Calamari Press
Calamari Press (now known as Calamari Archive, ink.) is a small-press book publishing company, founded in 2003. It has published over 70 book objects, including the literary magazine Sleepingfish and the acquired 3rd bed imprint.[1] Some of these have been first books by emerging writers such as Blake Butler, Miranda Mellis, Robert Lopez, Peter Markus and Chiara Barzini, while others have been resurrected reprints of out-of-print cult classics by established writers such as David Ohle, Gary Lutz, Stanley Crawford and Scott Bradfield.
Overview
Calamari Press arose out of the lit mag Sleepingfish, with early chapbooks by Derek White, Carlos M. Luis, Sandy Baldwin and Wendy Collin Sorin. In April 2005, Calamari Press published its first perfect bound book, The Singing Fish by Peter Markus, which received acclaimed reviews in places like American Book Review and DIAGRAM. This was followed by Land of the Snow Men by Norman Lock (a literary canard penned under the name of George Belden), Trilce by James Wagner (homophonic translations of Cesar Vallejo's Trilce), and The Night I Dropped Shakespeare on the Cat by John Olson.
In the fall of 2006, Calamari Press re-issued Peter Markus's first book, Good, Brother, followed by Derek White's Poste Restante. In early 2007 came Part of the World by Robert Lopez and The Revisionist by Miranda Mellis, an excerpt of which appeared in the June 2007 issue of Harper's. In 2008, Calamari Press acquired the 3rd bed imprint. In 2009, Calamari Press relocated to Detroit and Nairobi, Kenya, where it published Blake Butler's Ever (novella) and Boons & The Camp by David Ohle. In 2010, Calamari Press relocated to Rome & published titles by Vincent Standley, Gary Lutz and Chiara Barzini. In 2013, Calamari Press moved back to New York City & re-issued The History of Luminous Motion] by Scott Bradfield and the 12th issue of Sleepingfish, with which it celebrated its tenth anniversary and announced it would be subsequently online. The anniversary issue was written up in Poets & Writers Magazine in an article on avant-garde journals.
In 2014, it published books by Elizabeth Mikesch, Brandon Hobson, Stanley Crawford, Beth Steidle, and Laura Ellen Joyce, and digitally archived The City Moon, a newspaper published by Roger Martin & David Ohle from 1973 to 1985 in Lawrence, Kansas. In September 2014 Calamari Press changed its name to Calamari Archive, ink., announcing that it would no longer publish copyrighted works and aggressively participate in the American economic machine. In 2017, Calamari announced that going forward it would only publish anonymous and pseudonymous works.
Distribution
Calamari Archive books are distributed by Small Press Distribution.