Self-Publishing in Greek

In the world of self-publishing novellas for language learners, most authors use Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP). Why? For authors, it is easy to use - you just need to upload your manuscript and cover artwork and you are pretty much ready to publish. With KDP, your novella is published on Amazon and is accessible to Amazon's massive customer base. Many customers already have an Amazon account and are probably familiar with how Amazon works, so customers can buy your novella in a matter of seconds.

Sound too good to be true?

There are some drawbacks to KDP compared to other self-publishing websites, such as:

• If you have ethical concerns about Amazon
• KDP's royalty rate for authors is lower than those of other self-publishing websites
• KDP (almost) only supports publishing in languages that use the Latin alphabet

This last point obviously presents a challenge for those of us who wish to self-publish in Greek (Ancient, Modern - it doesn't matter!). In this post I will share all of the hurdles I had to overcome to publish my novella in Greek.

But there are Greek books on Amazon! How does that work?!

I am pretty certain that those books were published through CreateSpace, which Amazon bought out a couple of years ago. I never used CreateSpace, but I believe that it supported Greek. As far as I know, KDP continues to support all books that were originally published with CreateSpace.

There is also a way to circumvent KDP's language policy, which I will share at the end of this post, but this requires violating KDP's language policy.

I. Choose a self-publishing company.

There are a variety of self-publishing companies out there. Most of them are targeted at authors who wish to self-publish books in English for a wide audience, i.e. not those of us who wish to publish novellas in languages other than English for a very select audience (i.e. language teachers and self-motivated language learners). 

I went with Lulu. Why?

• Writers of Latin novellas use it (such as these)
• Lulu allows free edits (some self-publishing websites charge a fee if you need to fix errors in your book - no thanks!)
• No language restrictions! (Caveat: Books in Greek can only be sold on Lulu and are ineligible for their wider distribution service)

No self-publishing company is perfect, so choose the one that best suits your goals.

II. Convert your PDF files into a press-ready PDF files

Before publishing my novella, I had no idea what layers and flattening were in PDF files. KDP allows authors to submit any old PDF. Other self-publishing companies, on the other hand, require that your PDF be flattened to remove all layers (also described as a "press-ready PDF"). 

The easiest way to do this is with Adobe Acrobat Pro DC. 

The downside? Adobe is expensive! As of August 2020, it costs $14.99/month (USD). I am lucky that my work PC has Adobe already installed.

To convert your PDF to a press-ready PDF, click File, then Save as Other, then select Press-Ready PDF (PDF/X). In the save menu, I also clicked Settings... and selected Save as PDF/X-1a. It turns out that there are different types of press-ready PDFs. According to the wisdom of the Internet, PDF/X-1a seems to be the safest option. 

You will also need to convert your cover artwork PDF file too.

III. Publish!

At this point, your Greek novella should be ready to publish.

Fonts: Stick with PDF-friendly fonts that support Polytonic Greek. I used Source Sans Pro and Palatino Linotype. There are plenty of fonts to choose from, but always check your PDFs to ensure that they display correctly. Fonts may look great in your word processing program of choice, but may not be rendered properly or at all in a PDF. I had to change my fonts at least a few times!

Publishing with KDP: Remember how I said earlier that you can try to circumvent KDP's language policy and self-publish in Greek? It is fairly simple, but I have not attempted it, so do so at your own risk. The secret: select English as your book's language. I have heard that KDP will remove your book if they find out that your book is in an unapproved language. That was too big of a risk for me to take, so I decided to play it safe and publish on Lulu. 

I still have a lot to learn about self-publishing, so please share your tips and tricks! 

γράφε δή!

Is It Attested? Online Resources for Greek and Latin

Most writers of Latin and Ancient Greek today strive to appropriately use and imitate vocabulary and expressions found in classical texts. Surprisingly, what is often presented (and taken for granted) in textbooks is contrary to what classical authors actually use. Some examples: 

• The simplification of the differences between the use of the perfect vs. the imperfect. In my observations, this has led to a disproportionate use of the imperfect. For example, classical authors use the perfect of possum more frequently than the imperfect. 
• Many textbooks teach that the perfect stem of certain 3rd and 4th declension verbs like audio and eo ends in either -i- or -iv-. Did you know that the audiv- stem is more common than audi-? Or that the reverse is true for eo!

But how can I search the corpora of Greek and Latin literature to find out what authors actually used? The two resources below allow you to search the works classical authors.

For Latin: The Packard Humanities Institute's Classical Latin Texts (called PHI Latin Texts or simply PHI)
Pros:

• Search by word, phrase, or proximity
• Easy to access, no account required
• Fast search results

 Cons:

• Christian authors and post-classical authors are excluded 😢
• Cannot search by lemma (i.e. see all the usages of all the forms of a word at once)

For Greek and Latin: Perseus Digital Library Scaife Viewer
Pros:

• Search by word, phrase, proximity, and lemma (for Greek only)
• Ancient, medieval, and modern authors are included, even scholia! 😁

Cons:

• Requires a (free) account
• Search results are slower than on PHI
• Inconsistent appearance of search results (i.e. some results appear as one line of text, others as massive chunks of text that require lots of scrolling)

In addition to these, there is (for Greek) the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae (TLG), but I have limited experience with it. The TLG also requires an account and you have to pay to access all of its features. 

If you know of any others, please share them with me!

2018 Year in Review

2018 has (almost) gone, so I'd like to reflect briefly on some of the highlights of my year. 

2017 was a year of life-changing highs and lows. I passed the edTPA, got and accepted my job in Georgia, completed student teaching and my Masters, moved to Georgia, and finished my first semester in my new job. All these helped me through 2017, my most painful year personally. 2018 has had its ups and downs too, but I am grateful to be in an even better place now.

2018 was my first calendar year as a Latin teacher at Parkview and as a 100% CI teacher, so it's overwhelming to narrow down a list of highlights. 

Teaching:

• TPR - I first used TPR in 2017, but I did not feel that I was as successful as I wished to be. This past August, I really felt successful doing it again. See my post about it here.
• Brain Breaks - I first used Brain Breaks in 2017, but did not implement them consistently. Starting in August, I have made them a routine. See my post about it here.
• Writing my own novice-level Latin texts - Most of these have been translated and adapted from primary sources like Hesiod's Theogony (Saturn's overthrow of Uranus, the Titanomachy) and Homer's Iliad (Jupiter, Neptune, and Hades drawing lots) for Latin I students.
• Modifications for special ed. students - Miriam Patrick and I have been working closely to create activities and supports for our special education students, especially in Latin I. More details to come in a future post!
• Acting in the faculty play - Students invited several of us faculty to star in Check, Please, a play about a series of blind dates gone horribly-yet-humorously wrong. I played the role of Tod, a little boy who fools a woman into a date. 

  

  At 29 I could still pass for a kid. Yes, I am wearing a Mickey Mouse hat. Thanks for the youthful genes, Mom and Dad!

• Dressing up as Luigi for Halloween!

  

  Luigi forgoes Italian for the day because of half-off burritos at Chipotle on Halloween!

Greek & Latin:

• Biduum Georgianum - I had so much fun! I would love to do the longer immersion programs for both Latin AND Ancient Greek! See my post about it here. 
• Batrachomyomachia - I read two Greek texts this past year. First was the Batrachomyomachia, an epic poem that parodies Homer's Iliad. Instead of Greeks vs. Trojans, it's mice vs. frogs. I loved it - especially the deus ex machina ending!
• Digenes Akrites - The second Greek text I read was Digenes Akrites, a Byzantine poem about the life and adventures of Digenes Akrites ('Biracial Frontiersman'), a half-Arab, half-Roman hero who lives on the nearly-lawless eastern frontier of the empire (eastern Turkey today) and fights wild beasts, a dragon, and guerrillas. I graciously consulted Elizabeth Jeffrey's editions and translations of the Grottaferrata and Escorial manuscripts. This experience was a fun introduction to demotic Byzantine Greek and I'd love to learn more Modern Greek!

Travel: 

• The Midwest - In May and June, I enjoyed a nice roadtrip through the Midwest (Indiana, Illinois, and Ohio) with my girlfriend. It was great to see my family and best friends again in the Chicago area. Cedar Point was AMAZING! The best amusement park I've ever been to!
• Egypt - Also in June, my lifelong dream of going to Egypt came true and it was everything I had hoped for and more. Let me travel geek right now - I stayed in Cairo (just blocks from Tahrir Square!), Aswan (on Elephantine Island!), Luxor (steps from the Nile!), and Alexandria (right across from the Mediterranean!). I saw and did so much and I can't wait to go back!

  

  The Great Pyramid of Khufu at Giza! I went inside too!

• Istanbul - Coming back home, I had a long layover in Istanbul thanks to flying Turkish Airlines, one of my favorite airlines. Since it is Istanbul - AKA my favorite place in the world - I had to go see it even for those brief hours I was there. I got on the metro shortly after it starts at 6:00 AM and explored the city on foot. I checked out some Byzantine churches, walked along the Sea of Marmara, and visited Hagia Sophia (my eleventh visit - yes, I'm shamelessly obsessed!) - all with more than enough time to hop back on to the metro and return to the airport to fly home. 

  

  Under Hagia Sophia's legendary dome for the eleventh time, but just as excited as ever!

Annum novum faustum felicem tibi, lector!