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Part 1

haunt (Charles Francis) is as hard-working as they come, and truly an inspiration. His poetry is distinctly warm and sincere without sacrificing its delicate structure. He has also been incredibly generous with dispensing his experiences in the field with his non-fiction pieces on his page. As a self-published poet, he has a unique and un-jaded view towards modern poetry, and speaks with wit and infectious enthusiasm. My response, get carried away, it’s an exciting time to be reading!

- What are some of the merits, as you see them, of being self-published?

I feel the first and most obvious merit of self-publication is the amount of control you have over your work.  You make all the decisions about volume, pricing, design, touring, whatever.  It's your show and you run it.  This has been very satisfying in the past.  It also, I feel, makes you more accountable for the work in general.  By that I mean you feel personally responsible for any errors or production mishaps.  In turn, this makes you engaged with every step of the process, and better at what you do.

- What would be some of the drawbacks?

I would say the inevitable limiting of your scope.  Choosing this route can teach you a lot of lessons about transmitting art to the public, but in the end the size of that public cannot exceed the effort you put into it.  Going the traditional print publication route, you've got people who are paid to play your work against market forces and in turn make everyone involved some cash:  this results in lots of people contributing effort.  Going the chapbook route, for all its thrills, leaves you pretty much to your own devices -- devices that may not pack enough punch to break through.

- Are there any particular challenges to being self-published that aren't commonly talked about?

Well a common misconception out there is that anyone can make a chapbook so it's nothing special.  It doesn't carry the same weight as someone who submitted to contest after contest for seven to ten years before they win some award that in turn creates a modicum of buzz about their manuscript that may or may not receive consideration for print publication et cetera ad vomitum.  I don't know about any of you, but I don't want to wait seven to ten years for someone in a corner office to give my manuscript a lunch hour glance.  We have more power than that, as writers.  We should have the confidence and disobedience to the gatekeepers to match that power.

Of course, not just anyone can make a chapbook.  It is relatively rare to see chapbooks crop up in the scene.  I've worked with scores of literary arts performers through a good portion of 2004 and I only encountered five artists who put chapbooks together, myself included.
The process is exhausting.  I would say it separates the big talk from the big action.  The former will always outnumber, but never outgun, the latter.

- Could you provide a definition for a Chapbook?

Ever hear the surname "Chapman"? This comes from old times where chapmen would sell chapbooks on the street corner. Back then, a chapbook was usually a single sheet of paper printed and folded for the purposes of distributing political or artistic works to the masses. Today, the word chapbook refers to any self-published enterprise, often sold by poets or spoken word artists as they go on tour.

…I sold mine on the internet in addition to this, most writers sell chapbooks at weekly open mics or their own tours. Audience members buy them, and sometimes they buy extras for their friends. A lot of chapbooks are printed on cheap paper and bound in the saddlestitch style (professional staples, basically) and that's fine, especially if the artist puts the emphasis on his/her performance over the book. I put more emphasis on my book, and so I used thick linen paper and fastback/thermal binding (looks like a thin black cloth tape around the spine). I've been inspired by several examples around Northern Nevada, in particular Rob Gonzales' "Philosophedelic Poetry" and Tim Dufrisne's "Nosedive."

The chapbook run and performance tour for The New Starfall comprise one of the most vivid and satisfying times of my life:  I had culminated years of verse composition into a highly stylized full-length manuscript and then got to sell it on the page and spoken for crowds!  I sold eighty books in two months.  Made enough to pay for part of my graduate school expenses.  I was very happy about that experience.

Most chapbooks in the Nevada scene seem to go for $3-5 a pop and I sold mine for $7.  I used high quality linen paper and grainy cardstock covers all bound by thermal or "fastback" binding.  Compromising the quality of the chapbook to save on production cost didn't appeal to me, but I knew I was already charging roughly double the going price so I couldn't effectively raise the price of the book.  Many people have told me they would have purchased my book for $10 (and some in fact did, asking me to keep the change) but I would have sold them at a much slower rate and I had graduate school to contend with after the thrill and rush of last summer's poetry ventures.  Another drawback to self-publication is not knowing the value of your own work and distractions from your life outside of poetry.

- Some writer's are open to the idea of having their work published online for a fee to the reader, while others worry it could lead to a copyright violation issue, what are your thoughts on this issue where your career is concerned?

Well, at great risk comes great reward?  I have safeguards against copyright violation (while I cannot share all of them, I can say that there is a very specific reason I post only first drafts of poems on the internet) and these put together give me reasonable assurance that infringers pay the penalty.  The other piece of advice I have for this is to write in a very definite style that is uniquely yours.  This makes it silly for others to try to pass off your work as theirs because you have already published, registered, and marketed a full body of work that establishes that style as your own.  I have had my writing stolen before and happily, the infringer was a failure at both writing and intellectual property theft.

- How would you describe your reader/audience?

During the time of The Lyrical Underground (the show I ran for 33 weeks in 2004) I would say my reader/audience consisted of downtown coffeeshop regulars and high school to college-aged students. Ages 16-61, all walks of life, all inclined slightly toward the expressive arts. My readership also included deviantART members, who had the opportunity to buy the book online. I forgot where I put my sales stats, but I'd say roughly 10% of sales came from deviantART and 20% came from friends and family, leaving 70% sold on the Starfall Tour or at The Lyrical Underground.

-In what ways do you see your work progressing in the next 5 years?

Well I'm spending the next year working on my thesis, which will be a much longer prose work but I do plan to write the epilogue in verse as a series of 20-30 poems.  The next five years I'd just like to build a strong body of work featuring multiple manuscripts and aspects of production.  I'll have chapbooks and audiobooks out there.  I'll have internet streaming and public performances.  These results make me happy.  Widespread print publication would be nice, but it is by no means my goal.  Ideally, my activity should build enough momentum so as to attract solicitations from publishers -- not the other way around.

- Have you ever submitted your work or had your eye on any publishers?

I had a full vision for The New Starfall from concept to execution, and this vision did not include submitting to print publishers. I have studied the writer's market carefully over these years and will begin the submission process with my thesis in about one year's time from now. It is more grounded in memoir prose with a poetry epilogue, so I think it has a real shot. But maybe I should hold off on commenting until I actually finish the thing.

-Are there other types of writing you'd like to explore?

I have a background in entertainment journalism, screenwriting, and creative nonfiction prose. I have, for most of my life, been writing in some fashion. I should hope my interests evolve and collide, so long as I continue writing.

Continued in Part Two