Introducing: Chance Press Research (CPR)
Yes, it’s a fairly big announcement, and one we’re very excited to make. Soon, we will release two books under the “Chance Press Research” banner. More on those books in a minute, but first a word or two about CPR, and how it aligns with our editorial goals…
While we take pride in publishing a wide range of genres and mediums, we don’t intend to name a new series or imprint every time we publish a new type of book. However, one area on which we intend to focus in particular is research into forgotten, unknown, or underappreciated literature. Our goal is to find smartly written (and enjoyably readable) essays about interesting literary topics and to publish them in stand-alone editions under the CPR header. While generally the domain of literary journals and academic anthologies, we believe there is a place in the small press for editions like this, and we are proud to debut two such titles in March of 2010. We will plan to release at least one CPR book per year moving forward, and each will maintain the same basic design and edition size.
The first CPR title is an exhaustively researched account of Charles Bukowski’s “transition years” from 1945 to 1957, written by noted Bukowski scholar and bibliographer Abel Debritto. This essay debunks the myth of Bukowski’s famous 10-year drinking binge with greater authority than previous efforts and follows Bukowski during his gradual transition to literary acceptance in the 1960’s and eventual fame in the later part of the 20th Century. Debritto provides information that has never been discovered before, including the titles of Bukowski stories that were rejected from periodicals and then destroyed, and factual accounts of multiple self-generated Bukowski myths.
The second CPR title is a new edition of my essay, Confronting and Collecting the Works of Luigi Serafini. There has been sufficient demand for a new edition of this essay, and so I have added additional material (previously only available in the ten deluxe copies of the first edition) and printed new covers that reflect the design conventions of the CPR series.
These books will be available in trade, signed/numbered, and hardcover deluxe editions, with prices and edition size to be announced upon publication. Those already on our subscriber list will get first priority for deluxe copies (please email books (at) chancepress (dot) com to be added to this list).