This research aims to study the literary recommendations of the specialized cultural press, which prescribes content and is responsible for setting the cultural agenda. The object of study was the best books lists drawn up at the end of each year by the main cultural supplements of the Spanish written media (ABC Cultural, from ABC; Babelia, from El País; El Cultural, from El Mundo, and Cultura|s, from La Vanguardia). The analysis period was set between 2010 and 2021 (n = 1,286). The results reflect a marked preference of the supplements to include authors of Spanish nationality or, at least, works written in Spanish, although the strength of the United States and English is increasing in the historical series. There is also a clear dominance of the major publishing groups over the independents: in recent years, Planeta and Penguin Random House alone have contributed almost half of the selected works. In addition, the majority are older authors —in fact, more books by deceased authors are recommended than by those under 40 years of age—, with the limitations that this implies for the projection of literature written by young people.
Article Details
How to Cite
García-Cardona, J., & García-Borrego, M. (2023). The press as a prescriber of readings. : Recommendations of Spanish cultural supplements specialized in literature. Ocnos. Journal of reading research, 22(2). https://doi.org/10.18239/ocnos_2023.22.2.354
García-Cardona and García-Borrego: The press as a prescriber of readings. Recommendations of Spanish cultural supplements
specialized in literature
Introduction
The cultural supplements of the written press, responsible for reviewing, categorising
and ranking the different artistic works published in the national and international
sphere, tend to be mostly carried out by cultural journalists, figures inclined to
be identified with that of the educator and who serve as a middle ground between the
artist and the general public (; ). This role of the cultural journalist is related to the vision of authors such as
, who speaks of “intermediaries”, or , who compares this type of professionals with “cultural mediators”.
The fundamental function of cultural journalists lies in filtering the immense number
of published works, as well as providing analysis and interpretation that allows readers
to delve deeper into the less visible aspects of these works (; ; ; ). In short, cultural journalists take the form of content prescribers, this being
one of the main characteristics that differentiate them from other areas of journalistic
specialisation, as they select and amplify, through generally mass media, the scope
of certain cultural products.
The image of the cultural journalist has historically been discredited by the fact
that their functions fall under the umbrella of “soft news”, a step below what is
considered “real journalism”, which is embodied by political information or information
directly related to the public interest, so that cultural issues have been relegated
to a secondary level within the journalistic hierarchy. Although, according to , the task of cultural journalists implies an important degree of commitment to improving
the general appreciation of arts from the public, this attribution has sometimes been
linked to the commodification and even tabloidisation of information, as the role
of prescriber can affect habits of readers and determine their consumption patterns,
thus intertwining professional work and the economic interests of the cultural industries
(Hanusch, , ; ; ; ).
However, culture is considered to be one of the areas of specialisation that receive
the least pressure from their company, and even where their professionals have more
material and time resources to carry out their contributions. However, identify, in line with the contributions of , that the personal circle can lead to a certain bias when conducting some analyses,
which distances criticism —the journalistic genre par excellence of the cultural press,
unique in this area of specialisation— from the purely artistic criteria to which
it should be subjected. This is related to another factor implicit in the very nature
of cultural journalism that provokes misgivings in other areas: the subjectivism that
must necessarily be incurred when carrying out a critique ().
Although cultural journalists are usually considered as a compact and uniform group,
the careers and professional status of those who perform these critical tasks can
vary greatly. In the Spanish context, distinguish between “insiders”, journalists trained in the field of communication
and part of the traditional editorial team, and “outsiders”, coming from the literary
medium, multifaceted and with an education linked to the humanities.
Despite the fact that there is no lack of criticism, both in Spain and in Europe —not
necessarily well-founded, as shown in the work of )— regarding conflicts of interest, endogamy or the deformation of their professional
work (; ; ;; Rivas-Troitiño, 2006; ; ), the historical disdain for cultural journalism has recently been shifting towards
better consideration, as seen in works from Nordic countries, where the perception
of educator enjoys a high social reputation (; ; ; ; ). Recent years have seen an increase in the academic appeal of cultural journalism,
as sociologically it can serve as a means of studying cultural transformations in
a community (; ; ). Likewise, the cultural supplements of major newspapers, where these journalists
participate to a greater extent, are essential tools of cultural valorisation to legitimise
major authors and their artistic productions (; ; ; ).
Cultural journalism and literary canon
In this work of hierarchisation undertaken by the cultural supplements, it is interesting
to separate, as propose, the “social canon” from the “academic canon”. While the academic canon is
legitimised by academic bodies, and its components are considered to be high literature,
the social canon is made up of “la selección de lecturas que viene dictada directamente
por instancias sociales, ya sean las propias editoriales a través de sus variados
modos de promoción o los círculos de proximidad del lector (amigos, familia), siempre
un tanto al margen de las recomendaciones legitimadas desde el sistema educativo”
(p. 29). The recommendations of these lists of best books form part of the social
canon, as they are not corroborated by academic bodies and are based on the subjectivity
of the jury, with a final destination of dissemination to press readers, as a kind
of assistance in the filter of reading selection. Nor should the notion of canon be
confused with that of classics, as classics usually appear within the canon, but there
are canons that do not focus on the most influential classics in a given period and
society, even if they end up occupying the position of classic author or work (; ).
The notion of canon has been transformed over the course of literary history, and
several authors have pointed out some of the shortcomings present in the construction
of these canons: on the one hand, there has been a struggle against their hermeticism,
which continues to produce lists of eminently male members, where the novel genre
predominates (); on the other, new technologies in the issuing of criticism, and in the way of reading
and producing, which should have a key impact on the construction of the canon, have
not been taken into account (). The number of publications on the debate of the canon is rising, and, as evidenced
by previous studies, they focus their efforts on questioning a selection of the best
writers and works that systematically excludes important sectors of the literary universe,
and that has failed to consider crucial changes in culture and in social or power
structures ().
The study of reading habits has gained importance in recent years, and scientific
production has advanced notably. As reflected in the report of the Federation of Publishers’
Guilds (FGEE) in 2021, 64.4% of the Spanish population reads books for leisure, in
their free time; an increase from the 57.9% obtained in the 2011 reports. Research
on reading habits tends to focus on the creation and promotion of these habits, which
seems to be having consequences in the results offered by the FGEE. In the creation
of reading habits, normally studied in the field of teaching and pedagogy for children,
it is assumed that this task should be assigned to the family and the educational
system (Fernández-Blanco et al., 1999), intermediary institutions that have been superseded
as regulators of what should be read ().
Authors such as call on sociocultural mediators, cultural managers, librarians... to participate
in the development of reading habits in a public that ranges from childhood to old
age. The role of the cultural journalist as mediator has been mentioned above, who
also plays an important role in the development of reading habits, such as the ranking
of works chosen by a reader on the basis of lists of the best books. Moreover, the
public characterised as regular newspaper readers shares numerous traits with frequent
book readers (), which means that, through these cultural supplements, readers move from the journalistic
to the literary medium.
So far, the volume of publications on the chosen object of study —literary recommendations
in the specialised cultural press— is small. Only recently has it been observed that
women writers enjoy minimal space in the supplements of reference, despite the fact
that there is a trend towards parity in several of the main titles, or that authors
from the main publishing centres (Madrid and Barcelona) are over-represented compared
to the rest of the country and, above all, peripheral Spain (; ). On the other hand, there are no academic studies on aspects such as nationality,
language, publisher, publishing group or age.
Objectives
This study sets out to examine the reading recommendations of the main Spanish cultural
supplements, in an attempt to recognise the characteristics and differences in the
literary prescriptions made by the press of reference. Four central objectives were
established for this purpose. Firstly, this work aims to determine which are the main
nationalities recommended in the different cultural supplements, as well as the language
in which the selected works are written (O1). Secondly, to describe the editorial
distribution of the works, in order to detect whether there is any relationship of
preference between independent publishers and those belonging to large groups or conglomerates
(O2). Thirdly, to trace the demographic profile of the writers according to their
age in the year in which their works were chosen (O3). And finally, to determine the
common and differentiating features of the recommendations of the four major cultural
supplements of the Spanish press (O4).
Methodology
This research uses the technique of content analysis as a method of data collection.
To this end, a file has been applied to the best books lists of the main cultural
supplements in the Spanish press: El Cultural, from El Mundo; Babelia from El País; ABC Cultural, from ABC and Cultura|s from La Vanguardia. These lists usually come out at the end of the year and select the best works published
in the last 12 months. This repertoire necessarily forms a work of hierarchisation
and canonisation, affirming that these are the highest quality works written during
the year.
The lists that appeared between 2010 and 2021 were analysed, located through the newspaper
library of each medium, databases, and alternative repositories such as MyNews and physical archives from libraries. Ultimately, a record of 1,286 literary works
was reached, spread over a study period of more than a decade, as shown in table 1. Only the best books lists from the supplements Cultura|s, in the years 2010 and 2011, and ABC Cultural, in the years 2010 and 2015, could not be retrieved.
Table 1.Books analysed by supplements each year (2010-2021)
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultural
Total
%
2010
29
0
25
0
54
4.2%
2011
25
0
25
12
62
4.8%
2012
20
30
30
13
93
7.2%
2013
20
30
25
13
88
6.8%
2014
20
20
30
13
83
6.5%
2015
20
30
47
0
97
7.5%
2016
20
30
45
25
120
9.3%
2017
20
30
45
23
118
9.2%
2018
50
30
35
22
137
10.7%
2019
50
45
45
6
146
11.4%
2020
50
30
50
5
135
10.5%
2021
50
30
50
23
153
11.9%
Total
374
305
452
155
1.286
%
29.1%
23.7%
35.1%
12.1%
In order to determine the characteristics of the literary recommendations, the main
attributes of the work to be measured were established ad hoc, relating both to the author and to the publication itself, ensuring that these were
objective and non-discretionary to guarantee the reliability of the observations.
The resulting analysis sheet contained the following variables:
- Name of the supplement. Computed as a nominal variable with four options (Babelia, El Cultural, ABC Cultural, Cultura|s).
- Year of publication of the list of best books. Ordinal variable with twelve values
(2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021).
- Nationality of authors. Nominal variable with ad hoc categories for each country listed, with a total of 57 at the end of data collection
(from Albania to Venezuela, alphabetically).
- Language. Nominal variable indicating the language in which the literary work is
written. All 26 languages listed have been included (from Albanian to Yiddish, alphabetically).
- Publisher. Nominal variable that records the publishers of the chosen books. A total
of 171 publishers have been included whose publications appear in the lists (from
Abada to Visor, alphabetically).
- Group. Computed as a nominal variable, it includes the clusters or groups under
which the publishers studied above are found. A total of 15 groups have been identified,
as well as an additional category encompassing independent publishers (from Anaya
to Unidad Editorial, alphabetically).
- Age. An ordered scale variable that includes the age of the author of each work
selected in the lists of best books, taking as a reference the 31st of December of
the corresponding year.
Results
Nationality of authors and language of literary works
The data in table 2 show how authors of Spanish nationality predominate over the rest. However, there
are notable differences between the supplements. While in Babelia and ABC Cultural Spanish writers represent less than half —37.4% and 43.9% respectively—, in Cultura|s they reach 53.4% and in El Cultural 61.7%. There is a difference of 24.3 points between Babelia, the supplement that includes the fewest Spanish authors, and El Cultural, the medium that introduces the most (60.2% more). The second nation with the highest
share of authors is the United States, which ranges from 10.6% in El Cultural to 20.6% in Babelia. It occupies this position in all four supplements, while the third position seems
to be more disputed: for some it is the United Kingdom (El Cultural and ABC Cultural) and for others France (Babelia and El Cultural). Latin American countries do not enter the scene until position number 5, with Argentina,
which shows a maximum of 6.1% in Babelia and less than 5% in the rest of the supplements, and Mexico, in position number 9,
with a maximum of 2.7% in Babelia. Europe accumulates 76.8% of the total number of works, well ahead of North America
(18.2%) in all titles, which in turn is more than twice as many books as its South
American neighbours (7.4%), who together are even below countries such as the United
Kingdom (7.6%).
It should also be noted that Babelia is the supplement most open to different nationalities, including up to 42 different
nationalities in the period in question, while the others range from 29 for ABC Cultural to 36 for El Cultural.
Table 2.Distribution of books by nationality of authors and supplement
Country / Continent
n
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultu.
Total
1
Spain
650
37.4%
53.4%
61.7%
43.9%
50.5%
2
United States
196
20.6%
13.4%
10.6%
19.4%
15.2%
3
United Kingdom
98
7.8%
6.2%
8.8%
6.5%
7.6%
4
France
84
8.6%
6.9%
5.1%
5.2%
6.5%
5
Argentina
53
6.1%
4.3%
2.7%
3.2%
4.1%
6
Germany
34
2.9%
2.3%
1.8%
5.2%
2.6%
7
Canada
21
1.9%
2.0%
0.9%
2.6%
1.6%
8
Poland
19
2.4%
0.3%
1.5%
1.3%
1.5%
9
Mexico
17
2.7%
1.0%
0.0%
2.6%
1.3%
10
Italy
16
1.6%
1.3%
0.9%
1.3%
1.2%
–
Other countries
178
17.6%
12.8%
11.3%
14.2%
13.8%
1
Europe
988
69.0%
78.0%
84.1%
72.3%
76.8%
2
North America
234
25.1%
16.4%
11.5%
24.5%
18.2%
3
South America
95
11.2%
5.6%
6.0%
5.8%
7.4%
4
Asia
25
2.1%
2.0%
2.2%
0.6%
1.9%
5
Central America
11
0.8%
1.0%
0.9%
0.6%
0.9%
6
Africa
7
0.8%
0.3%
0.7%
0.0%
0.5%
7
Oceania
5
0.8%
0.7%
0.0%
0.0%
0.4%
Variety
42
33
36
29
58
% of total
72.4%
56.9%
62.1%
50.0%
From a diachronic perspective, there is a clear decrease in the ratio of authors of
Spanish nationality over the years, as reflected in table 3. From 2010 to 2021, it decreases 37.3%, or 24.9 points (from 66.7% to 41.8%). The
transition occurs between 2013 and 2016, when it drops from 70.5% to 38.3%: slightly
more than half. In contrast, there is a progressive growth in the United States, which
starts with 5.6% of authors of this nationality in 2010 and rises to 19.6% in 2021,
almost tripling the initial proportion. The rest of the nationalities do not show
a clear upward or downward trend, with cyclical fluctuations depending on the year
studied.
The phenomenon observed in the countries is replicated in the continents, with Europe
losing up to 21.4% of its hegemony between 2010 and 2021 (from 88.9% to 69.9%) and
North America tripling its hegemony (from 7.4% to 21.6%), while no clear patterns
are observed in the rest of the regions. The number of countries with representation
has grown in the years studied, in line with the increase in the number of selected
works.
Table 3.Distribution of the books by nationality of the author and year (2010-2021)
n
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
Spain
650
66.7%
59.7%
65.6%
70.5%
55.4%
45.4%
38.3%
42.4%
46.7%
49.3%
50.4%
41.8%
United States
196
5.6%
12.9%
7.5%
8.0%
9.6%
14.4%
19.2%
16.1%
19.7%
15.8%
20.0%
19.6%
United Kingdom
98
5.6%
6.5%
6.5%
4.5%
4.8%
12.4%
8.3%
8.5%
8.0%
8.2%
6.7%
8.5%
France
84
3.7%
3.2%
3.2%
3.4%
10.8%
9.3%
10.0%
4.2%
5.8%
6.8%
5.2%
9.2%
Argentina
53
5.6%
3.2%
4.3%
1.1%
6.0%
7.2%
5.8%
5.1%
3.6%
4.8%
2.2%
2.0%
Germany
34
3.7%
4.8%
2.2%
3.4%
0.0%
2.1%
7.5%
4.2%
0.0%
1.4%
2.2%
2.0%
Canada
21
0.0%
0.0%
1.1%
3.4%
1.2%
0.0%
0.8%
1.7%
3.6%
2.1%
3.0%
0.7%
Poland
19
0.0%
1.6%
1.1%
0.0%
2.4%
1.0%
1.7%
0.8%
0.7%
4.1%
1.5%
1.3%
Mexico
17
1.9%
1.6%
3.2%
1.1%
2.4%
0.0%
1.7%
0.0%
1.5%
0.7%
1.5%
1.3%
Italy
16
0.0%
1.6%
0.0%
1.1%
0.0%
2.1%
1.7%
0.0%
3.6%
0.0%
1.5%
2.0%
Other countries
178
20.4%
12.9%
10.8%
12.5%
14.5%
12.4%
9.2%
19.5%
14.6%
11.0%
11.9%
18.3%
Europe
988
88.9%
87.1%
86.0%
86.4%
80.7%
78.4%
71.7%
72.0%
74.5%
75.3%
71.9%
69.9%
North America
234
7.4%
14.5%
11.8%
12.5%
13.3%
14.4%
21.7%
17.8%
24.8%
18.5%
24.4%
21.6%
South America
95
9.3%
6.5%
5.4%
9.1%
8.4%
8.2%
7.5%
6.8%
5.8%
8.9%
5.2%
8.5%
Asia
25
3.7%
0.0%
1.1%
0.0%
2.4%
3.1%
1.7%
1.7%
1.5%
1.4%
2.2%
3.9%
Central America
11
0.0%
0.0%
1.1%
1.1%
1.2%
1.0%
0.8%
0.8%
0.7%
0.0%
2.2%
0.7%
Africa
7
1.9%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
1.7%
0.7%
0.0%
0.0%
2.0%
Oceania
5
1.9%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
1.2%
1.0%
0.0%
0.8%
0.7%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
Variety
17
17
19
18
19
19
21
26
25
22
21
27
% of total
29.3%
29.3%
32.8%
31.0%
32.8%
32.8%
36.2%
44.8%
43.1%
37.9%
36.2%
46.6%
As for the languages used in the books, the crosstabs of variables shown in table 4 indicate a comfortable predominance of books in Spanish in the four supplements,
although El Cultural achieves levels of 67.0% compared to the minimum of 37.7% in Cultura|s (43.7% less). English is the second language after Spanish, with a maximum of 30.7%
in Babelia and a minimum of 20.6% in El Cultural. French gains importance in the supplements Cultura|s and Babelia, both above 7%, but loses strength in El Cultural and ABC Cultural, being surpassed in the latter supplement by German, with 6.5% of the total.
The case of Cultura|s, which belongs to La Vanguardia, presents a peculiarity that distinguishes it from the rest: its commitment to literature
in Catalan (22.0% of the recommendations), almost on a par with English (23.3%), as
opposed to the rest of the supplements in which this language does not reach 1%, or
even 0.0%, as is the case of ABC Cultural.
Table 4.Distribution of books by language and supplement
Language
n
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultu.
Total
1
Spanish
677
47.9%
37.7%
67.0%
51.6%
52.6%
2
English
324
30.7%
23.3%
20.6%
29.0%
25.2%
3
French
81
7.8%
7.2%
4.6%
5.8%
6.3%
4
Catalan
71
0.8%
22.0%
0.2%
0.0%
5.5%
5
German
42
4.5%
2.6%
1.5%
6.5%
3.3%
6
Italian
15
1.6%
1.0%
0.9%
1.3%
1.2%
Other languages
74
6.7%
6.2%
5.1%
4.5%
5.8%
Variety
19
20
18
10
27
% of total
70.4%
74.1%
66.7%
37.0%
The study of the historical series allows us to detect changes of great interest over
the eleven years covered by this research, as shown in table 5. The dominance of Spanish in 2010 is overwhelming, with 74.1% of the works selected,
with English books in second place with 14.8%. Over the years, there has been a notable
decline in the former: from accounting for three out of four of the best books of
the year, by the end of the period studied the figure is down to two out of four (48.4%
of the total): literature written in Spanish has thus declined by 34.1% in eleven
years. The opposite trend is observed for English, which nearly doubles in the period
under study: from 14.8% of books in 2010, it rises to 28.8% in 2021. The rest of the
languages do not show a clear propensity in either direction.
Table 5.Distribution of books by language and year (2010-2021)
n
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
Spanish
677
74.1%
67.7%
61.3%
65.9%
63.9%
46.4%
43.3%
46.6%
46.7%
45.9%
51.9%
48.4%
English
324
14.8%
14.5%
16.1%
13.6%
15.7%
23.7%
30.8%
30.5%
33.6%
26.7%
31.1%
28.8%
French
81
3.7%
4.8%
4.3%
4.5%
10.8%
9.3%
9.2%
3.4%
5.1%
6.8%
4.4%
7.8%
Catalan
71
0.0%
0.0%
10.8%
8.0%
0.0%
7.2%
5.0%
5.1%
4.4%
11.0%
5.2%
3.9%
German
42
5.6%
4.8%
2.2%
3.4%
0.0%
2.1%
5.8%
5.9%
3.6%
2.1%
1.5%
3.3%
Italian
15
0.0%
1.6%
0.0%
1.1%
0.0%
2.1%
0.8%
0.0%
3.6%
0.0%
1.5%
2.0%
Other languages
74
1.9%
6.5%
5.4%
3.4%
9.6%
9.3%
3.3%
8.5%
2.9%
7.5%
4.4%
5.9%
Variety
6
9
11
10
10
14
10
12
11
12
11
13
% of total
22.2%
33.3%
40.7%
37.0%
37.0%
51.9%
37.0%
44.4%
40.7%
44.4%
40.7%
48.1%
Publishing groups and companies of the selected books
As detailed in table 6, Anagrama is the publisher par excellence for three of the four cultural supplements
(12.6% of the total number of best books). It has a higher proportion in Babelia with 15.2%, while in ABC Cultural it only reaches 5.2%, below Seix Barral and Alfaguara and on a par with Galaxia Gutenberg.
It is Seix Barral, precisely, the publisher that appears in second place (7.2% of
recommended works), with a greater presence also in Babelia (7.8%). El Cultural seems to opt for works published by Tusquets to a greater extent, while ABC Cultural, when it comes to compiling the lists, is particularly committed to Alfaguara, whose
case is paradigmatic: between 2010 and 2014, works by this publisher accounted for
9.3% on average in the four supplements, but the figure drops to 4.3% in the period
2015-2021, shortly after its sale from PRISA to Penguin Random House materialised.
In any case, the four major publishers (Anagrama, Seix Barral, Tusquets and Alfaguara)
account for 32.7% of the total number of works selected; the remaining 62.8% is distributed
among 167 other publishers. ABC Cultural is, in this sense, the supplement that most distributes its recommendations among
the smaller publishers (only 23.9% of the works cited are published by the four major
publishers), while Babelia shows a greater preference for best sellers (37.2%).
Table 6.Distribution of books by publishing house and supplement
Editorial
n
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultu.
Total
1
Anagrama
162
15.2%
14.8%
11.5%
5.2%
12.6%
2
Seix Barral
92
7.8%
7.2%
6.9%
6.5%
7.2%
3
Tusquets
89
7.5%
4.9%
8.4%
5.2%
6.9%
4
Alfaguara
77
6.7%
5.2%
5.5%
7.1%
6.0%
5
Galaxia Gutenberg
49
1.9%
4.6%
4.4%
5.2%
3.8%
6
Random House
40
3.7%
3.9%
2.2%
2.6%
3.1%
7
Acantilado
38
2.9%
2.3%
3.5%
2.6%
3.0%
8
Debate
34
2.4%
1.0%
4.2%
1.9%
2.6%
9
Galaxia G./Círculo L.
33
4.0%
0.7%
2.9%
1.9%
2.6%
10
Salamandra
31
1.6%
4.3%
1.3%
3.9%
2.4%
11
Taurus
31
3.7%
0.7%
2.7%
1.9%
2.4%
12
Visor
31
1.9%
0.0%
4.4%
2.6%
2.4%
13
Libros del Asteroide
28
2.4%
2.3%
1.8%
2.6%
2.2%
Big-4
420
37.2%
32.1%
32.3%
23.9%
32.7%
Others (not Big-4)
710
62.8%
67.9%
67.7%
76.1%
67.3%
Variety
73
80
77
67
171
% of total
42.7%
46.8%
45.0%
39.2%
When studying the groups in which the different publishers fall into, it can be appreciated,
as shown in table 7, that in the four supplements, independent publishers (42.1% of the total) are above
each of the main groups individually, but not as a whole (57.9%). ABC Cultural is the one that shows the greatest preference for independent publishers, with 48.4%,
while El Cultural is least inclined to publishers outside business conglomerates (37.4%). Planeta is
the leading group in terms of representation within the four supplements (24.4%),
with a higher proportion in El Cultural (28.1%) and Cultura|s (28.5%) than in Babelia (19.8%) or ABC Cultural (16.8%). In second place comes the Penguin Random House group (15.6%), whose works
are selected to a greater extent by Babelia (18.2%) and ABC Cultural (16.1%). PRISA, the group that includes El País and therefore Babelia, is better supported by this supplement than by the rest, although the differences
are not very significant (3.7%, compared to 3.2% for ABC Cultural, 3.1% for El Cultural and 1.6% for Cultura|s).
Table 7.Distribution of books by publishing group and supplement
Publishing group
n
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultu.
Total
1
Independent
542
40.9%
47.5%
37.4%
48.4%
42.1%
2
Planeta
314
19.8%
28.5%
28.1%
16.8%
24.4%
3
Penguin R. H.
200
18.2%
14.1%
14.2%
16.1%
15.6%
4
Feltrinelli
156
14.4%
14.8%
10.8%
5.2%
12.1%
5
Anaya
49
1.9%
2.3%
5.5%
6.5%
3.8%
6
PRISA
38
3.7%
1.6%
3.1%
3.2%
3.0%
Planeta + Penguin
514
38.0%
42.6%
42.3%
32.9%
40.0%
Others
840
62.0%
57.4%
57.7%
67.1%
60.0%
Variety
10
12
8
11
16
% of total
62.5%
75.0%
50.0%
68.8%
Table 8 shows that independent publishers are chosen to a greater extent in 2010 (59.3%)
than in 2021 (44.4%), a difference of 24.2% or 14.9 points. However, this trend does
not appear to be constant over the years, as is the case with the two large groups,
Planeta and Penguin Random House: the former goes from 9.3% in 2010 to 22.9% in 2021,
an increase of 146.2% in eleven years; the latter rises significantly from 7.4% in
2010 to 20.3% in 2021, with a growth of 174.3%. Together, the two groups have risen
from 16.7% of the selected works in 2010 to 43.1% in 2021, and with this upward trend
in several years they have come close to accounting for up to half of the best books
according to the media.
Table 8.Distribution of books by publishing group and year (2010-2021)
GROUP
n
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
Independent
542
59.3%
46.8%
36.6%
38.6%
43.4%
34.0%
43.3%
48.3%
46.0%
32.2%
42.2%
44.4%
Planeta
314
9.3%
19.4%
26.9%
29.5%
26.5%
19.6%
23.3%
27.1%
22.6%
26.0%
30.4%
22.9%
Penguin RH
200
7.4%
6.5%
8.6%
6.8%
20.5%
17.5%
17.5%
9.3%
19.7%
21.2%
17.0%
20.3%
Feltrinelli
156
0.0%
6.5%
5.4%
17.0%
10.8%
21.6%
15.0%
11.9%
8.8%
17.8%
9.6%
12.4%
Anaya
49
5.6%
1.6%
4.3%
2.3%
1.2%
8.2%
0.8%
6.8%
4.4%
4.1%
3.7%
2.6%
PRISA
38
13.0%
16.1%
12.9%
10.2%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
Planeta+Penguin
514
16.7%
25.8%
35.5%
36.4%
47.0%
37.1%
40.8%
36.4%
42.3%
47.3%
47.4%
43.1%
Others
840
83.3%
74.2%
64.5%
63.6%
53.0%
62.9%
59.2%
63.6%
57.7%
52.7%
52.6%
56.9%
Variety
7
8
8
9
7
9
8
6
9
8
7
8
% of total
43.8%
50.0%
50.0%
56.3%
43.8%
56.3%
50.0%
37.5%
56.3%
50.0%
43.8%
50.%
Feltrinelli, on the other hand, thanks to Anagrama, achieves a certain relevance over
the years, reaching 12.4% in 2021, as it had 0% of recommended works in 2010. Anaya
and PRISA, unlike other groups, show a decline over the period studied: Anaya falls
by less than half between 2010 and 2021 (from 5.6% to 2.6%), and PRISA disappears
from 2014 onwards.
Age of authors
Finally, it is worth reviewing the age profile of the recommended authors. The first
data shown in table 9 is their average age, 58.5, with oscillations of less than three years between supplements:
Cultura|s has the lowest average age, at 55.8, while ABC Cultural is over sixty (60.2). If we also include deceased writers, it is ABC Cultural itself which tends to include them to a greater extent, with 26.5% of deceased writers
on its lists, which represents slightly more than one out of every four authors recommended.
In El Cultural and Cultura|s, on the other hand, to find a deceased writer you must increase the count to 25 (4.6%
and 4.2% of recommendations, respectively). In terms of age ranges, authors aged 35
or less represent a small part of the sample (3.7%), and there are, in fact, more
writers in the 76-80 age bracket alone (4.8%) than under 35. The range with the highest
number of individuals is the one between 61 and 65 (12.6%), where the highest percentage
of authors is observed in almost all the supplements (Babelia 12.8%; Cultura|s 13.4%; El Cultural 12.8%; ABC Cultural 9.7%). Only two other age groups come close to this peak, namely the one immediately
before (10.6% between 56 and 60) and the one immediately after (10.4% between 66 and
70).
Table 9.Age of authors in 5-year ranges according to the supplement
Babelia
Cultura|s
El Cultural
ABC Cultu.
Total
Average age (alive)
59.9
55.8
58.8
60.2
58.5
Median (alive)
60
56
59
60
58
Minimum
25
26
26
35
25
Maximum
101
89
98
97
101
# of deceased
48
14
19
41
122
% of deceased
12.8%
4.6%
4.2%
26.5%
9.5%
Up to 30
1.3%
2.6%
1.8%
0.0%
1.6%
31-35
1.9%
2.6%
2.2%
1.3%
2.1%
36-40
4.5%
8.2%
4.6%
3.2%
5.3%
41-45
7.8%
10.2%
7.7%
8.4%
8.4%
46-50
9.4%
11.5%
9.7%
5.8%
9.6%
51-55
8.6%
11.5%
10.8%
9.0%
10.1%
56-60
10.2%
11.1%
11.9%
6.5%
10.6%
61-65
12.8%
13.4%
12.8%
9.7%
12.6%
66-70
9.1%
8.9%
13.1%
9.0%
10.4%
71-75
6.4%
6.9%
8.0%
4.5%
6.8%
76-80
5.9%
3.3%
5.3%
3.9%
4.8%
81-85
3.7%
2.6%
3.1%
1.3%
3.0%
86-90
2.7%
1.3%
1.1%
1.9%
1.7%
91-95
0.8%
0.0%
0.2%
1.9%
0.5%
96-100
0.3%
0.0%
0.2%
0.6%
0.2%
More than 100
0.3%
0.0%
0.0%
0.0%
0.1%
The apparent preference for older writers is underlined by other data: 9.5% of the
recommended authors are deceased, and 9.0% are 40 years old or younger. In other words:
more deceased writers are recommended than younger ones. In the specific case of ABC Cultural —which chooses not to include any author under 35— there are more deceased authors
than under 54. The youngest author is 25 years of age (the Spanish Andrea Abreu, for
Panza de burro); the oldest, 101 (the German-Dutch Hans Keilson for La muerte del adversario). In overall terms, the age that contributes the highest percentage to the total
is 70, with 3.2% of the total, which means that more writers exactly 70 years of age
are recommended than those under 34 (2.8%).
Conclusions
The main objective of this research is to determine the type of literary recommendations
made by cultural supplements through the best books lists published at the end of
the year. Firstly, the nationality of the authors included in these lists and the
language in which their literary works are written (O1) were studied. The first conclusion
is that books by Spanish writers have priority over the rest, although this predominance
is observed to a greater extent in some supplements than in others: El Cultural, from El Mundo, shows 61.7% compared to Babelia, from El País, with 37.4%. It is possible that the ideological tendency of the press in which they
are framed has had an influence, and that is why the supplement of El Mundo focuses more on national authors and Babelia, from El País seems to have a more internationalist perspective. This rule would not apply to ABC Cultural, whose profile coincides more with Babelia than with El Cultural. Cultura|s from La Vanguardia, for its part, operates in other coordinates due to the important nuance of language,
as will be explained below.
According to the diachronic analysis, the presence of Spanish writers has decreased
by 34.1% between 2010 and 2021 in the four supplements; in general, there seems to
be a greater predilection in recent years for exploring literary novelties from abroad.
However, the country that best lends itself to these incursions is the United States:
works written by its authors systematically occupy second place in all the supplements,
where they already reach 20% of the recommendations every year —quadrupling the 5.6%
that was noted at the beginning of the study period, in 2010—, beginning to act as
a reference for the national press and showing a cultural power that is usual in other
disciplines such as cinema but which, until now, had not been demonstrated in the
field of literature.
In linguistic terms, as with nationality, Spanish once again dominates, with 52.6%
of the total number of books selected. It should be noted that, unlike the previous
variable, literature in Spanish includes Spanish-speaking authors from all over the
world, and all works by Spanish authors written in another language (Catalan, Basque,
Galician, etc.) are excluded. El Cultural (67%) and ABC Cultural (51.6%), of a more conservative tendency, are the ones that recommend the most literature
in Spanish, while Babelia is committed to works in other languages, limiting Spanish to less than half (47.9%).
Cultura|s (37.7%) has the lowest proportion of works in Spanish, due to the commitment to Catalan
of La Vanguardia, with sections in its lists devoted exclusively to literature in this language. Works
in Catalan make up 22.0% of the total in Cultura|s, but less than 1% in the rest of the supplements: even so, it is up to four times
more common to find books in Catalan in Babelia, of the progressive daily El País, than in El Cultural, of the conservative El Mundo. In ABC Cultural, meanwhile, not a single work written in Catalan is recommended.
English is the second preferred language in the recommendations, especially for Babelia (30.7%) and ABC Cultural (29.0%), which once again highlights the influence of its two great ambassadors,
the United States and the United Kingdom. French, the third language, a long way behind
English, seems to receive considerably more attention from Babelia and Cultura|s than from El Cultural and ABC Cultural, which again may be due to the editorial lines of each title and the historical ties
between Spain and France.
Regarding the publishers and business groups to which they belong (O2), the predominance
of Anagrama in three of the four supplements is clear, which seems to place it as
the publisher of reference. The difference is notable with the three publishers that
follow it (Seix Barral, Tusquets and Alfaguara), which in turn mark a wide distance
from the rest. Of interest is the case of the last one, Alfaguara, whose average from
2010 to 2014 (9.3%) decreases to 4.3% between 2015 and 2021. The year 2014 seems to
be the turning point, in which recommendations under the Alfaguara brand are ostensibly
reduced (Babelia goes from 9.0% to 0%; the same happens with El Cultural, which decreases from 9.6% to 0%), just after its sale from PRISA to the Penguin
Random House group.
As far as publishing groups are concerned, Planeta and Penguin Random House are at
the top of the lists of the four supplements: Planeta encompasses two of the publishers
that contribute the most works (Seix Barral and Tusquets), in addition to other publishers
also widely represented in the lists (Deusto, Destino, Espasa...), and Penguin Random
House comprises another of the four main publishers (Alfaguara), along with others
with somewhat more modest representation (Random House, Salamandra, Taurus...). Their
growth, moreover, has been sustained, tripling its digits between 2010 and 2021, accounting
for around half of the books highlighted in the latest editions and with the prospect
of easily exceeding the 50% threshold in the coming years. A scenario in which two
groups dominate the vast majority of literary recommendations, which in turn determine
to a large extent the reading habits of readers, appears as a threat to the diversity
of the Spanish cultural landscape, already marked by the more than notable differences
in access between territories ().
Finally, one of the most striking features is that of age (O3): the results reveal
a clear inclination towards older authors over younger ones, surpassed even by those
who are already deceased. As highlighted in the results section, there are more writers
between 76 and 80 than those under 35, and in supplements such as ABC Cultural, not a single author under 35 has been detected in eleven years. Moreover, a tenth
of the writers included in the lists are deceased (up to 26.5% in ABC Cultural), a percentage which leads to the conclusion that there are more deceased writers
than under 40. On the one hand, it can be interpreted as ratifying the association
of canonical works with classics (): it is possible that not enough time has passed for young authors to have established
themselves as canonical literary figures worthy of appearing on these lists —in the
academic case, a key canonisation factor is the number of publications and critical
attention of the work in question. On the other hand, it can point to the hermeticism
of the literary landscape, a circuit from which new writers can often find themselves
excluded for extra-literary motivations. In addition, it provides reasons for the
loss of strength of the literary critic in the tastes or habits of young readers,
especially between 13 and 25, as is noted in and ). The fact that the youngest author on the lists is 25 years old (35 in ABC Cultural) or that the average age in all the supplements is 58.5 years old, prevents young
readers from finding literary figures to reflect on, or literature that focuses on
the experience of the new generations, which can only be emulated and not embodied
by older writers.
The literary hierarchisation proposed by cultural supplements, considered in this
study as a moulding agent of current reading habits due to its prescriptive potential,
shows a notable diachronic process in the different variables studied. On the one
hand, there is the promotion of the home-grown through the inclusion of works written
by Spanish authors or in Spanish; although the internationalist trend has diminished
this clear preference, with the United States and English being closely followed by
home-grown production. The publishing monopoly has been further consolidated around
the large publishing groups, Planeta and Penguin Random House, throughout the years
studied, conglomerates that each year absorb relevant publishers on a national level.
Finally, maturity enjoys a privileged status in the literary circuit, with older authors
whose works fill the lists every year, excluding young artists from direct participation
in the Spanish cultural agenda and, indirectly, in the reading habits of the public.
According to the data, the prescription of cultural supplements directs the reader
towards works that embody specific typological traits, despite only arguing aesthetic-literary
criteria in the selection process.
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