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This is an emergency appeal. We must raise $150,000 in the next month.
Dear friend of MR,
For more than forty years, Monthly Review Press has been a rare and influential outlet for socialist analysis. Generations of students, activists, and revolutionaries around the world have learned much from its books. But as part of our family of readers, you already know this.
What you don't know, perhaps, is that Monthly Review Press, like so many left enterprises, survived only with the generosity of supporters like you. But now we need your help more than ever. In recent years, the book publishing industry has changed dramatically. With increased corporate consolidation and the emergence of big chain stores, small independent booksellers--important to us--have been driven out of business, and our operating margins have been severely constricted. To this must be added the hostile political climate of right-wing triumphalism, as well as a cultural atmosphere that discourages serious reading and engaged critical thinking.
Faced with these momentous shifts, we concluded that to survive and remain effective, Monthly Review Press had to extend its publishing reach to address new market conditions. So, we have arranged for a major university press to distribute our titles. This new opportunity has the potential to provide us with improved and expanded sales respresentation, and for the frist time give us leverage with the big bookselling chains. It could also allow us to take advantage of state-of-the-art technologies in customer service. And it could enable us to aggressively seek out and publish the best of radical books. We wish to stress that the agency representing us will have absolutely nothing to do with our editorial program. We will continue to be the only ones responsible for the product.
But this opportunity comes with a big price tag. Immediately we must move all of our books to the new warehouse. We must also now pay for the services provided by our new distributor. In the long run, increased sales will offset these costs. But at this moment we urgently need the resources to continue Monthly Review Press's historic mission of socialist education.
This is only the third time in half a century that we have had to come to you with emergency appeal. Please respond now. The outcome is in your hands.
In Solidarity,
Paul M. Sweezy Harry Magdoff Ellen Meiksins Wood
Monthly Review Foundation 122 West 27th Street New York, NY 10001
* Monthly Review Foundation is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization