One place I was appearing as a writer was in the small-press realm. Largely unseen and at the fringe of the literary world, its prolific, low-circulation reviews, quarterlies, ‘zines, chapbooks, and even full-sized books reflected a passion for literature, an intense mission, or outright ambition rather than an accountant’s commercial motivation. Many were marginally funded, mimeographed or photocopied, while others had more traditional printers, perhaps even typesetters, and a few of the biggest even had paid staff. Most were edited by dedicated individuals or partnerships; others by an institution or circle; and still others by college English departments, with either students or faculty as the team.
It’s where the action was – and remains.
Among the book publishers, Black Sparrow and Copper Canyon stand out, along with Shambala for a Buddhist focus.
In general, university book presses garnered more respect and financial backing and weren’t open to those of us who weren’t in a professorial track.
In college, I had been told of a widely recognized poet who averaged 20 rejections for every poem he had accepted in one of these journals. That was meant as inspiration to keep us lesser voices from despair.
Well, a few years later, I was getting about 20 rejections for every batch of five poems I mailed out. Still, I got more than a thousand acceptances. They usually paid me with two contributor’s copies, or did before the action shifted online. There are some fine online sites, by the way, if you look.
The track was how you were supposed to build a reputation and even entice an agent or editor. I think they were all too busy to notice.
A newspaper career was usually supposed to grow the same way: start out on a small daily somewhere out in the sticks, one with next to nothing pay, and work your way up. Or as one critic warned publishers, this was a process of eating your young. Or your seed corn, in another version.
(The highest income I ever reached, by the way, was the national median. And that was thanks to our Newspaper Guild contract, unlike most of our rivals.)
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Acceptances created another challenge, drafting a contributor’s note.
I noticed that many of the writers listed their most recent book or two, but I really didn’t have that much. Others went with where they were teaching or working on an advanced degree. With my name distancing myself from the more common tag I used in the newsroom, naming the newspaper wasn’t really an option – and not that wise, anyway, if the content was of a controversial nature, as many still saw the hippie movement.
The solution, then, was to look for some bit that would make me more human. Do try it, if you’re asked to come up with something similar. Even be flip, if you can.
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The World Wide Web has taken all of this in a new dimension, of course.
We bloggers are essentially producing ‘zines or similar small journals. We even have photography as a regular option, not a given back in the day.
I’ve even gathered my published poems along with newer ones and published them as free PDF chapbooks at my own online imprint, Thistle Finch, a sister to this Red Barn. Do look it up.
More crucial has been the growth of ebooks and on-demand print publishing, which I’ll discuss in an upcoming post.
Jnana's Red Barn 