My correspondence with Lambert Academic Publishing

The response

The temptation to respond in kind to their peculiar semi-literate email was overwhelming, and I fell.

From: Nicholas Welch

To: e.collins@lap-publishing-house.com

Subject: To: Nicholas (daniel Sibley) Welch / University of Victoria

Dear ms. emma Collins,

Since you have honoured me by addressing me with a lower-case initial, I will take the liberty of doing the same, and thank you very much for this mark of confidence! I assume you, like me, enjoy the poetry of e.e. cummings?

I am of course more than flattered that Lambert Academic Publishing is expressing interest in my thesis, Northwest Passage: Northern Athabaskan Copulas and Auxiliaries. I have long thought that, as you say, this work should be accessible to a wider audience. Indeed, such a gripping topic should be on the shelves not only of the world's linguists, but of every pipefitter, chartered accountant, and astrophysicist on the planet, don't you agree?

Unfortunately in recent years I have changed my thinking on some of the issues in the thesis. I hope this will not prove a problem. Perhaps you won't mind if I expand a little.

I have decided since 2008 that copulas and auxiliaries in Northern Athabaskan languages are not actually words at all, but members of a small species of bat that subsists on wax-moths. Also, I have heard that Laurence Sterne has since expressed reservations about my inclusion of a quote from Tristram Shandy, to which the title makes reference. You might well object that Larry has been dead since 1768, but really, should we let that lower our guard against a possible intellectual property suit? You and I both know the answer to that is a loud "NO".

Hence the new title of the thesis is "NOT a quote from Laurence Sterne: Lepidopterophagic bats in Northern Athabaskan languages". You will have to admit that has a certain snap to it!

Of course all of the linguistic glosses of copulas and auxiliaries in the text itself would have to be replaced with photos of bats. You will appreciate that these must be in full colour; in fact, facing-page plates would be best. You can do those?

In these days of online stalking and identity theft, I am also profoundly uncomfortable with releasing to the world a work in which I am identified by name as the author. If I had my druthers (which I have seldom had for long; you wouldn't believe what it costs to keep me in druthers), I would prefer the author to be listed as "Lieutenant-Colonel Constantine Streamers". Don't you think that would be impressive in one of those sans serif fonts with the thick ascenders?

Finally, please be aware that I cannot possibly allow publication of a work of mine without personally meeting the editorial team, preferably over martinis. I am leaning toward spending the next five years in Auckland, New Zealand, but I could, at some inconvenience, make a brief excursion to meet your team after I have been in Auckland for a couple of months. Accordingly, if you throw in a return ticket from Auckland to your head office in Saarbrucken, with accommodations for a week (five-star – let's say in March 2015), we might begin to think about calling it square.

Yours in great haste,

Nicky

PS.: You didn't mention the movie rights, emma. I think it is ESSENTIAL to discuss this issue before we get comfortable, don't you? – N.

PPS.: I enclose a sample page with a facing plate for your information.

Sadly, after this, I heard no more from Lambert Academic Publishing. I almost miss them.