Alan Squire Publishing

A Small Press With Big Ideas

Reuben Jackson Narrating Graphic Novel "March" for MLK inspired Concert In-house ASP wordsmith and noted Jazz Scholar, Reuben Jackson, will be narrating March: Book One, written in part by sitting Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis, for the Vermont Youth Orchestra's celebratory performance of Duke Ellington's Three Black Kings (which includes an ode to MLK) and Antonin Dvorak's New World Symphony (which takes inspiration from African American spirituals). Amy Lilly wrote beautifully on the subject over on Seven Days an independent journal in Vermont. You can check out her … [Read more...]

A Short Thought on Grace's Interview with Jorie Graham (by Writer, Nin Andrews) Nin Andrews is a poet. Most recently of Miss August which is out now from the awesome Cavankerry Press and most notably of the collection, Why God is a Woman. Nin Andrews is also a fan of Grace Cavalieri's interview with Jorie Graham which she recently extolled over on ITN. Grace interviewed Jorie as a part of her NPR-affiliated show The Poet and The Poem. Listen to Grace's full interview with Jorie Graham HERE   … [Read more...]

Grace Cavalieri's November 2018 Exemplars of Poetry Every month for the Washington Independent Review of Books, the amazing Maryland Poet, Grace Cavalieri, author of Other Voices, Other Lives, does a round-up style review of the best recently released independent books of poetry and books about poetry. This is November 2018's and you can find her full review HERE on the WIRoB site And don't forget to support your indies! Here is an excerpt, a review of The Book of Sharks by Rob Carney from Black Lawrence Press (What an awesome job they did with the cover art on this one. Wow!) The … [Read more...]

Talking Jazz and Rock with Poet Reuben Jackson Author and music educator Lauren Ritchie sat down with ASP's Reuben Jackson this week to talk jazz with the man himself. Reuben's music credentials are long and impressive, from curating the Duke Ellington Collection at the Smithsonian to hosting a weekly Jazz radio show for NPR Vermont, to his poetry which takes inspiration from and frequently comments on the American Jazz idiom. Listen to or read the interview on Ms. Ritchie's site HERE Here is a slice of from the audio transcript: Q: Do you think that if somehow we skipped back 40 years and … [Read more...]

Grace Cavalieri's Monthly Poetry Review and Round-Up, August 2018 In preparation for September's list, we look back at the great collections reviewed by Grace Cavalieri for her monthly feature in Washington Independent Review of Books. All the collections Grace reviews this month are coming out of indie publishing houses, which, sure, make up the large majority of those who actually publish poetry, but also stand to lose the most, and take the greatest risks on the most singular works. Indie presses are those who publish new writers, those who mentor and evolve with their poets. While the big … [Read more...]

  Elizabeth Hazen sits down with Elizabeth Spires to discuss her new Poetry Collection, "A Memory of the Future" Two well-educated poets, clear admirers of one another's work, and denizens of Baltimore sit for what must have been a rigorous yet pacific cup of tea. Hazen, author of Chaos Theories, gives a short review of Elizabeth Spires' new collection and an overview of her career which, among trenchant analyses, glimmers with admiration. Then follows a short Q&A where Spires muses on her home city, politics at play, and the influence of zen in her life and her poetry. Read the … [Read more...]

Elizabeth Hazen's "Thanatosis" selected for Best American Poetry 2013, an interview and debrief In 2013 "Thanatosis", a poem from Elizabeth Hazen's debut collection Chaos Theories, was selected for publication in Best American Poetry. B. Boyd of The Baltimore Fishbowl sat down with Elizabeth to discuss the honor and to chronicle her evolving relationship with science, poetry, and chaos theory. Read the full interview here A long excerpt and "Thanatosis" reprinted: What was your process like, working and reworking this winning poem? I was reading about the principle of fight or flight … [Read more...]

"Main Character: Richard Peabody has devoted his life to Washington's writers. At what cost?" In 2011 Lora Engdahl wrote a long feature article on Richard Peabody for the Washington Post, exploring his countless contributions to DC's literary brood. Richard Peabody has not only been patron saint to the arts (what with his magazine, Gargoyle, and his press, Paycock), but also a Socratic figure and mentor to many young writers just finding their sea legs--it is with great satisfaction we might read the names of people, now household, who got their start in Gargoyle. This is all to say that … [Read more...]

An Interview with Grace Cavalieri Senior Editor of December Literary Magazine, Ron A. Austin, sat down with Grace Cavalieri for an exciting and rapid fire (if, sadly, slim) look at the author behind Other Voices, Other Lives, the second installment in ASP's Legacy Series. Read the whole interview here An Excerpt: DECEMBER How do your personal experiences manifest in your work? When, if ever, do you feel the need to adjust things in your work (settings, characters, etc.) to protect people in your life? CAVALIERI Great question as it hinges on the moral life of the writer. I … [Read more...]

A Featured Solari Poem on Poets and Artists Rose Solari's poem "Portrait of a Girl Gulf-Side" is featured on Poets and Artists with a small introduction by Grace Cavalieri. Read the full poem and introduction here An Excerpt: PORTRAIT OF A GIRL, GULF-SIDE                    Naples, Florida At first, I thought it was happiness that made her rock her head from left to right, again, again — that girl, maybe twelve, in her pink   skirted two-piece, her dark hair swimming, gorgeous, down her back. She clutched an Ipad in a thick pink rubber case.   Rose Solari is the … [Read more...]

Lessons From a Turtle by Elizabeth Hazen Once at the National Zoo, I watched a pair of giant tortoises copulating, the sound that emanated from their habitat like a sleeper’s distress in the midst of a confusing dream. My son wondered what the matter was. All of the children wondered, the older ones with a slight blush of awareness. The adults chuckled nervously, parents scooting their children along to the next exhibit. Meanwhile I stared with the fascination of a scientist, the brazenness of a paparazzo. How those enormous, armored bodies could fit together—how even turtles could evince … [Read more...]

Richard Peabody Talks Gargoyle Magazine Buzz McClain of Northern Virginia Magazine sat down with Richard and others close to him in order to ask a very important question: What's next for Richard Peabody? Founder of the DC-ubiquitous annual magazine, Gargoyle, esteemed editor and writer in his own regard, Richard has recently put out through Alan Squire Publishing a compendium of his work, The Richard Peabody Reader...so, what's next? Read the full article here A Long Excerpt: “For a while Gargoyle was pretty regular, but I’d say for the last 20 issues it’s always been ‘Well, this … [Read more...]

Rose Solari Speaks to Ramola D at Delphi An Interview with Rose Solari Rose sits down with Ramola D, the founder and editor of Delphi Quarterly,  to talk about her writing and publishing journey. She touches on writing, Joanna Biggar, James J. Patterson, the business behind the scenes, and the conception of Alan Squire Publishing. Read the full article at Delphi Quarterly here An excerpt on the conception of Alan Squire Publishing: Rd: That sounds like such a great approach. Did something in particular inspire you both to move forward from running a sports magazine to starting a … [Read more...]

The 'Mones "Yuppie Drone" Dissected Bryan Thomas's feature in NightFlight Magazine is a dissection of The Pheromones' 1982 smash hit "Yuppie Drone." For the folks who don't know, The 'Mones were an art-folk duo comprised of Alvis and Jimmy Pheromone, that is, Alan Johnson and ASP's own James J. Patterson. Bryan goes into quite some detail on the lyrical content and force behind "Yuppie Drone" in an attempt to contextualize it in the climate of 1982 when it was released (and the subsequent album in 1986 of the same name), and, to therefore, contextualize that cog-in-the-system verve, … [Read more...]

Grace Cavalieri on Fred Rogers Won't You Be My Neighbor is a new documentary focusing on the life and career of everyone's favorite friend and TV personality, Fred Rogers, AKA Mr. Rogers. For an op-ed about the still rippling cultural impact of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood which ran for over 40 years, Kathi Wolfe turned to Grace Cavalieri who befriended Fred Rogers while she was working as the associate director of children’s programming at PBS. Though Grace only gets a line it is one which helps to answer an important question: just who is this Fred guy anyway when without the set, the … [Read more...]

The People, an alternative indie-publishing canon, by Richard Peabody In March of 1980, Michael Martone did something extraordinary — inviting a motley crew of indie press folks up to Johns Hopkins University. Martone, a student at the Sems, had begun a subversive mag with fellow Hoosier Michael Wilkerson, which they dubbed Indiana Mon Amour. The conceit? You had to write about Indiana to be eligible for inclusion. The concept a chippy response to the workshop lip service to “place” and very much in keeping with those two madcap zealots. Their zine experience plugged them directly into the … [Read more...]

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Pit bull by Reuben Jackson I. Among twenty sleeping row houses, The only restless thing Was the voice of the Pit Bull II. I was of three headaches Like a neighborhood in which there are as many Pit Bulls. III. The Pit Bull paced in the dealer’s yard. It was but a small part Of my anxiety. IV. A man and his dog are one. A hustler, his stash And a loyal Pit Bull Are frightening . V. I do not know which to prefer: The disdain of neighbors Or the disdain of neighbors. The Pit Bull breeding- Or the policeman rolling his eyes. VI. Rain covered … [Read more...]

On Her Relationship with Music, Three Poems by Rose Solari Read all three poems by Rose Solari: Another Country, Myself When I was There, and That Day  on the Redux Literary Journal site "These three poems are all rooted in my relationship with music. After my brother died, I was going through some old photos when I ran across one of us as young adults in our parents’ living room. Mom was at the piano singing and playing, and he and I were laughing, trying to sing along while he balanced me on his shoulders. This became the basis for 'Another Country.' Our mother was a tremendously gifted … [Read more...]

5 Plays from the Contemporary American Theater Festival Reviewed by Grace Cavalieri The inimitable Grace Cavalieri, a dramatist herself, returned from the 28th season of the Contemporary American Theater Festival with a lot to chew on. The plays this year moved through an astounding breadth of topics from race, gender, and water politics in a post-apocalyptic world (Thirst), to ruminations on history featuring a soviet spy with an eidetic memory (Memoirs of a Forgotten Man). For the very fact that the plays were so strong this year and varied so much, The Contemporary American Theater … [Read more...]

Report from the West Coast: ASP’s Joanna Biggar Talks Paris, Then and Now March 28, 2018   The San Francisco Bay Area Group met March 10th for a timely presentation by Joanna Biggar, whose first novel, That Paris Year, was published by ASP in 2010.  Here’s a report: Joanna began her talk, entitled, “I Will Always Have Paris: A Writer in the City of Light,” by saying it would not be a PowerPoint, but rather a show and tell, subjective, intuitive, and circular.  She began by reading a segment of her essay in Wandering in Paris: Luminaries and Love in the City of Light, an … [Read more...]