Women in Independent Publishing: A History of Unsung Innovators, 1953-1989 [Paperback]

Women in Independent Publishingis a collection of interviews with and resources about women actively engaged in small-press publishing between the 1950s and the 1980s. The interviewees include Hettie Jones, Margaret Randall, Bernadette Mayer, and many others.

The scope and range of the interviews showcase a variety of types of publishing possible within the small press community. These interviews illuminate the unifying and diverging elements between multiple publishing “scenes” and reveal their particularities and commonalities.Women in Independent Publishingis a timely and urgent documentation of literary history and reveals and celebrates the multifaceted roles of women editors and publishers and the communities they built.

The book includes a critical introduction, an afterword by contemporary small-press publisher M. C. Hyland and a robust resources section that provides further paths for reading and literary recovery.Stephanie Andersonis an assistant professor of literature and creative writing at Duke Kunshan University in China. She is the author of three books of poetry and the coeditor ofAll This Thinking: The Correspondence of Bernadette Mayer and Clark Coolidge(UNM Press).“This long-overdue tribute to women publishers and editors in the small and independent press world is chock full of fascinating interviews and resource information. While creating ‘presses of their own,’ these women had a profound influence on the poetry, literature, and politics of the last half of the twentieth century. Women in Independent Publishing is a must-read for book lovers everywhere.”—David Unowsky, founder of The Hungry Mind Review“Book artists will find in this work fascinating details about the publishing process, but every reader will be moved by the personal energy that drove these women to become publishers and the powerful network of friends and commlsŠ