international publishers who do not always pay royalties.

Conclusion

Having a publishing plan is an essential element for academic success, although it is

not the only element you need. Knowing where you are going and how to get there
is, like the road trips I like to take, requires careful consideration and planning. That
does not mean you should never divert from your plan, some of the best journeys are
those that end up in unexpected places.
References 13

References

Bottrell, D., & Keating, M. (2019). Academic wellbeing under rampant managerialism: From
neoliberal to critical resilience. In D. Bottrell & C. Manathunga (Eds.), Resisitng neoliber-
alism in higher education Volume 1: Seeing through the cracks (Vol. 1, pp. 157–178). Palgrave
Macmillan.
Brabazon, T. (2018a). Vlog 129: What’s your story. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBP_U6Z
wgAU&t=1045s. Accessed 29 Sept 2018.
Brabazon, T. (2018b). Vlog 124: Author platform. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjX77f
Vn5KA&t=32s. Accessed 20 Sept 2018.
Valencia-Forrester, F. (2020). Models of work-integrated learning in journalism education.
Journalism Studies, 21(5), 697–712.
Valencia-Forrester, F., & Backhaus, B. (2021). Widening participation in service learning. In E.
Sengupta, & P. Blessinger (Eds.), International perspectives in social justice programs at the
institutional and community levels (Innovations in Higher Education Teaching and Learning,
Vol. 37) (pp. 77–88). Emerald Publishing Limited.
Chapter 2
Foundations Matter

Abstract A range of foundational issues are covered in this chapter. These are
the foundations that should underpin your approach to academic publishing and
your journey through it. There are some important questions that readers need to
consider before developing an academic publishing plan. To this end this chapter
introduces the concept of your story, that is not only knowing what you story is as
an academic but the importance of being able to effectively communicate your story.
It provides examples of how this works in practice across different disciplines. It
provokes the reader into thinking about their own story. Knowing what your story
is and being able to vocalise it will help to underpin your approach to research and
publishing. Another element that underpins your story is your ethical principles and
ethics are explored from the perspective of how an academic’s ethics inform their
relationships with others when co-authoring and publishing. Additionally, tensions
can be experienced in the competing need to publishing for career purposes and to
produce knowledge that matters, makes a difference, and contributes to society. This
chapter discusses ways of managing these pressures. The focus here is not just on
being a public intellectual, which is important, but making a real-world difference
with your research. As such this chapter explores how academics can think about
their research and what real-world problems and issues it addresses.

Key Points

. Apply the ‘pay yourself first’ principle

. Do not let other people create a fork in your pathway
. Stick to your own agenda
. Research, write and publish what you are passionate about
. Treat others as you would like to be treated.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 15
J. Ewart, Planning your Academic Publishing Journey,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-5902-0_2
16 2 Foundations Matter

Introduction

Welcome to academia. I want to start by destroying any misconceptions you may have
about academic life. Most academics are not working together towards a common
cause. There is little hand holding in academia. In fact, if an academic is holding
your hand, it will more than likely be to ensure you stay in their line of sight,
under their control and that you don’t reach for the stars. Many academics are often
unhappy people at risk of burn out working in institutions that are poorly managed.
My academic colleagues around the world have shared accounts of how they and
others have been bullied and the appalling mismanagement of such cases, in some
cases leading to extremes such as academics taking their own lives. It can be a
bleak, soul sucking environment. It can be very easy to focus on the negatives—too
much teaching, a heavy administration load, email overload, bullying, narcissistic
personalities, and colleagues’ bad behaviour—all at the expense of getting on with
the research and letting the world know about the results of your latest study or
investigation.
It is possible to survive the toxic environments that increasingly characterise
universities if you identify and undertake work that you are passionate about and
find pride in doing. However, there may be times when the only solution is to move
institutions or countries. Teaching can be rewarding and a source in which to find
satisfaction in bringing up the next generation of scholars and it can be a source of
material to write and publish about. Research can also provide much to be proud
about, whether it be a discovery that changes the world, study findings that make a
difference to the way practitioners do their jobs, a new or improved process, a gadget
that will reduce pollution or a project that helps to solve a vexing social problem.
Other academic activity such as service to the community or your profession can
also provide inspiration. This chapter will help you to see your way past some of
the obstacles that you will encounter. While much of what occurs in academic is
not in your control, the way you respond to it is up to you. It will help you to think
about the foundations of your work and life as an academic. This will underpin the
development or progression of your academic publishing journey. Often the academic
context and the environment present what can appear to be barriers to developing
and maintaining a successful publishing pathway. Taking control of what you can
control will help you to navigate the sometime rough terrain of academia.
This chapter focuses on four key foundation stones of your academic publishing
journey: publishing imperatives; telling your story; t-shirt slogans of your life; and
ethical matters. After dealing with these foundational matters the chapter concludes
with a short but important discussion of the role of planning in publishing.
Publishing Imperatives 17

Publishing Imperatives

There are competing and sometimes conflicting tensions that drive the imperative to
publish. These will not always serve your interests, although they may be presented
as being beneficial to you. Getting published is not the only imperative for many
academics. Universities engage in counting the number of refereed publications
(journal articles, book chapters, books etc.) and academic’s research productivity
are judged on the resultant count along with grant income. Activities such as Excel-
lence in Research Australia (ERA) and Research Excellence Framework (REF) in the
United Kingdom mean grant income is important, as is the ranking and impact of jour-
nals in which academics publish. These exercises also focus on the impact of research
and academics must provide evidence of that as well. Management in some univer-
sities have tried to shift academics’ focus towards specific outputs through these
exercises. In the early days of the ERA exercise in Australia I heard an academic
manager informing an academic historian that books did not matter and that they
should shift their publishing to journal articles in highly ranked journals because
were the publications that would count. The historian nodded sagely and went back
to writing their 15th book knowing that the goalposts would shift again in a few
years.
The problem with such exercises is that early career academics can find themselves
directed, or pushed, into a research and publishing pathway that is designed to meet
the institution’s mandate only to find that several years into their career that they
have lost their passion and are writing merely for the sake of producing the types of
outputs valued by their institution and not necessarily their discipline or themselves.
For beginning academics, it can feel impossible to push back against, or ignore these
institutional and national mandates. Some may consider forging their own journey
to be a Career Limiting Move (CLM). At these times, reflecting on your story can
help to fend off the foolhardiness and temporality that characterises some of these
exercises. Mid-career and senior academics can also find themselves on unstable
ground when arguing against institutional mandates or ignoring them and pursuing
their own pathway. Publishing imperatives depend on the context of the university
for which you work. For example, a colleague in a Central African university says
that time for research is largely theoretical, that is academics in his country are
expected to research and publish but are allocated minimal time which is often take
up by unexpected activities that suddenly become a priority for the university. This is
not an uncommon experience. Tensions between university priorities and academic
mandates are common. An academic from a Middle Eastern university elaborates on
the tensions that exist between academics and their institutions:
Academic excellence is not just research excellence and not just teaching excellence. No,
there are other dimensions that have to be taken into account regarding the role of academics
in society, and you [universities] are abandoning these roles. You don’t give them any value,
but this is institutional, this is this is deeply the consensus within the academic administration.
But no, they don’t want that because it brings them trouble. When academics go out into the
public and speak their mind, often confronting government, often confronting public opinion
that that brings a whole lot of trouble to the academic institutions. And they are cowards.
18 2 Foundations Matter

They try to avoid it as plague, but nonetheless it’s an important role of the universities.
(Middle Eastern scholar)

This scholar’s comments reveal the multiple roles that academics are required to
fulfill while also highlighting the underlying tensions around them.
If a primary motivation or part of your story is to make a difference by sharing
your findings with others, then you will be more secure in pursuing a publishing
pathway that is relevant and appropriate for you. Sharing research with industry,
government, communities, and non-government organisations may be, and many
academics would say should be, your primary motive in publishing. Solving the prob-
lems and challenges that the professions, industry, government, non-government, and
businesses face can be highly rewarding. As public intellectuals we have a duty to
share our knowledge, research findings and outcomes with various publics, particu-
larly those who might benefit from that knowledge. Some academics remain mired
in a publishing for publishing’s sake mindset, as if that is the beginning and end goal
of research.
However, it is important to think about publishing in a different way. Research
is about the questions that help inform our thinking about the social, economic, and
scientific problems. It is informed by considerations such as who should benefit
from the knowledge we produce, how we share that knowledge with others and the
contributions we want to make to society. I’m certainly not advocating any sort of
self-help movement for academics; in fact, I ardently loathe self-help books. Many
of these types of books and the movements that spring up in their wake ignore social,
economic, and cultural contexts not to mention power relations, that make changing
one’s life for the better unachievable no matter how hard an individual might try
to follow the advice in these types of books. Many of our colleagues working in
universities in the Global South do not have the time to research and publish and no
end of self-help books will make a difference to that situation.
This book cannot cover every single institutional, disciplinary or the various
contexts that characterise working as an academic in international universities. I hope
it helps you to inform you about what is important and what you value in publishing. It
is up to you to locate and understand the value of publishing in your discipline, while
also understanding the institutional, national, and international contexts of higher
education and how they work to influence and inform your research and publishing
pathway. The value of academic publishing varies across institutions and countries.
What is important for you as a scholar is that you know about these contexts but
that you don’t let them rule or derail your story. The way you craft a narrative about
your research is a type of public relations exercise. If you can craft your research
and publication story in a way that is not at odds with the institutional context, you
may be able to continue happily on your publishing pathway with relatively little
interference.
The reality is that there are other factors and associated tensions that drive the
publishing imperative including the desire to climb the academic ladder by securing
that next promotion, and eventually making it to the pinnacle of full professor. For
many academics in the Global South, these factors present significant impediments
Publishing Imperatives 19

to publishing. For example, a study of the experiences of academics at a Sri Lankan

university (de Silva, 2022) highlights that the pressure to publish from their research
had positive and negative effects on them. It also revealed some of the barriers to
publishing quality outputs including resources, university culture, a lack of knowl-
edge about publishing opportunities and incentive programs that could affect the
quality of publications by encouraging sub-standard outputs. Pressure to publish can
also vary within disciplines. In science the quality of publications matters as Petersen
et al. (2013) highlight this in their discussion of the development of a tool to assess
the impact of the quality and quantity of publications produced by scientists. They
find (2013: 15316) that in science reputation is based on factors such as the perceived
quality of a publication and “decisions made based on those perceptions” which were
closely linked to citation numbers.
In addition to the aforementioned pressures there is increasing insistence that
academics need to attract grant funding which requires that academics have a publi-
cation track record. There are other reasons for publishing such as producing knowl-
edge not just for the sake of it, but to make a difference. That is not to say that
knowledge for knowledge’s sake is not a worthy pursuit because it can lay the foun-
dations for great change. Publishing your research findings can make a difference,
not just for the university’s purposes or to achieve that next promotion. For example,
scientists from various universities clearly have made a difference during the COVID-
19 pandemic, developing and testing vaccines in an extremely time and politically
pressured environment. Oxford University scientists were involved in developing the
Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine (see https://vk.ovg.ox.ac.uk/vk/covid-19-vaccines). As
with many vaccines the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine was not without controversy,
but the contribution that academic scientists made to the development and ultimately
the availability of COVID-19 vaccines is enormous and highlights the important role
of academic research.
Making a difference through research is not only the domain of the sciences.
Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences can also make real-world differences.
For example, a project I co-led called Reporting Islam, had significant outcomes in
relation to Australian journalists’ knowledge of Muslims and their faith and best prac-
tice in reporting stories. The project was designed to assist journalists working for
Australian news media organisations and journalism students towards more informed
reporting on stories about Muslims and their faith. The research embedded in the
project in the form of pre and post training session tests showed an immediate
improvement in their knowledge of Muslims and Islam and of what constituted
best practice in reporting associated stories following the training. That project was
underpinned by the international research, interviews with journalists and journalism
educators, and case studies of news media coverage of Islam and Muslims. It was
about addressing problematic reportage which many Muslims felt contributed to
social divisiveness. Other researchers have moved into producing podcasts about
their research or interviews with those who bring solutions to social issues. Research
that makes a difference is now highly valued within and outside the academy.
While distributing research findings through traditional academic publications is
part of the work of many academics, it can be quite a lengthy process. Some academics
20 2 Foundations Matter

speed up the process of distributing their findings by publishing summaries of their

results in publications that are directed at industry and government. Others make
their findings available through commentary pieces in online publications so that
industry and members of the public can read about their work. In both cases, if
your research has not been published in peer reviewed journals or other academic
publications you should make it clear to readers that your findings have not been
peer reviewed. The value of these types of non-academic publications is that they
can be published by researchers anywhere in the world and may include blogs, vlogs,
public commentary on news sites, and briefing papers. There is potential for such
publications to make a significant impact on industry and government, including on
policy makers and practitioners. They should be written in plain, simple language
because they are largely for a non-academic audience. Their style and tone are also
important and must be relevant to the readers.
When it comes to publishing in journals, there are real hurdles for academics
working in universities in the Global South. Many journals published in the Global
North focus on studies relevant to Europe and the USA, while also publishing in
English. This can create barriers for those wanting to publish from research under-
taken in the Global South. Political contexts can have a negative effect which mani-
fests in the spurious rejection of publications submitted to international journals by
academics in countries such as Israel and Russia. This is despite many academics
lack of support for, and vehement opposition, to government policies such as the
occupation of Gaza Strip and the war on Ukraine. While politics and science are
not supposed to mix, many academics in Israel feel they are out of contention when
it comes to international funding opportunities due to the political climate in their
country. For many of those entering academia, the situation is made more difficult
by the political situation in some countries, for example in Israel some people are
not able to attend university or are seriously disadvantaged in their attempts to do
so. For those hoping to develop an academic career this type of situation is further
complicated by reduced investment in higher education and the contingent precarious
employment situation.
There are several useful books for academics located in the Global South that
provide insights into the broader contexts of these environments and how to manage
the impacts of them on their academic work including publishing. Global Academic
Publishing Policies, Perspectives and Pedagogies (2017) edited by Theresa Lillis,
and Mary Jane Curry discusses the state of academic publishing across languages
and countries, providing advice about responses to pressures to publish in English
and strategies for those whose first language is English in publishing. Another useful
work is The Sociolinguistics of Academic Publishing: Language and the Practices
of Homo Academicus (2017) written by Linus Salo, which examines sociolinguis-
tics and academic publishing from a historical and current viewpoint. It provides
case studies of Swedish academics in the disciplines of history and psychology and
has a useful discussion of publishing and funding models and associated pressures
on academic life. Additionally, Suresh Canagarajah’s A Geopolitics of Academic
Writing (2002) is a thoughtful analysis of the geopolitical and economic conditions
of academic writing in the Global South with attention to the effects this has on the
Knowing Your Story 21

availability and circulation of knowledge. He critiques the approach journals in the

Global North take to publishing, highlighting how this locks out or exploits those
in the Global South. That book is useful for those scholars in the Global South in
thinking about the conditions of their work and how to deal them.

Knowing Your Story

The kind of academic you are matters. How you treat others matters. These things
matter because they go to the heart of who you are as a person and how you behave
as an academic. They form the foundations of your story as an academic. Knowing
your story and how to tell it, is not about some strange motivational or cult-like
approach to academic life. It is not about being mindful or any other mis-used and
mis-applied term appropriated from an Eastern religion on a whim and bandied about
in an esoteric way. Being aware of contexts, situations, other people and how you are
interacting with them is vital. Your story is fundamental to understanding how you
underpin the way you approach working with others and your research. It is about
your perspective and your journey. Universities are riddled with people who want to
co-opt your story. Run your own race. Focus on your own story.
The story you tell yourself about your own research and publishing journey, how
that fits within the rest of your academic work and how it fits with your life is
important. Brabazon (2018) asks three key questions that are integral to forming
your story. I have slightly altered the last question slightly to reflect that this book
is for those who are post-Ph.D., and in the early or mid-stages of their academic
careers. They are: What is your fuel? What is your engine? What propels you in
your life and your research? Brabazon describes the answers to these questions as
the t-shirt slogans of your life. The t-shirt slogans of your life are the principles that
underpin it, as Brabazon (2018) explains:
What are your values? And indeed, what do you value? This is not the story that you tell
other people. This is not the story that you tell people on a date, like tell me your life story,
this is not this stuff, it’s not the story that you tell at a job interview, this is much more honest,
much more important, this is the story that you tell yourself. And yes, whatever story you
are telling yourself it can change, it can transform.

The last point in this quote is very important—it is about the possibility of trans-
formation. Over the course of an academic career, your research and publishing
trajectory will change. Your pathway may diverge from your plan, so too will the
way you tell your story as you progress through your career. Your story won’t neces-
sarily be the same when you are doing your Ph.D. as when you are a full professor.
Elements of it, and the foundations of it, may remain intact but the journey will
change your story.
Determining your story means asking yourself some important questions. What
drives you?; Why are you doing this research?; Why do you want the world to know
about it? It is useful to consider two additional questions: So what and who cares.
22 2 Foundations Matter

They relate to considering why your research is important (so what) and who it is
important to (who cares). Your story might be that you studied medicine because
you wanted to help people. Your drive to help people led you to doing a Ph.D. After
your Ph.D. you continued working as a practitioner but realised that you wanted to
extend helping others through teaching and so you applied for and were successful
in attaining an academic role where you can continue to practice and teach the next
generation of medical practitioners. Your focus on making a difference is apparent
in your research in developing new and improved treatments and finding a cure for
breast cancer. The motivation for your research is that several members of your
family have had this type of cancer. You might be a social science academic who
previously worked as a journalist often covering stories about diverse communities
and people. You have studied news media coverage of minority groups as part of a
Master’s degree and then in your Ph.D. Your research has been driven by your own
experiences of being a member of a minority ethnic group and a desire to improve
news media coverage of minority groups. Your journey is clearly tied to wanting
to make a change to journalists’ practices and improve social cohesion. When you
obtain an academic post, your research will always be underpinned by the motivation
to change practice and society for the better. These examples show how academics in
different fields bring their own passions to inform their story and academic journey.
To sustain an academic publishing journey, you need to be motivated by more
than promotion and external success. Like a Ph.D, the motivation needs to come
(Brabazon, 2018) “from something very deep, so curiosity, fascination, intrigue, the
desire to solve a big problem”. These are the types of motivations that sustain a
research and publishing career over the scope of several or more decades. Knowing
your core values will help you to claim and maintain a claim on a research space.
Brabazon (2018) elaborates:
What matters, what is the grammar that is a punctuation for your life? If you can work that
out then that can provide an incredibly powerful way to claim your space, claim your lane
and work out what you stand for. It then doesn’t matter what the mongrels, the haters, the
mean girls, whatever those people say is irrelevant to you because this is what you are doing.
And you’ve got to hold onto this core and frequently of course these are core values. Now
for me my core values are pretty clear, and I’ve developed them really over the last 20 years.
My core values are compassion and kindness and when I think about my personal story, my
personal story has always been walk gently on the earth and then disappear. Wake up in the
morning, do some good and certainly don’t do any harm, that’s it. So, think about what your
core story is. There’s going to be people that come into your life and then across your core
values and I need you to know what they are but also sit in them, be confident in those core
values, don’t be brittle and stay within your lane, stay within your story no matter who is
trying to pull you out of that lane.

If you can answer the questions posed in this chapter thus far and if you know your
core values, you will be well set up to stay firmly on your pathway when someone
tries to derail your journey. Do not get enmeshed in other people’s dramas. Do not get
sucked into their vortex. Do not make their problems yours. Do your own thing. Keep
on your pathway and keep moving through your journey. Every time something or
someone threatens to derail your train, remember your story, your core values, your
motivation, your ‘so what’ and your ‘who cares’. Unfortunately, success sometimes
Knowing Your Story 23

comes at a cost and those who really succeed, not the ones who run around loudly
publicising their bog-standard achievements, can become the target of the small
minded. Brabazon’s (2018) advice in dealing with these types is:
… you do not have to deal with other people’s insecurity, fears, weakness, or anger, you
don’t have to deal with their stuff. You just simply note it. I note your issues, move it to the
side, move it out of your lane, keep running. Centre yourself, keep moving.

Your story will enshrine your personal and professional ethics and in turn that
will inform your work with others when it comes to publishing, whether they be
other academics or publishers. Many academics are driven by a passion for their
research and publishing. For a colleague in a Central African university this involves
a set of core values and being able to contribute to academic knowledge. He finds
consistency is important in ensuring his work is underpinned by his values and
that research findings were not just returned to the academic community but to the
people who contributed to them. He explains: “I think the end goal shouldn’t be a
peer reviewed paper in general but bringing it back in the community. I feel that’s
very important”. He suggests that for academics entering academia, no matter what
part of the world they work in, that they should “keep their heads up because it is
going to be a rough, rough road to drive on”. This scholar’s point about perseverance
is a valuable one for those beginning an academic career.
Experimentation can be an important part of academic work. A scholar working
in a university in South China suggested that those starting out in academia should
not be afraid of breaking away from their post-graduate training when it comes to
structuring and writing a journal article or book chapter. She elaborates:
I was very much set in the training that I had, and I thought that was the ideal route to take
and the ideal way to structure, let’s say a chapter or an article. Little did I know that academic
writing can actually take many forms and shapes, so it was through reading more, reading
different types of publication that I got to know that, oh, I can actually do it differently. I can
actually move components around. So once I realised that I found my headache lessened.

However, experimentation went beyond writing styles, to encompass ideas and

approaches to research. This manifested in a review the academic from South China
received on a journal article:
Well, by the time I got to the conclusion of a of a draft, I threw in an idea and then the
reviewer came back and said it’s absolutely irrelevant. Take it out. And then I kept it [aside]
because I still thought it was fun. So, I experimented with it. I haven’t succeeded yet, but
the comment coming back [from a different journal] was not as dismissive, if I may say. So
being able to or being willing to experiment with an idea.

Her point is a vital one, that is do not be afraid to experiment because it can lead
to great pieces of writing and great ideas.
24 2 Foundations Matter

Publishing Ethics

This section of the book is not about research ethics in the traditional sense of
applying for ethics clearance for your research project. Each university will have its
own processes for academics whose research requires ethics clearance. Rather, the
focus here is on your personal ethics when it comes to working with other academics
and publishers. Part of your story will encompass your approach to professional and
personal ethics. This goes to the heart of the earlier discussion in this chapter about
what kind of academic you want to be and ultimately, how you want to treat others.
Personal and professional ethics ensure consistency in your approach to a variety
of situations involving co-authors and publishers. They are the rudder that steers
you through the often-choppy waters of academia. When things get strange, weird,
or tough, your ethics and values are your touchstone. They remind you of what is
important, how you want to treat people and what you want to think of yourself. This
is not to say that everyone approaches ethics in this way. We have all heard tales about
the dissertation supervisor who thinks it is fine to ‘borrow’ a student’s research and
publish it as their own, or a supervisor who believes their name should be listed as
first author on a journal article or other publication from a student’s thesis. Academic
publishing ethics can seem as complicated and exhausting as online dating. There
will be more discussion about key aspects of ethics in Chapter 5, which explores the
intricacies and maze of co-authoring.
Your personal and professional ethics will connect deeply to and be woven
throughout your story. They will be a fundamental part of who you are and what
governs your approach to other people. They will inform everything you do, how
you treat other people, how you approach your work, how you talk about your work,
and the outcomes you want from your research and publishing. Taking and main-
taining an ethical approach based on being a reasonable and kind human is not
always an easy road. There will be times when people come into your arena with
their swords drawn and you will have to choose whether to defend your standards
and to meet them with your own sword drawn or to throw down your weapon. If
you have acted ethically, consider whether it is worth the energy and time to engage
with people whose egos have far outstripped their minor achievements. Colleagues
have shared some wild stories about the poor, bad and mean behaviour of academics
when it comes to publishing. For example, supervising a colleague for performance
purposes when you are having a relationship with that person while also co-authoring
with them is far from ethical and would breach many university policies.
Good ethics dictate that you treat others how you would like to be treated. While
things go wrong when publishing, whether as a sole or co-author, your profes-
sional ethics can help you to deal with problems as they arise and potentially solve
issues before relationships are irrevocably damaged. For example, professional and
personal ethics would dictate that the following situation should not have occurred. A
colleague had a co-author withdraw from co-authorship of a book five weeks before
it was due to the publisher. There was no indication that this would happen, and the
remaining author was left facing a difficult situation—drop the project, renegotiate the
Planning to Find Time 25

contract with the publisher or find another co-author to help complete the manuscript.
The matter of personal ethics comes into play in this example in two ways. Firstly,
the second author who later withdrew from the project without warning, should have
indicated much earlier in the process that they were struggling with writing their
chapters. This would have enabled a discussion about what support could be offered
to that author or what other arrangements needed to be made. While co-authors can
withdraw from publishing agreements, they need to consider the impacts on those
who remain responsible for delivering the publication to a publisher. Professional
and personal ethics would dictate that a conversation should have been initiated by
the second author far earlier than it was.
Ethics matter when dealing with publishers. For example, when I was writing a
book about a major terrorism case, I was trying to secure an interview with the person
who appeared to be at the centre of the case. I approached several major publishers
who were very responsive to the book and its approach. However, those publishers
wanted to ensure there was an interview with the person who ostensibly appeared to
be at the centre of the story. While I had not at that stage secured an interview with the
subject, I had pointed out that the book was not really about that character but rather
about political intervention and legal issues. However major publishers declined to
contract the book until that interview was confirmed. I made a verbal agreement with
a small, independent publisher and prior to signing a written contract, secured an
interview with the central character, and my professional and personal ethics dictated
that the verbal agreement with the smaller publishing house should stand, and it did.
This may have been to my detriment because a larger publishing house would have
more resources to invest in promoting and marketing the book.
Ethics are an important part of publishing and most academics at some time in
their careers will experience challenging ethical situations. It is worth noting that
most people do not deliberately act in unethical ways but are often forced into poor
decisions by the publish or perish mantra and that this is a systemic institutional
problem.

Planning to Find Time

Many academics plan to find time, some day to write that journal article they have
been thinking about for the past year or two. Planning your research publications
and the longer-term picture around your publishing journey will help you get down
to writing. Having a plan is crucial, without it you will be like a ship at sea without
a radar—directionless. While planning is important, you should not spend hundreds
of hours colour coding charts and tables, devising systems for reminding you that
you have not written your daily word count, because that may take all your time
away from actually writing your publications. Planning can help to keep you on
track and provide a reminder of your progress. There are many methods of planning,
from a simple whiteboard listing your proposed publications for the year, to an excel
spreadsheet to laying out your plan and tracking your progress. There are software
26 2 Foundations Matter

programs such as Omniplan that provide more detailed approaches to managing

complex projects and publication outputs. Whichever planning tool you use it is
useful to be able to lay out your goals and then track your progress against them.
There are also books and great vlogs and blogs that attend to the matter of writing
and finding time to write, and I do not intend to repeat that advice here. For instance,
the book Writing for Publication: Liminal Reflections for Academics (Stewart et al.,
2021) provides advice and reflections about the conditions of writing scholarly publi-
cations and how academics can position themselves within the world of academic
publishing. A common lament amongst academics is that they do not have time to
devote to research or writing up the findings of their studies for publication. Many
academics are simply not allocated time for research or to produce publications.
This is common in Global South universities where some staff do not hold research
qualifications such as a Ph.D., are not always granted research time as part of their
paid workload. The flow on effects of this is that there are fewer academics who can
provide supervision for postgraduate students at those institutions. These academics
are at a distinct disadvantage, often trying to secure places in universities in the
Global North to gain a Ph.D. but some struggle financially to do so and hope for a
scholarship. Others muddle or struggle through with the financial support of family
or a multitude of part-time jobs. Academics also struggle with family and caring
commitments which they find eat into the time they might otherwise have devoted
to writing, for example evenings and weekends.
I remember having a conversation with a colleague some years ago and she was
lamenting the lack of time to write a book. She had applied for a period of research
leave which she wanted to dedicate to her book project, but her leave application was
somewhat ironically rejected because she had not written and published a monograph.
When she approached the head of department to discuss her options, he advised
her to take long-service leave and use that time to write her book telling her she
should do so “because everyone else works on their long service and recreation
leave”. These types of comments only add to environments that create conditions
for burn out. The precariat—those academics employed as casuals who are only
paid for teaching and marking with no research time allocated—face even more
hurdles in trying to find time to research and publish. For this group, it is a catch 22
situation with universities often demanding evidence of a research and publication
track record for those applying for full-time positions. Members of the precariat
struggle to find unpaid time to develop and maintain their publishing track record.
Even full-time academics whose positions allocate a portion of paid time to research
can find themselves burdened with heavy teaching, service, and administration loads.
By the time the teaching is completed, they have little energy left to write.
There are ways to allocate time to writing journal articles or books. Whether or
not your paid academic position provides time for research, one useful approach is to
hive off blocks of time every day to devote to writing. Academics who think that they
can leave writing that journal article or book chapter until after teaching finishes, may
find themselves exhausted and unable to meet deadlines. A daily writing block of as
little as 20 uninterrupted minutes can keep the topic fresh in your mind and help to
ensure progress. This is what is known as the ‘pay yourself first’ principle. It may be
Planning to Find Time 27

that early mornings, before the rest of your household wakes up, work best for you.
Perhaps late evenings are the time when you can devote yourself to your research
and writing. Find what works for you and attend to it daily. Make sure you have a
set task to undertake and complete each day and at the end of your writing session,
make a short note as to what you want to achieve the following day. Professor Tara
Brabazon’s vlogs, which are primarily designed for higher degree research students
and early career academics, are an extremely useful resource for those wanting to
find time to write and ways to manage academic life. She covers a wide range of
topics providing advice and guidance drawn from the international literature and
based on her extensive experience working in universities around the world. The
Thesis Whisperer is another useful blog that covers issues associated with academic
writing and research.
Apart from the ‘pay yourself first’ principle there are other ways to work out
how much time you can devote to research and the associated task of writing up
your findings for publication. For those who are in full-time paid employment one
relatively simple formulae is to work out how many hours a year you are paid to
work. For example, those working in full-time academic roles in most Australian
universities are paid to work 36.25 h a week, although most academics work far
more hours than for which they are paid. Based on paid hours means an academic
would probably work 36.25 h × 48 weeks (assuming that they have four weeks
paid leave). Those working in a context where workload is broken, for example into
teaching (40 percent), research (40 per cent) and service (20 per cent) would have
a total of 1740 work hours allocated as follows: Teaching, 696 h; Research, 696 h;
Service, 348 h. If you allocate two hours a day to research including writing up
publications, in 48 weeks you will have clocked up 480 h of your 696 h allocated
to research. This does not take into account time taken off in case of illness, injury
or caring responsibilities. Of course, this is only an example, and some may argue
it is a relatively rare or even unattainable one. Most academics work far more than
36.25 h a week. You can change the formulae to reflect the hours you actually work,
or you can adjust your working hours to reflect what you are paid to work.
For those who feel that teaching is robbing time from their research allocation
journal articles and books about teaching provide time saving tips for dealing with
and managing the overload. Unpaid work devoted to research is usually for altruistic
purposes such as providing solutions to social problems, or to build up your publi-
cation track record for your next job application. For the precariat, determining the
time you can commit to writing publications will depend on your paid work commit-
ments, your family and caring responsibilities, and other activities you undertake.
Planning is equally important for you if you are in this type of circumstance, as it
will help you stay on track and achieve your goals. An important aspect of planning
your academic publishing journey is knowing your working style, that is under what
conditions you produce your best writing. A colleague explains:
One has to know oneself. By that I mean you’re working style. It took me a few years really
to find out that I would be most efficient if I could just have a block of time without teaching
duties, without admin work. So, to know one’s working style is very important. You can then
know what kind of schedule you need to clear or create or plan for your upcoming project.
28 2 Foundations Matter

Planning when and how you will write is just as important as knowing the
conditions that best suit you for writing and what you want to write about.

Finding a Mentor

Finding a great mentor who is suitable for the phase of your career you are in is
important. Mentors will come and go as you progress through your career and they
through theirs, others will be your career-long supporters. Mentors can help with
navigating the complexities of academia, planning your research and publishing, act
as a sounding board and provide reflections on your teaching. They can advise you
how to survive and thrive in academia. Before you look for a mentor, or mentors,
you need to think about what you want from the relationship and what you can
bring to it. Knowing what you need help with, your strengths and weaknesses as
an academic will help you to locate the right mentor. Your institution may have a
mentoring scheme and accessing that may bring the added benefits of a structured
program that has ensured training for those providing mentors. Always research a
potential mentor before approaching them. There are many resources available about
how to locate and develop a relationship with a great mentor, some of these will be
provided by your institution while others can be accessed through the websites of
publishers. There are vlogs and blogs about academic mentoring that can be found
through search engines.

Conclusion

Four of the key foundations to academic publishing have been discussed in this
chapter. They include managing publishing imperatives; working out how to tell your
story; knowing the t-shirt slogans of your life; and why ethical behaviour matters.
Planning your academic publishing journey requires some strong foundations in
relation how you behave and treat others, the treatment you expect and will accept
from others. These foundations will help you navigate the sometime placid, some-
times treacherous waters of academic research, writing and publishing. If you are
an academic whose workload is split between teaching, research, and service, or
teaching and research you will need to find a balance between these areas. Applying
the ‘pay yourself first principle’ to your research and writing is a good way of ensuring
you allocate time to nurture your passions.
References 29

References

Brabazon, T. (2018, September 21). Vlog 129: What’s your story. https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=LBP_U6ZwgAU&t=1045s. Accessed 29 Sept 2018.
Canagarajah, A. S. (2002). A geopolitics of academic writing. University of Pittsburgh Press.
de Silva, R. (2022). Perceived research publication pressure on academics: An exploratory study at
The Open University of Sri Lanka. OUSL Journal, 17(1), 119–137.
Lillis, T., & Curry, M. J. (Eds.). (2017). Global academic publishing policies, perspectives and
pedagogies. Multilingual Matters.
Petersen, A. M., Fortunato, S., Pan, R. K., Kasiki, K., Penner, O., Rungi, A., Riccaboni, M., Stanley,
H. E., & Pammolli, F. (2013). Reputation and impact in academic careers. PNAS, 111(43),
15316–15321.
Salo, L. (2017). The sociolinguistics of academic publishing: Language and the practices of homo
academicus. Palgrave Macmillan.
Stewart, G. T., Devine, N., & Benade, L. B. (2021). Writing for publication: Liminal reflections for
academics. Springer Verlag.
Chapter 3
Planning Your Academic Publishing
Journey

Abstract This chapter deals with how to plan your academic publishing career. It
begins with the big picture. Drawing on vlogs, blogs, and the academic literature it
provides a roadmap to keep you on track. It reflects on the current state of academia
and how academics at different stages of their careers can negotiate the precarious
research planning landscape. It encourages researchers to think about what their story
is and ensure that story underpins and informs their publishing plan. Critically, this
chapter focuses on your story, the one that you want to tell with your research and in
doing so it builds on the concept of your story as mentioned in Chapter 1. Taking a
strategic approach to the way you talk about and discuss your research is important
and planning is a useful tool here. As your career progresses your research plan will
become more complicated, and it will probably involve juggling multiple projects
and publication outputs at the same time. This raises competing tensions, and this
chapter also considers the struggle between the race to secure grant funding and the
desire of academics to publish, providing tips on how to manage those demands.
Finally, the differences between outputs and outcomes are covered because this goes
to the impact of your research and publications, which are integral to your story.

Key Points

. How to produce a publishing plan

. How you tell your story matters
. Balancing publishing and funding applications
. Research outputs and outcomes

Introduction

Planning when, where, and how you will publish is important. A well thought out plan
that is a living document, that can develop and respond to changing circumstances
will help you to stay on track. Your plan should be driven by you, so that you get
what you want from your career and to ensure you are in charge of your journey.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 31
J. Ewart, Planning your Academic Publishing Journey,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-5902-0_3
32 3 Planning Your Academic Publishing Journey

Your plan will change as you transition through the various stages of your career.
Regular reflection on where you have been and where you are going will inform the
process of updating your document annually. This chapter focuses on planning as an
essential element in your story. The plan helps you to develop and to tell your story,
that is the story of your research and publications and their impact. This builds on
the idea of your story as discussed in the previous chapter. The emphasis is placed on
your story because it is yours. It is not a story to be crafted or told by your academic
supervisor, or your institution. It belongs to you and should be crafted by you.
Over the years there have been tales told and retold about beginning academics
who have been directed towards or away from research projects. While I recognise
that there are strictures on many aspects of academic life, you should still have agency
when it comes to your research pathway. Pursuing what you are passionate about
should underpin your research and writing. The way you talk about your research
and how you tell your story is crucial. The importance of this became evident to me
when I listen to the way a former colleague discussed her research which was about
the cultural significance of a particular piece of jewellery. That item was a sought
after a romance symbol worn by women. She talked about the ‘fun’ elements of
her research and how beautiful the jewellery was, rather than telling her story in a
way that would have highlighted the academic significance of her work in terms of
popular culture and memory. While the cultural heritage aspects of her research on
that item of jewellery were explained in a journal article she wrote, she was unable
to translate this in conversations with her peers. The way she told the story of her
research downplayed its worth, and the unfortunate outcome was that colleagues
were largely dismissive of it, thinking it was frivolous and a waste of time. Her
experience reinforces that you need to understand the environment of the university
in which you work and the expectations of your discipline when discussing your
publications and research. This chapter also covers a range of prosaic matters such
as balancing the imperative to obtain research funding with the need to establish a
publication track record.
There are many things that people will neglect to tell you about planning and
managing your publishing when you enter academia. You will encounter those who
are colloquially referred to as ‘mean girls’ or ‘mean guys’. These people will, unfor-
tunately, deliberately try to derail your carefully laid plans. They might try to redirect
your focus to support one or more of their pet projects, or they might simply place
roadblocks in the way of your carefully considered publishing pathway. However,
truly knowing your story—that is what motivates you professionally, personally, and
what your story is about—will help you deal with these situations. Unfortunately,
success is often not cause for celebration in the academy. There are people want
to tear down those who are successful. Academics who publish prolifically in high
quality journals and with top ranked international publishers are particularly at risk
of attracting the ire of their more mediocre colleagues. The following comment from
a colleague illustrates some of the aforementioned issues:
I was at an international gathering of about 15 scholars who were all experts in a very specific
field. Someone mentioned the name of a dear friend and colleague of mine, which prompted
one of those present to comment dismissively “Oh her. I’ve heard her speak and it was a
What Is Your Story 33

content free zone”. Well, I managed to keep my poker face on, because inevitably this kind of
mean spiritedness does not deserve or require engagement. However, I knew the person who
made the comment did not have even a quarter of the academic publications nor a tenth of
the public engagement record of my friend and certainly no-where near my friend’s prolific
publishing, public writing, and engagement record.

These types of comments only serve to highlight the inadequacy of the person
making them.
The meanness can sometimes be dressed up as critiques in the form of peer reviews
of grants or publications that contain unhelpful, nasty, and inappropriate comments.
These are often thinly disguised attempts to minimise an applicant’s chances of being
awarded a grant or having their article accepted for publication. Receiving negative
and non-constructive comments can be quite devastating for those new to academia
and even seasoned grant applicants might be blindsided by this type of behaviour. Of
course, there will be those who say ‘toughen up princess’ to academics facing this
kind of cruel and callous behaviour. That is not particularly helpful. There are some
wonderful, supportive academics around the world and finding one to mentor you,
or just to provide a listening and kind ear at such times, is vital.

What Is Your Story

In my first academic job, a colleague gave me two useful and memorable pieces of
advice. They were: You don’t work for university X, you work for yourself; and: Do
not see yourself as stuck at university X, rather see yourself as part of a world-wide
community of scholars. These two pieces of sage advice helped form part of my story.
At the time, I worked at a regional university. I enjoyed my job and liked the university,
although some of the early experiences I had there may have put someone with a more
delicate disposition off academia forever. Despite the relative geographical isolation
of the university, I never saw myself as being stuck in what some colloquially refer
to regional Australia as the Badlands. Having worked in communication and public
relations professionally, I understood the value of being able to explain my work, my
research and what fundamentally underpinned my approach to academic and non-
academic audiences. I also understood my colleague’s latter comment to mean that
academics are mobile and often change institutions and are essentially building their
profiles as they progress through their careers regardless of the institution at which
they are located. If you enter academia like most academics do through a formal PhD
program, followed by, or coupled with contract work or an ongoing position, you
will probably have a tiny kernel of an idea of your story.
Others like me enter academia through non-typical pathways. My journey started
as a journalist and then I shifted to working in strategic communication. I was asked
to take on tutoring work at a university and then encouraged to apply for a full-time
academic position. At the time I had almost completed a Master’s degree and was
thinking about undertaking a Ph.D. I had a bit of an idea of what my professional
story was, but I had no idea of my academic story or how to tell it. I bumbled through
Another random document with
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the individual who is translated and handed over to their care.
Nevertheless, the raw material counts for a good deal—as you
express it in one of your homely English proverbs: 'One cannot make
a silk purse out of a sow's ear'; and on the same analogy even our
skilful ministers of state would be unable to construct the true
substance of a Child of the Sun-god out of an inferior Herthian
mortal. The nicest caution has therefore to be observed in the work
of selection. For nearly three years now I have been busily seeking,
and can at last congratulate myself on having obtained the requisite
material, the potential dross that will later be converted into pure
gold. For some time past I have been on your track without arousing
the smallest suspicion in your mind, and now at length I have
grasped the favourable, the critical, the final moment in which I claim
you for this most exalted, and indeed most sacred office....
"You are thoroughly out of touch with your own age and with your
own country in a special degree, and for my purpose your deep-
rooted dissatisfaction causes in me on the contrary the most intense
satisfaction. You have grown disgusted with the decadence of your
Royal House; you are sick of the greed and frivolity of your
aristocracy; you abhor the mischievous methods and aims of your
unscrupulous demagogues in power; you shrink from the violence
and brutishness of your all-powerful mob; you lament the utter
incapacity of the few serious and honest politicians who yet survive.
You mourn over the industrial devastation and the uglifying of your
once-beautiful world; you turn with horror from the blatant arrogance
of the ruling gang of financiers, who with the besotted populace
mean to involve the whole world in a final sordid struggle for
mastery. On all sides you see nothing but rapid change upon
change, all for the worse; the rooting-out of all that is good, artistic
and ennobling, and the substitution of all that is vile and
mercenary....
"You are obsessed with the same hatred of this evil transformation
as are we ourselves, the ruling body in Meleager, who utilise your
planet now, not as in the past for purposes of imitation and guidance,
but for serious warnings as to what to avoid in our own future course
of polity. For in Meleager we still set before us as our main striving-
point Universal Content, not so-called industrial and educational
Progress and the mere amassing of wealth. The happiness of all is,
and always has been, the sole aim of our statesmen, and we firmly
hold that the various theories of equality that are so advertised and
belauded on your Earth are in reality most deadly poisons that are
being injected into the corporate mass of humanity. One of the
leading saints of your Christian Church has wisely said that in every
house are to be found vessels alike formed to honour and to
dishonour, yet that, as they are all equally necessary, so viewed in
that reasonable light are they all equally honourable. Thus in our
government of Meleager do we recognise the clear necessity of the
various grades of society which form the total fabric of every healthy
and happy state; whilst we reject with scorn and loathing the
specious notions that, under the guise of an equality that has no real
existence, endeavour to weld all society into one drab dismal
detestable whole....
"Nowadays everything that is ordered or orderly you worldlings have
set out to destroy. Your barbarian hordes broke up the stable Roman
Empire; your fanatical reformers and greedy monarchs destroyed the
consolidating features of the Middle Ages, which though very far
from being perfect yet presented many illuminating features which
we deemed expedient to copy in Meleager. In recent years your
death-dealing guns and your proselytising emissaries have
destroyed wantonly the vast matured civilisations of China and
Japan and Burmah, which are now rapidly casting out all their
antique virtues and are fast absorbing all the vice and vulgarity of the
West. Every community, howsoever poor or insignificant, yet content
to work out its own salvation and be governed by its own ancient
laws and customs, and consequently happy and healthy according to
its own lights, you have disturbed and dismembered....
"Everywhere and every day the beautiful is retreating before the
utilitarian; smoke and noise pollute the greenest and loveliest valleys
of Europe and America; dirt and disease increase in spite of your
undoubted advances in medical science, whose services are given
over to the individual who will pay for them rather than to the
community at large. One sees the feeble and the cretinous of your
world breeding like flies, whilst those of a better condition and in
sound health are found too selfish and too tenacious of their ease to
undertake the trouble or expense connected with the rearing of a
family. Epidemics continue, and in the form of a gift of Western
civilisation are allowed to sweep away whole tribes and nations of
wholesome primitive peoples; your most loathsome and yet
preventable diseases of contagion still hold sway, either by reason of
your own indifference or from false ideals of a prudery that, I
confess, wholly passes my own comprehension. Over all your Earth
the universal craving for wealth at any cost of morals or self-respect
has settled like a blight. All pleasures of the intellect are rapidly
ceasing to attract, and the extravagance and debauchery of the
ostentatious rich are announced by your odious vassal Press as the
sole objects worthy of attainment or imitation to-day....
"You slaughter and exterminate your rare animals and your beautiful
birds in order that your women may adorn themselves with their pelts
and plumage, and even now in this cold weather I have watched
your fine ladies daily walking in your noisy, crowded streets of
London, half-naked yet wholly unashamed, with their limbs and
bosoms exposed equally to the bitter wind and the lascivious eye of
the stranger, whilst masses of costly furs, the spoils of innocent and
peaceful animals, are heaped upon their pampered bodies....
"Whither are you being driven in this mad stampede after so-called
progress and knowledge? In what morass will this mocking will-o'-
the-wisp ultimately entice and overwhelm you?... I see chicanery and
disbelief possess your churches and their priests; a clinging to
stipends and a craving for personal leadership seem to me to have
become the sole guides of such as are themselves supposed to
guide their flocks. Everywhere change, restlessness, cynicism,
vulgarity, extravagance, crime, hypocrisy, covetousness, greed,
cringing, selfishness in every form are rampant; what sensitive mind
would not instinctively recoil from contact with such a changing
world? Can a nature such as your own endure to be associated with
such a mass of passive squalor and of active evil? Are you not more
than ready to welcome some chance of escape from such an
uncongenial environment?...
"As you confess in your heart the utter collapse of your early aims
here on Earth—so must you recognise your unique chance to attain
to something higher than even you dreamed of in your youthful
moods of hope and ambition. You will be reincarnated as the Child of
the Sun, after you are once translated to Meleager. That is a part,
but a part only, of The Secret, which perhaps already you are
inclined to regard as The Fraud. And yet, if fraud it be, its ultimate
aim is a beneficent and unselfish one, for it has been practised in
order to keep a whole population happy and content...."

"And herewith I think I had now better give you some instructions, or
rather hints, as to your new position and as to your proper attitude
towards the governing caste of Meleager on your arrival there. As
King, the Child of the Sun is invested with a species of sovereignty
that has no exact counter-part on your Earth. Your high office in
Meleager partakes in some respects of the nature of a King of
England, of a Pope of Rome, of an old-time Sultan of Baghdad, of a
modern colonial governor; yet it is itself no one of these things. To
sustain your part you will be reincarnated after your long sleep, and
you will awake to find yourself endued with a fresh supply of youth
and energy, whilst all your acquired learning and ripe experience of a
lifetime already more than half consumed will abide in your brain.
There now remains for you the final stage of all on Earth, that of
putting yourself and your future unreservedly and confidently in my
hands...."
There followed an abrupt spell of silence in which d'Aragno
scrutinised me closely. I knew not why, but I had begun to
experience a sort of repulsion against his arrogance in thus
presuming obedience on my part before ever I had signified my
assent. I felt in some wise bound to protest against this assumption
of my readiness to obey, and accordingly I made a protest rather out
of personal vanity than from any depth of rebellious feeling.
"And suppose, sir, I decide not to accept your proposal? Suppose I
refuse absolutely and doggedly to accede to your demand, whatever
the consequence to myself? What then?"
D'Aragno rose from his chair, thrust both hands into the pockets of
his dress jacket, and took up a position on the hearth-rug before the
dying embers of the fire. A curious expression, which I quite failed to
analyse, spread over his features, as he regarded me sternly for
some moments in silence. At length he spoke:
"Your objection I do not regard as sincere. It is idle, and has been
prompted, I am convinced, by a vague sense of wounded dignity on
your part. Perhaps I have been not sufficiently considerate to your
proper pride. You are anxious to 'save your face,' as you express it in
your English idiom. I therefore refuse to take your question seriously.
You have, I know, in your heart the fullest intention of complying with
my arrangements." A pause ensued, and he added with indifference:
"In any case, do you suppose for an instant that I have thus spoken
to you openly of The Secret with the smallest possibility of my
sharing it with any living mortal on your Earth? In reality you have no
choice left you. Whether you follow or refuse to follow my lead, your
connection with your own world is already severed. Need I make the
case any clearer to an intelligence such as yours?"
Again a spell of silence, which was ended by the harsh five strokes
of the Westminster clock resounding through the heavy air. With the
final reverberation I bowed my head, and simply said: "I am ready."
It may have been only my fancy, but I thought I detected a shade of
relief pass over that now sinister face; at any rate, the pleasant
earnest look had returned when d'Aragno muttered quietly as though
to himself: "I never felt a moment's doubt!"
Again I essayed a question, this time, one that was really agitating
my mind: "As I am unalterably and inevitably destined to fill the
throne of your kingdom in Meleager, surely I may be permitted to ask
you for how long a period I am to enjoy the position that has been
thus allotted to me? How many years can I expect to rule in this
realm whence there is obviously no return? Is my reign to continue
till the end of my natural mortal life, or is it to be prolonged
indefinitely by mysterious measures, such as you have already
hinted at?"
D'Aragno stroked his chin meditatively for some minutes and then
replied in a placid voice: "That at least is a reasonable and proper
question, though I have not the knowledge to answer it as you could
wish or might reasonably expect. I was an infant when our late king
came to be crowned, and he has ceased to rule since my sojourn on
the Earth—that is to say, his tenure of office must have lasted some
forty years. Thus for three years or more our realm has been without
a monarch, so that the whole community in all its classes has begun
to clamour vigorously for a successor, and hence the task of
selection wherewith I have been entrusted, and which I am now
bringing to a close. Our late king was, I fear, unfortunate in his
relations with our priestly or governing class, and by his own folly
rendered his office a source of real danger to our whole system of
administration. I have every reason to believe no such catastrophe is
likely to occur in your case. Your native endowments of head and
heart, combined with the additional advantages of youth and wisdom
that you will obtain on your arrival in Meleager, will protect you
sufficiently from such an untimely ending. Yet I warn you, you will
require all your faculties, especially those of self-restraint and
discretion, if you are to win and retain the good will and co-operation
of that all-powerful hierarchy which is actually not only your master
but in a certain sense also your creator. It used to be said in ancient
Rome that two augurs could never pass in the public streets without
smiling—well, you must first of all learn to repress that classical
grimace, and be content to abide ever with a solemn countenance in
an atmosphere of make-believe. Moreover, the desirability of such
an attitude ought not to irritate a person who like yourself is filled with
a divine discontent. You will be the glorious and adored figure-head
of a community wherein the maximum of human happiness and
content has been already attained. But I shall not pursue this
dissertation further. With my warning voice ever whispering in your
ears, and with your natural tact and intelligence to guide you, I am
sure you will not fail. As to the length of your reign, I cannot tell you
what I myself do not know. But this much I can honestly say, and that
is, its duration will wholly depend on your own action, and on your
relations with the senators, who alone possess the sources of power
that are essential to your continued maintenance in office. For aught
I know to the contrary, our priests, by means of their marvellous
recipes and contrivances, may be able to prolong your life, and even
your youth, indefinitely for centuries. But I do not speak with
authority; I can only repeat that the extent of your reign depends very
largely on your own behaviour."
"On one other matter I should also like to be informed," interposed I,
"and I trust you will not condemn this question as superfluous. Tell
me, why out of all the inhabitants of the Earth have I, a bankrupt in
worldly glory and success, a person of mediocre attainments and the
owner of no special gifts of beauty or rank, thus been chosen to fill
so exalted a position? I ask from sheer curiosity, and from no subtle
desire to plead my unfitness as an excuse to decline your proffered,
and indeed accepted, honour."
My companion seemed to approve my question. A humorous look
flitted over his features as he dryly answered: "You are fully justified
in your inquiry; but you must recall that I have already mentioned
that, though your world is large, my own field of choice is very
limited. Our King, as I have already said, must be naturally a true
Child of the Sun; in other words, he must be tall, fair, blue-eyed. This
is essential, and such restrictions practically limit my search to your
northern races, and mainly to such as are of Teutonic stock.
Secondly, our King elect must be of middle age, for past experience
and a ripe intelligence are also necessary to our plans. Thirdly, he
must be either a bachelor or a widower, and preferably a misogynist
at heart. He must not quit the Earth homesick; he must not be a
natural prey to the influence of women, so far as it is possible to
guard against this danger, the mainspring of all our fears in
Meleager. For the sheer possibility of the founding of a royal race
springing from the union of the Child of the Sun with a maiden of
Meleager is a constant cause of alarm and watchfulness on the part
of our hierarchy. Not to mention the mischief resulting from any such
intrigue to our body politic, the possible birth of a Prince, a
connecting link between the Divine and the Human, might in a few
days, nay, in a few hours, shatter in pieces the whole edifice of the
present system of government that it has taken so many centuries of
unremitting wisdom and state craft to erect. Surely I need not dwell
on this all-important phase? Last of all, we must have a comely
personality and gentle birth combined with high intellectual gifts and
training. This combination of qualities is not so easy to discover as it
ought to be on your Earth. Your handsome nobles are either illiterate
or debauched, and are often both simultaneously; or else they are
slaves to family ties or to female influence in some form; whilst those
who are both noble by birth and breeding and also highly cultivated
are usually undesirable for our high purpose owing to their physical
defects. In spite of all this, there are doubtless many hundreds of
persons living who would be eligible and would answer to all our
requirements as well as or even better than yourself; nevertheless,
after much reflection I have good reason to suppose that the
hierarchy of Meleager, whose envoy and servant I am, will find no
cause of quarrel with my choice."
Six o'clock struck out on the foggy morning air, as d'Aragno finished
speaking thus, and I grew aware of the renewed vitality pulsing once
more in the surrounding London streets. "One more matter, however,
I must speak of," suddenly ejaculated my host, "before we can freely
discuss the final arrangements. I do not aspire to know what
difference, if any, your impending transit to another planet will entail
in regard to your chances of existence in the Hereafter. On your
Earth, I understand, men hold the most varied and contradictory
opinions and theories on this subject; and even in your Christian
section of humanity I gather there is no real unanimity on this point.
We in Meleager have our own ideals and beliefs in the Hereafter, but
these are purely speculative, for none has ever returned to us from
the domain beyond the grave to tell us the true details, and none
other can supply them; we accordingly let the great question rest
without laying down dogmas of necessary belief. But whether in the
Other Life you will be judged or treated as a denizen of the Earth or
of Meleager, I cannot imagine. I think it my duty however to remind
you of this anomaly in case it may have escaped your notice, for I
am well aware what strong hopes of endless happiness many
members of your Christian churches build on the shadowy world
yonder. From my own observations I know you yourself are fairly
punctual in your religious prayers and duties, and I have always
welcomed such an attitude as edifying on your part; but as to what
are your real views and beliefs on the question of the Other Life I
have naturally no clue. On this one matter therefore I admit you run a
certain problematical risk in your translation to our star; but at the
same time I cannot conceive that your future interest in an unseen,
unknown, undescribed and unsubstantial world could be of sufficient
import or strength to compel you to struggle against your natural
desire to rule as a king in another sphere, perhaps for a stretch of
time that would be out of all proportion to your earthly span of life."
He ceased suddenly, and kneeling at my feet said slowly in a suave
voice that was not wholly free from irony: "And now let me tender my
most respectful homage to the King elect of the planet of Meleager!"
D'Aragno then rose, and for the next hour discussed with me the
necessary steps to be taken before the consummation of his mission
on our Earth.
III
It was long after seven o'clock when I found myself walking home in
the grey drizzle of the early morning. As was my custom when in
town during the last few years I rented a bedroom at my club in St
James's, and the apparition of myself in evening dress at the club
doorway at that unusual hour of return evoked a momentary look of
surprise on the face of the well-trained porter who was then
sweeping the hall in his shirt-sleeves. Making my way up to my bed-
chamber, I proceeded to carry out the first portion of my late
instructions from d'Aragno. This consisted in swallowing a tumblerful
of cold water in which I had previously dissolved the contents of a
small packet he had given me before leaving the hotel. After that I
undressed and crept into bed. On arising again I felt light as air, with
the additional sensation of being several inches taller than my actual
stature. My mind too had become singularly clear and active, so that
I was enabled to carry out all my intended preparations with ease.
First of all I placed my valuables in my trunk, which I locked; then I
dressed myself in a tweed suit, and made my way downstairs to the
club smoking-room, where I quietly undertook the final details I
considered necessary before my departure from this world. I had no
parents living; my brothers and sisters were all married and had their
own homes; I had no debts, and my few outstanding bills could be
easily settled by my executors, for some few years before I had
signed a will that I deemed fair and adequate. There was nobody to
lose in any material sense by my sudden demise; on the contrary,
my brothers would obtain possession of my property, for I was the
owner of a small landed estate and of a meagre income that was the
source of secret but intense bitterness to me under this present
oppression of plutocracy. I had therefore no more arduous task
before me than to compose a letter to my favourite brother, so that
he could easily infer from its contents that I had decided to make
away with my life. This might have proved an unpleasant theme for
composition under different circumstances, but on this occasion I
experienced no difficulty in expressing myself to my own satisfaction.
This last matter accomplished, and one or two cheques to
tradesmen signed and posted, I put on my overcoat and hat, and
sallied out of the club towards noon. A feeling of lightness of body
combined with a sense of calm exaltation of mind assisted me, as I
walked slowly through the muddy streets towards the National
Gallery, one of my most frequent haunts in London. Here I spent
about an hour in sauntering through the huge rooms hung with the
glowing works of the Old Masters, stopping occasionally to admire
some special favourite, and even studying with interest a recent
addition to the collection that hung on a solitary screen. Quitting the
gallery, I crossed Trafalgar Square, the while sensing the gush of its
fountains and gazing at Landseer's stolid lions; thence I strolled
down the length of Whitehall as far as Westminster with its majestic
group of Gothic towers, and after filling my eyes with its bristling
outlines against the murky winter's sky, I entered the north portal of
the Abbey. Here again I wandered in an erratic but pleasurable
frame of mind that I vainly tried to analyse to myself, and after many
pacings to and fro in the ancient cloisters, that held so many
memories for me, I left the Abbey to proceed very slowly towards
Charing Cross by way of the Embankment. According to our
prearranged plan, I boarded a certain train that same afternoon for
Dover. The journey seemed to me interminable, and as I lay back on
the cushions at times I fitfully hoped for some collision that might
prove fatal to me; whilst at other moments I grew morbidly nervous
lest by some unforeseen accident I might be prevented from
reaching my destination in good time.
I alighted at Dover about five o'clock on a raw, cold, windy, showery
evening. From the station I passed into the street, and thence, in
pursuance of my instructions, I followed a road leading westward.
Ere long I had left behind me the suburbs of the town and was now
tramping a dreary exposed thoroughfare that ran between market
gardens. As I walked ahead slowly and deliberately, I suddenly saw
emerge from a mean inn beside the road a short, thick-set man in
seafaring dress and bearing a bundle on his shoulder. I knew him to
be d'Aragno, and I continued to follow in his track. He proceeded for
some distance along the high road, and then striking abruptly into a
by-path amongst the dismal vegetable plots led towards the sea. The
lights of Dover were now far behind me, and I realised sharply the
fact that I was saying farewell to the kindly and accustomed world of
men for ever and aye, and was advancing towards a doom whose
nature I only dimly understood. Like Rabelais, I was stepping into the
Great Perhaps; I was about to take a plunge into the ocean of the
Vast Unknown.
There was no human being in sight save the mariner, and he took no
notice of my presence. We began to descend the steep and slippery
path towards the beach in the teeth of a tearing gale from the west.
The rain was drenching me to the skin; the darkness had increased;
once or twice I stumbled heavily. Suddenly my guide turned round
and, noting my difficulties, halted to assist me but never spoke a
word. With a firm hand he led me down the slope, and shortly we
were walking on level ground beside the sea, whose angry waves I
could hear close at hand, and could even distinguish the white foam
on their crests as they broke on the shingle. After some minutes of
skirting the fore-shore my companion stopped, and, waiting for me to
approach, for a second time he seized my hand and thus helped me
to climb a small crag that jutted out into the raging surf. Together we
reached its summit, where we rested for a moment. Then d'Aragno
in a sonorous whisper bade me remove my clothes, and one by one
I stripped myself of every sodden garment in the midst of the pitiless
gale laden with rain and spray. When I was naked as ever I was
born, my companion signed to me to lie down on the flat surface of
the rock. I obeyed, and he next produced a small phial which he
gave me to drink. Strangely enough in this brief space as I lay
numbed and bruised on the sharp clammy bed, buffeted by the wind
and stung by the lashing of the rain-drops, two lines from an old
Moravian hymn kept buzzing in my brain;
"Oh, what is Death?—'Tis Life's last shore
Where vanities are vain no more."
But it could have been only for a minute or so, for d'Aragno was
already forcing the phial to my lips, and at the same time helping me
to raise my aching head, the better to obey his command. A burning-
hot sweetish liquid now raced down my throat; an indescribable
sense of warmth and repose began to trickle through every portion of
my body; wondrous waves of violet and vermilion were floating
before my eyes or in my brain; in a shorter space than it takes me to
write this single sentence I became insensible.

Hours, days, weeks, even months may have elapsed before I

happened on my next moment of consciousness. A dim sensation
first of floating, and then of being swayed or rocked, filled the vacant
interval between my lying on the spray-wetted rock at Dover and my
awaking amid unfamiliar surroundings. At the first quiver of sentient
life I could see practically nothing; I could only feel that I lay in semi-
darkness with my whole frame stretched out vigorously but without
pain on a couch which contained a system of pulleys at its head and
foot. I was faintly aware of the pressure of this innocuous species of
rack, and was trying to open my eyes wider, when an approaching
figure waved a censer before my face, and the thick narcotic smoke
issuing thence promptly forced my half-awakened mind back into
slumber. My next impression was more definite. The chamber
wherein I reposed gradually took shape, as it were in patches, such
as occurs in cases of recovery from the effects of chloroform after a
severe surgical operation. I was no longer extended by pulleys, but
rested supine on the couch, whilst three or four persons were busily
engaged in kneading and pinching every muscle in my body. My
mouth too felt very sore, and by exploring with my tongue I was
astonished to find that several new teeth, evidently drawn from
strange mouths, had been recently inserted with exquisite skill in my
own gums, for what with the blight of middle age and the inattention
of youth my back teeth were by no means numerous at the date of
my recent withdrawal from Earth. Whoever my dental surgeon might
have been, there could be no two opinions as to his skilful
performance on my jaws, for he had not only removed such molars
as were decayed or broken, but had planted and made grow freshly
plucked substitutes with their bleeding roots. The whole operation
was complete, and its completeness has led me to believe that a
considerable period must have intervened since my arrival in
Meleager, where presumably I was now lying. I noticed that the
figures around me were clothed in flowing white robes, and I was
beginning to satisfy my curiosity still further when again someone
approached with a censer, which he deftly swung so close to my
face that once more I was compelled to swallow that thick stupefying
incense whose fumes speedily plunged me in oblivion for a second
time.
On the third occasion of my awaking, the obscure chamber was still
occupied by white-robed figures, but the manipulation of my body
had evidently ceased. Among those present I noticed an old man
with a white beard, and some inches taller than his colleagues, who
paid him special deference. I rightly conjectured this venerable
person to be the Arch-priest, of whom d'Aragno had spoken, both
from his evident superiority of rank and his more elaborate garments.
I was still feeling very weak and languid, but after staring around me
for some minutes with an effort I managed to raise my arm. The
action was immediately noticed, whereupon the individual with the
censer once more prepared to advance, but was checked by an
imperious gesture from the Arch-priest. The latter now approached,
and after peering long and steadfastly into my face he made a sign
to the others present, and all but two left the room. He then signalled
to me to rise, but though I attempted to do so, my physical weakness
forbade me, and I sank back exhausted. The two junior priests
thereupon firmly raised me in their arms, and half-walking, half-
supported I was led out of the chamber to a further and a much
larger room, in the centre of which I perceived a wide circular hollow
space with steps descending, such as one sees in ancient Italian
baptisteries. From this hollow there issued a great sound of gurgling
and roaring, as well as a most horrible stench of chemicals, and as I
was dragged none too willingly towards the edge I saw below me a
pool of dark, sinister-looking, stinking water that was rising and
falling in a constant state of ebullition. I made a feeble attempt to
struggle, but the Arch-priest laid a firm grip upon my nerveless arm,
whilst the two attendant priests hastily proceeded to hook a couple of
chains to two stout rings inserted in the farther wall of the chamber.
To these chains was attached a pair of strong leathern slings, which
were now skilfully fastened beneath my arm-pits. Thus provided, I
was pushed rather than persuaded to descend to the lowest step of
the awesome basin, and was then unceremoniously thrust into its
bubbling and hissing depths. Down, down, down I went into the icy
surge, whose suction I could feel dragging me as violently as though
a pair of giant hands beneath the water had hold of both my ankles.
Then suddenly gasping and spluttering I was pulled up to the
surface, only in spite of my protests to be once again lowered into
that awful gelid fountain, whence again after a fearful interval of
choking and shivering my body was withdrawn. On the third
occasion, however, the two priests drew me towards the steps, and
their master signed to me to quit the pool. I exerted myself only too
eagerly, and with a nimbleness that amazed me I hastened up the
steps towards the Arch-priest, who had been watching the whole
gruesome rite with the most solemn air.
No doubt it was as the result of certain rare properties in this ice-cold
liquid that I now experienced a rapid transformation from a state of
mind and body that was the limit of feebleness to one of almost
superhuman strength and capability. Even before the two priests had
armed themselves with masses of warm soft towels to dry me I felt
myself glowing with health and youth. My brain seemed to clear and
expand in some unaccountable way; I could feel every artery and
muscle in my body thrill in joyous unison; to move my limbs was
sheer delight. I realised too that my normal height had been
increased by some inches, evidently due to the recent painless
racking that had caused me to awake prematurely. "This must be the
Fountain of Rejuvenation of which d'Aragno spoke," thought I. "I
wonder he has never tried a bathe himself in these waters!"
I found an exuberant joy even as I stood thus being rubbed and dried
by the priests in the new appearance of myself; I thought of the
justice of Vergil's comparison of the glittering young Neoptolemus at
the fall of Troy with a snake that has just sloughed his scurfy skin in
the warm spring sunshine. I positively quivered with my new-found
pride of life. I had cast aside all care and terror; and as to the
reflection of having lost the world of my birth, what fresh worlds of
adventure were there not ahead of me to conquer or to enjoy in
return for the mean, squalid, ungrateful Earth that I had deserted for
ever and ever! Had I now been on the Earth itself and not on the
planet of Meleager, I felt no doubt but that in a month or so I should
be competent to lead an army to victory, or to astonish the House of
Commons with a speech whose memory would outlive a generation,
or to write a poem or a novel that would last whilst the English
tongue endured, or to paint a picture or to mould a statue that would
cause Raphael and Michelangelo to turn in their graves with envy.
As Plato once held that the sum of all human knowledge is innate in
every man, so I knew at last that the old Greek's axiom was
fundamentally correct, but that I alone possessed the hidden key to
unlock that chamber of the human brain wherein this mental wealth
lies safely stored. I was the Semi-divine; I was the Super-man; I was
the new Napoleon alike of the arts of war and peace; I was the latter-
day Euphorion, child of beauty, strength and culture.
With this strange new sensation of power pulsing within me, I was
suddenly seized with a hot qualm of indignation against those white-
robed priests, who had so lately been subjecting my sacred person
to a series of manipulations and tortures, and had even more than
once dared to thrust my awakening dignity back to the dull chambers
of sleep. I quite forgot (though of a truth only for one brief instant)
that after all I in my newly acquired pride of strength and intellect
was but the creature of these flamens, a mere Frankenstein evoked
from a semi-defunct, middle-aged, useless inhabitant of the Earth,
who in his agony of failure had voluntarily committed an act of self-
effacement. Nevertheless, I turned almost fiercely on my
companions, and with an angry wave of my hand bade them turn
aside their prying eyes, whilst I completed the act of drying my skin.
They obeyed without protest, and a few minutes later one of the
priests, still keeping his face averted, handed me a curious garment
which it took me some little time to adjust to my person. It was a thin
white woollen article of undress, which completely covered my body,
inclusive of arms and legs, like the chiton of the ancient Greeks. Its
feet moreover were distinguished by a contrivance for keeping the
great toes free, in the event of wearing sandals, so I presumed.
When I had at length fitted my form into this enveloping garment,
whose texture felt deliciously light and warm, the priests once more
turned towards me and helped me to don the remaining portions of
my attire. These consisted of a pair of buskins of soft dark blue
leather that reached half-way to the knee, a tunic of blue cloth with a
golden belt, and a flowing cloak of the same rich shade of blue, lined
with pale blue silk, that was fastened over the breast with a golden
clasp set with a splendid sapphire. Finally I was invited to seat
myself in a low chair, whereupon one of the priests proceeded to
comb out my hair with a large golden comb. From a burnished metal
mirror that was held before me I now realised, to my astonishment,
that my hair was of such an inordinate length that some weeks must
have elapsed for its growth; it had moreover been bleached, for it
was of a pale yellow shade and had a strange silky texture. On the
other hand, I may state here that all the hair on the lower portion of
my face had been eradicated, nor have I yet had any occasion to
use a razor. As a finishing touch, a fillet of blue and gold was bound
round my luxuriant locks, much in the manner one sees depicted on
the royal heads of antiquity in coins and medals.
With this last addition my toilet was now complete, and I was bidden
to rise. The Arch-priest led the way, and I followed with the two junior
priests, one of whom upheld my flowing mantle, whilst the other bore
over my head an open state umbrella of blue silk, heavily fringed
with gold, and closely resembling the same emblem of state that is
used to shelter the Host in processions of the Roman Church. We
then traversed several broad gloomy corridors before entering a
chamber of considerable size that was lit by flambeaux as well as by
lamps of classical form. Here were assembled about a score of
young men whose dress closely resembled my own except that its
dominant colour was crimson instead of blue. On my appearance all
these persons threw themselves prostrate on the floor and remained
thus motionless. At this juncture the Arch-priest for the first time
addressed me, and his spoken words were in the ancient Latin
language. Now I had always possessed an affection and capacity for
this tongue, which I have all my life defended from the baseless
charge of its being a dead language that is constantly levelled at it by
ignorant or prejudiced critics. My proficiency in Latin both at school
and at college had been noteworthy, and now, thanks to the reviving
effects of my late immersion in those medicated waters, all my
former acquaintance with the Roman tongue was suddenly restored
to me. I was thus able to grasp the gist of the Arch-priest's remarks,
and my replies through the same medium were more than tolerable,
a circumstance that evidently afforded great satisfaction to the old
man. I gathered then that this group of youths kneeling before me
was composed of the flower of the nobility of Meleager, from whose
ranks I was bidden to choose a tutor and two equerries suited to my
needs. The Arch-priest further stated that he deemed it preferable for
myself to make my own selection in this important matter, for which
reason he had devised this plan.
I was quick to perceive that such a privilege must be carefully
exercised, so I reflected for a few moments before deciding. I have
often flattered myself on being a good judge of human character
from the face, and in our world I often fell to speculate on the internal
qualities of persons in every station of life that I chanced to meet.
Bearing my past observations in mind, I gave a sign for the band
before me to arise, and on a word from the Arch-priest the whole line
leaped up and stood to attention. Beckoning to one of the priests to
hand me a torch, I carefully scrutinised the row of candidates for my
favour. Now the youth who stood seventh from the first at once
challenged my attention; his countenance showed me that he
possessed, consciously or unconsciously, the special qualities I
demanded—fidelity and discretion. Thrice with calm deliberation did I
pace up and down that comely company, and on each occasion I felt
myself confirmed in my original judgment. I nodded to the Arch-
priest, who now handed me a golden rod with which I lightly touched
the shoulder of Number Seven. The young man immediately fell at
my feet, which he embraced, the while murmuring some words of
gratitude in the language of the Meleagrians which of course I did
not at that time comprehend. He then rose, and was about to take up
a position behind me, when his fellows at once advanced and loaded
him with their congratulations on the exceptional mark of honour he
had just received. Some of his more intimate friends threw their arms
around him, others shook him by the hands, and others again spoke
words of encouragement. So far as I could observe, the spirit of
jealousy seemed wholly absent. The Arch-priest, who appeared to
approve my choice, patted the young man's cheek in a friendly
manner, as he told me I had chosen well in Hiridia, for such was his
name. Nor have I ever had reason to repent of my selection, for
Hiridia has always proved a most faithful friend, and also a well-
meaning guide according to his Meleagrian lights, during the whole
period of my reign, as I shall relate in due course.
As to the two equerries, whose office would not entail such intimacy,
I did not deem it necessary to discriminate so closely amongst this
band of noble applicants, all of whom were doubtless adequate for
the purpose. So I simply touched the first and the last of the row
standing before me, and these fell out of the line and made me
obeisance. This matter concluded, the Arch-priest signified to the
remainder to retire, whilst the chosen three tarried behind.
By this time I was beginning to feel the pangs of hunger most
acutely, and recollections of my last meal partaken on Earth in the
London hotel rose greedily to my mind, as I began to guess how
many weeks must have passed since I had eaten. "Your King is
hungry and faint for need of food," I remarked in my best Ciceronian
Latin to the Arch-priest, who, so I had observed, was now treating
me with a degree of deference and even of obsequiousness that he
had not shown in the chamber of the fountain. The old man bowed
low and long, gave some instructions to Hiridia, whereupon he and I,
followed by the two equerries, proceeded to leave the room. Before
departing however, the Arch-priest hung a heavy chain of gold round
Hiridia's neck, and presented similar chains, but of silver, to his two
companions. One of these latter now bore the umbrella of state over
my head and the other upheld the cloak, as with Hiridia beside me I
prepared to quit the chamber, after I had returned with as much
dignity as I could muster the sweeping obeisances of the three
priests, who did not offer to accompany us. More corridors were
traversed thus, before we finally entered a lofty pillared hall, which I
at once rightly conjectured to be the banqueting chamber of the
palace. Here were gathered many men, both young and middle-
aged, all wearing clothes similar to those of my three companions,
as also a considerable crowd of individuals dressed in short blue
tunics and obviously of an inferior social caste. The first were, of
course, the members of my Court, all eagerly expecting their new
sovereign, whilst the latter were the servants of the household. On
my appearance there were deep bows and genuflexions from the
nobles assembled, and still lower bows from the menials, the latter
raising their left arms to cover their faces, as though the sight of
myself were almost too precious or sacred for humbler eyes such as
theirs to dwell upon.
I seated myself at a solitary table on a dais, slightly raised above the
pavement. The board before me was covered with a coarse linen
cloth heavily fringed with blue, whilst the viands were served in a
number of glazed white earthenware platters of elegant form, the
appointments in general reminding me of meals eaten years ago in
old-fashioned hostelries of the Romagna. Of the dinner itself I need
not say more than that the meats, though unfamiliar, were quite
palatable, as was also the rough red wine which was served
abundantly throughout the meal. To my relief I found that knives,
spoons and forks were in use, and that the drinking vessels and
some of the dishes were of glass. After a dessert of strange but
delicious fruits, and many species of nuts, a crystal goblet of the
most elaborate workmanship was set before me and filled with a
rather thick sweet red wine, apparently a kind of muscadel. I had sat
down ravenous, and in due course I rose from table satisfied, at
which movement on my part every person in the room likewise stood
erect and remained so standing till I had passed through the
doorway.
From the banqueting hall, guided by Hiridia, I proceeded to my
sleeping apartment, wherein I found a low square bed of some richly
carved dark-coloured wood. A long open gallery occupied one side
of this room, and thither I hastened to obtain a glimpse of the outer
world. It was a lovely warm starry night, but without moonlight, so
that I could only discern my surroundings very dimly. I was able,
however, to perceive that this gallery was situated at a considerable
height above the sea, whose expanse I could just distinguish in the
far distance, and that below me and around me there lay a large city
built on steep hillsides descending to the shore. Falling waters made
a pleasant murmur in my ears; a faint hum of human activity arose
from the city beneath; the shrill cries and chirrups of insects and
night birds were clearly audible at intervals. There was nothing
unearthly in these darkened surroundings, and yet I knew I stood
alone in a fresh world of mystery and wonder, and how vehemently I
longed, as I paced that colonnade, for the sun to rise so as to make
manifest the scene that was now all but hidden from my impatient
gaze! Hiridia stood beside me, and I think he tried to participate in
and sympathise with the thoughts that were agitating my mind, for he
often pointed into the gloom and made remarks which were of
course, as yet, unintelligible to me. Long did I continue thus to stare
and speculate, and indeed it was only out of consideration for poor
Hiridia's many yawns and signs of weariness, vainly suppressed,
that I finally turned with reluctance from the balcony and prepared for
a night's sleep.
IV
I slept soundly, and was only awakened on hearing, as one does
whilst wandering in the misty caverns of dreamland, a strange
prolonged noise of peculiar timbre, the last reverberation of which
had scarcely died away by the time I was fully conscious and had
raised myself in bed. The room was filled with the early light of dawn,
and from my pillow I could see beyond the open gallery the splendid
disk of the sun's majesty emerge from the distant watery horizon.
Hiridia was on his knees muttering prayers with arms extended and
face turned towards the sunrise, whilst a servant of the palace,
wearing the short blue tunic and blue trousers and blue scarf that