Publisher: Obama could influence reading

Jonathan Galassi, the president of Farrar, Straus and Giroux known for his golden editing pen, says President-elect Barack Obama may give the publishing business a shot in the arm.

He and his staffers were jubilant last month when Obama was spotted, days after his election victory, carrying “Collected Poems” by poet Derek Walcott, a Farrar, Straus and Giroux author and 1992 Nobel Laureate whom Galassi has edited.

“Obama is a big reader, and he’s an author, so people are paying attention to what he reads,” Galassi, 59, said Monday night before picking up the Mercantile Library Center for Fiction’s Maxwell E. Perkins Award for his contribution to the art form. “He could have a lot of influence on books and what’s read.”

Even with a bestselling author living in the White House, Galassi said, he’s concerned about the future of book reading and buying.

The popularity of Amazon.com’s Kindle wireless reading device proves that demand is strong for reading electronic works, he said. Still, publishers must figure out how to find buyers who also like films, video games and reading blogs.

Galassi was the fourth recipient of the Perkins Award.