Catherine Daly, regarding chapbooks (and in aside of sorts responding to Gary Sullivan's latest musings on chapbooks and distribution) wrote on her blog last week, amongst other things, "...publish them [chapbooks] to give them away, sell them at readings. Don't claim they're books -- they're NOT -- and don't expect to sell them at bookshops, except zine stores & specialty places, don't expect them to be assigned to classes, etc. -- i.e. to be treated as long, serious works of art, because they're not, because bookshops don't stock them, and people buy them mostly at readings, etc.
A chapbook is mostly a vanity or learning excerise, like producing most printed ephemera. The large exception is fine letterpress, but note that no one is buying this stuff at your average bookstore, either."
that just rubs me absolutely wrong. I don;t know Catherine Daly but I've heard this sentiment and this argument that chapbooks are not books before. It's defeatist and snobbish and ignores a rich and important history (and present culture) of literature and packaging of literature. I left a comment of course. I hope others do too. I don't know why I let it bother me but hers is a typical attitude and I just don't buy it. Not one bit. I of course invite anyone to give me some real evidence that chapbooks are not books. Evidence that relies on something other than the mere fact that average bookstores don't stock them.
If bookstores don't want to sell chapbooks, fuck em. If people cannot track down what they want to read without the help of a warehouse in California, well fuck em. Fuck em if they prefer a spine with a title printed on it. And fuck em if they think a chapbook is a little token of sentimentality, good for a pat on the head, but not for a serious read.
Do this one time:
A perfect bound book is a stack of paper with a cover glued to one edge.
A chapbook is a stack of paper folded with a cover and bound at the fold with thread or stitch.
Both contain words written by people. The use and arrangement of these words can be considered art. If poetry of course is art. And it is.
The perfect bound book is printed and usually bound by a machine.
The chapbook is printed and usually bound by hand.
The perfect bound book can be as many as thousands of pages.
The chapbook can be as many as thousands of pages as well though it is often under 60.
Poetry can happen at any number of pages you can imagine.
What is the difference between the formats? Only a few minor things. Why do we not see more chapbooks around? I do not know and I don't care. If you like to read and you like printed books and you like poetry - then you'll take it how it comes to you. And if it comes to you handbound on a few precious leaves of paper, you'd cherish it even more? Of course. Because you like poetry and you like to read and you are constantly reminded that some people care about the words as much as you do...
Well that's the idea anyway.