Dwelling in Possibility: Adrienne Rich, Poetry, & Printing

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Dwelling in Possibility: Adrienne Rich, Poetry, & Printing

Dwelling in Possibility:

Adrienne Rich, Poetry, & Printing

An introduction by Emily Hancock

Adrienne Rich. Photo copyright by Robert Giard.

Adrienne Rich. Photo copyright by Robert Giard.

There are some touchstone texts that seem to be always current, always resonant with wisdom, always “present” with us, whatever the year and however much the political and/or personal landscapes may have changed. 

Many of the essays of Adrienne Rich (1929-2012) are such touchstones. I first encountered the transformative work of this American poet and essayist in graduate school, in her prose collection Blood, Bread, and Poetry, in which she declares (with Audre Lorde) that poetry is not (and poets are not) superfluous, but as necessary and nourishing as food and air to the person—the people—we might be and become. Poetry is communion and it is frontier—the meeting of the other and the self.

Jacket for St Brigid Press' edition of Adrienne Rich's essay, printed letterpress on Thai mulberry "water drops" paper.

One of Rich’s essays, “Permeable Membrane,” is this sort of text—invigorating, relentless, and charged with readiness to affect (infect?) the reader with its power and possibility. Again and again. First published in 2006, “Permeable Membrane” is a short piece capable of waking us up, of challenging our complacency, our silence, and our siloed existences.

Convinced of the inseparability of art and society, poetry and politics, Rich argues for and invokes a relational understanding of language: "Art is a way of melting out through one's own skin. 'What, who is this about?' is not the essential question. A poem is not about; it is out of and to.” As individuals and communities and a nation, we exist in a dynamic ocean of thought, culture, politics. We’re in the conversation—“root-tangled in the grit of human arrangements and relationships,” as Rich writes—whether we know it, like it, or actively participate in it or not.

Rich navigates both mystery (the “ghostly” presence and process of writing poetry) and politics (solidarity movements, dictatorship, and the American political machine) with equal subtlety, drawing from sources historical and literary to illuminate the world we find ourselves in as well as some of the choices and consequences that are laid before us. With the precision and prescience of an artist who has her finger on our pulse, Rich’s essay that was first published 12 years ago reads like it hit the newsstand this morning.

St Brigid Press' letterpress printed edition releases on March 8th—International Women's Day.

St Brigid Press' edition of "Permeable Membrane" was hand-set in Goudy Old Style type (cast by Patrick Reagh in California), printed on a hand-cranked press, and sewn by hand. 

Why print something that is still available in numerous books and anthologies? One answer is that part of the job of craft is to make new what is not; to re-new and re-connect us, from the craftperson’s hand to the receiver’s. From me to you. An energetic and artistic renewal, and a conversation, happens in this process. The poet and essayist Jane Hirshfield says, “A work of art is not a piece of fruit lifted from the tree branch: it is a ripening collaboration of artist, receiver, and world.”

Another answer is personal to me: as much as I believe in and engage with the fantastic literature that is emerging daily, I believe in and desire to offer anew the already written—works like Rich’s and Thoreau’s and King’s that for years have been leaping off pages, enlarging perspectives, and spurring creative engagement. Each time we return to these touchstones, their wisdom becomes present again, positive change for our communities becomes possible again, and we become empowered again.

My hope for offering this edition of Adrienne Rich’s “Permeable Membrane” is that you may lean with her into the conversation and perhaps join more consciously in the great current of art that is making and re-making us, the poetry that is “language intensified, intensifying our sense of possible reality.”

If you would like to order the St Brigid Press edition of "Permeable Membrane," please click HERE. Scroll down below for additional details and photos of the booklet and the process of creating it.

The booklet's technical specs:

  • Hand-set in Goudy Old Style metal types, with Phenix titling.
  • 16 pages, letterpress printed on Mohawk Superfine text paper, with Thai mulberry paper jacket.
  • Frontispiece print is a digital reproduction of an original watercolor by Nancy Maxson, commissioned specially for this publication.
  • Hand-sewn with Irish linen thread.
  • Limited edition of 190 numbered copies.
  • $28 each.

Very special thanks and appreciation goes to our friend and collaborator Nancy Maxson, who created a marvelous watercolor painting, entitled Mirror, to accompany this edition of "Permeable Membrane." The painting was digitally reproduced on fine vellum paper at Bailey Printing in Charlottesville, and serves as the frontispiece to the edition.

Thanks also to W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., for permission to reprint "Permeable Membrane."

If you'd like to read more of Adrienne Rich's prose writing, here are a few titles to get you started:

  • A Human Eye: Essays on Art in Society, 1997-2008 (the collection in which "Permeable Membrane" appears)
  • Arts of the Possible: Essays and Conversations (which collects Rich's earlier essay, "Blood, Bread, and Poetry")
  • What Is Found There: Notebooks on Poetry and Politics

Some photos of "the making of" our edition of "Permeable Membrane": click the images to see a larger photo and accompanying text.

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Walking into Winter

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Walking into Winter

One of the greatest gifts my parents and grandparents gave to me as a girl was the gift of walking. Of taking strolls along sandy roads at dusk, watching bats and stars appear. And hours-long rambles through rolling fields and woodlands—ears tuned to the drum of woodpeckers, eyes following threads of light among stands of hardwoods or pine. These walks wove the senses, and patterned the language that would eventually make poems from such experience. 

One of these poems is “Walking into Winter.” Included in my forthcoming book, The Open Gate: New & Selected Poems, it seemed a fitting piece to also offer to you all now, as the late November days begin to darken early and the last wild seeds are being cast to the wind. It’s a time of letting go, and of gathering in. 

Below, you can read “Walking into Winter,” listen to an audio clip as I read the poem aloud, and watch a brief movie of butterfly-weed pods opening in our field. As we journey into this winter season, may we each carry light and warmth within, tending the seeds that will sprout again come spring.

Listen as the author reads her poem:

Watch butterfly weed seeds in the breezy field at St Brigid Press. This native species of milkweed is slowly expanding on our land, providing food for insects.

If  you are in the area, please join us for the official book launch this coming Sunday, December 3rd, at 2pm, at Black Swan Books (Staunton, Va.). We'll have light refreshments, read some poems, and celebrate together.

If you can't attend, you may pre-order the book on our website here: 

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Printing, Circa 1776

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Printing, Circa 1776

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a demonstration of the University of Virginia’s replica wooden common press:

The common press at the University of Virginia.

The earliest printing presses in Europe, from the time of Johannes Gutenberg and his associates Peter Schöffer and Johann Fust, were constructed primarily out of wood. Using similar technologies as contemporary agricultural presses (for winemaking, papermaking, olive oil extraction, and linen pressing), these 15th century printing presses used a wooden screw to lower a heavy wooden plate onto a bed holding cast metal type. The screw was turned by pulling a lever, or "bar" (also called the Devil's Tail ;-). Wooden common presses remained in use until the early 1800s, when iron handpresses and new types of cylinder and platen presses were developed.

Josef Beery demonstrating UVA's wooden common press.

UVA’s common press was constructed in the 1970s, as a result of research at the Smithsonian Institution on the "Franklin" common press. It is on display in the Harrison Small Building’s South Gallery. Though the bar is kept locked for safety most of the time, you can still walk right up to the press and examine much of its design and function. Occasionally, folks associated with UVA’s Rare Book School offer working demonstrations.

The session I attended last week was lead by Josef Beery ~ book designer, letterpress printer, woodcut artist, papermaker, educator, and cofounder of the Virginia Arts of the Book Center in Charlottesville. A practitioner of the printing arts for many decades, Beery is a perfect guide to the history and use of this fascinating press.

When you finish marveling at the wooden common press, head downstairs to the Albert & Shirley Small Special Collections Library. A highlight of the Library’s wonderful collection of rare books and manuscripts (including significant holdings in the history of books and printing) is a rare first-printing of the Declaration of Independence, printed the night of July 4th by John Dunlap. It’s on permanent display along with many other early printings of the document (the world’s most comprehensive collection of these) near the Library’s entrance.

If you're ever in the vicinity of Charlottesville, Virginia, don't miss this chance to see the common press, the Declaration of Independence, and many other artifacts of printing-circa-1776!

* For more information on early American printing history, visit the American Printing History Association (APHA) website.

* To follow the fascinating process of reconstructing a wooden common press, visit Seth Gottlieb's blog post series at APHA.

* Watch Josef Beery demonstrating the traditional method of using ink balls to apply ink to the type on a common press:

Josef Beery using traditional ink balls to apply ink to the type on the University of Virginia's replica wooden common press.

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Simple Binding for Single-Section Booklets

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Simple Binding for Single-Section Booklets

Sometimes a little bit of extra effort gives a lot of extra elegance to a project. Such is the case with this style of binding a single-signature booklet to a jacket-with-a-spine. 

I learned this from the fabulous Myrna Keliher of Expedition Press, and she learned it from the wonderful printers and binders at Stern and Faye. 

Below is a step-by-step outline of the binding style. But first, here's a two-minute video I took in my shop, showing the basics of affixing the pamphlet-sewn booklet to the scored-and-printed jacket:

THE BASICS: 

  • Sew your single-section booklet. In my video example, it's a five-hole pamphlet stitch pattern.
  • Prepare the jacket you wish to encase your booklet in, printing any text on the cover, and scoring the paper stock where you want the folds to be. In my video example, I determined how wide I wanted the spine to be (a quarter-inch) and how wide I wanted the flaps to be (about 3 inches), then made the scores and folds. (I use an inexpensive Martha Stewart brand "scoring board" to make accurate creases.)
  • With a narrow brush (quarter-inch or so), run a thin line of glue along the back of the last sheet (your booklet's endpaper), about a half-inch in from the sewn edge.
  • Position the booklet, back (glued) page down, on the inside back jacket cover, and press gently to adhere the page to the jacket.
  • Fold in any flaps, and close the jacket over the booklet.
  • Voila! A sweet, simple, smart-looking book!

All the best to you in your own creative adventures!

St Brigid Press

*** For more information about the book shown above, A Handbook for Creative Protest: Thoreau, Gandhi, & King in Conversation, please see our post HERE.

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The Preface from "A Handbook for Creative Protest"

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The Preface from "A Handbook for Creative Protest"

Listen to author Emily Hancock read the Preface from our newest publication:

A Handbook for Creative Protest: Thoreau, Gandhi, & King in Conversation

For more information about the book, please see our post Here.

To pre-order a copy ($22), please email us ~ info@stbrigidpress.net

Join us on Sunday, July 23rd, at 2pm at Black Swan Books in Staunton for the official launch! Emily will be reading from and signing copies of the Handbook.

 

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Old Poems, New Forms

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Old Poems, New Forms

During some Spring Cleaning at the Press a few weeks ago, I rediscovered a sweet small project that had somehow gotten buried by other works-in-progress. 

“Overnight on Abiding-Integrity River”

an unfolding poem

Ancient Chinese poetry has long been an enjoyment of mine, particularly poems translated by David Hinton. And a favorite author that Hinton translates beautifully is the early T’ang Dynasty poet Meng Hao-jan (689-740 C.E.).

One of Meng’s crystalline four-line poems struck me as a lovely candidate for a miniature book. At 2-inches square and a half-inch thick, this unfolding journey is small in size but large in scope. Meng’s linked, sensory lines seemed to naturally suit themselves to a linked, tactile format.

I set the poem in metal type, printed it on my trusty foot-treadled Golding press, and cut-and-assembled the paper pieces by hand to form the book. It’s a very limited edition — just 21 books. $15 each.

If you'd like a little ancient new book of poetry, click here.

Many thanks,

St Brigid Press

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Thoreau and Friends

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Thoreau and Friends

Hi dear Friends of the Press,

As the temperatures rise on this eve of the Summer solstice, we are rocketing along with new work here at St Brigid Press. Thanks for taking a moment to hear about it!

Recently we turned our attention to a new book honoring someone with a Very Big Birthday coming up in July ~ Henry David Thoreau turns 200 on the 12th! 

Thoreau's birthplace, the Wheeler Minot Farmhouse in Concord, MA. Photo credit: John Phelan

Thoreau's birthplace, the Wheeler Minot Farmhouse in Concord, MA. Photo credit: John Phelan

What began as a small commemorative project has since evolved into a multi-faceted book. As Emily’s research into Thoreau’s life and writings progressed and as local, national, and international news unfolded, we began to see a strong connection between Thoreau’s work and that of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., and began to feel the timely resonance of all three men today. 

Turns out, Thoreau’s famous essay “Civil Disobedience” had a profound influence on both Gandhi and King. In different times, places, and circumstances, each man developed a philosophy and a practice of nonviolent resistance to injustice. Those ideas and their implementation lead to powerful individual and societal change, and are as relevant today as in the 19th and 20th centuries.

So, we’d like to introduce the new publication due out soon:

A Handbook for Creative Protest: Thoreau, Gandhi, & King in Conversation

The Handbook will present selected excerpts by each author, along with a Preface and commentary by Emily Hancock.

At about 35 pages, it proved a bit too large for us to accomplish at this time via hand-set metal type, so we decided on a unique and flexible “hybrid” design: The interior pages have been digitally typeset and designed by Emily and will be printed offset at a local shop; Emily will then letterpress print the covers and hand-sew the book here at the Press. This hybrid design lets us allow the full text to be what it needs to be, and yet still incorporates signature elements of the handmade book that are important to us and to you. 

Our fingers are crossed for a late-July release. Stay tuned!

If you would like to put your name on the pre-order list, please email Emily at stbrigidpress@gmail.com 

Many thanks, and all the best,

St Brigid Press

“Action from principle, the perception and the performance of right, changes things and relations; it is essentially revolutionary.”
— Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience"

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Printing with Nature

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Printing with Nature

Hello Friends of the Press,

Last year we published Reverie, a little book poems that featured illustrations printed from grasses growing in our field. I loved the process and the look of these nature prints (which I first learned about from John Ryder's wonderful book Printing for Pleasure), and they came immediately to mind when I began to think about what illustrations might accompany our newest production ~ Wind Intervals, a chapbook of poems by Jeff Schwaner.

Collected and dried last autumn from the tree outside our print shop door, I had a stash of beautiful Japanese maple leaves under weights in a corner of the shop. Many of Jeff's poems include the presence and imagery of trees, including maples. It seemed like a perfect match.

So, this past week I began adding prints made directly from these dried leaves to the pages of Wind Intervals. Here's a little peek at the process ~ enjoy!

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Wind Chimes

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Wind Chimes

On the heels of this week's snow and sleet, the wind has come howling in. Today at the Press we're feeding the woodstove, catching up on reading and writing, and going over proofs of Wind Intervals, the new chapbook of poetry by Jeff Schwaner.

“What is the sound of a loosening of leaves
like forgetting hands just before they drop
to our sides?”
— Jeff Schwaner, in the title poem "Wind Intervals"

One of our favorite poets, Jeff brings to his work a deeply engaging mixture of observation, introspection, and connection. We are honored to be publishing his next chapbook of seven poems, carefully selected and printed by Emily Hancock.

Recently, we invited Jeff to the Press to record some of his poems. Let these whet your whistle for the rest of the book!

Wind Intervals will be published in two formats, a Standard Edition and a Special Edition. We are currently taking pre-orders of both.

STANDARD EDITION

  • 150 numbered copies
  • hand-set in Bembo types (cast by the Bixler Letterfoundry in NY)
  • two original illustrations
  • letterpress printed on our 1909 Golding Pearl treadle press
  • Mohawk Superfine text paper
  • Hahnemühle Bugra covers
  • hand-bound at the Press
  • $24

SPECIAL EDITION

  • 35 signed and numbered copies
  • hand-set in Bembo types (cast by the Bixler Letterfoundry in NY)
  • two original illustrations
  • letterpress printed on our 1909 Golding Pearl treadle press
  • Revere Book mouldmade text paper
  • St Armand handmade covers
  • hand-bound at the Press
  • $35

To pre-order a copy, please email Emily Hancock at stbrigidpress@gmail.com, or fill out the form below.

Mark your calendars ~ the official book launch for Wind Intervals will be April 28th, at 7pm at Black Swan Books in Staunton, Virginia! (Pre-orders will ship that day.)

Thanks Friends, and hold onto your hats!

St Brigid Press

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