May we have the next dance (poem)?

The lovely thing about running a small press right now is the versatility of the concept of 'publisher'. The traditional requirements of the job are diverse enough as it is – editing, designing, marketing, etc – but in this brave, new, impossibly noisy digital age, it would be strange to ignore all the other ways publishing can be developed.

My window display for Biddle Sawyer Silks

As The Emma Press, I plan launch parties and tours, host poetry readings, manage the growing community of supporters, create poetry postcards to reach a wider audience still, and I've started making videos of poets reading their work. I've set time aside in the summer to make ebooks; I'll whip out my sewing machine the moment I hear the words 'window display'; and I've got a whole page of blog ideas which I need to write and post somewhere. My interpretation of the role is skewed unabashedly towards my personal interests, and this extends into the books I choose to publish – which is the long way of saying: I really like dancing, so we're going to do a book of poems about dance!

The Emma Press Anthology of Dance is the next in our series of themed (but not Ovid-inspired) anthologies, following on from The Emma Press Anthology of Motherhood and Fatherhood (May 2014), and Best Friends Forever (Dec 2014). It will be edited by Rachel Piercey and myself, and rules for submissions are similar to previous calls, except now you have to be a member of the Emma Press Club. I'm tremendously excited to be publishing a book about dance, and I can't wait to see how people respond to the brief.

Six anthologies in, I'm developing a sense of the challenges as well as advantages of our genuinely open submissions policy. We have to create the best book we can from the poems we receive, and while we can indicate the character of the book we want to produce, we can't control how people respond. I quite wanted to have a lot of poems about historical and fictional parents in our Motherhood and Fatherhood anthologies, but the response was overwhelmingly personal and first-person. I thought we'd get enough poems about emigration to fill our Homesickness and Exile book, but instead we had more about a general sense of alienation and detachment. So, for the Dance anthology, I've resisted the urge to write an exacting brief, as well as the urge to construct an image of what the finished book will feel like. I want it it be joyous and to somehow evoke the exhilaration of dancing, but as for the specifics I am more than happy to be pleasantly surprised.

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The Emma Press Press Anthology of Dance is open for submissions until 1st June 2014. Read the full specification here.

Catch-up with Valley Press: Jamie McGarry interviewed by Greg Freeman

This interview originally appeared here, on the poetry hub 'Write Out Loud', and was conducted on the 9th March 2014.  Questions were asked by Greg Freeman, answers given by Valley Press editor Jamie McGarry.

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You’ve recently completed a “national tour”, to celebrate, among other things, your five-year anniversary. How did the tour go, and how did Valley Press start?

The tour went well - I'd always envisioned a tour before Christmas on the five-year anniversary, and it was tremendously invigorating to see it come to fruition, and to be living out of a suitcase, travelling round the country celebrating the books I'd published.  I usually lead a rather quiet, uneventful life, so this for me was literally the most excitement I'd had in years... I think the authors and attendees had fun too.  In terms of enjoyment it was a success, and I also made a bit of money out of it, so no complaints.

Jamie looking suitably prosperous, 'on tour' November 2013.

I had also planned to release a celebratory anthology at the five-year anniversary, featuring an extract from each VP book and details of the origins and development of the press.  In the end, it wasn't possible, but I still hope to do it later this year - I may re-write history and say Valley Press began with the first publication of someone other than myself, in October 2009, thus keeping the whole 'five years, fifty books' thing going (which was the title of the tour).

The story from 2008 was that, after failing a Primary Teaching course, I decided to throw myself into literature as a possible alternative career.  I'd been pursuing teaching simply because it seemed like a sensible route to take, but with that door now closed, I was suddenly free to experiment... and with a novel and enough poems for a book sitting on my hard drive, I decided to leap straight into self-publication, without even trying other routes.  It wasn't about the fame and fortune at that point, it was more about the process: I published the first two VP books just to see if I could bring a book into existence.  I think there were only 40 copies of each produced, most of which I gave away, but it was enough to get a taste for what publishing would be like.

By 2010 I had published ten books, and got myself a degree in English Lit, so the future would have been back on course - except, eight months after graduation I was unable to find any employment, so I had almost no choice but to try running Valley Press full-time from January 2011.  And things have worked out surprisingly well!  I suppose the moral of all this is, every failure is an opportunity - just keep plodding forwards, and keep bumping into walls until you find a door.

You also publish fiction and non-fiction. How big a part does poetry play in your output?  How do you regard the prospects for poetry publishing and sales of poetry?

Valley Press is mostly about the poetry, truth be told.  The ratio of poetry to non-poetry reflects my own interests as a reader, therefore around three-quarters of the output has been, and will always be, poetry.

Your visitors will be pleased to hear I think the prospects are extremely good for poetry publishing.  Maybe it's just the way my operation is skewed, but VP poetry titles have always performed as well as - if not better than - the fiction and non-fiction titles.  When marketing, and direct selling at events, I've found readers are readers and are interested in the topic, content and appearance of a book primarily, not worrying too much if it's in verse or not.  I may be wearing large blinkers, but I can only see engagement with poetry growing in the future.  Each identifiable niche of the media seems to have an increasingly audible voice, and with people's attention spans allegedly shrinking, poetry could go truly 'mainstream' (the way erotic fiction has) at any moment.  I'm waiting...

In 2013 came the intriguing news that Valley Press and another small press publisher, The Emma Press – known in particular for its Mildly Erotic anthology – had become “engaged” with a view to marriage. Can you explain this a bit more?

I heard about the Emma Press when Emma published her first book... there was just something about that book, and the press, and its owner, that captured and held my attention like nothing I'd ever seen before.  As me and Emma began communicating, in a series of lengthy emails, I realised our values were pretty much exactly aligned.  Not only did I believe the Emma Press was destined for great things, I wanted to do all I could to help it get there; so we began sharing information and resources in an admirably selfless manner, as well as selling each other's books at markets and events.

The 'engagement' was our idea for formalising this arrangement, in the amusing, romantic and wholesome style preferred by Emma and myself.  Our first act post-engagement was to start a joint blog - see here for the first post, announcing our intentions.  This connection is probably the best thing that ever happened to Valley Press, and I'm keen to keep it going (and growing) in the years to come... though we haven't set a date yet for the 'wedding', which would perhaps come with a shared anthology.  To add a pleasant extra note of complication, I myself am engaged and planning a wedding at the moment, so the key question is: will l beat Valley Press to the altar...?

What has been your most satisfying moment in poetry publishing so far?

The moments I remember the most are the book launches; where it's a book by a person I really admire and respect, we've spent months editing/designing it and got it exactly right, and where dozens and dozens of people horde in and buy big handfuls of copies each.  There was the palace visit as well (see below), but nothing can compare to nights that fit the description above - and I have been lucky enough to have quite a few of those.

Your website mentions the weighty number of submissions you receive each year.  How should a poet who wishes to be published approach you?  Are there any dos and don’ts?

I am constantly grappling with submissions, and it is not an understatement to say I change my policy on them every month - which can be quite frustrating for submitters, I imagine.  A look at the statistics should deter people even further: since I started seeking subs in 2011, I have received more than a thousand unsolicited submissions and published just six of them (with the other titles coming into existence more organically).  All of those six broke through on quality alone; in a couple of cases, they were the best examples of a genre I was keen to try, but it was still quality that got them through.  So the only 'do' for submitters is, write an amazing book - one that happens to sync up exactly with my own tastes.  On you go!

One thing I plan to do (and Emma has already started, I think) is to only accept submissions from people who have purchased a book through the Valley Press website in the past few months - this may be a slightly controversial approach, but it's started to make a lot of sense.  Before I can re-open submissions with that new rule though, I need to work through a big bag of unread manuscripts that has been ignored since September... watch this space!

Your website says you’ve designed nearly all the Valley Press book covers. Again, are there any rules you think should be followed, in creating the look of a book?

The most important rule of cover design is to not give up until it's perfect, or at least at a truly professional standard.  When creating a cover, you should look at it and think: 'would (major publishing house) publish a book with this cover..?'  You have to be brutally honest with yourself, and if the answer is 'no', keep working.

I'm ashamed to say I haven't always followed that bit of advice, for a variety of reasons, but I have done okay (for someone with no design training) and plan to continually improve this aspect of the business in future.  My approach now is to realise my limitations as a designer, and concentrate on getting the most interesting, eye-catching, high-quality photographs for the covers - then adding simple text that doesn't detract or draw attention from the photo.  I can see this becoming a sort of 'house style' in future, though I would never go with the conformist, 'series' covers that a lot of poetry publishers employ (not that there's anything wrong with those).  The great thing about the 'photo/simple text' approach is it doesn't require a great deal of technical skill; just a bit of positioning and good taste.

Readers can see all the VP covers on this page, if they are curious.  I should also mention, in the interests of having a holiday this year, I do hire out my cover design skills for extraordinarily reasonable rates - contact me through the website if you need one doing.

You have your own book of poems, The Dead Snail Diaries. Does publishing get in the way of your creative output at all?

It definitely does, and the truth is I haven't been able to write a single poem since I started full-time publishing back in January 2011.  It was literally off like a switch - until then I used to write at least one a week, after that, not a thing.  If any psychologists are reading this... what happened there?  Answers on a postcard!

Fortunately, by that point I had written enough poems about snails to create a themed collection, and though the VP edition is now out of print, I'm pleased to report the Emma Press will be re-releasing The Dead Snail Diaries (with new illustrations by Emma) later this year.  It will be extremely bizarre to be on the other end of the publishing process for a change, and to be promoting myself and my writing again after a three-year break, but I'm looking forward to it.

Finally, how did you enjoy the recent poetry reception at Buckingham Palace? What was it like to meet the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh?

It was a wonderful experience, a real once-in-a-lifetime thing, to walk through the halls and see the not-too-rebellious cream of British poetry there in their best suits and frocks (and queuing to get their coats back at the end... very strange to see the likes of Armitage and McGough in that context).  It was a night where I'd pass someone, look at their namebadge, and double-take on realising who this was, remembering all the incredible poems I'd read by them over the years.  And it was such a compliment to be invited; it's really the only recognition or reward I've had for my publishing so far, the first hint that what I'm doing might be somehow important - and you can't imagine how chuffed my old mum was when I showed her the invite.

As for the Queen and the Duke, the meeting could best be described as surreal - as they ushered us through the corridors, at one point I looked around and said: 'this is intense!', at which a footman appeared and said, 'this way sir'.  My name was then called out, I stepped round a corner and the Queen was literally there, suddenly, in front of my eyes... I have no memory of what followed, but the official photographs include one of me shaking hands with her and one of me bowing awkwardly, so I know I didn't go too far wrong.  A night to remember, in any case.

Mike Di Placido reviewed by Jonny Aldridge

JM: I don't normally post reviews, but this is a great piece, not currently available on any website - but soon to be published in Myths of the Near Future magazine. Mr. Aldridge is fast becoming one of my favourite reviewers - check out his ingeniously-formatted thoughts on Miles Salter's Animals here.

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"A master of tone": Mike Di Placido's A Sixty-Watt Las Vegas

In short: this is a very very good book of poems by Mike Di Placido. Having moved on from his professional footballing days in debut pamphlet Theatre of Dreams (Smith/Doorstop, 2009), he has returned with witty, funny and bold poetry from a Yorkshire "househusband". That explains the poem about a hoover, then.

These 30 poems are an idiosyncratic bunch: three are vignettes of animals, four are imagined meetings with T.S. (Eliot), Ted (Hughes), Simon (Armitage?) and Dickens, and seven are set in Scarborough with musings on Britishness, history and suicide. All are first-person narrated, a lot with "you" present too. And they are mostly very personal and very engaging.

Di Placido's at his best when he is writing—we presume—autobiographically. We meet the dad, the wife, the godson, the first employer 'Albert', and we find out "whatever happened to uncles". The writing probes at nostalgia—embracing it, but cynically—as when the narrator reminisces on his first job as a porter’s assistant at "The Norbreck Hotel, Scarborough, 1968". "Then we lost touch. As you do", he writes:

"Until today that is, when, walking down

memory lane past the hotel, I see you staring

owl-like through a window,

waiting for the coaches to arrive."

There is a clever play going on here, with the "lane past the hotel" pun and the simple diction only hinting at the importance of "memory" in preserving our idols, in this case preserving them almost in "cryogenic suspension" ('Uncles'). We would be privileged to get more of this from Di Placido, and I would happily read an autobiography of his whole life in poetry if it came in at this standard.

Di Placido is a master of tone: he plays the literary muser, the true romantic, the social commentator and the stand-up comic all in one. I think he knows this, and is very sly in using it to his advantage. In 'Heron' we expect a comic skit on this "ridiculous" bird, "this gangling oddball", and then he ends with this magnificent stanza:

"But not that skewer of a beak

you imagine a fish seeing

through the shattering glass,

the whirl of water."

That "shattering glass" is the best poetic phrase I've seen in a long time. And if you read it with Di Placido's Yorkshire rasp, the dropped vowels make it all the more impressive. (Here he is reading 'Hare'.) This is not the only instance where Di Placido approaches the issue of underestimation. The witty opener to 'Alfie's Magic Wand' doubles as a "serious" statement on the topic of audience and reception: "He started to cry when he first saw me, / which I took as a positive sign – / nice to be taken seriously."

Having said this, let's not write him off as a defendant for the underdog. Within Di Placido's colloquial style these poems are esoteric, ultra-specific and intellectually acute. Because of this, you get insight into Di Placido's inspirations and motivations. Most poems are anchored by a real detail, a time, a place, which he has remembered and wanted to sanctify in poetry. I love that 'To R. S. Thomas' begins with a sentence-long quotation on poetry and God from a daily newspaper—"R.S. Thomas (The Independent, Saturday 27th February 1993)". And twenty years later Mike has published a poem about it! Another poem cites an article from "Scarborough Evening News, 13th March 1991", but then others are inspired by Christopher Smart’s 18th-century religious poem ‘Jubilate Agno’ or Robert Lowell’s ‘Memories of West Street and Lepke’. Di Placido takes inspiration from wherever and whenever—which isn't to say everywhere and anytime—and he re-imagines events in his own inimitable style.

The weakness? A couple of poems seem to jar with the rest of the collection, something which could be easily avoided by more rigorous editing. These are times when Di Placido tries for an elevated and urgent tone, and it falls flat. In 'Recovery' especially, where "you’ve pieced back / together your heart, / re-inserted those eyes", or 'The Assassin' (death) who "does answer us / when we interrogate the arid silence / [...] silence is his answer". The poet obviously felt the need to make this collection more dynamic but, seeing as this kind of drama doesn't come easy to him, he should have more trust in his own voice.

Of course, a true test for any work is how much it fails to meet the publisher's description. In this case, Valley Press says that the poems "demonstrate wit, wisdom, and Di Placido’s continuing ability to reveal the extraordinary from the ordinary." It's a credit to Mike's work that this is pretty much true. And at 27p per poem, this collection is well worth it. Go. Buy.

A Sixty-Watt Las Vegas by Mike Di Placido is published by Valley Press at £7.99

A little bit of how's your father/motherhood anthology

Publishing 27th Feb 2014

We've had a great response to our call for submissions to The Emma Press Anthology of Motherhood and The Emma Press Anthology of Fatherhood, with 346 people from around the world sending in their poems before the deadline on 9th December. We received 170 submissions to our anthology of Mildly Erotic Verse earlier in the year, so we were slightly startled by the response to this new call, and delighted by the number of people who felt moved to submit.

Rachel (my co-editor) and I have now read all of the poems (nearly 1000!) and we met up last week to compare notes. It took 8 solid hours of discussion over two days, during which we found that most poems fell into one of a handful of categories. Popular ones included: loving portraits of children and pregnancies; anxious reflections on the responsibilities of parenthood; difficult relationships with parents; and poets considering their parents in the light of their own parenthood. In order to create a balanced pair of collections, we tried to select the strongest poems in each category, but the extremely high standard of submissions meant it was frequently difficult to make the final call.

Publishing 29th May 2014

We ended up with two shortlists from which we'll be crafting our final selections next week, and I hope to start sending out responses in the last couple of weeks of January. I can already tell that these are going to be two incredible books, full of wisdom and heartbreaking insights, and I can't wait to share them with everyone next month and in May. In the meantime, I am also very excited about the covers (exclusively revealed on this blog), and about the launch party for the Anthology of Motherhood, which will be on Thursday 27th February in Vauxhall, London. I hope that lots of Emma Press supporters will come along to support us - do join the Facebook group or put it in your diary if you'd like to attend. I will also try to take the books out of London and around the country, so watch this space.

My opinions on The Future of Poetry Publishing, which I was too excited and unrequired to divulge at the Northern Lights Writers' Conference

Jamie and I on our way to the Waterside Centre

I've been thinking a lot lately about the improvisational nature of the Emma Press, so I was delighted to be asked to be on the panel at the 'D.I.Y. Publishing' talk in Manchester a few weeks ago, and even more delighted when it transpired that Jamie would also be there, along with Wes Brown of Dead Ink.

The talk was part of the Northern Light Writers' Conference, organised by the lovely Richard Evans, and it took the form of a Q&A led by Leeds writer SJ Bradley. Jamie, Wes and I each explained our route into the small publishing world before tackling questions about the importance of energetic authors, how to get reviews and press coverage, and how to find an audience. Here's a nice excerpt from Desmond Bullen's review of the Northern Lights Writers' Conference:

'The opening panel’s reservations about self-publishing (quite apart from E.L. James’ literary infelicities, her success is the rarest of exceptions to the general rule) might have blanketed the D.I.Y. Press panel with the damp of caution. That it did not owed much to the tripartite enthusiasm and youthful momentum of Wes Brown of Dead Ink Books, Jamie McGarry of Valley Press and Emma Wright of The Emma Press.'

It was very enjoyable, and I was so excited to be on a panel at last that I completely forgot to steamroller the event with my list of the strengths of small poetry publishers. I think they're still worth an airing, particularly given the concerns raised at a recent Byte the Book event on the future of poetry publishing, so here they are:

The Future of Poetry Publishing: the secret weapons of the small poetry publishing world

1. Commissioning apparently uncommercial titles. The received wisdom that there's no money in poetry is oddly liberating, because there's no sense of there being an obviously lucrative strategem from which we diverge at our own peril. We could try and copy Faber, but why not instead do what Faber can't, and take a chance on strange little books and booklets which we love and believe in? Why not publish an illustrated pamphlet of poems about Angela Lansbury, which is so bloody gorgeous that even people who never saw Murder She Wrote love it at first sight?
2. Unconventional book design. You'll never see so many self-consciously classy-looking books as in the poetry section of a bookshop. The idea is, I guess, that poetry is a serious artform and everyone wants to look like Faber, with their iconic typographical covers. But Faber sells books because they are Faber, not because of their cover design! Unless you have a poet with a name like 'Harry Styles', a text-only cover is not going to help sales, and nor will an image of mist and some fences. Instead, how about giving ...
3. individual attention to each title, from the cover to the marketing. It doesn't make sense to apply the same methods to every title, especially when you're a tiny publisher. The cover and interior design should express the character of the book, and I firmly believe that when the publisher manages this then the whole book stands out for being the thoughtfully-crafted object it is. You won't fool anyone into thinking you are Faber, but you can convince them that you're a more fascinating proposition altogether. I was told by a bookseller that The Flower and the Plough was too bright, handmade-looking and small for mainstream bookshops, but people at fairs and markets still reach for and buy it. See also: how Sidekick Books launched their Angela Lansbury book.
4. Developing authors. Once again, because there is no money in it, allegedly, why bother cutting corners? Shoving a poet through a sausage machine is pointless when there's only pence to be made anyway, and there are so few household-name poets that it's better to develop some potential superstars rather than attempt to poach Simon Armitage from Faber. Jamie writes on the Valley Press site that he spends the majority of his time editing, and so do I, along with the powerhouse that is Rachel Piercey, who thank god is on my team. If all publishers waited around for perfectly-formed poems and poets to fall through their letterbox, readers would miss out on a plethora of delights. 
5. The personal approach. Bigger publishers rejoice in business-y names, or the surnames of men no-one remembers anymore, but smaller publishers are labours of love and still intimately connected with their founders' personalities and idiosyncrasies, so why pretend otherwise?

So there you go, my thoughts on poetry publishing, as untold to the audience at the Waterside Centre in Sale. Despite the repeated received wisdom, I do happen to think there is money in poetry publishing, but that's the subject of a future blog.

Notes from the Mildly Erotic Poetry Tour

While Jamie's been publishing books up in Scarborough at a rate of knots and also planning our engagement party (yes, this is happening), I've been on tour. Poetry tour. This still feels a shocking state of affairs, given my fear of public speaking and still-fresh memories of dreadful Latin reading competitions, but I'm learning to deal with it and with every show my nerves are slightly better.

My flier design for the tour

Needless to say, it wasn't my love of performing which led me to plan the Mildly Erotic Poetry Tour. Rather, it was my enjoyment of all the conversations Rachel (Piercey, my co-editor and co-conspirator) and I had with the poets from The Emma Press Anthology of Mildly Erotic Verse when we met up with them to introduce ourselves. I wrote about one aspect of the experience over on the Erotic Review, but what I didn't mention was how dazzled I was by all the poets' thoughts on eroticism. It felt like a natural – albeit terrifying – step to create a show around them and to take their poetry to a wider audience, so we started planning a tour: a small one in case we didn't get Arts Council funding, and a larger one for if we did.

Amazingly, we did. Thanks to a couple of very helpful discussions in the Arts Council London office, tweaking my application to emphasise the way we were trying to reach people who might not usually attend poetry shows, my proposal was accepted and we were able to go ahead with the 10-date tour and actually pay the poets and ourselves. I'd cut it quite fine with my application, so I was plunged instantly into a whirlwind of tour admin at the same time as planning the launch of the anthology and now, just under 2 months after receiving the funding, we're already halfway through the tour.

Jon Stone performing at the Gallery Cafe, Bethnal Green

We kicked off straight after the launch party with a tiny gig on September 28th in the shop window of Penny Fielding Beautiful Interiors in Walthamstow, home of mildly erotic poet Ruth Wiggins, before heading to Bethnal Green, stomping ground of Jon Stone and Kirsten Irving, for a larger show at the Gallery Cafe. Then we had a couple of weeks off before resuming the tour in Brighton, Belfast and Stratford-upon-Avon, all in the space of 6 days, visiting local poets Hugh Dunkerley, Stephen Sexton and Richard O'Brien respectively.

Introducing the poets at Bookfinders, Belfast

And it's been going well! We've had audience sizes ranging from 8 to 39, and people have emailed us afterwards to describe the erotic epiphanies they've experienced as a result of the show (kidding). I've loved seeing how the people respond, and I've even begun to relax enough in between introductions to actually listen to the poems myself. The best show so far might have been Belfast, which Stephen Connolly from The Lifeboat helped me organise. The audience was small but so responsive that they burst into spontaneous applause at some poems, much to the EP crew's delight. The open mic section at Stratford-upon-Avon was also very exciting, as the local poets really embraced the theme. I'm still frantically promoting the remaining 5 dates, but after that I will begin thinking about my next tour, because there must be a next tour, and it must be even bigger! Jamie is currently planning his VP50 (Five Years, Fifty Books) nationwide tour, so between us by next year we should have accumulated some pretty extensive experience and our subsequent touring powers will be pretty spectacular.

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The Mildly Erotic Poetry Tour is stopping by London (31st Oct), Norwich (2nd Nov), Reading (3rd Nov), and Oxford (8th and 16th Nov). Full details here.

Making No Marks: Behind the Scenes in the Valley Press Pamphlet Department

In August 2013, Valley Press entered Phobia, Form, Sea Swim, Destroyed Dresses and Couples into the Michael Marks Awards for Poetry Pamphlets, which also gives an award to recognise an outstanding UK publisher of poetry in pamphlet form. This week, the shortlist for both awards was announced: to Valley Press, the judges awarded the special prize of no mention whatsoever.

Fortunately I'm an excellent loser, and in that spirit, I am posting the thousand or so words I wrote in my entry form for the award (composed over many long, candlelit evenings - but not as many as it took to produce the pamphlets!) To find out about more successful pamphlet publishing operations, see here, otherwise read on...


Please give a brief description of your pamphlet publishing programme from Jan 2012 to June 2013, with a statement of your publishing philosophy, aims, strategy and future plans with regard to poetry pamphlets.

Pamphlet publishing programme - Between January 2012 and June 2013 I published five pamphlets, all poetry, varying in length between 26 and 38 pages. I had an open submission policy during this period, though only one of the five was a true unsolicited submission: two were commissions where I contacted the authors directly, and two were established writers who contacted me with a specific project in mind.

Publishing philosophy - I run Valley Press full-time, as a (theoretically) profit-making business, without funding, with each new print run funded by sales of the last one. With this in mind, and so much at stake, you may ask: why did I choose to publish five of the ‘slim volumes’ this competition is celebrating?

I am passionate about pamphlets. When I started publishing, I found some resistance to this form; buyers at the chains didn’t think a poetry pamphlet could be successfully stocked, and as a result, my sales agency didn’t include pamphlets in their catalogue or represent them to the trade – though I’m pleased to say I later changed their minds on this issue, based on the success of my pamphlet programme from Jan 2012 to June 2013.

The three main reasons I pursue pamphlet publishing are as follows: a) they are ideal for young poets who have a growing reputation and an existing fanbase, but – crucially – not enough poems to merit a full collection; b) they are ideal for short-form projects by established authors, ideas that would lose appeal if stretched over a full-length book; c) if priced and displayed correctly, they can be ideal impulse-buy items for readers who wouldn’t buy poetry ordinarily, or haven’t a lot of cash to spend on new books. Also, there is the great economic plus of pamphlets: they inevitably require fewer resources (less investment in cash and time) than a longer publication, which is great for me. All of the pamphlets entered have made a significant profit; enough to justify my time working on them, at least.

As for the content of the pamphlets, I am looking for poetry that can appeal to both a complete novice – perhaps someone who has never bought a poetry book in their life – but also people who are passionate about poetry, and have been regularly spending money on poetry books for decades. This may sound like an ambitious goal, and it is, but hopefully as you read the pamphlets you will agree I have achieved this (though perhaps with varying degrees of success).

Aims/Strategy - My primary aim, once I had found my five pamphlets, was simply to sell as many as I could – you can read how I went about fulfilling this aim in my answers to the next two questions.

Future plans - I plan to continue publishing pamphlets in the future; I am currently pursuing several poets for 2014, and I don’t plan to change my approach as described above and below.


Please provide a brief statement of the design and print criteria you employed in publishing poetry pamphlets in 2012 and 2013.  This will be looked at in conjunction with your submitted pamphlets.

The most distinctive feature of my design and print criteria for pamphlets is that it does not vary at all from my approach to a full-length collection. I use the same printer, the same format (all my pamphlets have spines, important for bookshop display), and spend the same amount of time designing the covers for my pamphlets as I do any other book.

This means, instead of forming a ‘series’ of covers, each of my books has a unique cover and design, which illustrates either the mood, the topic or the themes of the book (ideally, all three). Initially I concentrate on finding a high-quality photo or illustration, then I choose a font and arrangement of that font to complement it. For the back covers, I use review extracts where possible, otherwise samples of the poems (or both). My most successful pamphlet cover is probably Destroyed Dresses, where I used an old dress-pattern packet, front and back, erasing some (but not all) of the original text and replacing it with text relating to the book.

With regards to internal design, I simply attempt to display the text as clearly, and with as much ‘class’, as possible. If I didn’t make this clear earlier, I do all the design work on these pamphlets myself – this is how I am able to make a profit.

My 2013 pamphlet Couples had a special design feature – the author had written the poems in complementary pairs (or ‘couples’), so I set the book with the poems in their pairs facing each other, usually justified towards an equal margin in the spine. I also split up the acknowledgements and contents pages to keep this theme consistent. The cover photo for Couples was staged specially for that cover; I actually appear on it, as an ‘extra’ in the background.


Please provide a brief statement of your sales and promotional strategy and activities for poetry pamphlets in 2012 and 2013, giving examples of achievements.

Email newsletter: Many of my general promotional efforts are aimed at increasing the subscribers of the Valley Press email newsletter, with a particular focus on getting regular buyers of new poetry titles to subscribe, and value the newsletters as entertainment in their own right. In this way, I have a direct route to these buyers, and can explain to them in an unhurried way why they should purchase the pamphlets. I have doubled my newsletter subscribers every six months since I launched the business (today, more than 600), and I feel most of my website sales (and thus, most sales of the pamphlets) are a result of this.

Social media: Valley Press has a presence on all the main social networks, and fortunately, with the pamphlet authors being on the younger end of the age spectrum, so do they. As such, I make sure everyone on my networks and the authors’ is aware of each publication; not by posting a link over and over again, but by sharing samples, news, or original creative content related to the title.

Web advertising: All five of my pamphlets had a particular marketing ‘angle’, which I could exploit on services such as Facebook adverts and Google adwords. For example: I aimed Destroyed Dresses at young women interested in literature and/or vintage items (the book has a vintage feel), and I aimed Couples at people with an interest in – or suspicion of – all things romantic (it was released on Valentine’s Day).

Events: Readings, or chat-show style events, are another essential angle for promoting pamphlets. With some help from me, the authors have done a dozen readings each since the publication of their pamphlets.

Yours sincerely,

Jamie McGarry

Editor, Valley Press