Henrique Mota is the founder and publisher of Princípia Editora in Portugal. After studying Law at the Portuguese Catholic University and International Relations at Johns Hopkins University, he followed an academic career and a journalistic one. In 1997, Henrique Mota founded Princípia, at first an academic publishing house, which now has six imprints, covering nonacademic genres as well. Between 2016 and 2018 he was the president of the Federation of European Publishers, having multiple initiatives in defending the freedom of publishing and enforcing the copyright law.
In 1997 you founded Princípia Editora, an independent publishing house which now has six imprints and a variety of genres, authors and titles, both Portuguese and in translation. What was the Portuguese book market looking back then, how have you decided to create this publishing house and how has it developed over the years?
I had some previous professional lives, an academic one and another as a journalist. In 1997, I decided to close my work at the university and I was trying to find, to decide what to do. At a certain point, I had founded the publishing house of the Catholic University, where I was kind of the CEO. I was a professor in law. After other ideas and years, I decided to found this publishing house because I thought it would be the possibility to keep contact with some of my previous colleagues. So it was an academic publishing house at the beginning, and it lasted as an academic for a number of years. Then, at a certain point, former academic colleagues offered me their manuscripts either in fiction, poetry, or religion. I decided to begin new projects, new imprints for those books. So that's why we now have six different imprints for six different areas of publishing. I find this is an interesting experience because I have different authors. I have academic authors, authors from religion, and from other areas. So that's the reason why we began as academic. But then the opportunities and the needs invited me to found different imprints to accommodate these new books by the same authors, because the authors were still academic authors.
Which are the main distribution channels for the Princípia books and which are the most useful promotion and marketing instruments to reach new readers and stay close to the committed ones?
We have the traditional distribution system through professional bookstores. Unfortunately, that system is now focused on mainstream books. Most of the independent bookshops closed during the crisis from 2008-2010, and so now we have much less capacity to sell non-mainstream books in the big channels. The big chains are like supermarkets or airport bookshops. What they want is fiction and, in general, books with a high turnover. But for publishers like us, who publish in niches, it is very difficult to have that channel. So we work with these bookshops, of course, but we also try other solutions. For example, for the religious imprints, we are developing a new system of selling in different churches. We have a shelf for self-service. People see the books, take them and leave the money there. Then we, once a week or once every two weeks, go there, replace the books, and collect the money. For the religious imprint that means already more than 13% of sales, which is interesting. Also, because the revenue is higher than the revenue from the normal bookshops, we give a contribution percentage of the sales to the church, but it is less than the cost we have with the distributor. So, I would say that if we have 13% of sales there, it's an increasing figure, and we are developing, as the experience has been good so far, we are trying to develop in new places.
Then, the marketing is very difficult in Portugal for a small publishing house, and mine is a small publishing house, because the costs are high, and the number of books we publish every year doesn't pay the cost of a professional to do the marketing of the books. So, we try to find marketing solutions on our won, but we don't have specific departments for marketing. We have contacts with journalists, we have a newsletter, we have some instruments, but they are proportional to our own dimension.
On the publishing house’s website the importance of alternative formats and channels of distribution is acknowledged. Which is the public’s interest in ebooks and audio books for Princípia in particular and for the Portuguese book market in general? What about the online bookshops?
I cannot tell you the percentage of the online sales because, for the moment, they are included in the sales of the shop we have, because it's the shop that processes them. But I would say it is less than 10% for online sales. However, if you put together the online sales we do with the online sales of the marketplaces where we are, then the number is higher than 10%.
But the sales of the e-books are low, it should be about 2%. The sales of audiobooks are really almost nonexistent. That's a surprise because the experience of many publishers in Europe, and also in Portugal, is to have good sales with audiobooks. I expected to have good sales with audiobooks too, but we don’t. We tried to do audiobooks for the titles we published in our religious imprint. Maybe the topic and the audience explain this poor sale of audiobooks.
And what about the other imprints? Or you haven't tried them.
No, we tried only with this imprint, and we were so disappointed that we decided to stop and reconsider that project. Sometimes a publisher has to make decisions against their own will. My will was to proceed with the audiobooks, but figures are against you.
Are the books in Portugal also sold in other Portuguese-speaking countries? What is the impact of these areas, especially Brazil, on the Portuguese book market?
Yes, they can be sold, but the sales are very low for three reasons. First, the distance – so the cost of transport from Portugal to Brazil and to African Portuguese-speaking countries is very high. Second, in Africa, you have low literacy, so the number of readers is very low, and thus the sales are very low. In Brazil, literacy is better, but the Portuguese in Brazil and the Portuguese in Portugal have some differences. The high-educated standards of Portuguese are very similar, but the popular one can be very different. So, it is difficult. If you want to sell an academic book, like a book in law, medicine, or political science; probably you can sell it. But if you want to sell a fiction book, it will be very hard. And vice versa, Brazilian publishers don't sell books easily in Portugal. So, in Portugal, most of the international contracts nowadays are for Portuguese language, except Brazil, because we take care of the other Portuguese-speaking countries because they accept our rule; and there are separate contracts for Brazil contract with the Brazilian publishers.
I was curious about this, because we at the agency I work, we sell separate rights in Portugal and in Brazil, and I’ve always asked myself why these two are separate markets, and now I understand.
I tend to always try to buy worldwide Portuguese rights because I try to find Brazilian publishers interested in buying my translation and then adapt it to its audience, but it's not easy.
Between 2016 and 2018 you were the president of the Federation of European Publishers . Which are the Federation’s main goals and how can they impact the publishers’ activity?
The Federation of European Publishers is an umbrella organization that represents national associations in Brussels. Together with the national associations, it defends in Brussels the interests of the industry and brings together publishers, authors, booksellers, and libraries. Although we all work with books, we often don't have common perspectives about public policies. So, the Federation of European Publishers is very active in defending public policies that protect copyright and the ecosystem. The ecosystem means authors, publishers, booksellers, and readers, sometimes libraries. However, libraries have a different perspective; they are part of the ecosystem, but their interests sometimes are not aligned with the other organizations. The Federation of European Publishers represents publishers, while the European and International Booksellers Federation represents bookshops. They tend to work together, although each represents a part of the industry. I would say that for a national publisher like me, I need the representation of the Portuguese Association, and the Portuguese Association needs the representation in Brussels of the Federation of European Publishers.
Which have been the most important initiatives you had and accomplished during your mandate? As a note, for our Romanian book market your 2017 statement regarding the absurd law of the one state textbook publisher was an important support.
The freedom of publishing in general, either in textbooks or in other areas, is probably the first topic of the federation. Then, the protection of copyright, because protecting copyright means protecting publishers, but also authors and even bookshops. That was probably the most important debate I participated in during my presidency because we were discussing copyright law, which was a very important aspect and a very time-consuming discussion with the European authorities. It was important to understand that without the FEP, national associations—even the big national associations—wouldn't have been able to achieve the same results as the 28 countries together. Even after Brexit, the British are still part of the Federation.
In the message you sent for the occasion of Portugal being the guest of honor of the Romanian book fair Bookfest, you said you wanted to contribute to the promotion of Portuguese books’ diversity. From your point of view, which are most distinctive features of the contemporary Portuguese literature?
Well, I'm not a literature publisher, so I'm not an expert. Not necessarily in fiction, but in general, I would say that we have a very open industry that is interested in publishing different types of books. The catalogues are very diverse, and I think they complement each other very well. They are very interesting, and that means that this diversity is very important in terms of cultural diversity. A country, whether Romania or Portugal, needs cultural diversity for people to be able to think differently and to have educated debates on different topics. I would say that the most terrible challenge a country can face is a monolithic publishing industry. The idea of a unique textbook is part of that. We need different opinions. We need to be able to discuss and to ask others why they think differently. If you want to think differently, you need to read different things. If we all read the same things, we all think the same thing. If we all read the same thing, we are kind of behind bars of lack of information and lack of capacity to understand the world and to decide what is better for me and for my country. So, I would say that there is an absolute indispensable link between freedom of publishing, freedom of reading, and democracy.
Why do totalitarian regimes avoid freedom of publishing? Because they know that is this way more people will think the same thing and could be manipulated. If you don't give people different perspectives, they can be manipulated. The challenge is to invite people to read—read books, read newspapers, read magazines—because when you read, you not only enjoy the moment, but you also educate yourself and gain information to be able to judge your world and your society. It's important to think about what is better for your country and society—national or local.
Apart from having a competitive activity among the publishers, Portugal also has cohesive initiatives in promoting reading: 𝗣𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗼 𝗡𝗮𝗰𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗱𝗲 𝗟𝗲𝗶𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗮, „𝗖𝗵𝗲𝗾𝘂𝗲-𝗟𝗶𝘃𝗿𝗼” vouchers and the Fixed Book Price law are some of them. How are these initiatives actually work on the one hand for the publishers and on the other for the public?
I think the fixed book price law is the milestone of the process. I am very much in favor of the fixed book price law, and I believe there is a clear justification to cancel the competition law for books. If you decide on books under the argument of discounts, on the one hand you will always buy the same kind of books, and, on the other hand, bookshops will close. I once read a paper saying that the fixed book price law in France saved bookshops. When it was cancelled, the Gentlemen's Agreement in the UK, which was a kind of fixed price law, led to the closing of a significant number of bookshops there. In fact, it could be true if you look at the number of bookshops in both countries—possibly, I'm not sure, but I read many years ago that the number of bookshops in the Paris area is greater than the number of bookshops in England. I share this information as I received it; I never confirmed it. But probably it's true because I had my own experience on this. The first time I walked down the Oxford Road in London, a long, fantastic avenue, it was in 1975, when I was 15 years old, when I did my Interrail, which was a typical train trip we used to do back then. I was surprised by the number of bookshops on that avenue. Now, if I walk it, I find only one, two, or three bookshops along that long avenue, which stretches for kilometers or miles, if you prefer.
So, that is probably true. What I take for granted at this point, based on my experience in Portugal, is that every time you damage or do not consider the fixed book price law, bookshops close. That's what happened in Portugal in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2012. The law has not been properly enforced, and most of the independent bookshops closed. I had a bookshop during that time, and I experienced it firsthand. Without the fixed price law, my bookshop wasn't viable. I think that is the most important instrument.
These days in Portugal, TikTok and the invitation to young readers to read books have been very successful—probably more successful than the national plans for reading. I don't have figures again, but I think I can say that.
How would you describe the Portuguese book market at the moment, in comparison with other European markets?
The mainstream fiction, I would say, is doing very well and is increasing. I think that is not true for the different niches — poetry, art, academic, religion — those are not increasing; sales are not increasing as they are in fiction. But I'm happy that in fiction sales are increasing because if they increase now, that means we are getting new readers. If you get new readers in the future, sooner or later, they will try other different books, and so that is definitely good news.
[The meeting with Henrique Mota took place at Bookfest Book Fair in Bucharest, on the occasion of Portugal's participation as guest of honor. The interview was recorded in English and transcribed.]
[Photos: Facebook page Portugalia, invitat de onoare la Bookfest 2025.]
