Small Press

We feel our operations need to be positioned within a sphere of revolt and radical will. Pure, pure love.

But expression (not only in myself outwards but by other people inwards) has always enabled me to find optimism. The name of the press embodies this sort of optimistic cynicism.

We believe a book provides a theater for the words, where the stage starts with the cover and moves inward through the physical narrative established by the pages—a journey through time and space.

I believe very strongly in the mission of the small presses. Far beyond the froth of commercial publishers, independent and small presses are largely where literature is born and lives.

I think that the kind of work you can encounter in micro-press publishing is where it’s at. Sure, it may not fit perfectly on your bookshelf, that accounting of one’s intelligence… but it is where poetry is most free, and so obviously, best.

Our aesthetic focus has always been on creating handmade, unique publications which, in their format, do justice to the writing published in them.

It’s as if 11:11 Press wanted to exist, and I happened to pick up on its wavelength and brought it into physical being. It’s like gravity or magnetism, and I can’t help but do it, and do it in a way that is fair for the authors, readers, and editors.

Our aesthetic builds on the idea of resonance, and poems that can offer moments of discovery with every new reading. Our mission is to be “committed to upholding the values that make poems timeless.”

Backbone is a niche press that focuses on writers of color and culture writing. We believe, in art, but certainly the literary arts, every voice is essential.

We believe in the fissures art can create in consciousness when, even if just for a moment, we experience a more vital way of operating in the world—and through that moment then seek out more extreme and enlightened modes of existence.

It can feel like a labour-intensive process, but I’ve found that there’s huge appreciation, from both the poets and the readers, when effort is made to give the words a beautiful home.

Website Submission Guidelines Interview with Joan Baranow and David Watts, Editors How did Wolf Ridge Press start? Our press started in 2008 when David had put together a collection of…

In the early months of 2017, we were discussing how often writers of formal or experimental poetry in Canada had to go through a man to publish a chapbook of experimental literature. We wanted to provide a space for writers to publish experimental, formal, political, feminist, or genre-blurring poetry that wasn’t governed by a dude.

Eventually I read a few manuscripts by people that hadn’t been published anywhere, and I knew they deserved to be out in the world, so I started Broken Sleep to publish the voices that weren’t getting recognition—and to focus on working-class writers to an extent.