11/6/11  

Novelist Mona Simpson’s eulogy for her brother Steve Jobs is online in the NY Times. His tremendous hunger to live the life he was meant to live may be the most important gift he leaves us.

We joke sometimes that we need an extra day in the week, our lives are so busy busy busy. At 2 a.m. this morning the clocks jumped back an hour, in most of the US.

So, how are you spending your one extra hour, today?

The message that you should live the one particular, individual life you were meant to live is not original or unique but there are few exemplars so sparkling as Jobs. People utterly and uncompromisingly who and what they are. I’ve known a handful up close and personal. These are the people who inspire me.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon with my publisher, Jen Bosveld, who could not put on a false face if her life depended on it. She’s apt to tell you exactly what she thinks, whether flattering or shattering. She is a tough defender of her positions but never closed-minded, a rare combination of traits that makes conversation with her exceptionally pleasurable—that, and her breadth and depth of life experience. Disaster preparedness to small press tricks-of-the-trade to the alarming debt with which for-profit university students are saddled—that was the first half hour of our discussion. Over the years Jen has vexed and occasionally enraged me with her intense focus and drive—sometimes at the expense of her own health—but she remains a role model of living the life one was meant to live. Most people who know Jen wish they had one tenth her energy and zest for life.

Many years ago I worked as a volunteer for a hospice program, one of the first of its kind in this country. The volunteer coordinator, Peg, said something profound in my training session: People die the way they have lived. There was a lot of romantic clap-trap in the seventies, about near-miraculous end-of-life personal transformations. The stuff of Hollywood B-grade movies, not real lives. Peg insisted her volunteers have, and  communicate to family members, realistic expectations of the dying.

It's surprising how often over the years her words have come back to me. Peg taught me to honor the coping skills people have right now, right here in the present moment. Not to expect them to abandon what’s working, especially in a crisis. And all of our crises, when you boil it down, are rehearsals for the final crisis of dying.

Yet to live your one best life requires stepping out of the very assumptions and defenses that keep us upright day to day. You have to winnow away whatever in your life obscures the crucial and essential, and to act on behalf of those, at times ruthlessly. You have to risk--well, everything, sometimes. 

Sacrifices and leaps of faith are stock in trade. Sometimes it’s not pretty, and often the path is not clear-cut. In jettisoning the non-essential, other people, including loved ones, can get hurt. Expectations will inevitably be disappointed. Mistakes are made. If you’ve got a soupcon of wisdom to go along with your ruthless pursuit of your One True Life; if you’re not a complete narcissist, you do what you can to make amends to those people you’ve hurt. But you will not be deterred by opinions. Nothing will keep you from following your dream. 

This is not to say that relationships are not a part of the One Life. Jobs was also an exemplar of integrating the personal and professional sides of life. Yes, it took a while for him to find the ones with whom he would spend his life. But once he found them, family and friends, he loved as completely as he followed his creative drive at work. He was in all areas of his life, it seems, uncompromising in his passions.

Steve Jobs’ highest value was beauty, and this is a little bit remarkable when you consider how tremendously functional and practical, how ergonomic his inventions. They work, really well. But what seduces is their beauty. It may be that this balance at the joining-point of art and technology was his genius.

I’m a little bleary from travel, a little drained from not sleeping enough lately. I didn’t use my extra hour this morning for sleep, though I thought yesterday evening that I would. I used it to cook and to bake. That nesting part of my life has fallen away lately in the midst of production runs, family needs, the daily busyness of living. My house smells fantastic today, stock simmering on the stove and baked delicacies cooling on the counter.

I haven’t posted blogs much lately either, though I have several unpublished drafts half-ready. I hardly open Facebook. I'm spending my time and my energy pennies elsewhere. I heard a great commentary about social media on NPR the other night, about how “free” social media are not really free at all. In order to use them effectively to promote a small business (like the wompus) one must invest tremendous energy and time over a protracted period. For me right now that doesn’t trump actually working on books, though I will get back to it one of these days. It’s part of getting the books out into the world, and that is also an element of my One Life.

In Mona Simpson’s eulogy to her brother, you can read Steve Jobs’ last words. They got me thinking along a familiar line, about how we determine what constitutes a “good life”, a life well lived. For some people this flows from religious belief, and more specifically, belief in an afterlife or its lack. For me the question of life after death necessarily remains an open one—I was trained as a scientist, and I recognize certain problems for which we have no capacity to gather or test evidence beyond the subjective and malleable. I remain an afterlife agnostic.

But in the end that doesn’t affect my life choices. For me, living my One Life, the one I am meant to live, is what counts no matter the backdrop. If I disappear from existence completely and permanently on the day I die, it is important to me that I have used my brief life on the planet as fruitfully, as richly as I’m humanly, specifically, individually capable of doing.

And if we luck out, and there’s some other existence on the other side of death’s door, so much the better. Lifting up art, and loving each other, these are my drivers. My version of right life and right livelihood flow from these, regardless of the meaning of death because either way, death is the end of this One Life.

What makes your heart sing? From what chosen path would you look back on your deathbed and say, I lived the One Life I was meant to live? 

And how will you use your one extra hour, today?

with love,

sammy

9/29/11

Rosh Hashana can be loosely translated as “head of the year.” I’m working here at the wompus today, on the Jewish New Year, and if there is any truth to the notion that where you place your energy at the start of a new year predicts the year to come, it’s going to be a grand one.

I took a break for a lunch of leftover black Japonica rice, sharp cheddar cheese, and Roots & Fruits--that’s what I slapped together when I realized somewhat belatedly that last evening was Erev Rosh Hashana, or the eve of the new year.

Alongside a whole wheat matzoh ball soup and the traditional round loaf of raisin challah, I served an ad hoc mixture of roasted root vegetables and fruits with basil, honey, cinnamon, curry, and balsamic. And of course, we dipped the traditional apples in honey, to signify a sweet new year.

What we eat is always an interesting reflection of how we live. I’ve been surviving on takeout food for much of the past month.

Before lunch today, I updated correspondence with a couple authors, printed tests of two second printings, and did fresh print runs of those two chapbooks, fifty copies and fifty covers apiece. I got one set folded and the other offset for folding, and the endpapers are partially folded as well. I took a few minutes to make notes for an interview—the internship applicant arrived early and seems a lovely person, and I think we’ll be fortunate if he decides to spend some time at the wompus.

After he left I checked my inbox. I was delighted to find a new Poet’s Greatest Hits manuscript from Chad Prevost, and it looks like it’s in very good shape. I haven’t been able to put enough time into Greatest Hits this past year, so maybe this volume will kick-start my energies. Almost all volumes have now arrived here from Pudding House. The Greatest Hits books make such a wonderful complement to our other new books at the wompus, and we feel privileged to carry that line forward.

I’m happy and excited to need more copies of the books I printed today. Our initial print runs are modest, averaging under 200. Since we own the means of production and we can print more as needed, there is no advantage to storing vast inventories. We now have three chapbooks that have gone into second printings. Robert Miltner’s Queen Mab and the Moon Boy was first—Robert did a couple off-site readings at the D.C. AWP meetings last February and generated some buzz on the book there, and then sold more at his readings back in northeast Ohio. Mary Weems’ Closure is going back to press after university orders and local readings emptied our shelves. And Ann Cefola, whose chapbook, St. Agnes, Pink-Slipped, only came out a couple of months ago, is doing a superlative job of pushing out word of her book, generating sales both here at the press, and at author readings and events in her region.

Shana tova,

sammy

~ ~ ~

ROOTS & FRUITS:

Select some root vegetables. You could include potatoes of any variety, turnips, whatever floats your boat. I happened to use:

butternut squash, jewel yams, carrots, parsnips, red onion

Scrub, and where necessary (butternut, parsnip), peel. Cut as desired. I wanted this dish to cook swiftly, so I sliced everything thin, but these veggies also roast well in big chunks if you have the time to wait.

Toss lightly in olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Again, if you’re in a hurry, lay these in a single layer on a baking pan; if you’ve got time, they can go into any baking dish, with an occasional stir. Place in a preheated, hot oven. I roast them at 400 or higher. Thinly sliced, they need only about 20 minutes till fork-tender and slightly browned.

Meanwhile, chop up some apples and pears—lots of other seasonal or dried fruits would work, too. Toss lightly in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, drizzle with honey, and sprinkle lightly with cinnamon and curry. Toss in some chopped fresh basil leaves, and when the veggies are almost done, place fruits into oven. Like the veggies, they will cook very quickly in a single layer on their own baking sheet—if cooking longer you can use any baking dish, or they can simply be thrown into the veggies for the last five or ten minutes. Roast briefly—you want them soft to the tooth but not mushy. Mix fruits into vegetables (if cooked separately) and serve for a sweet new year!

9/7/11

Duotrope does not list Kattywompus Press. If you’re one of the many writers who utilize their site for submissions, you won’t find us.

I’d submit a listing, but Duotrope does not include in publications listings any publisher that charges the writer one red cent for any aspect of submission or publication, and the wompus has a $15 submission fee for manuscripts. If we get around to doing a periodical or anthologies, we probably won’t have a fee for those. Reading a couple of poems or a short short story doesn’t take much time. Reviewing an entire chapbook manuscript, on the other hand—or 25 pages of a full length work—takes substantial time and effort.

I titled this blog Poetry but in fact, small press publications of all literary stripe are, to be polite, economically marginal.

The wompus does not use student screeners. Every manuscript which comes in to the press is read by the editor in chief (me). Some manuscripts are also reviewed by my associate editor. While we do not offer full manuscript editorial reviews—for which editors charge hundreds and sometimes more—I often do include in rejection letters some comments and suggestions, for what they're worth. I believe in writers, and I do everything in my power to support their efforts.

There’s a boat load of confusion about how small presses finance their work. Most writers don’t even know the difference between subsidy and university presses, and independents. Few writers know the constrictions attendant to nonprofit status--a number of people have casually asserted I should file for nonprofit status. There are many, many small presses alive today, and many different business models, from retiree or hobbyist presses that publish a book or two each year, to full-on, full-time, day job operations like BlazeVox.

BlazeVox is a respected and beloved small press which is for the most part, like us, a one-horse town. It's run by Geoffrey Gatza, who recently found himself at the center of a storm over his shifting business practices. You can read a summary and catch links on Brian Spears' blog on The Rumpus (no relation to the wompus). In short, Gatza has shifted the BlazeVox business model to try to stay afloat in hard times, and now requires some of his accepted authors (he hasn’t made clear what proportion) to pitch in $250 before their book is produced. No contribution = no hard copy publication (e-book only).

I started this blog by mentioning Duotrope’s policy that “all money flows to the writer.” I’m a fan. So, why do I violate that by charging prospective authors a reading fee? And how does a reading fee, or Gatza’s new required author “donation” policy, inflect what type of press is being run? The issue is vanity publishing, and you might think by now we’d have a perfectly clear definition of what that constitutes.

A wonderful wompus author—he is both a delightful wordsmith and a lovely human being—recently offered to help me pay for production of his book. His is the first full-length manuscript we accepted. I am in love with the poems. I stand by his work 100%.

As a start-up, I am broker than smoke. I won’t belabor here the thousands of dollars I have invested in various arms of the press. It might get paid off someday, and someday I might actually begin to eke out a living off this press. But not today, not this year. To be clear, like Geoffrey at BlazeVox, this is my day job, and for the moment my health insurance and regular meals come courtesy of my partner's income. 

So I turned down this author's offer of help. I told him I cannot risk the reputation of the press. There can be no confusion on this point: Kattywompus Press does not do pay-to-play publishing. No amount of money you might offer will convince me to publish your book. And if I love your manuscript, you will not be required to “donate” anything further beyond your best efforts at refining the work itself. Vanity publishing is pay-to-play, and any press that accepts a manuscript provisional to the author ponying up has crossed that line.

This includes, by the way, any press that requires you, the author, to collect a minimum number of “pre-orders” before they will do your press run.

This might seem like a subtle distinction from what we at the wompus, and many other independent small presses do, which is to send out a pre-production offer for more author copies.

We pay our chapbook authors with 20 copies. We offer wholesale author discounts if/when they want more of their book, and we make these discounts available for first run for two reasons. (Here is me, the editor in chief, coming clean, absolutely.) Yes, if you order 50 or 100 additional copies, of course it is helpful in defraying my material and labor costs of publishing your book. But I also offer it for more prosaic reasons: I only do a press run of what we need. We do most production in-house, so it’s not the same model as out-sourced print-on-demand, but it has the same economic advantage: we don’t have a warehouse of inventory sitting around soaking up our money. 

So yes, we offer additional copy purchase on the eve of production—sometimes the author’s request for additional copies doubles our press run, so we need to know. But we never, ever, ever require orders from the author. Once you get an acceptance from us, you are free to take your 20 author copies and never order more.

Geoffrey at BlazeVox defends his up-front author charge in part by noting that his authors receive additional copies at far lower cost than most presses offer. That's a fact. Is the up-front fee a better model? That's for you to decide for yourself. For myself, and Kattywompus Press, I prefer to steer clear of front-loading. Any wompus author who is selling in large numbers can also purchase in large quantity from the press, which puts the author discount at 50%. 

The only up-front fee we require is for submissions, and this fee can be waived, and is regularly waived. I take manuscripts without a reading fee when they are invited submissions—we have quite a few of those right now. And I will waive the fee to a writer for reasons of economic hardship.

That said, you’d better make a tight case on that argument. Writers are not often well off, economically. Nevertheless, we writers must invest a bit of money now and then in support of our writing, be it in the form of a new computer or a contest entry fee or a conference or workshop. Your economic hardship has to weigh againts that of the press. We are not now and we will never be a vanity press—I would shut the whole thing down before I’d make my money from pay-to-play (or as Geoffrey notes, before I'd publish simply because I knew something would sell--our selections are based in literary, not monetary value). But we do need to accrue some small compensation for a tiny percentage of our labor, and we have to cover material costs, so reluctantly, we charge a reading fee for manuscript submissions.

Geoffrey Gatza, at BlazeVox, refers to his new required author contribution as a form of cooperative publishing. That’s a really interesting discussion in itself. I had an exchange some time back with an author whose previous book was published by a straight up collective. They are very good to their authors (each other). They appear to publish good looking books. And to do so at what they consider a reasonable price (in my opinion, too low a price for color cover, perfect bound, full length books), they partner with a corporate vanity press called First World Publishing. She was incensed when I pointed this out. But for me, it's akin to partnering with Wal-mart, a mega-corporation which has done more damage to American communities and working conditions than just about any other single source you could name. 

That conversation made me sad. As sad as the exchange where I told a poet recently published by Finishing Line that they, too, now meet accepted criteria of a vanity press, despite their long prior history of “legitimate” publishing. And like BlazeVox, like the publishing coop I mentioned above, Finishing Line does not (as of my last perusal of their website) make explicit this fact. 

Therein lies a piece of this dispute. A good starting point for any small press is to be up front with writers and readers. Tell us what you're about and why. Don't fudge specifics, and don't sidestep the hard questions. Probably, Gatza sidestepped some of those tough questions on his shifting business model because he is uneasy with them himself. Nobody likes to admit they are struggling for money, and downshifting to a model which is bound to stir controversy can't be comfortable for him.

These are important conversations, and that sticky intersection of art and economics is never an easy place. Does anybody in small press publishing--editors, publishers, authors--lack a deeply felt opinion?

Those of us who love the book, and who love and support small presses, have to grapple with the fact that lines are blurring. That does not mean we should ignore the ethical aspect of emerging models. If anything, it makes scrutiny more critical than ever. And it makes mutual support--moral as well as material--essential.

Here at the wompus, this is the only economy we have known. Does founding a press under this economy certify us insane? I know for sure that it certifies us as lovers of the book, and lovers of the independently produced, beautifully crafted, small run book. So is Geoffrey Gatza, over at BlazeVox. So are the folks—I am willing to stipulate—at Duotrope, who won’t list my press because I charge a reading fee.

8/7/11

Only a few feet of air between me and Bob Dylan last night at Nautica Pavillion. Before Dylan and his five-man band took the stage, Leon Russell played a set of rock and roll standards with plenty of blues. Looking a hundred years old, and backed by a band who look barely outa high school, Russell can still bring it.

And then came Dylan himself, the poet laureate of rock, in his custom suit and white-with-black-tips cowboy boots and his straw hat, gravelly voice mumbling his brilliant lyrics, riffling the keyboard and chanting and bobbing and blowing the harp. He’s still got it, that magnetism that brought him into the spotlight decades ago. 

I have spent a half dozen car trips to and from Columbus playing and replaying Blond on Blond to wrap my head around some of Dylan's more complicated lyrics. There are few singer-songwriters whose work more seamlessly transmit as poetry.

Thanks to Brian, one of my favorite people in Cleveland, we had seats in the center of the front row. I’ve never seen a concert that close up and personal. But from the moment Dylan stepped onstage, nobody was sitting. Leaning on that front rail, we could see the sweat drip and fly from Dylan's face, we could see the rings on the lead guitarist’s fingers and the expressions shifting his face as he bobbed between bandmates and the master himself.

Behind the stage we watched the sky pink and then darken. Huge ships slipped past on the Cuyahoga River, looking close enough to touch. The rusty hulk of a drawbridge framed one corner of the pavilion tent. Swallows and pigeons swooped over the river and the lights of the city shone on the other shore. It was a jewel of a Cleveland night.

Earlier, while we waited for the concert to begin, I scanned the crowd. Nautica is small, as outdoor, stadium style venues go. Even the nosebleed seats have a good view, and the setting is delicious. The day was hot and muggy but by concert time it was cooling down and a little breeze stirred at sunset. The crowd was as white as any I’ve seen, and every single musician—every single roadie, even—who hit the stage was white and male. I remember times when Dylan recorded and toured with a more race and gender mixed band, but not this time.

You’ve got to love testosterone, to like rock concerts. You know that old saw, Why does the guy play in a rock ‘n roll band? To get the girl. (Why does the guy do anything? To get the girl—or boy, as the case may be). The soul of rock music is instinct and energy-driven, even for a rocker like Dylan, whose lyrics are smart, beautiful poetry. At base that energy is sexual. This applies as much to girl bands. Testosterone is a hormone shared by all genders. It propels sex drive, assertiveness, and some other traits that are far from exclusively male, but which we associate with masculine drive.

So if you don’t love those things, just download the tunes, buy the CD, don’t torture yourself with the Dionysian feast of a stage show. The primal force of both these bands was intensely and undeniably sensual, and anyone who has ever closely observed a rhythm guitarist or a drummer or any other rock or jazz musician perform live, knows it.

Today it’s back to being a responsible grownup, catching up on work and family obligations—and of course, the books—still savoring the images and the songs and the nearness of this icon of a generation.