Woodbridge Farm Books is a small press based in Kingsville, Ontario.
Grant Munroe is the
co-publisher and editor of Woodbridge Farm Books. His fiction, essays,
interviews, humor, and reviews have appeared in several U.S. and Canadian
outlets, including The Walrus, One Story, Globe and Mail, Los Angeles
Review of Books, Toronto Star, Literary Hub, National Post, Literary
Review of Canada, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, and more. He's
a graduate of New York University's MFA Program in Fiction. Born in Miami,
Florida, he holds dual United States and Canadian citizenship.
1 – When did
Woodbridge Farm Books first start? How have your original goals as a publisher
shifted since you started, if at all?
The press started as
the publishing arm of the Woodbridge Farm Residency, which I founded in 2016. The residency’s set on
my family’s ancestral property in Kingsville, Ontario, on the north shore of
Lake Erie, near Windsor and Detroit. We’ve been fortunate to host several
award-winning authors, including André Alexis and Diane Schoemperlen, among
others. My friend and co-publisher, Chris Andrechek, though it would be
exciting to publish chapbook essays by our guests, both to celebrate and
memorialize their visits. So we started a series called Writers at Rest: Authors on Their Pastimes and
Hobbies.
Given the interest
the chapbooks are garnering, our goals are expanding. We’re currently working
on the start of a new series, which we hope to publish soon.
2 – What first
brought you to publishing?
Chris and I met at
Biblioasis, where we worked together for several years. Until recently, Chris
was Biblioasis’s Production Manager. From 2014 to early 2017, I ran their
Marketing and Publicity department. In that sense, we were already in publishing
when the press began.
3 – What do you
consider the role and responsibilities, if any, of small publishing?
Some small presses
approach publishing with heaviness. They yoke themselves to the burden of
advancing literature within a culture that ignores its importance, hang their
heads, and groan under the weight. That’s good for some, but not me. I don’t
share that mentality, that gloom – it’s not in my nature. Apart from the
responsibility we have to do the best for our authors, I feel no pressure to
meet any role. For us, publishing is serious play. Each new project is a puzzle
and wonder. We surround ourselves with friends, collaborate, and beauty
results. The process is a joy, as it should be.
4 – What do you see
your press doing that no one else is?
Not many chapbook
presses exclusively publish prose. In the future, when we expand from
chapbooks, our focus will remain on developing works that reflect the good
humor I mentioned earlier. Nothing weighty, no books that readers should
consume out of a sense of responsibility or “betterment.” There’s too much of
that already.
Quality also sets us
apart. Chris sources the finest paper to make our chapbooks. He designs and
typesets each to perfection. We fold, hand-bind, and number every copy. The two
of us are exacting – no sloppiness allowed, no corners cut! This is part of the
fun.
5 – What do you see
as the most effective way to get new chapbooks out into the world?
Events are key. We
throw parties. For those who can’t make these, we offer the chapbooks through
our website.
6 – How involved an
editor are you? Do you dig deep into line edits, or do you prefer more of a
light touch?
It depends on the
draft. Because we’ve been lucky enough to publish works by established writers,
my touch is typically light.
7 – How do your
chapbooks get distributed? What are your usual print runs?
Through parties, as
mentioned above, and online through our website. As of now, our runs are small:
100 copies. Just recently, we printed the second edition of Diane
Schoemperlen’s essay on collage. That meant designing, printing, and
hand-binding another 100 copies.
8 – How many other
people are involved with editing or production? Do you work with other editors,
and if so, how effective do you find it? What are the benefits, drawbacks?
I edit the essays
myself.
9– How has being an
editor/publisher changed the way you think about your own writing?
I approach it with
the same perspective I’ve always had.
10– How do you
approach the idea of publishing your own writing? Some, such as Gary Geddes
when he still ran Cormorant, refused such, yet various Coach House Press’
editors had titles during their tenures as editors for the press, including
Victor Coleman and bpNichol. What do you think of the arguments for or against,
or do you see the whole question as irrelevant?
I favor the
white-shoe Manhattan model: out of respect and professional esteem, editors of
one house publish colleagues from another. The gentility of this tradition is
charming. In practice, though, I can see how a press might be tempted to
publish one of its own – especially when the pool of publishers is limited, as
it can be in places like Canada. If Chris or I were ever tempted to write a
local interest book, for example, I wouldn’t hesitate to put it out through our
house. Control over the process is crucial, not only to ensure the highest
quality of the book itself, but to guarantee that the work is well marketed and
distributed.
11– How do you see Woodbridge Farm evolving?
Like I mentioned
above, we’re developing a new series of chapbooks. In the future, I see us
publishing books. This might not happen for several years. Or it could happen
next year.
12– What, as a
publisher, are you most proud of accomplishing? What do you think people have
overlooked about your publications? What is your biggest frustration?
We’re proud of
everything we publish. The press is still too small for anyone to have
“overlooked” an aspect of the work we do. As for frustrations: there aren’t
many. Laboring under tight deadlines is something we aim to avoid. It hasn’t
always been possible, but we make every effort to manage the process in a way
that eliminates stress. Much of publishing involves planning. The better the
plan, the better the process, the better the publication.
13– Who were your
early publishing models when starting out?
Given our origins at
Biblioasis, that press was certainly an influence. But concerning chapbooks,
specifically, I’m enamored by the format’s early history. There’s a wonderful
old book from 1882 titled Chapbooks of the Eighteenth Century. It’s a
collection of pieces from that period, many of which are illustrated with rude
woodcuts. Some are poems, but the majority were written in prose: folk tales,
morality tales, spurious histories, and comic fictions (or “comic relations”).
They’re typically light and humorous. Both then and today, by their ephemeral
nature, chapbooks offer freedom. They aren’t encumbered by the implicit
authority of books. With few exceptions, people with access to the simplest
technology could (and can) publish anything. We assume that “fake news” is a
recent phenomenon, but any scholar of publishing knows this isn’t the case: in
past eras, pasquinades, pamphlets, and nouvelles à la main spread false
information about conspiracies, scandals, and political intrigue. The
incredibility of these texts is what makes them a pleasure. So are the
accompanying images, which is why our chapbooks feature interior black and
white photography.
14– How does Woodbridge Farm work to engage with your immediate literary
community, and community at large? What journals or presses do you see Woodbridge Farm in dialogue with? How important do you see those
dialogues, those conversations?
Our parties and
readings always include local authors from the Windsor-Detroit region. I’m not
sure we engage in “dialogue” with other journals or presses, but we have friends
everywhere, from big corporate houses to the smallest micropresses. Just
recently, we had lunch with Karen Schindler of Baseline Press in
London, Ontario. She’s been publishing beautiful chapbooks since 2011. I’m
astounded by their quality. She binds each by hand at her dining room table.
15– Do you hold
regular or occasional readings or launches? How important do you see public
readings and other events?
Our events take
place in the summer. They coincide with visits from the authors we host at the
residency here in Kingsville.
16– How do you
utilize the internet, if at all, to further your goals?
Like I mentioned
earlier, we sell our chapbooks on the Woodbridge Farm website. We spread word
of recent publications on social media, via Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
At present, the press doesn’t have dedicated accounts on any of these sites. It
will eventually. In the meantime, you can keep up to date by following me on
Instagram at @grantmunroe, or on Twitter at @grantcmunroe. I post on the former more frequently.
17– Do you take
submissions? If so, what aren’t you looking for?
Our essays are
solicited. We don’t take submissions. The exception is commercial work. Last
spring, for example, we published an exhibition catalog for Arts Council
Windsor and Region.
18– Tell me about three
of your most recent titles, and why they’re special.
To date, we’ve
published chapbooks by three authors: Diane Schoemperlen, Dani Couture, and Alix Hawley. Each wrote essays about their hobbies, and how
those hobbies influenced their award-winning fiction and poetry. For decades,
Diane has been assembling fantastic collages. Much of her material comes from
old Victorian textbooks. Dani wrote about long-distance running – or not
running, in fact, which, after an injury, became a hobby unto itself.
Finally, Alix wrote about photography. Her Instagram account (@alixhawl3y) offers a trove of everyday scenes. In her essay, Alix describes how
they purposefully reflect a mood of patient observation.
It’s common to
assume that the authors we love are entirely focused on writing. But like most
creative people, they’re engaged in a variety of interests. Nabokov chased
butterflies. Slyvia Plath kept bees. We all know about Jonathan Franzen’s
birdwatching. That’s a hobby he shares with Margaret Atwood. In No Time to
Spare, the last book written by Ursula le Guin (embroidery), she tackles
the subject of free time, and the way people fill it. “The opposite of spare
time is, I guess, occupied time,” she writes. “In my case I still don’t know
what spare time is because all my time is occupied. It always has been and it
is now. It’s occupied by living.”
With this series
we’ve undertaken, my hope is to collect as many essays by as many authors on
the subject le Guin identified: the occupation of fruitful living. Who else is
doing this? No one that I know. The result is wonderful. It deserves to be
shared.
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