A few days ago the news surprised. The editorial director of Grupo Planeta in Argentina, Ignatius Iraolaafter 16 years; leaving his stall, a central position in the local book market. A lifetime dedicated to the company that he joined during his adolescence as a cadet and in which he held various positions in the press and marketing area until becoming director for Argentina and the Southern Cone.
The Planet Group is, along with Penguin Random House, the most important firm in the sector in the country and the Hispanic world. It is a Spanish multinational with interests also in media and education. Under its umbrella, it brings together 70 stamps dedicated to all kinds of themes and authors.
Iraolathroughout his 16 years of management in the Argentine subsidiary, edited more than 6000 titlescreated unprecedented reading niches and accompanied the growth and success of new writers and genres.
About to turn 50, and after two years with very good results in the midst of the pandemic, Iraola takes the option of running from the foreground of the activity. “Actually it is something that I have been maturing for four years – he explains to NEWS-. In 2018 my daughter was born and I understood that my work pace was going to greatly complicate my relationship with her. In the pandemic the world stopped and I realized that she was very happy in my house, with my daughter and my wife (the writer and journalist Ana Wajszczuk). I fell in love with my neighborhood, because I didn’t know it, it was never there. And I wanted to be calmer, closer to my family.”
But this retirement is not a total farewell, because Iraola will continue to collaborate with the Group as an advisor and accompanying the authors with whom he has always worked; in direct contact with the President of Planeta for the Southern Cone, Gastón Etchegaray and with adriana fernandez, the person who will replace him in office. “Adriana has been working with me for many years, she has great talent, capacity for work and honesty when it comes to making books, which position her as a great future editorial director,” explains today, a former director.
Yesterday and today
When asked what the differences are between yesterday’s market and today’s, Iraola points to the digitization of books and sales channels as the first big change between past decades and today. “Another interesting fact in recent times is that independent bookstores have become important again. There was a return to the local, local bookstore, to the bookseller as the great recommender”, he explains.
As for the innovations that Planeta and his work team were able to introduce, the creation of new genres and niches is among his main contributions, for example, cookbooks or rock or soccer books. “Before, literature was considered a ‘book’ purely and exclusively. There was a break there. Planeta always worked the situation. At some point we had the rhythm of a newsroom. We brought a new air to tapas. We were more aggressive at the time of posting. I personally learned from Alberto Diaz and Juan Forn to work closely with the author, in all processes”. But literary production did not stop at his management, and the Emecé label, for example, was part of the incorporation of young literary firms such as Pedro Mairal, Fabián Casas, Tamara Tenenbaum and collections of stories by Mariana Enríquez, Samanta Schweblin, Federico Falco and Oliverio Coelho. “The publishing house has accompanied women’s empowerment with books over these years, from the edition of a text with the fundamental ideas of the group “Ni una menos” to essays by Alexandra Kohan, Luciana Peker and María Florencia Freijo,” explains Iraola.
Impossible not to ask him about the unforgettable books and writers among the thousands he published in his career. The memory of Osvaldo Bayer and Juan José Saer is the first that comes up. But he also has great affection for Paul Auster whom he received in Buenos Aires. Among the books by current authors, “Malcomidos” by Soledad Barruti, “El Salto de Papá” by Martín Sivak, “Las malas” by Camila Sosa Villada, “Cámara Gesell” by Guillermo Saccomanno, “El spectacle del tiempo” by Juan José stand out. Becerra, “El Di Tella” by Fernando García and “El Flaco” by José Pablo Feinmann, which was originally his idea. “It made me very happy to have been able to summon Juan Forn again as editor to make the Rara Avis collection, in Tusquets, and I feel very proud to have been the first to publish Gabriel Rolón and to have brought to the market a serious author who revolutionized the industry (Rolón has sold more than 1.5 million copies). I was very happy working with Felipe Pigna, with Jorge Fernández Díaz, with Miguel Rep, with Alejandro Dolina”.
Is there a book that has remained in the inkwell? “I have two or three projects in mind with very important people, who give me great hope. For Planeta, of course, I can’t imagine working for any other company”, he concludes without giving more information.
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