A PRICE war is being waged on the shelves of the world's English-language bookshops but some local booksellers appear unwilling to host this battle of the classics.
After all, if people in wealthy Hong Kong are happy to pay $90 for The Great Gatsby, why sell Hard Times for $17? Even the local representative of Penguin books - which has started importing cut-price specials in a new series called Penguin Popular Classics - admits she isn't giving a strong promotional push to the cheap series locally ''because it doesn't make much profit''.
The war started two years ago in England with a small Hertfordshire publishing house, appropriately called Wordsworth, having a dream that the popular market for classics was not dead, just financially overstretched.
The group, dubbed ''the David'' of English publishers by the British press, brought out a series of books - from slim Lord Jim to fat War and Peace - at GBP1 (HK$12) each and claims it has been more successful than anyone could possibly have imagined.
''In two years we have sold 400,000 copies of Wuthering Heights alone and have been averaging out at one million sales every month,'' said editorial director Marcus Clapham from his London office.
The series never caught on among Hong Kong's space-conscious booksellers, but the group's slingshots into the rest of the world's English-language classic book-buying market worried the Goliath of paperback makers, Penguin, so much that it was forced to bring out its own GBP1 series, Penguin Popular Classics, to compete.
A further 40 titles will be priced at GBP1.99 from October.
